I’m So Glad My Husband Told Me She Was A Woman

The following is a companion piece by the wife of Emily Crose, who wrote “When I Told My Wife I Was Transgender, Our Whole Marriage Had To Change.”

That day in November, 2014 will be a day I never forget.

I was sitting on the couch watching TV, as on any other evening, when my husband of five years said those dreaded six words: “I need to talk to you.”

I knew exactly what this talk would be about, because four years earlier, we’d had the same conversation — then swept its difficult contents under the proverbial rug. I always knew we’d need to have this talk again, and that the denial could only persist for so long.

My husband needed to tell me about an identity crisis — a gender identity crisis, to be exact. A therapist, I was told, had uncovered and revealed the root of a persistent unhappiness, and a sense of never fitting in: gender dysphoria.

At that moment, my world seemed to stop.

***

When we had first discussed the matter years earlier, we were young and still newly in love. We had only been married a little over a year, and had recently left our home state and moved 650 miles away. So we left it alone. I didn’t want to, nor could I, deal with this.