Robert wears button-down shirts and sneakers Monday through Friday.

Come Friday night, Kaylee slips on a dress, brushes on makeup and kicks up her heels.

Kaylee plays the character of Robert five days each week. Although she hates the masquerade, she fears she will lose everything if she drops it.

Kaylee is a transgender person. Born male, but feeling every bit female from the earliest age. She didn't come to grips with it until adulthood just a few years ago. Now she lives a dual existence. It is a time of transition but also a time of fear. Fear of being found out, or of being outed even by a well-meaning friend.

Living south of Wilkes-Barre, Kaylee knows for some people, the reaction to encountering a transgender person is violence.

"My biggest fear is that somebody finds out and beats me to death," she said, cutting the silence that follows with a nervous laugh.

Because of her fears, The Times-Tribune has agreed not to identify her.

Kaylee's journey and apprehension underscores the challenges of transgender people. Even as lesbian and gay Americans are increasingly accepted and affirmed by society, bolstered by a wave of legal victories nationally, transgender people don't feel much change and aren't sharing the enthusiasm.

Legal recognition for their marriages is a worthwhile legal pursuit, said National Center for Transgender Equality communications director Vincent Villano, but a marriage license and wedding cake seems exotic.

"While we certainly support marriage equality, our concerns are more basic," Mr. Villano said. "We want transgender people to be able to have a job, provide for themselves, and have the basic right of being able to walk down the street without fear."

Support over marriage equality and job protections such as the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, has overshadowed policy victories unique to transgender people, Mr. Villano said, such as the ability to appear for a driver's license photo in the gender they express.

Inner struggle

Kaylee is one of an estimated 700,000 people in the United States considered transgender, a sliver of the population. She reaches for words to describe how growing up as Robert never felt right. Conventional male behavior didn't feel right. The genitals felt like they didn't belong. As a teen, Robert dreamed about being castrated — as a welcome reward. Robert suppressed those feelings well into adulthood. A few years ago, hunting through a thrift shop for a Halloween costume, he picked up a dress, not thinking much of celebrating the holiday in drag. Donning the dress became transformative.

"Being female went from my head into my heart," Kaylee said.

Kaylee doesn't participate in the activities of local LGBT groups. She doesn't frequent bars where lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender groups are welcome. As a man and woman, she was never into the bar scene. Kaylee is physically a man. She is engaged to a woman and confesses, "I'm not really sure what that makes me."

The membership of national and local advocacy groups is primarily built around sexual orientation, the "L" "G" and "B" of the acronym. While these groups include transgender people as part of their mission — the "T" — getting transgender people active and publicly involved is difficult. A minority of a minority, transgender people have a different source of their identity and different goals.

Advocates working toward equality take pains to include transgender people and would deny support of any law that jettisoned transgender people, which happened in the past. Ted Martin, executive director of Harrisburg-based Equality PA, frequently reminds media and lawmakers that the group also works on behalf of transgender people.

"The transgender community remains perhaps the most discriminated-against group in the country, and it may be the last group against whom discrimination is viewed as acceptable," he said. "It needs to be said again and again that transgender people are part of our mission."

On Equality PA's website, a visitor will see statewide statistics on the National Transgender Discrimination Survey but when clicking on a link "To See the Latest on Advancing Transgender Rights" see "Post Not Found."

John Dawe, executive director of the NEPA Rainbow Alliance in Plains Twp., said "LGBTQ (which stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning)" appears as one big happy acronym. The growing catch-all is a collection of sexual or gender minorities that don't necessarily socialize or understand each other, he said. The misunderstandings often lead to prejudice. It took years for the NEPA Rainbow Alliance to have some sort of outreach to the tiny, largely invisible local transgender population. Three years ago, the alliance began an online TransNEPA Discussion Group and drew about a dozen regulars.

So in her willingness to share her story, Kaylee is unlike most Northeast Pennsylvania transgender people, who lead quiet, even reclusive lives taking jobs that require little interaction with the public. Kaylee understands why. The journey of transgender people is often difficult and painful, one that fractures families and severs friendships. Transgender people view coming out as a new beginning and are loathe to talk about the past, she said.

Being asked to talk about their experiences makes transgender people feel as though they are justifying their existence, Kaylee said. Curious people ask questions they would never ask a nontransgender person — such as questions about genitalia, medical treatments or sexual behavior. Kaylee described it as being made to feel like "an exhibit in a self-narrating zoo." Yet, Kaylee feels an obligation to speak out, handling questions matter-of-factly. Just as gays and lesbians did a generation ago by coming out, Kaylee thinks she may spare future transgender people some pain.

Gender dysphoria

Matching their lives to a gender into which they weren't born is a completely different challenge than that of gay people. Once called gender identity disorder, the mismatch between one's brain and body is now called gender dysphoria.

"It's a very real thing and very painful thing," said Tiffany Griffiths, Psy. D., of Dunmore, who is certified to treat patients with gender dysphoria. "They face ridicule, open threats; they are scoffed at and made fun of, told they are disgusting, weird and crazy. They receive very little empathy from our society because it is difficult to imagine having body parts that don't feel like they are yours. We want to ignore and deny what we can't understand."

As Dr. Griffiths and her colleagues help clients resolve an internal struggle, they end up counseling them on emotional damage inflicted on them by society.

Acceptance

Kaylee's journey is just beginning, and so far, she has been fortunate. It was only about a year ago when Robert first began to appear publicly as a woman. First, at church, the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Wyoming Valley. Noticing another transgender person often attended services there, Robert began presenting as a woman.

Congregants were supportive, said Andita Parker Lloyd, president of the congregation's board, who noted that the congregation had undergone the church's LGBT diversity training to become a "Welcoming Congregation."

"This congregation will support anyone in their journey, be it one of spirituality or gender identity," Ms. Parker Lloyd said. "This is a commitment we take seriously."

Annette Marquis, director of LGBTQ and Multi-Cultural Programs for the Boston-based Unitarian Universalist Association, said the church has historically supported the inclusion of marginalized people.

"We believe you should be able to bring your whole self to your spiritual community," she said. "Transgender individuals are the same as us and have the right to express themselves as whole people."

More than just outward appearance changed for Kaylee, said friend James Haberkern of Dallas, who once viewed him as awkward and quiet.

"Something seemed off about him, maybe we didn't know exactly what it was," Mr. Haberkern said. "When Kaylee came out, it wasn't a surprise. I told her ‘That closet you were in had a plate glass door.' Now she's herself, more genuine, comfortable, friendly and outgoing — Kaylee-esque!"

Kaylee traveled to Harrisburg recently to an event sponsored by TransCentral PA, a transgender group, and found many "really nice people." Kaylee has maintained her relationship with Dorothy Weigand, to whom she is now engaged. Robert braced for the worst when he revealed to the woman he was dating he wanted to live life as a woman.

Ms. Weigand recounted her reply: "I love you for who you are as a person, not for what you are on the outside. How we are on the outside is always changing." She adds with a shrug that she was happy to give her beau the dresses she no longer wore.

Kaylee's parents aren't thrilled about their son's transformation, but they've accepted it. Kaylee moved in with them and took over the home mortgage payments.

Kaylee has begun interacting in small ways with the world outside church and small circle of friends. She attends a board-game group whose participants didn't see her situation as a big deal. She got tired of changing into male clothes in the car to run simple chores. She was scared and self-conscious at first, but recognized that people are generally too busy to notice anything or at most, do a double-take. Living life and doing normal things as Kaylee is exhilarating.

Robert was always anxious, even depressed. Kaylee feels relieved. "I have places where I can be who I am," she said, rare for a transgender person in Northeast Pennsylvania. But those moments are short-lived.

Getting dressed as a man and becoming Robert for his information technology job is increasingly painful. Kaylee has to mentally prepare. The clothes never feel right and are more uncomfortable all the time.

As more transgender people come out, she hopes that Northeast Pennsylvania and the world will become a more understanding place. She offers a simple notion:

"The vast majority of people are born a gender that fits them and just clicks, it seems intuitively right," she said. "But for a small percentage of us, it does not click and it does not seem right. We are still human beings and still people."

Contact the writer: dfalchek@timesshamrock.com