Why transgender women belong in womens sports

Sara's story is a perfect example of the power love, empathy, and most of all, community have to save us in our darkest moments. Check out Sara's other channels @HECKYEAHPickleballAthletics and @SoSara and she's also got a Facebook, but I'm trying to encourage her to come to YouTube where the cool audience is.

Thank you AJ for sharing my story so elegantly, you're an amazing ally to people who need you. I am beyond grateful for you ❤

I relate to how Sara talks about trying to learn to be a guy and build a character, a persona, an avatar. I describe my pre-transition days as bad performance art. Transitioning was the scariest thing I have ever done and the most rewarding thing I have ever done.

I went to a talk and i found that by the time trans women are about 4 years of HRT they lose about 9kg of muscle mass. I found that crazy to even comprehend. My opinion is that team sports should allow trans women as the advantages become less overt and advantageous compared to an individual sport. I think the biggest advantage trans women have over cis women is that trans women have higher hemoglobin levels, meaning we can carry more oxygen and thus have an advantage for endurance. Other characteristics are so nuanced, like bone structure is just hard to comprehend how that could give an advantage. For reference I transitioned just after turning 17 and I'm 5'11" 150lb and do a lot of cardio. I'm 21 now. My build is so much smaller now than what it was before I transitioned. I would love to go into sport again, but i am scared of being harassed for it like Sara. She is so strong, and thank you for the video Ajay

Im not much of a competitive sports player, but i FEEL you with that heavy fear of brain damage. I've had so much anxiety about it over the past 6 months, after an injury

your support for the trans community seems a bit out of the blue but also extremely genuine and thoughtful. you didn’t just speak for us, you gave one of us a chance to speak openly. idk the respect youre showing us throws me off a bit but is much much appreciated. thanks for putting these videos out there. it’s nice stumbling on a gem. seriously wish you the best mate

Honestly as a trans woman a lot of parts of her story really resonate with me. The way she discussed her experience is very thoughtful & inspiring. Its wonderful to see her story elevated in this way. She deserves so much love.

Is it women’s sports, or is it female sports? When sports were segregated, was it done based on biological sex, or gender identity?

Came for the motorbikes, stayed for the advocacy. Thanks to both of you for making my pretty shitty life a little bit brighter ❤

What transphobes always don't consider is that HRT in trans women pretty much obliterates all of our muscles, and makes things harder in general. Just a couple years ago before I went on HRT I was somewhat strong, I could lift fairly heavy objects, especially when working on my car. Nowadays, after being around 1.5 years on HRT, everything is so much harder to lift and I feel like I only have like half of the strength I used to. If I was hypothetically competing in a sport, being put in the mens league would mean I would get absolutely destroyed, even if I trained my hardest.

I will agree with you if you can name one trans person competing in high level male sport.

Sara’s story is so amazing. I feel so bad for her, her struggles were so avoidable if she had a lot of the resources we have now. Truly a courageous woman, I’m so proud of her and her story.

I'm the furthest thing from an athlete, but I am a trans woman, so it means a lot to me to see Sara's story and have it shared by someone who looks like the guys who gave me weird looks in high school. Personally, I feel like trans women in sports in a conversation that can have a lot of nuances to it. Trans women like me who went through a male puberty and transitioned later in life may have a group advantage over other groups of women, but it's a subjective thing. For certain sports it shouldn't really matter, like basketball or tennis or golf I guess (I don't know, I only date jocks, I'm clueless about sports that they don't play lol). Estrogen legit makes you less physically strong. I think it's something only mtf people can really grasp because it's extremely visceral to us. They warn you about it before starting HRT but you don't really understand how wide the gap really is at the time. Like, it didn't even take a year before my 90lb rottweiler could pull me around without even a trying when before going on estrogen he couldn't budge me an inch and my muscle mass barely changed in that year. I have a friend who's a cis woman and works out (I do not, walking my dog is as much exercise as I get) regularly and is like 6" shorter than me and she's way stronger than me now because she wants to be athletic in that way. My height gives me a lot of strength through leverage but that's about it. And if we move past women like me, we need to look at the girls coming out before they start puberty/early enough in the wrong puberty to realize it's not what they want, those trans girls realistically, really aren't any different from cis girls. There's zero reason to keep them out of girls sports and deny them something they love or a future they see for themselves. I didn't give up singing when I started transitioning, it would be like cutting off an arm. It seems so inhumane to me to do that to another human that values their athleticism the way I value my musical ability.

As a pre-transition MTF, the part at the end where she talked about her past self hit me like a truck. It’s hard for me to even think about taking steps to get HRT (even though I know I want to), as I would have to come out to pretty much everyone I’m close to, and while I’m fairly certain they wouldn’t hate me for it, I still feel like they would think of me differently and jump to all sorts of conclusions. During that segment, I felt like I was looking at the person that I will become and hearing her say that she didn’t regret who she was before had (and currently has) me crying tears of joy. There’s a voice inside me (and a somewhat common one from my experience online) that keeps telling me that every day I don’t take steps to transition will only hurt me in the long run, but her words really helped me reinforce what I know is true, that being that I shouldn’t feel rushed to transition and whenever I feel like the time is right will be the perfect time for me. I’m very grateful that she was willing to share her experience, and I wish her the best.

trans woman here. I was on the high school cross country team, and was the worst person overall.

Thank you so much for being such an amazing ally. I'm a transman and I doomscroll A LOT. I often forget that there are good people in this world who fight with us for our rights. Thank you.

Everybody telling their story, I am a 67 year old white man, chronologically and visually. I was raised to be open minded about humans, and will always thank my parents to have raised me so. People are people; give your fellow humans that!! Allow them to be who they are, not who you think they ought to be. Even if they're your kids. I never had any kids, and that breaks my heart and hurts my soul. I love the promise that is young people, they are our only hope. Treat kids, (and frikkin' everybody!!!) with respect, and objectivity. You may know a person now, today, but you have no idea what trauma they may have experienced in their past. Leave them be. Only kindness and patience make progress, NOT hate and cruelty and exclusion. I don't even have a GF, and just got some cool frisbee's. Bowling, or Bocce, or juggling, skateboarding, surfing, speed typing.....there are tons of sports that would make no difference the gender of the player!! LOVE is in SHORT SUPPLY, as is compassion and empathy and patience and understanding. And it doesn't cost a thing. Life is very short, as it is. Life shouldn't have to suck.

hm yes a human being with empathy.. seeming increasingly rare

Thank you, both of you for making and uploading this video. From Sarah’s (I hope I spelled that correctly) courage, strength and willingness to talk about a very heavy and emotional subject. You for letting over 100k people view it and getting a message out not only saying that all women belong in sports, but those words coming from a cishet male who took the time to truly understand the trans and LGBT+ community from previously not understanding it. People like you are some of the largest helpers trans individuals have against the constant damage transphobes do. So once again, thank you, and enjoy your day / after / evening.

All people and minorities should be respected as well as their feeling but what about the feeling of women who has to compete or share intimate places with transgender women, what about their feeling. Why should the feeling of someone should prevail above others or worse forced to accept it...