Finding Laura

One Woman’s Journey from Transgender to Transformed

If I had known in 2007 that God’s creation of male and female was not only good but impossible to alter, I would have saved myself a tremendous amount of pain and suffering. At the time, I would have repeated the typical cultural catchphrase that I was “born that way.” I believed I was a man trapped in a woman’s body and that the only way I could be “my authentic self” was to transition from female to male.

Looking back, I see the threads of lies that had been woven into my heart. They sowed bitterness and envy in the depths of my soul, which led me to reject myself and long to be someone else.

Abused & Confused

When I was young, my mother was overworked and stressed. She had severe health problems, and my hyperactivity often clashed with her need for peace and tranquility. When she responded to me in frustration with phrases such as, “Get off of me,” “Leave me alone,” or “Go to your room,” I didn’t understand the pressure she was under, and my young mind perceived her words as rejection. In addition, she was much closer to my older brother, and I envied their relationship. So I acted like him. I played with his toys; I wore his clothes; and I wanted to be with him whenever possible. In school, I found it difficult to fit in. Girls seemed foreign to me, and I felt awkward around them. I didn’t know how to talk to them, so I would run off and play sports with the boys. At home, I spent every moment I could with my dad and my brother.

When I was eight, I was molested by my friend’s nine-year-old brother. This shattered my world. I felt enormous shame. I was also deeply conflicted because this violating act also awakened sexual curiosity. I began experimenting with friends, which only enhanced my sense of shame and made it even more difficult to relate to peers.

When I reached puberty, the boys no longer viewed me as a friend but as a potential girlfriend. Unfortunately for my tender heart, I was unknowingly suffering from autoimmune disease that wreaked havoc on my endocrine system. I gained an enormous amount of weight and ballooned into “plus sizes.” Not only were the boys no longer interested in me as a girlfriend; suddenly they no longer wanted to be associated with me at all. The male companionship in which I had found refuge for most of my life vanished. Instead, I suffered cruel teasing. My sexual compulsions had no outlet, and I felt rejected and undesired.

By this time, my hatred of being female had grown deep, bitter roots. Although I had been raised in a Christian home, I did not know the peace and love of Jesus or believe the promises of the Bible. I did not heed the Bible’s warning that bitterness would lead to my own defilement (Hebrews 12:15–16). I didn’t know that the Bible further said the envy I felt towards boys was evil, warning that “where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice” (James 3:16). I allowed bitterness and envy to take over and darken my soul. I loathed myself as I looked at others, wishing I could be more like them.

Desperate to be Desired

I became angry at God for making me a girl. Many times I prayed that he would let me wake up as a boy, and I looked in the mirror every morning hating every inch of my body. Determined to be desired by boys so I could feel wanted again, in tenth grade, I ran track and played soccer. I lost all the excess weight, became an object of lust, and soon became addicted to the feeling of men lusting after me. I would flaunt my body toward any guy who feigned a modicum of interest. I thought that if I could just be desired by men, I would find happiness, self-worth, and value. Instead, I ended up used, abused, and rejected over and over again. It was humiliating to be thrown away like trash, and the little self-worth I’d had slipped through my fingers.

Within two years I gained back all the weight, and the men who had once pursued me scattered like roaches. I felt like both the leper and the harlot with the scarlet letter. I tried to satisfy my raging sexual addiction with pornography, but that left me feeling dirty and unsatisfied. Finally, desperate to be desired, I joined an adult hookup site. Surely, I thought, the men who just want “no strings attached” sex will want me. The sparse remnant of dignity and value that remained in my soul slithered down the drain as nearly two thirds of them rejected me outright, based on my weight, and the other third never wanted a second date.

If Only I Were a Man

Instead of admitting that my own sin had led me down this path that had resulted in feeling worthless and rejected, I accepted an even greater lie. I reasoned that the problem common to all the failed relationships was that I was supposed to be a man. If I were the man in the relationship, then I could romance a woman and treat her the way I longed to be treated. I could become that which I could not find.

The Ride that Never Ends

I had no idea of the destruction that embracing that lie would bring into my life. What started as a desire to reinvent myself into someone I liked better soon became a nonstop conveyor belt of hormone shots, legal changes, surgeries, and a nightmare of never-ending dysphoria.

I thought recreating myself as “Jake” would bring freedom, but instead it became my prison cell. None of the transition “therapies” relieved any of the gender dysphoria long-term. While they seemed to relieve the distress for a time, I always eventually realized that the latest hormone treatment, or surgery, had not made me a man. Instead, I found myself having constantly to reinvent my life, and I always had to worry that someone would find out the truth.

I read a quote from another transgender person who said that being transgender is like being on a plane ride that never ends. This is exactly how I felt. At first, I had believed I was off to some exciting destination, but instead I was on a perpetual flight. In horror, I eventually discovered that the “genital reassignment surgery” I had always planned to have would at best yield artificial results, or, at worst, could leave my body maimed.

No matter how many transition “therapies” I underwent, I never became a male. I simply altered the appearance of my body to make people believe a lie. With an incurable ache of grief, I realized I had been deceived. I was devastated, without hope, and feeling more worthless than ever. The happiness and excitement I had felt in those first few years of transition had dwindled to a tiny percolating hope that one day it would feel real. But that day never came. As the years passed, I realized the dysphoria would never go away. But as much as I hated being transgender, the thought of returning to a female identity was far more painful. So I remained in my male identity, trapped in the constant awareness that I was living a lie.

Created on Purpose

But Jesus did not leave me without hope. He came to me in my darkest days and revealed himself to me through my mom, my boss, and others who were full of his love and light. My Christian boss had so much more joy than my other co-workers. And my mom had been so transformed by Jesus over the years that she had become a different person from the mother I had known growing up.

The Lord began to convict me of the sinful life I was living. He called me to come and follow him rather than my own desires. He said, “You cannot claim to love me and yet reject my creation.” Then I heard him say, “Let me tell you who you are.” I will never forget those words. In that moment, my whole idea of identity shifted from trying to become what I wanted to be to wanting to know who God had created me to be. What purpose was I created for?

As God began to reveal himself to me through his Word and through others, I turned toward him in humility and repentance. And he in turn saved me and changed my heart. He took my heart of stone and gave me a heart of tender flesh. (Ezekiel 11:19). For the first time in my life, I began to know real joy and peace.

Redemption

In his grace and mercy, Jesus saved me while I was living in sexual sin as a transgender person. Thankfully, he did not leave me there, and I left the transgender identity and lifestyle behind to follow him. At the time, I thought I would be miserable for the rest of my life. I had always known the Bible was true, and deep down, I also knew that I had been living in sin for many years. I just never wanted to serve God because I thought being a Christian would be boring and unfulfilling. I did not know that I had never known Christ. I did not know what it was like to be filled with the Spirit of God himself. And I did not know that he had created me with a plan and a purpose. I had no idea of the amazing transformation God had in store for me.

As I began to forgive my mom and dad, my siblings, my peers, and all the men who had hurt me in the past, Jesus began healing my heart. The more I forgave others, the more I became aware of the depths of my own sin. I repented of sinful attitudes I had harbored over the years, and the more I forgave and repented, the freer I began to feel. One day, I suddenly realized that I really loved being the girl God had created me to be!

Several years later, the Lord brought an amazing man into my life, and we were married in 2022. Two years later we opened a ministry together called Eden’s Redemption. We believe that at the root of transgenderism lies the same root of all humanity: we were created for the Garden of Eden; but we were exiled, and we are all longing for our home. God is wanting to heal all of us from our brokenness. He wants to help us forgive others and repent of the ways we have hurt ourselves and others. And he promises us a new life if we will follow him by trusting in his Word and not our own hearts. It is Jesus Christ who sets us free.