When I questioned my identity I found an ally I wasn't expecting

Emmey grew up in a conservative family. When she first learnt about the queer community, she felt she had to whisper the word gay.

Emmey at her Year 12 graduation at Brisbane’s Citipointe Christian College with her siblings and her mother, Janina on the right.

Being trans in a religious family was a struggle.

I grew up in a Christian home, with Christian parents, and extended family. It was all normal to me as a child.

Everything was nice and squeaky clean, and I didn’t know anything about the queer community.

I went to Christian schools which never mentioned gay people and the churches never mentioned trans people (or if they did, I was too oblivious to notice).

As I grew up, I learned about the queer community and things I’d never heard about through the internet. This didn’t start until high school.

I thought of myself as a Christian all the way up to grade nine.

After that, I learnt about queer identities. Suddenly a whole new world had opened for me.

It was quite strange at first – I felt like every time I said gay or LGBTQI+, I had to whisper it.

I had heard the word gay used as an insult in primary school and didn’t know it was related to anything else, so saying it felt dirty to me.

When I started questioning my sexuality, I was scared about how people would react.

Being from a religious home, I was terrified of what my parents would say. I didn’t even bother to think about my grandparents or extended family.

They were far more religious than either of my parents, and the tiniest thought about opening up to them was scarier than anything in the world.

Emmey at her formal with her friends

The more I discovered about myself, the scarier it became. My first questions led me to believe I was gay.

I first came out to my friends and then held that secret tightly to my chest for months before coming out to my mum and siblings.

They were so accepting, it honestly surprised me.

But I still held onto the secret.

Coming out to my dad was a far scarier experience. At this point, my parents had split, and my mum was non-religious, but my dad was still very religious. Finally, I did come out to him.

Eventually, I started questioning my gender – I concluded I was non-binary and the cycle started again.

I told my friends – they accepted me. I hid it from my mum, but she finally found out and accepted me. This time I didn’t tell my dad. I still couldn’t face him with things like this, his religion scared that part of me. I wouldn’t tell my extended family.

I ultimately found myself to be a trans woman and repeated that cycle.

Towards the end of my schooling, and about two years after I found myself to be a trans woman, I decided I was going to wear a dress to my school formal.

Emmey at her Year 12 formal

I planned it all with my mum. We bought the dress, the shoes, everything. I wanted this to be my big coming out, to finally show everyone who I really am.

All was going according to plan until about a week before the formal. Someone in my cohort told the staff, and I received an email from the principal asking me to come to his office for a chat about not allowing me to wear my dress.

I showed my mum. I was terrified of going – this was a deeply religious school who had in the past presented speakers that told us that being gay was evil.

We decided I wouldn’t go and contacted a lawyer. We talked with the school through the lawyer and after many emails and what I felt were thinly veiled attempts at manipulating the situation in their favour, the school reluctantly allowed me to attend the formal.

A selfie Emmey and her mother of Janina

After this, and before the next school year started, they introduced a new clause in their contract which stated that they believed being trans or gay was equivalent to paedophilia or bestiality.

The uproar from the wider community was enormous.

A petition was formed and hundreds of thousands of people signed it. So many people were unhappy with this contract.

Because of this, myself and the others from Educate, Don’t Discriminate found each other.

We decided to form a group and act against the school for doing something like this, we never wanted to see it happen to any student ever again.

We created our website and put resources up there for parents, teachers and schools to properly educate students on LGBTQI+ topics.

After this whole ordeal, there’s been a noticeable rift between myself and my extended family.

I feel a large majority of my family don’t believe what I’m doing is right, and it shows.

In my opinion, some show it in silent contempt whilst others do so quite vocally. It’s quite disheartening to see.

My values will never align that way, so I fear the rift between my family and my grandparents can only get wider.

I would love to someday reconcile with them, but for now, I think they have a lot of learning to do, about me and about my community.