Janet Mock has been a face for the transgender community for years now, but her status as an international icon hasn’t always been a reality. In fact, Mock wasn’t always proud of being trans and in a new interview with Oprah Winfrey, she explains how long it took to fully embrace her trans identity.
During a recent episode of “Super Soul Sunday,” Mock explained that she knew as a young child that she was really a woman, and that it wasn’t until she was 18 that she began getting gender confirmation surgery. However, she explains that she spent years hiding her identity because she didn’t want to become “othered.”
“I don’t know if I’ve transcended it yet,” she explained to Winfrey. “I still think that for most people, the most interesting thing about me is my transness.”
Mock adds, “I think there’s a lot of power in saying that I will proudly and unapologetically embrace that part of my identity… the one part of my identity that I was taught growing up to be silent and [a]shamed about.”
Despite all of the personal shame she’s felt, Mock says she fully accepts what it means to be a trans person.
“I will stand here in that complicated mist of existing as … a trans person, as a trans woman. I think that there is power in that, but there is still an ‘othering’ attached to any kind of labels that I think that kind of qualifies personhood or human[ness],” she said.
We applaud Mock for finding peace with her identity, and even more so for sharing her courage and confidence with the world to help other trans individuals find peace about their identities as well.
