Street survivor looks out for homeless LGBT youths

David Wagner, Special to The Chronicle

Friday, November 25, 2011

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/25/DDJ11LVJ5G.DTL

Despite being a star student, Mia Tu Mutch is amazed she survived high school.

Facing bullying from her classmates, constant thoughts of suicide, rejection from her Southern Baptist parents, and the very real prospect of ending up permanently homeless, she clung to any reason to keep living.

"Every day I would say, 'I'm not going to kill myself today. I have a test tomorrow,' " Mia says.

Mia is transgender. She became homeless at a young age, but unlike most teens in her position, she was able to pull herself out of it.

San Francisco youth commissioner battles old foe: LGBT youth homelessness
Staff Reports

http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2011/11/san-francisco-youth-commissioner-battles-old-foe-lgbt-youth-homelessness/

SAN FRANCISCO — Mia Tu Mutch, a 20-year-old transgender female in San Francisco, spends many of her days assisting LGBTQ youth, and facing an former foe of her own — homelessness.

In a profile appearing in Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle, Mutch said she is amazed she survived high school, citing facing bullying from her classmates, constant thoughts of suicide, rejection from her Southern Baptist parents, and the very real prospect of ending up permanently homeless.

    Mutch is from a small Southern town, and after being forced to come out to her parents as transgender, she survived a reparative therapeutic regime her parents enrolled her in at their church. Mutch said sees her current progress as nothing less than a miracle.