It was August 2015, and I had only recently started my course of estrogen therapy. Although the physical effects were subtle, the emotional impact was immediate, and potent. As I glided my fingers against my bare legs, I could feel my skin was beginning to soften, and my body hair was thinning out. Instead of shaving my body and face every day, I could now do it just once a week.

As my body was in the process of visibly feminizing, I vehemently denied any speculation from friends and family about the possibility that I was exploring my gender identity and beginning to medically transition. Whenever my roommate, who shared a dorm room with me, would ask why I was wearing baggy sweaters in the summer, I would nervously laugh and tell him it was laundry day. In reality, my breasts were beginning to develop and I didn’t want him to notice. I wasn’t ready for him, or anyone, to uncover my truth. But as each day passed during that summer, it became unbearable to deny. By the end of that summer, I was tired of enduring the performative labor of presenting as a boy, and the unrelenting dishonesty made my bones ache.

So, adorned in a beaded halter top and a leather miniskirt, I walked out of my dorm for the first time presenting as the woman I know I am. I felt exposed and vulnerable, but also relieved to have finally shed the facade of maleness that had imprisoned me for my entire life.

As I cautiously made my way down Union Square West, vivid memories of being forced to wear suits at formal events and being grouped off with the boys in gym class flickered through my mind. While I was taking those first steps outside as the real me, it struck me that even though I had existed in the world for 21 years, no one had seen the real me until this day. I was finally creating a new life for myself, and I desperately wanted to be accepted and welcomed by the world. So I kept walking.