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And while Harriet dealt with predictable bullshit, she also encountered supremely understanding officers: "In my military mental health evaluation, one of the things the mental health officer actually said was that they needed to act quickly to change my name and gender, because I was so far progressed and they didn't want to cause severe detrimental mental health effects or stressors on an otherwise well-functioning soldier."

On a personal level, all of the transgender soldiers we spoke to reported widespread support from their comrades. When Harriet was kept from lodging with her fellow female soldiers after coming out, they stepped up to make things right: "All of the other women soldiers that were there at the time -- some of them didn't know me at all -- actually got together of their own accord and went to leadership and said, 'This is wrong. She belongs with us. She's one of our sisters.' It was really, really awesome."

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For their part, our sources haven't been subjected to the kind of we'll-get-you-while-you're-asleep-in-your-barrack boys' club punishment we might expect from Hollywood's depiction of intolerant military culture. That's not to say it doesn't happen, and there are still a lot of soldiers (41 percent) who don't support transgender service people, but Jerry thinks many of those folks just haven't actually met any out trans soldiers. He explained, "I've been stealth for a year now, and four people know at my command. These guys are proudly conservative, and each of them have treated me with dignity and respect. One of them was a former cholo, and now senior enlisted, so mad respect to him. So when I see someone on social media comment about "tranny this" and "shim that," I know I can change their perspective, because I've done it four times on base already. It's all about patience and education. The professionalism of our force never fails to surprise me. In the end, we're all brothers and sisters in arms, and we should want what's best for each other."