Dianna Boileau - Behold I am a Woman Now

1972, Canada, Dianna Boileau, English,

Full title: "Behold I am a Woman Now" by Dianna Boileau.

I found this book on a fantastic website of transascity.org. It is available for reading there. When reading I cried, cried, and cried. I thought that my own transition was a challenge but it was nothing compared to what Dianna Boileau had to go through in the 60s and 70s.

In the preface, we can read: "Now Dianna tells her story. The story of a boy growing up to discover he was a girl in every way but in physical equipment. The story of a boy forced by society to live a secret life of shame and degradation in the night world of the sexual outcast. A story that is bizarre, startling, shocking - yet one that is deeply human and courageous, a moving plea for tolerance and understanding of individual sexual preferences, no matter how unusual they may be".

In the 2016 article in the Spectator, Dianna was described as "The woman who was trans before her time". In 1970, she was in the headlines, as one of the first Canadians to have gender-confirming surgery. She published one of Canada's first trans memoirs, and then she disappeared, married, and avoided the status of a trans pioneer. As the Spectator stated: "It was a life she (Dianna) always wanted, in which she could be just another woman".

Dianna Boileau (c. 1929 or 1930 – 2014) was a Canadian transgender woman, and among the first Canadians to undergo gender-affirming surgery. She began living as a woman in her late teens. Boileau was born in Manitoba, and during her teen years, her family resided in Fort Frances, a small town in western Ontario. At the age of 17, Boileau began presenting as female in public. She later lived in Calgary and Edmonton, where she worked as a model and stenographer, then moved to Toronto, working as a stenographer and legal secretary. In 1962, while living in Toronto, Boileau was involved in a fatal car accident which resulted in sensational press coverage focused on her gender. This incident led Boileau to attempt suicide.

Following this, Boileau began taking feminizing hormones and investigating gender-affirming surgery1. In 1969, she and a friend underwent orchiectomies (removal of the testicles) in New York. In 1970, Boileau underwent surgery at Toronto General Hospital to have her remaining male genitals removed and female genitals constructed. In 1972, she published a memoir, “Behold, I Am a Woman”, and lived the remainder of her life in private. Boileau’s story is being commemorated with an Ontario Heritage Trust plaque in Fort Frances, Ontario.

Quote from www.thespec.com

Available via transascity.org

Quote from www.thespec.com

Available via transascity.org

and Wikipedia

Photo via digitalarchive.tpl.ca