There is an awful lot of work to do to protect trans folks. We are still disproportionally poor and administratively and institutionally discriminated against at all levels of society.

Anxiety, depression, and suicide don't discriminate based on how much money you have - though it might make it easier for you to get help.

I think that some of today's focus on freedom of information and trans rights have a tendency to focus on the actions of individuals and how they should be regulated by governments. However, I think it's important to remember that it is the institutions themselves - schools, tax collection services, banks, human resources decisions, health departments, police departments, prosecutors, courts, and prisons - where the most devastating and systemic problems occur today. The scale of these problems is simply unimaginable.

While being tossed around the world from place to place as a teenager, I wasn't really tethered to any place or anyone.

Even if I didn't have the support that I have, I would still be fighting the same fights, and I would still be the same person that I am today.

It can be so difficult to get people to think about systemic institutional problems. It is easier just to see the actions of one or two people and say, "That's wrong!"

As a young kid, I spent a lot of time exploring the world around me.