By Ash Jayy

I’ve always loved Autumn. Whenever that time of year rolls around it brings with it a sense of comfort that wraps me like a blanket. It was autumn when I decided to live.

Early in my transition, I was an angry, depressed and suicidal 14-year-old trans boy, feeling such deep loneliness. Every single morning, I had to get up and fight just for the right to exist. I’d come out at thirteen. Initially that decision had given me such a feeling of joyous freedom, but it quickly faded when I began to realise that no one was showing up for me. I was screaming my truth out at the universe, but no one was hearing me.

I couldn’t cope and turned to self-harm because it felt like the only way to hold onto control. I could hurt my body as punishment for changing in ways that felt suffocating. Soon, even that wasn’t enough. I was so exhausted by just trying to exist and I couldn’t see a light at the end of the tunnel. How could I continue to exist in a world that was suppressing me at every single turn?

I wanted to die; I ended up admitting this accidentally to a kind maths teacher at my school. She had a duty of care to report what I’d told her, and her decision saved my life. I wish I could thank her, but the truth is I don’t even remember her name. Because of what she did, I ended up in hospital.

Sitting in the window of the ward, I looked down at the street opposite. A group of university students were walking along with their shopping bags and one of the people in the group had a loaf of Warburtons toastie bread. They were balancing the bread on their head. It kept falling; they kept putting it back on. The situation was so bizarre that I started to laugh. My whole body was shaking with laughter with it, and when it died down, I had a realisation. I was still capable of feeling joy.  

That moment showed me that the constant anger I was feeling didn’t have to be quite so constant. I decided to live. To take myself out of that darkness. I built walls around myself and became my own support system – it was me against the world. It was not an easy road. It took me a long time and a lot of trial and error, but I slowly began to replace the anger that I used to fuel my existence with joy.

I also started to use kindness to manage the hate I experienced on a daily basis. Being kind allowed me to shut up a lot of the people standing in my way with a simple ‘good morning’, and I found in time that a lot of the verbal abuse died down because the people shouting slurs at me wanted me to fight back, to meet their anger with my own. A lot of them had no idea how to respond when their slurs were met with a smile or a ‘I hope you’re having a good day’. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it did make life a lot easier to manage day to day.

I look back on that time now and I’m so in awe of my younger self. I had basically zero support – no one was validating my identity – and yet I still stayed out and visible. I stood up for myself day after day and when I reached rock bottom, I found a light and I clung to it, no matter how difficult life got. I forgave the friends who had turned on me when I came out. I carved out the path to adulthood and ensured that it was filled with as much joy as possible.

I’d spent so long being known as Ash Jayy, the trans kid. In my late teens and early adulthood, I wanted to be as stealth as possible. But I realised when I was twenty that I was doing my younger self an injustice by keeping his story hidden. I was also doing myself an injustice by hiding the fact that my experiences shaped the man I am today. So, I started telling my story.

This is the first time I’ve written publicly in depth about how difficult my teenage years were. I don’t want to keep it hidden anymore because now I’m in a place where I can be that beacon of hope that my younger self so desperately needed but never got. I can stand up as a happy trans adult and show how joyous my life is – and that’s what I intend to do.

Struggle, anger and pain are not eternal. Trans people can live lives that are full of happiness, kindness, joy and love. I am proof of that. I made it to adulthood. The world needs to see more trans joy and I’m more than happy to play my small part in supplying that. I love my life, and you can too.

Ash Jayy is a freelance writer, content creator and social media consultant. His writing is inspired by his experiences as a queer, trans disabled man and he tries to put a joyful spin on every piece he writes. When he’s not working, he’s usually reading romance novels and knitting!