In late May 2020, the Steph's Place website was made 'live', in the hope it could bring to the British public's attention the plight of transgender people.
It was mainly concerned about the 1% of us, who are trans, but also making room for transgender people in other countries who also suffer discrimination and sometimes persecution. At the time of launch, Steph the founder of this website could not have hoped that it would go on to see many thousands of visitors every week.
Transition.
Steph's Place changed in the spring/summer of 2021 to become a group of like-minded people.
The co-editors of this website are:
Claire: (pronouns - she/her) - Claire spent most of her life in the closet, enduring an exploration / shame / self hate cycle many trans people will be failiar with. After coming out in 2016 she explored identifying as gender fluid for a couple of years, being openly gender non-conforming as a "guy" - which was not a fun experience. As things settled down her natural identity asserted itself fully, and is now almost exlusively on the "binary" female side. Coming to terms with being trans has helped identify some other longstanding issues - enabling her to get treatment for ADHD, which she has unknowingly lived with all her life. She is currently on the waiting list for a GIC, trying to get a local LGBT group started, and also runs a micro-enterprise that raises awareness of transgender lives and issues through workshops and talks. Claire is our lead investigative journalist.
Julie : (pronouns - she/her) - Julie spent many decades as a gender non-conforming guy before being diagnosed with gender dysphoria at a gender identity clinic in 2016, and advised to live as a woman 100% of the time to maintain her good mental health; but for relationship reasons, she now leads a genderfluid lifestyle. She is Dorset Area Coordinator for transgender support charity, Chrysalis, she facilitates a transgender support group in a prison, is a member of Wessex Crown Prosecution Service Hate Crime Scrutiny Panel, a Governor of Hampshire Hospitals Foundation Trust and has her own transgender consultancy, Julie specialises in features and trans health.
Nicola: (pronouns - she/her or they/them) - Nicola identifies as trans to herself and online but presents as Gender fluid. Having ‘felt different’ most of her life, Nicola started acting more and more on those feelings over the last five years or so (yes a bit late in the day – like many). After having ‘been discovered’ at home (2019), that has led to a lot of soul searching and much counselling. Having become much more feminine in appearance over that time, there are preparations afoot to be much more visible. This will then allow her to be more open about her daily presentation. That will take a more Gender-fluid style to give a smoother transition for work and home life. None of that takes away from her desire to see trans, genderfluid and non-binary people’s lives improve and have a much better press than is currently the case. Trans lives matter and we are all on this planet to live life to the full and basically get along with each other. It’s just some don’t want that. That bigotry has to change.
Paul: (pronouns - he/him) – Paul joins us offering his understanding and perspective as a cisgender father of an adult trans daughter. You can read about Paul’s experience of a trans parents journey of discovery in the article he posted on this website HERE: For the four years since his daughter revealed her true identity, Paul has learnt first-hand the reality of being trans plus witnessed the lies that are spread on social media and in our national media and decided that there had to be a place for those within the community to feel safe and supported by like-minded allies. Steph’s Place will help to provide this. Paul tends to specialise in de-bunking press articles and topics - he is also an expert on trans folk in sport.
Steph: (pronouns - she/her) - Steph is the old one who thinks young. She is a post-op trans woman having an "F" Passport and Driving Licence. She loves writing, women's fashion and everything trans - detesting injustice, male violence, patriarchy, war, corruption, sexism, discrimination, homophobia and just about everything else that is 'wrong' in society today. She tends to be our spokesperson and was platformed in a one-hour live radio broadcast about trans rights at midday on Friday 24th June 2022 with Adam Fleming on BBC Radio Four. Steph later learnt that some 600,000 people had 'tuned in' and a further 36,000 listened to the podcast within the next two days! A link to the podcast is HERE:
Steph likes to think she is a 'listener and tends to 'get on' with most people. She has spent almost her entire life working with and alongside women (often in pregnancy) and is often not that comfortable around men, in part because she was sexually abused by a non-family member as a child. Steph tends to do most of the blogs and also enjoys investigative journalism. She has written for magazines on various topics but normally on parenting, lifestyle and trans subject matter. She also often speaks to journalists and members of the Government.
More.
For over the past three years or so, transphobic groups have been formed and given considerable media coverage. Often these groups say they are women’s or biological groups - but the truth is their real aim is to disguise transphobia under a convenient cloak.
Transphobia - the true definition of this word, "transphobia" is - "the dislike or prejudice of a transgender person."
And to counter these transphobic groups, an everyday person in the street may think our government would protect us. Trans people - a small, vulnerable group of people, many of who suffer mental health issues because trans healthcare in the UK is in disarray - that waiting times to see specialists can be as long as six years.
But the UK government does not help.
Lobbied by right-wing extremists, the transphobic groups, even alleged "Christian" organisations from the United States, trans people are left by our government isolated and alone.
Without a voice.
Our joint aim, though, is to raise the trans voice.
To continue to increase awareness and acceptance in society of trans people - and to eventually form an organisation to counter the transphobic groups that seek to erase our voice and, in some cases, our very being.
We have a plan.
Claire, Julie, Nicola, Paul & Steph xx
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Love and let live