Caroline Cossey was the first openly transgender model to pose for Playboy, and she starred in a James Bond movie and graced numerous magazine covers before moving out of the spotlight completely. She told Cosmopolitan.com what her journey was like and the future of trans visibility.

Having my assigned gender match the way I felt inside was always a struggle. When I was born, I was identified as male because I had male genitals, but as many people now know, your gender really has nothing to do with what's between your legs. As I developed further, I couldn't identify with anything my brother was doing, and I just felt better dressing up and playing with dolls with my sister. As years went on, I went through school getting picked on and bullied, and I mostly survived by hiding away.

Later, when we had sex education at school, I realized I wasn't attracted to girls and was more attracted to boys. At that point, I just assumed I was gay, but that wasn't right for me either because then, years later, when I was letting my hair grow long, boys weren't finding me attractive because the boys liked boys who looked like boys. Then I'd try to go into gay clubs and they wouldn't let me in because they thought I was a drag queen. It wasn't until I met someone who was transitioning that I just felt like, Yes! This is for me.

At that time in London, if you wanted to transition, you could, but you had to see a psychiatrist and get an evaluation, and then you had to wait two years for approval for your surgery, which was covered for free under our national health care system. Sadly, though, once you were approved, you got put on a waiting list and it could take another two years after that to even get the surgery. My goal then became to raise the money to pay for it myself because I couldn't wait to have it done, but I also wanted to do it legally.

During that waiting period, I got into theater, and while I was there, I met a choreographer who said I could make it as a showgirl, so I happily went along that path. I wasn't billed as a transgender or transsexual performer — I was just working as a woman and saving my money. As luck would have it, I got an audition with the Bluebells, which was a famous troupe of Amazonian women, and I got in. Sadly, once they did some digging into my background, they saw a restriction on my passport and noticed I hadn't had the full surgery. They told me that if it leaked that I was born a male, it would be too risky for them and could damage the organization's reputation. That was very disappointing, but I still went to Paris anyway and got a job in another show and started saving up my money.

While I was hanging out after one of the shows, a man told me that he had a very rich friend who said he'd do anything to meet me and would pay anything to see that someone like me exists, and if I met him, he would give me anything I wanted. So I thought about it and asked my girlfriend to come along. Once I arrived, I was led through a corridor and told to put on a robe and not ask any questions but answer all the questions I was asked. The man then asked me to take off my robe and he just looked at me like, "Oh my god," and that was it. At the time, I really needed to have my breasts enlarged because I was skinny as a rake, and even though I was on hormones, they still weren't getting bigger. So once they paid me, I used the money to finally get the breast enlargement I'd wanted.

Years later, while I was back in Paris working in a show, I fell in love with a man who wanted me to move to Kuwait with him and I happily did. He gave me everything I could ever want: designer dresses, jewelry, security, and a penthouse, but he told me I couldn't have surgery. He said I could leave him if I wanted to, but he didn't want me to have it. After about five months of trying to accept that fate, it just got to me and I missed my family and [I] headed home to London with my tail between my legs because it hadn't worked out between us. But then I just thought, I can still make this work, and packed up and moved to Rome.

A choreographer there helped me put together a striptease, and I used that money to pay for my own surgery. Once I was doing my striptease, people told me I should get into modeling and I quickly started working with an agency as a model, which I thought would be so great. At the start, nobody knew that I was trans because it wasn't anyone's business, and if it were up to me, I never would've discussed it. But the more successful I became, the more real the risk of my being exposed became.

I took a job on a British game show called 3-2-1, and on my first show, I met a girl on the set who said, "My boyfriend knows you! You used to dance with his friend, and they said you used to be a man!" and so I had to immediately tell my agent the truth and I had to get out of that job and out of the contract, so I could protect myself from being outed.

I started working again elsewhere, but I kept getting threats from the tabloids that they were going to out me. Then, much later, because I had landed a role in the James Bond film, a tabloid spent a ton of money to buy an old hospital file of mine to prove that I was born male. I found this out because when I went to the Gender Recognition Panel to get my records changed to female, they said they couldn't find the file there because the tabloid, News of the World, had purchased it and outed me.

Once that happened, I went into hiding and even attempted suicide. I woke up in my bathroom in vomit. I just felt ashamed and embarrassed. Fortunately, my mom and my dad and my brother and sister were all there for me, and then slowly but surely, I felt strong again. I think if you have love and support, that's a form of counseling in a way. And then at a certain point, I just got sick of being ashamed of something I'd never had any control over, which was my assigned gender.

I wanted to show all of the jocks and heterosexual Playboy readers that transgender people could be sexy and attractive.

After I felt stronger, I began to work again, but sadly, I was only really being offered transsexual roles and even did a beer ad that said, "She's coming your way, but she's a he." It was all this gimmicky stuff that made me feel exploited, especially since I'd already had success as a female model and now was being treated like a gimmick and not a person. However, when I was invited to the Playboy mansion and was asked to pose for Playboy, I wanted to do it because I wanted to show all the jocks and heterosexual Playboy readers that transgender people could be sexy and attractive and help them lose the preconceived notions they had about us.

But everything changed when I went on Howard Stern. He came out dressed up as a woman in order to interview me and joked that he'd gone through the surgery, and I didn't know he'd do any of that. He also made a joke about cutting off his penis and then handed me a sausage, and I just felt like, I don't need this. I need to keep my sanity. I've got somebody who loves me, and I don't want to continue in this circus, and I stopped my career right there.

Since then, times have changed so much that it's amazing. I knew over the years when I'd see shows with gay characters that one day there would be more visibility for trans people. Of course, there are still such horrendous stories about what trans people are facing, especially in other countries. I know an Indian lady and her family completely cut her off for transitioning, so it's still not easy for everyone.

It took me such a long time to be able to get the surgery, and I'm glad I had that time to think about whether it was right for me. Your gender is not about what's between your legs. I know many transgender people are bothered by genitals that don't match their gender identity, but I would like them to know that their genitalia doesn't define their gender. I've just heard from so many people who were miserable after getting the surgery because they thought it was right for them, but it actually wasn't.

about my experiences now because I think it's helpful for people to know what I went through. I'm taking small steps getting back into the public eye, though, because my husband and I have enjoyed our privacy and freedom. Now I'm just trying to use my experience to help other people and create a network where people can help one another, which is what I'd like to use social media for. Using it to tell people which restaurant I went to last night doesn't interest me as much.

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Lane Moore Sex & Relationships Editor I'm Lane Moore, sex & relationships editor at Cosmopolitan.com.

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