After 20 years in social services, Louis is now completing his undergraduate degree, specializing in the intersection of race, class, gender, and spirituality. He hopes to continue his education in seminary. He’s grateful to the Rev. Yvette Flunder, his pastor at the City of Refuge Church in San Francisco, for her prayers and support. (raised female)

Trisha’s a manufacturing engineer in a company of 1,500 employees, where she was the first person to transition on the job. Her two daughters, who Trisha says are “beautiful people with genuine hearts and a strong, moral character,” refer to her as Dad at home but call her Trisha when they’re out. (raised male)

A well-known trans-activist, Pauline led the campaign for the transgender rights law enacted by the New York City Council in 2002 (www.nyagra.tripod.com). Pauline says she knew she was transgender long before she ever heard the word. In kindergarten, she saw girls wearing stretch pants with stirrups, but when she asked for a pair, her mother’s shocked reaction brought home to her the expectation that she act and dress like the boy she was being raised to be. (raised male)

Jay, the youngest in a family of nine children, transitioned to male while working as a project manager in an office furniture company. He and his fiancée, Jessica, are active members of the Dumbarton community, where Jay participates in Playback Theater and the Christian education program. (raised female)

Jane’s graduate work is in linguistics; she works as a graphic designer and homemaker. She says that due to having a variant of Turner’s syndrome, she was “born a genetic mosaic of female and male.” Struggling with the inconsistencies of her physical and psychological makeup, she tried to be a male until she was a young adult, when she chose to begin estrogen treatment and live as a woman. As she put it, she went “very quickly from sociopath to productive citizen.” Jane says that her husband, “a godly man,” treats her medical history as a non-issue. (born intersex, raised male)

This picture of Tony was taken while he was caring for his mother, who had Alzheimer’s. Tony transitioned after many years of activism in the lesbian/gay and women’s rights movements. At the time, he was a deputy sheriff. (More information in the A&E video, Transgender Revolution.) (raised female)

When we met Jay, he was eagerly awaiting his 18th birthday so he could begin his transition to male. Jay is an accomplished musician, having played the B-flat clarinet, as well as the bass and concert bass clarinets. He played string bass in the youth orchestra and tuba in the marching band. He’s now teaching himself to play the guitar and hopes to start his own band. (raised female)

Carla, a former minister, has recently been able to renew her lifelong passion for acting. Within a few years of her transition, she was cast in two leading female roles, first as Ima Perry in The Immigrant, then as Eliza Gant in Look Homeward Angel. (raised male)

Trish was the cultural programs director for the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center in New York City, where she directed several programs, including a popular series on sexuality. She’s shown here at the reception honoring her and her life partner Beth after their commitment ceremony. (raised female, identity female)

Willy is a public health consultant, writer, and performer whose solo show Born on the Edge of Race and Gender made its debut in San Francisco. Willy conducts training on transgender and lesbian/gay/ bisexual issues in community-based and hospital settings and runs a support group for people of color on the female-to-male spectrum. (raised female)