Transgender pride event to be held in Palm Springs

Though he never had an official "coming out," Leon Garcia of North Palm Springs— then the seemingly average teenage girl — started making drastic changes to his appearance. He cut his hair. He walked differently and started using the men's bathroom at school. He even carried his backpack a different way.

And he no longer cared about acting "lady-like" in public.

"I just let go of that," said Garcia, 17.

But the transition from woman to man came with high costs. He lost all of his friends. Most of his family members disowned him.

"A lot of people didn't understand. Other people didn't want to accept it," he said. "They felt they had known me my entire life as something different and couldn't assimilate or adjust."

Before making the transition from woman to man in his freshman year of high school and before he even knew what being transgender was, Garcia remembers hating his body, but he couldn't figure out why.

"I didn't feel normal. ... I didn't fit into any mold," he said. "I was a square peg.

"I really didn't think I would make it through seventh grade. I really didn't. Or high school for that matter."

The nagging feeling brought on suicidal thoughts.

Suicide attempts are particularly common among transgender teens in the stages leading up to their transition, when the depths of their identity are unknown even to them, experts say. Being in this state of limbo — during which many teens can't figure out why they are uncomfortable in their own bodies — is often too much to bear.

Transgender people throughout the U.S. have a much greater risk of attempting suicide, often the result of experiencing several forms of violence such as bullying, harassment or physical assault.

Nearly half of young transgender people have seriously considered suicide and about one-quarter say they've made a suicide attempt, according to statistics from the Trevor Project, a national organization that provides crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to LGBTQ youth.

These struggles exist in the lives of transgender youth in the Inland Empire.

It's the reason transgender activist Thomi Clinton is hosting an inaugural Trans Pride Picnic from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday at Ruth Hardy Park in Palm Springs as a way to bring the community together.

Clinton hopes the picnic promotes visibility and a sense of pride among the transgender community.

"A parent's duty is to nurture a child to reach their greatest potential. We must keep an open mind to our children, to prevent suicide, and our community as a whole needs to accept that 'uniqueness is not weakness,'" she said.

The picnic will include food, music, face-painting and bunny petting for kids.

"I think it's awesome that (transgender people) have safe places like that to go to be able to be who they are,' said Audrey Kelly, a Temecula teen whose boyfriend transitioned from woman to man.

Kelly, 18, met Jaden Handzlik when he was six months into his transition. They've been together for nearly two years.

"When we first starting dating, he would get mis-gendered and that would totally throw off his whole day. Some days, we couldn't leave the house," she said. "There were some pretty bad days."

Kelly's part of an organization known as PFLAG, formerly known as Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. The organization supports and offers educational resources to LGBT people and their families. The majority of transgender teens struggle with suicidal thoughts, she said.

"We've had to talk some people down from suicide," she said.