Blind and Trans
Have you ever heard of Emily Brothers?
Well if you haven’t I would love to introduce you to an amazing trailblazer in our Queer Community. Emily was assigned male at birth when born in 1964 and was diagnosed with a condition known as aniridia which left her blind. Why is that important? Because one of the greatest stigmas people in the transgender community face is that our identity is not “real.” Many of us have faced the discriminatory remarks that just because we are drawn to something classified as feminine does not make us a woman. Our biology is constantly called into question. Some conservatives go as far to as to label us as sexually deviant, or that this is a fetish that our “eyes lust after.”
Emily is a bold and powerful example of what we face daily, and what we know internally to be true of who we are. THAT WE ARE AND ALWAYS WILL BE WOMEN.
Emily knew from a young age that she was a girl, and expressed it as such. You can read more about it in an interview here where it recalls the following:
“Brothers has never known what she looks like. Born on Merseyside in 1964, the middle child of working-class parents who lived in a “very basic flat, two rooms, inner-city”, she was diagnosed with aniridia — a condition affecting the iris — at six months old, and spent the first 10 years of her life undergoing eye surgery, sometimes weekly, in a futile battle to save what little sight she had. At seven she became a weekly boarder at a Catholic school for blind and partially sighted children, and “began to feel more and more apart from my family, because my world was so different to theirs”. But she felt isolated within the school, too, unable to believe in God, increasingly insomniac and severely depressed by the time she reached her teens. “I didn’t even have the words to express it. I knew I had male characteristics, but all the time I just imagined myself as a girl.” She “acquired” a skirt and a top, and would wear them in secret, but was “terrified” of being caught.”
In the book To My Trans Sisters edited by Charlie Craggs, Emily highlights the stress,and discomfort this caused her. It left her with a life of mental anguish because she faced this discrimination for what she knew as true. Many of us know of the same struggle, what we know we are, and the hope of not disappointing those we love. Emily however had to hold fast to who she was while facing mounting challenges.
In 2006 she faced her darkest demon, suicide, as she contemplated drowning herself on a cold winter on the British shore. She knew she would crush her wife, and was worried most for what impact it would have on her two children. She states that the pain of losing them was enough to push her to the end of her rope. As she walked into the water she describes wishing she had the courage to end it, but her body, her soul refused. As she made it back from the water, she refused to live a life that wasn’t hers anymore and came out.
In the process she of course had to face the difficult journey of losing friends and families for choosing to live, and also had to face societies ill perception in the early part of this century and the medical obstacles. What is even harder is she had to navigate what it meant to be a women, without the aid of sight. Those she encountered throughout England in the medical community continued to remark they had never had a blind transgender patient. Emily would have to teach the doctors, along with the world.
Emily could not just assume what the stereotypical look was like, nor did she have the aids of support from families, a spouse or grown children. She would have to set out on her own, and hope to find support in the process. However, she was determined to be HER. She remarks in another article, many times this process was terrifying. For many of us in the trans community we obsess with how we look. We look for signs of stubble, how to minimize our shoulders, how to blend in. Emily had to hope for the best, in a world that wishes us it’s worst. What she continued to believe was this :
“I know I’m a woman because I know how I feel. There’s an inner sense you don’t need to have sight to know you feel female.”
(https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-worlds-first-blind-trans-politician)
She continued to push for transgender and disability acceptance and began a political career. Even as she was attacked by a British paper she said she refused to go away no matter the dirty remarks. She was selected to be a candidate for Parliament and found great support from those within her community. She was surprised when many people found her story to be an inspiration, and looked for ways to support her. Though she did not win, she has continued to be a voice for minority and marginalized groups across the UK, and now has reached a larger worldwide audience.
Emily is an inspiration. She shows us that we are who we know ourselves to be. Her transgender journey continues to show the validity of our identity, and continues to expand our stories.
Additionally, Emily is the example that when we are comfortable with ourselves we can begin to thrive, and be the change we wish to see around us. While Emily faced losing her sight as a child, facing parents that refused to understand, and bouts with suicide and depression she has prevailed. In the process she continues to share her story, she continues to help normalize our transgender experience and be a beacon as an older sister for those in the community.
Now in 2018 I hope we can continue to push our world as passionately as she has. Let us be bold in living our identity, and let us take the leap to be true to ourselves so we can shine in the world.
