Pamelas Palace Reborn

I moved from my primary school to secondary school in September 1972. I was a September baby so I was eleven, almost twelve before I moved to high school. The school I went to was North Manchester High school for Boys. A strange choice you may think, but I did everything I could to take my mind of my internal conflict and all I saw was playing fields and grass, something not seen at my concrete primary school. I loved the fact that it looked so colourful compared to the redbrick and grey of my Junior school. I tried taking my mind of internal conflicts with activities almost every day. I did sound, lighting, set painting with a local dance group at their regular rehearsals, as well as attending one of their many visiting shows to do sound at weekends. My mother had taken me to dance class as a five year old, but terrible shyness meant I only went to one or two sessions. Other activities included St John Ambulance Brigade, one night for training and practice, and the rest of the time do...

I had my Surgery on 17 April 2001 a couple of years after this photograph was taken at a pub in south Manchester. I continued with the Original Pamela's Palace as well as the original Mermaids website. But after to original Gender Recognition Act and the winding down of the campaign group Press For Change, I thought the time was right to retire from doing the websites, and retire from campaigning to get on with the rest of my life in stealth. 2017 changed all that. Firstly, early on in the year, I heard of the transphobic attack on a girl who had been born trans, who was shot in the face with a Ball-bearing (BB) gun in Greater Manchester. Then there was the case of a woman born trans who was denied the right to have contact with her daughter. A daughter who was then bullied by her religious community because her parent had been born trans. Various newspaper reports that had moved from being the sensationalist exposes of the previous fifty years or so, to being downright nast...