'My heart breaks': Former trans child shares how she healed from trauma, gender dysphoria
Erin Brewer started identifying as a boy after she was sexually assaulted at the age of 6, which led to feelings of self-loathing that eventually resulted in her turning to pornography before she found peace through God and accepted His unending love.
After the assault, Brewer wore her brother’s hand-me-downs and cut her hair short, thinking that if she were a boy, the violation would never have happened. Brewer’s dissociation from her own body often manifested in a strong sense of rage, and she would do things like beat her head with a brush when she saw herself in the mirror.
A teacher referred the girl to a school psychologist, who encouraged Brewer’s mother to portray womanhood in a positive light and expose her daughter to strong female role models. The school psychologist also recommended Brewer join a group for children who struggled with communication, and these interventions helped set the girl on the path toward reconciling with her identity as a female.
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The girl struggled with not wanting to be a woman throughout most of her teens. But the guidance she received, combined with getting her period, a biological development that is distinctly female, helped her to stop denying her sex.
“It was gradual, but I became tired of fighting reality,” Brewer told The Christian Post about why she stopped identifying as a boy.
She expressed gratitude toward the teacher who recognized something was wrong and referred her to the school psychologist, fearing that if she had been a child struggling with her gender identity nowadays, the school would have encouraged those feelings.
“My heart breaks for the little girls who are not getting the help they need and instead are being told they’re born in the wrong body,” she said, crying. “Especially because so many of these kids did suffer from sexual assault, and instead of getting the help that they need to process what happened to them, that sexual assault is pushed aside, and it’s almost like they’re being re-assaulted every time their gender confusion is reinforced.”
Brewer is now a public speaker who advocates against allowing children suffering from gender dysphoria to socially transition or undergo body-mutilating procedures. Five years ago, the advocate published a video discussing a fake male appendage that young girls who want to identify as male can buy and wear in their pants so they have a bulge. The video has since gone viral.
“The packers are not even as bad as it gets,” she said. “There are puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones that undermine a child’s fertility and sexuality for the rest of their lives, setting them on a path of self-destruction.”
While the advocate never took drugs or underwent a sex-change surgery when she struggled with her identity, Brewer did ask teachers to call her “Timothy” at one point. She is afraid to even imagine what her life would have been like if her desire to identify as a boy had gone further. Now a mother to three children, she's keenly aware that she might never have given birth had she gone down that path.
Reconciling with the fact that she was not a boy is not the end of Brewer’s story, however. The advocate’s insecurities about her body and need for male attention continued to trouble her in her adult life. She started making pornography in her 40s, which, for a time, made her feel valuable and loved.
Men would send Brewer requests, and she would do things like pee on a flower if they asked. She admits that she was going through a rough period where she struggled with her self-confidence and finding a career. A therapist she spoke to even encouraged her to keep doing porn, likening Brewer to a social worker because she was providing a service for men who needed it.
“I’m kind of a quirky female, and I think that pornography filled this gap of needing male attention,” she said. “Suddenly, all these men told me I was attractive and beautiful; they thought I was a princess and wanted to marry me. I never experienced anything like that before, and it was like a drug.”
Brewer made pornography until September 2019, when she had an opportunity to speak in Washington, D.C., for the Eagle Forum, a conservative group founded by the late activist Phyllis Schlafly in 1972. Until that moment, Brewer said she never had a sense that making pornography was wrong.
“Being around the women at the Eagle Forum, I suddenly had a sense of God that I’d never had my whole life,” she said. “I’ve always been sort of an atheist and agnostic type, but just being around those women, those women who were so grounded in love, it was the first time I really felt unconditionally loved by people.”
After disclosing to those at the Eagle Forum that she had done porn, Brewer expected scorn, but instead, the organization expressed concern for her well-being. Members of the organization warned her that pornography was dangerous, and she eventually stopped doing it.
“I think it was unconditional love that God has for us that I had never felt before,” Brewer said.
A loving Christian community surrounded her, encouraging her to view herself as God’s daughter and to recognize that the Lord did not want to see His child harmed. Before surrendering herself to God, Brewer had over 400 videos on Pornhub, which she deleted after finding Christ.
After everything she experienced, Brewer would advise parents and school officials to stop allowing children to believe that they're inherently flawed. She urged authority figures not to enable the discomfort young people sometimes feel about their bodies.
“The treatment should help them manage and resolve those feelings so that they can then be comfortable with who they are without damaging themselves,” she said.
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter: @Samantha_Kamman
