A somewhat transsexual story of love, trust and reproductive rights

I fell in love with a boy. A rather sad boy, but with the most inspiring thoughts and beautiful eyes. We talked about everything, from colors to families and philosophy. We talked about identity and curiosity and he expressed a wish to now how it felt to be a woman. Just a wish.

It became gradually clear that the wish was more than that -- it was a powerful and undeniable feeling of actually being a woman, only in the wrong body. A feeling that had been buried deep down many years ago because of an unforgiving surrounding. You might expect someone to freak out a bit when their partner tell them a secret of this dignity, but I never did. I never did, because it was so very clear from the beginning that this was right. It was like turning on a light inside what was now my girlfriend. She spoke up. She smiled and laughed. She could bear seeing herself in the mirror, although the dysphoria of being in the wrong body is always there.

She got her diagnose -- \"transsexual\" -- about a year ago, and has now access to female sex hormones. The problem is she can't take them yet, because that will render her infertile, and she is not allowed to save germ cells. The laws in Sweden demand transsexual people to be sterile in order to make a juridical sex change, and to be considered sterile you can't have any saved germ cells. Transsexual people are not allowed to adopt since they are considered having a psychological disease (although one easily fixed - just change the body and things will be fine!) and it is hard to get access to a sperm bank since all health care is run by the state in Sweden, and same-sex couples are continuously discriminated against. In other words: Our government prevents me and my girlfriend from having babies in the future.

To have children is not a human right, but to control your own reproductive rights, and to be able to try, is. No one should be forced to choose between vital health care and their reproductive rights when there are options. I have always known I want to be a parent one day, and that has not changed just because I happened to fall in love with a transsexual girl. I refuse to give up the thought of a child at 21.

A friend of mine told me about this community. He always says \"think about all the crap that people get published just because the were born in the right family or context. Well, you've actually got a story to tell. Trust in your own voice.\" So that is what I'm trying to do here at Pulsewire. Trust. Trust you to listen to my story.