Denise’s story

Gender: transgender woman

Home: Alaska

As a woman who transitioned later in life, I’ve lived with an intimate awareness of secrets for decades.  My family is full of them.  Secrets of alcoholism (I’m not the only alcoholic), of domestic violence, of young teenage births.   And I know first hand that secrets like the turmoil of gender dysphoria can simply kill. I’ve been out 15 years now because the place between addiction and dysphoria is not a place of possibility. I fought my way out of the closet because I wanted to live. And now that I can breathe, I refuse to return to the dark. I will not cooperate with my own destruction and I don’t want to watch others do it either.  So I advocate for addiction recovery and a life filled with sexual/gender and other flourishing. And I’ve found a pathway for myself to that end through a queer spirituality.

Photographer’s note:   

When I first met Denise and her spouse at a Pride event a couple of years ago, I was already 30 or 40 stories into this project—and I had yet to encounter someone who so openly and comfortably wove together their queerness and their spirituality, particularly within a Christian framework.  For someone raised to believe that queerness and spirituality were incompatible, I was intrigued, and was curious hear more of Denise’s story.

The following year on another trip, Denise welcomed me into her worlds – with conversations at the church where she feels at home and one of the libraries where she dives deep into queer theology.

Denise’s approach to faith, like much of her life, is both methodical and deeply personal. After bonding over our shared military backgrounds and hearing more about her spirituality journey, Denise pointed out a Foucault pendulum in the library.  She explained how the pendulum works—how its swing appears to rotate as the Earth turns beneath it.   The Foucault pendulum itself doesn’t change its motion; the planet shifts underneath it. Likewise, Denise’s identity as a trans woman of faith isn’t what needs adjusting—it’s the lens through which the world perceives her that must shift.  

Photos taken August 2024