Date of Award
Fall 12-5-2022
Degree Type
Capstone
Degree Name
Master of Arts in Professional Writing (MAPW)
Department
English
Committee Chair/First Advisor
Garrard Conley
Co-Chair
Erin Bahl
Abstract
This is a memoir about my lifetime search for clarity about my gender identity. My primary goal for the project was to catalog the steps I took in the sometimes-tortured and confusing path I followed over the course of my life, from childhood to late adulthood, striving to understand who and what I am in terms of my identity and how, once it was clarified in my mind, coming to terms with it and, at the ripe old age of seventy, taking the steps necessary to affirm it by way of the male-to-female transition. A secondary, incidental goal was to develop a roadmap for individuals who are beset with a similar predicament and, most important, demonstrate that it’s never too late to have a fulfilled life.