Episode 4: Jacob
RELEASED 04/10/2020 by Push Diaries Podcast
“Mama isn’t just a word.
It’s a promise.”
- Mimi Lemay
Mimi Lemay is an advocate, speaker, author, woman of faith, leader in the LGBTQ community, and mother to 3 children. Her 2nd daughter told her, “I am a boy,” when she was 2.5 years old. Jacob is transgender. He and his family has chosen truth, great strength, the humility to accept, and the greatest of life’s freedoms—loving who you are.
Twitter: @mimislemay
Instagram: themimilemay
Facebook: Mimi Lemay
Photography Credited to Kelly Lorenz
See Kate Snow’s most recent interview with the Lemay’s below.
About Mimi’s Book
A mother’s memoir of her transgender child’s odyssey, and her journey outside the boundaries of the faith and culture that shaped her.
From the age of two-and-a-half, Jacob, born “Em,” adamantly told his family he was a boy. While his mother Mimi struggled to understand and come to terms with the fact that her child may be transgender, she experienced a sense of déjà vu—the journey to uncover the source of her child’s inner turmoil unearthed ghosts from Mimi’s past and her own struggle to live an authentic life.
Mimi was raised in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish family, every aspect of her life dictated by ancient rules and her role as a woman largely preordained from cradle to grave. As a young woman, Mimi wrestled with the demands of her faith and eventually made the painful decision to leave her religious community and the strict gender roles it upheld.
Having risen from the ashes of her former life, Mimi was prepared to help her son forge a new one — at a time when there was little consensus on how best to help young transgender children. Dual narratives of faith and motherhood weave together to form a heartfelt portrait of an unforgettable family. Brimming with love and courage, What We Will Become is a powerful testament to how painful events from the past can be redeemed to give us hope for the future.
Ryland Whittington’s Story
Jacob was encouraged to be his true self after seeing Ryland’s story.
This powerful, moving story—which has already touched more than seven million through a viral video created by the Whittington family—is a mother’s first-hand account of her emotional choice to embrace her transgender child.
When Hillary and Jeff Whittington posted a YouTube video chronicling their five-year-old son Ryland’s transition from girl to boy, they didn’t expect it to be greeted with such fervor. Beautiful and moving, the video documenting Hillary’s and Jeff’s love for their child instantly went viral and has been seen by more than seven million viewers since its posting in May 2014.
Now for the first time, they tell their story in full, offering an emotional and moving account of their journey alongside their exceptional child. After they discovered their daughter Ryland was deaf at age one and needed cochlear implants, the Whittingtons spent nearly four years successfully teaching Ryland to speak. But once Ryland gained the power of speech, it was time for them to listen as Ryland insisted, “I am a boy!” And listen they did. After learning that 41% of people who identify as transgender attempt to take their own lives, Hillary and her husband Jeff made it their mission to support their child—no matter what.
Hillary Whittington shares her experiences as a mother through it all, demonstrating both the resistance and support that their family has encountered as they try to erase the stigma surrounding the word “transgender.”
Resources:
https://www.hrc.org/explore/topic/transgender
https://www.genderspectrum.org/quick-links/understanding-gender/
https://www.glaad.org/transgender
FIND A PFLAG CHAPTER
Our 400+ chapter network provides confidential peer support, education and advocacy in communities in nearly all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Our 200,000+ members and supporters cross multiple generations of American families in major urban centers, small cities, and rural areas. PFLAG has been saving lives, strengthening families, changing hearts, minds and laws since 1972. Our family and ally voice is integral to advancing equality.
About Gender Multispecialty Service (GeMS) at Boston Children’s Hospital
The Gender Multispecialty Service (GeMS) at Boston Children’s Hospital is committed to providing the highest level of individualized, safe, and affirmative care to gender-diverse and transgender individuals and their families. Founded in 2007, GeMS was the first major program in the U.S. to focus on gender-diverse and transgender adolescents. Since that time, they have expanded their program to welcome patients from ages 3 to 25.
Click here to visit their website.
Check out these other powerful videos below.
After engaging in a series of enlightening conversations on the intricacies of gender identity and sexual orientation, pastor Mark Wingfield (a straight white male) felt an important calling. Genesis states all humans are made in the image of God. People in the LGBTQ community are no different.
Elizabeth August shares her story about the magnitude of a mother's love. This young mom tells how she had to grieve the death of a son while simultaneously celebrating the birth of a daughter, when her five-year-old, who was born male, asked to present as a girl.