Caitlyn Jenner considered coming out as transgender in death
Rich Polk/Getty
Caityn Jenner, who publicly transitioned in 2015, has revealed she considered coming out as trans in death.
Talking to Broadly, Jenner discussed her first attempts at transitioning back in the 1980s.
Jenner said she postponed her transition upon falling in love with ex-wife Kris Jenner, the Keeping Up with the Kardashians matriarch.
The former Olympian said that before making the life-changing decision to transition, she thought “a lot” about being buried in women’s clothes.
“I thought about that a lot over the years,” Jenner said, “and it would shock everybody. Screw ‘em.”
Vanity Fair cover with Caitlyn Jenner (Vanity Fair)
Jenner came out as trans in 2015 and documented her transition through the E! reality show, I Am Cait. But accepting herself as a trans woman was something she struggled with for years.
After building her career as a successful Olympian, Jenner said she found it difficult to detach from the masculine personality she had created for herself.
In the ’80s, Jenner decided she would transition before turning 40. She underwent plastic surgery on her nose, began taking cross-sex hormones and had a hair removal procedure for her beard.
She said she had a “small B-cup” when she met Kris Jenner. After their marriage and birth of Kendall Jenner, their first child together, Jenner underwent a surgery to get rid of her breasts.
“I can’t even go swimming with my kid,” Jenner said she felt at the time.
- Caitlyn Jenner speaks at the AOL 2016 MAKERS conference at Terranea Resort on February 2, 2016 in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty)
In 2015, Jenner left her former identity as Bruce behind and finally embraced Caitlyn and appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair’s best-selling issue of the year and received Glamour’s Woman of the Year award.
But missteps after her very public transition earned her the ire of the LGBT community.
Jenner upset the LGBT audience with her remarks on marriage equality. Appearing on Ellen DeGeneres’ talk show, she said: “I’m older than most people in the audience. I kind of like tradition, and it’s always been a man and a woman. I’m thinking, ‘I don’t quite get it.’”
Furthermore, her status as a celeb and white rich woman didn’t sit well with trans activists, who thought Jenner was in no position to understand the struggles of poor trans people of colour, who suffer more abuse and experience more discrimination than others.
Jenner is aware of that disconnect: “Along the way, did I make mistakes? Absolutely,” Jenner told Broadly.
“But I never did it maliciously. I just didn’t know, you know? And I really didn’t realise how critical the community was going to be.”
Members of the LGBT community also took an issue with Jenner’s controversial political endorsements. In 2016, Jenner, a Republican, supported Ted Cruz and eventually voted for Donald Trump in the presidential election.
“Trump seems to be very much for women. He seems very much behind the LGBT community because of what happened in North Carolina with the bathroom issue,” she told Stat at the time.
In the run-up to the election in 2016, Trump criticised North Carolina’s bathroom bill, which stated that people should use public bathroom according to their “biological gender,” thus discriminating against trans and nonbinary individuals. The then-candidate said people should use any bathrooms “they feel [are] appropriate.” He then backtracked his statement.
“He backed the LGBT community. But in Trump’s case, there’s a lot more unknowns,” she added.
- Donald Trump holds an LGBT rainbow flag during a campaign rally at the Bank of Colorado Arena on the campus of University of Northern Colorado October 30, 2016 in Greeley, Colorado. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty)
Jenner has since changed her tune and now says Trump “has been, for all LGBT issues, the worst president we have ever had,” and says she could not support him for re-election.
“I want him to know politically I am disappointed, obviously. I don’t want our community to go backwards,” she said, “just leave us alone, that’s all we want. Then maybe later down the line, we can get somebody a little better.”
The Republican party is not known to be a beacon of support for LGBTQ rights. Several Republican states have passed or attempted to pass discriminatory laws, such as exclusionary bathroom bills.
Jenner said she would rather work to change the party’s stand on LGBT issues from within.
“The Republicans need the most work when it comes to our issues, I get that. I would rather work from the inside,” she said.
“I’m not the type of person who is going to stand on a street corner with a sign and jump up and down. No, I’m going to go have dinner with these people.”
Jenner flew to Washington for Trump”s inauguration and met with Vice President Mike Pence, whom she calls the “real enemy.” She recalled telling him she was a Christian and a Conservative, but also a trans woman.
When asked if she would ever vote Democrat, Jenner said she would have to look into it.
“I don’t vote parties, I vote the person,” Jenner said.
