Ace Kinkopf and Emily Pelton

00:02 We are now recording.

00:09 My name is Emily Pelton. I am 53 years old and today is Saturday, January 16th, 2021 here in Atlanta in my home and my partner is my child a scan cost and while I know Ace because they suspend with me all of them.

00:35 My name is a skink off. I am 18 today is Saturday January 16th, 2021. I am also here at home in Atlanta, Georgia. And my partner is Emily Pelton who is my mother. I know her because she gave birth to me and raised me.

00:57 So obviously we thought about it and we decided that the thing that we would focus on today near that down to two things. I didn't realize we'd actually finalize the important things that happened and parts of your life. But the part that's probably been the most defining and a huge part of our relationship is you embracing your gender identity and me Learning To Be Your Mother through that and support you through that and understand that and we both struggled a lot. But I feel like it's it's given us both so much too and

01:54 I'm grateful and I'm proud and I feel like it's affected me in profound ways that I'm still figuring out but I'm interested to hear from you a few things. But one is what is the thing that you are most proud of?

02:15 About the way that you've handled discovering accepting and embracing your gender identity. What are you what are you most proud of at the very broad question? I guess I mean silly just, you know, just existing.

02:37 I guess you know the existing as myself it's because it's it's scary. But I I'd rather do it then not what scary doesn't exactly treat people like me the best. You know, I I know you don't like it when I joke about it, but morbid humor as a coping mechanism. I joke about the fact that statistically speaking not going to live that long.

03:22 Because I mean it is true the statistics are that trans people don't make it to their 50s because hate crimes in Georgia are in considered hate crimes because

03:41 Georgia but so what are some of the things that you did or decisions that you made that the that made you decide to do to be yourself to to have your open identity the way that you do instead of some other other ways that the people might handle it what?

04:09 I mean

04:11 I just can't really imagine doing anything else and I think that you'll definitely help Dad with embracing me when I came out about my sexuality and being not straight. Can you talk about that? I'm very gay and very clear but we need to be like when you told us yes.

04:42 I initially came out as bi sexual bisexual. I it wasn't the best plan. I was about to go away for summer camp and I figured I would tell you all before it right before I left so I wouldn't have to deal with y'all this reaction. Were you afraid we would have a bad reaction?

05:10 Yes, and no.

05:12 You did give me three separate. It's okay to be gay talks before I came out cuz I wasn't exactly subtle. Sorry. Yeah, so when I believe I was 13 when I get out to y'all and I wasn't exactly subtle. So you had given me three separate. It's okay to be gay talk and think that was the right thing for me to do. Absolutely definitely help me with you. No getting up the courage to do it. I was I was still scared because you know, it's it's a scary thing and you know what 13, I wasn't exactly, you know, really thinking about everything another entirely logical way, I guess, you know.

06:07 But I think you are so just maybe did it that way cuz you just didn't want to share your feelings with a difficult time for me and I was having a lot of difficulty with like expressing emotions and such at the time anyway, but I thought it would be a good idea to tell y'all will actually initially I planned on telling y'all.

06:36 On the day same-sex marriage was legalized. So the night before I left but I chickened out and I decided I would do it right before I left thinking I wouldn't have to deal with all this reaction. So I told you all before we got in the car to drive a half hour to the airport.

06:57 And then you proceeded to walk me through the whole airport because I was in unaccompanied minor.

07:03 To the airplane

07:05 So it didn't it didn't exactly work out that way. And of course y'all were super supportive and wonderful because you've you've always tried your best to be supportive of me and it's it's been a learning curve on how to do that. But it's never been a question of if you are going to do that or not, which I really appreciate. Thank you, We've been on a learning curve to that's definitely true. So what about the time because there were a lot of these like important moments I think for us and getting where we are and there was the time that you told us that you were trans and you remember that night.

07:54 And what you what you were worried about I

08:02 So I didn't know how to do it. So I actually texted a older friend of mine who is also non-binary who's out to their family and ask them how they had done it and they said they had done so through their therapist. So they had essentially had like a family therapy meeting and then said that they were trans and then Heather therapist do with the rest of the explaining. Why didn't we do that? Because we we could have done that. That is what we did owe. Well then but there was there was I guess the part that I mean is when you had packed up your things that was the therapist that was but it was a night. Was it the night before or the night after it was the night before it was the night before? Okay. I'm sorry.

09:02 Sessions so that I could do that and my my therapist wonderful but didn't just explain it for me. She she had me explain it for myself. And you know, we we had that conversation and y'all took it really well and there wasn't really a reason for me to think that you wouldn't but I think I just seen so many stories online about people getting kicked out of their house for this or just mistreated. So I packed a bag and I had a whole contingency plan. I was ready to call a friend's mom to come pick me up. I had a house key I hit the bag so that it was right by the door so I can slip in and slip out with it without

09:58 Dealing with y'all.

10:00 And when you found out about that you cried I did because I mean there was no reason for me to think about what happened. But why do you think I cried because that's that's an awful thing for you know for your kids to think that you're going to kick them out. I mean, that's that's all full of course, I mean

10:28 I think I did cry and still makes me.

10:34 I don't want to cry now because that is I think the thing that's hard as that. We've been through so much together and

10:57 That you still feel so fragile that you still feel so vulnerable or at least at that time you did and other things you say, you know make me realize that you feel you just feel vulnerable in the world. But even maybe you feel vulnerable in the family where you don't yet know that we completely love and embrace you that this is something that somehow sets you apart or makes you not as good or not. Not the kind of child. We would want and I

11:37 I don't know. How will you know, I hope we'll get to a point where that just would never enter your mind again. Yeah, but it seems like there are points where even if we worked hard together developed understanding that you still feel vulnerable and I guess I haven't been through what you've been through. So it's not something that I get angry about. It's just it makes me sad to realize that that's what's going on inside you all the time.

12:09 And I mean we've we've really grown from that point and I I do I mean I do fully trust you and Dad and that you would never do that guys have my best interests at heart always like I said whether or not you are

12:29 Acting getting it right getting it right. I mean just kind of Eternal parenting question not just exclusive to you guys. That's true. But I do know that you love me and it's not going up, you know change for something like this. I think another thing they're really

13:03 Rattled me at the beginning of my transition was

13:11 You and I seem to remember this differently. I don't think you remember. This is the start of the fight, but I very much do.

13:22 But I was going to a friend's birthday party and it was a pool party and I wanted to get a pair of swim trunks and you kept asking me why I wanted swim trunks and I I didn't fully know. I just knew that that was what would make me the most comfortable.

13:44 In that that's that's what I wanted to wear a swimwear with swim trunks and you were kept asking me like do you want to be more like a boy does this mean you want to be a boy and I I didn't have an answer. I just knew that that's what Nate would make me the most comfortable and that's what I wanted.

14:11 You just kept pushing and get turned into just a full-on fight, and eventually I stomped off and then you followed me and then I kept telling you to get out before I said something. I regret it because I needed time to cool off and you were telling me no because the last thing you told me the last time we had a fight that I had had to call a friend to talk me out of suicide, but you wouldn't leave me alone and I screamed a few at you and you were

14:52 Understandably not happy about that. But you left and you said that you are going to be staying at a friend's house for a few days and not

15:04 I think that's stuck with us for different reasons. I think with you, I mean sharing your child scream a few that you was not a good experience, but

15:15 I remember how that started and how that was a fight about something with that and from then hide it took me a while to get my trust back in you about. Well, I think that's a part of the process that I regret and it's what was going on in my mind during that period is I was trying so hard to understand.

15:44 What was happening inside you and even now and I try to explain to people what non-binary is which is sort of not only female or not fully male. It's a hard thing to hold in your head because of the I don't fully understand my own gender identity. But I think in the gendered world we live in in a people are always wanting an explanation and I think in my mind, I thought if I could just understand what was happening in your head better that it then I would know what to do. And I did I should have just stopped asking questions, but I was trying to get you to tell me something. I feel like you were just holding something back and when I didn't realize you just weren't ready to you know process that information for yourself. I didn't have an answer. I know I know that now but I think it was a turning point for me at least. It was one learning moment.

16:44 Where I finally realize that part of this process with you was going to be to just stop asking you so many questions with to stop trying to understand all of it or to make sense of it or to have a clear narrative in my head that I could maybe tell a friend that it just was it was going to be messy and it was maybe going to change cuz I do think it's still changing and that I had to just hold that uncertainty as part of my responsibility to be your parent and I'm really bad at holding uncertainty. I'm really good with goals and like challenging in a meeting challenging goals and climbing up, you know mountains but not not holding uncertainty in my head and I learned that part of being your mom was going to be

17:43 Did I had to do that and not only did I have to do that. I was going to have to explain that to other people who were less willing to do the work of you know, of of of of understanding that you were evolving in ways that they probably never thought about in their whole life, but I know that now and I know also that we don't owe the rest of the world a bunch of answers about you that you get to be yourself and I think that was also the time that I really had to look myself in the mirror and realize what was happening to me as a parent. I realize that I had all these things in my head about you.

18:31 Cuz you were a certain kind of kid, you are always super smart and you know tons of talents and into so many things and I had I had all these visions of like what kind of adult you were going to grow into and what kind of life you would have and probably even like what kind of person you would marry and I didn't know I was hauling all that baggage about you around with me, but I started to realize that I was and that I had start letting you be the architect of your future and I just had to kind of follow you around and be there for whatever that was that it wasn't for me to set this big road map for you and then I had to really face up to the unpleasant fact that I have been doing that and I was I was kind of ashamed of myself. So, you know, I had I had been thinking that I owned your future kind of and and and now I know I don't

19:29 And and I it's it was very freeing, but it was also very painful because I started to realize that I was not

19:40 You know that I did some things about myself as a parent that I wasn't so proud to admit but I think they're going through that. Help me be a better parent. I hope so and it made me more able to accept for example, like when you decided to have surgery that was still hard, but I knew from the moment that you said you needed to do that.

20:05 That my job was to make that possible for you. I I have been planning on it for a lot longer than I knew that you had it. You're not very good at hiding stuff. Do you want to tell that story? I mean, I honestly don't fully remember but I mean I started doing research into going to stay with the surgery was a lie. I had what is commonly referred to as Top surgery in my case a double mastectomy.

20:41 And I mean summer last summer. I started researching it my freshman year of high school and a night. I remember I was looking into it and looking into the car.

21:01 Anything after school for a play and I was I was I was getting real sad because I I was looking at these things and I was like, I'm going to have to find $10,000. I don't even have a job right now and one of this.

21:22 He was a junior at the time offered to take me on a ride around the block on his motorcycle to make me feel better. Which witch did a little bit of sweet of him. I'm glad I didn't know about that. Then when I mentioned that I've been on a motorcycle he kept trying to figure out but you start you started trying to save up money. Yeah, I started trying to save up money. I saved up about $400 maybe which is nowhere near $10,000 which the surgery also didn't cost anywhere near $10,000. Thanks to our insurance. I remember when we were doing the consultation. All right without insurance $57,000 numbers, like excuse me, what with insurance?

22:17 But when you it was kind of another one of these moments though, there were you said you wanted this and you started talking about how you were going to pay for it and we're lucky that you know, we have to dad and I both have a good job and we have savings and we have good health insurance, but I was just again so surprised that you thought that

22:42 We are going to have to pay for that and that we wouldn't do that for you. I mean, I was like I said I was planning on I

22:51 After that fight that we had I did not feel comfortable talking to you about things to do with my transition. I see why it took me so long to bring up the name change its why it took me so long to bring up testosterone and why it took me so long to bring up surgery.

23:12 And I mean I was planning on I mean obviously there are certain things that happened that we couldn't plan for after I turned 18 and I was not aware that there would be a pandemic that summer but my plan was to say that I was going on a road trip and go and have the surgery done on my own during the pandemic yes, or went. Okay. So when you I know you said when you said you had a surgery last summer we talked about this Summer that was 20 20 Independence. Oh my gosh. Okay well and it's interesting about the surgery to because once I knew how important it was to Ace and they started having you know testosterone.

24:10 You know, I'm injections and other things that was really clear to me that this was an important part of Aces transition. And so, you know, we went and try to get the best doctor and do you know to write by Ace and then they wouldn't let us we went in December. They wouldn't give us a surgery date. I so will you just put one down as a as a like Draft date? Will you just give us a placeholder and they did and still looking for so you were in the middle of a job. We were going to be on a different health insurance write a lot of these questions, but but I was really worried when we we we were planning to pay for it whether or not there was insurance, but we're hoping the insurance will come to your but we were also I was concerned that because of the pandemic we would lose the surgery slot. But in fact, we were quite pleasantly surprised to see that AC.

25:10 Condition of gender dysphoria was considered, you know a real health condition. And so it was required surgery. It wasn't optional surgery is it would have been if it was some kind of you know, just cosmetic procedure that it was viewed as a health a health reason and so they did keep us on the schedule and I and I just remember how happy I was how thrilled I was that we still had that opportunity. I was scared though to send a sin to hospital during the pandemic and Ace was actually not even there 24 hours, but there was a lot of emotion around that surgery for both of us. I mean well around nervousness for you. Yeah. Definitely. I had to go in alone. You walked me.

26:10 I went as far as they would let me know when we got to the hospital. They said only one person is allowed my turn to Dad and I was like well see you after I knew that I knew that you weren't going to let that go so you walked me up and got me checked in and then lasted send the waiting room for like at least a half an hour, but they did a great job and an ace was really brave and strong last summer recovering and doing everything right and and looks great and hopefully Aces body is now feeling more like the body Ace.

27:09 Wants to have right? I mean

27:17 I'm I'm really happy with how it turned out and I feel a lot better in my body.

27:24 And yeah, I do still get his tendered alot partially because a lot of people just don't know what non-binary is partially because

27:38 I despite having been on testosterone for over a year now. I'm I'm still short and still look very feminine. But you're in a place now at the college you go to where people are very accepting of your gender identity. Once they know what it is, right? Yeah, and it's it's also a place where people don't assume or quite honestly if they do assume based on my appearance that saved that I'm non-binary because I look non-binary. We're in general but well and we went in a we work really hard to this was part of the journey. I think I guess from my perspective as the parent. I was very very concerned about, you know, because we didn't even talk about your old school and change these girls and let's not talk about back inside so unpleasant but we

28:38 Because of that whole experience we knew that the you know, I was sure that Ace needed a welcoming community and we discovered as we started looking at colleges how important it was to really go and do everything we could to see and meet people and get a sense of that. And so we I'm not sure in the end that you really appreciated this or not. But we did visit 20 School know it was too many I counted is that including the ones that we just walk right out of well, yeah baby, baby. Yeah and Elsa the pride index that Ginger my that the high school college counselor. I had before my senior year. She left unfortunately, but that was part of the big.

29:38 Spreadsheet I made but what is a what is the pride index The Pride index is it's the campus Pride index. It's a website database thing. I believe it's self-reported data from students about how lgbt-friendly how friendly at school and they also look at things like the school's non-discrimination policy housing housing options that was huge pig for me. There was a school that I was really excited about Mom is not super excited about it. But I well we toured I I really like they're they had come to my high school in Pitch themselves, and they said they had like a lot of hands-on experience of learning in a lot of Community Partnerships similar to my high school, which I really loved.

30:39 But we went there and we asked at the end of the tour about gender-neutral housing and they they did not have it. I mean the other thing I think we should spend a minute on what happened there because it wasn't just that they didn't have it and I felt sorry for the for the admissions counselor because I think it first she thought I was worried. She was Miss gendering You is female and she was worried. She thought I was worried that boys would get into your dorm. She thought we were asking about that and said I was like no it like a place of floor where you know, it's not about being male or female and and the more we try to describe it the more you could tell that she just was like, oh my gosh will know we don't have anything like that and the thing that was terrible at the end and I don't know if you remember this, but it

31:39 It hurt my heart was she said well, you could live in a on a floor and then around the corner you could have your own room, you know where you wouldn't have to be connected to people who were either gender and I thought wow and this, you know, I just thought if you were saying that to somebody that likes it just it's to me it reminded me of separate but equal you know, that like would it be okay to say that to someone of a certain razor of a you know, what would we say that kind of thing that we're just going to put you off in a corner by yourself? Because you're different we wouldn't say that to people but with people who are gay or nonbinary or non conforming is still okay to say those kinds of things and she knew it was okay and she was apologetic and even send a note. Yeah. There was a terrible sign of the times just that some school work.

32:39 You know have a sort of that. You don't especially the school you're at now, which is wonderful they seem to really understood it. But there's still so many players salaries until we get is any gender Johnson, right? But that's not most goals. Right? So we so we worked really hard to find you that place and you know, I'm I'm just so proud of all of this that you've done and hopefully just the fact that you I guess I guess the fact that you've trusted us and an especially me. I think to help you get to this point where you can have this really full life in an accepting community and I just I just want to see the

33:29 Over time maybe you'll start to feel less vulnerable. I hope that our laws and other people and and some of the things happening in our country. But also just the environment that you're living in at school and in your confidence. I just hope you get to the point where you feel like you're a full and equal member of society and that you can claim your space and I am really glad I'm really proud of the way you claim your space and it's taught me a lot about being willing to stand up to other people and I'm being braver with my own family and being braver about talking about this and not accepting slides and a little microaggressions that I feel like I get for my friends sometimes that they don't intend but it's learning to really stand up and say this is about

34:26 The kind of human that you are you taught me that all of that actually kind of funny because I'd say you I I mentioned earlier that I I had a lot of men. I mean I still do have mental health struggles, but I had a lot in middle school. Yeah, and you really taught me to stand up for myself during that time and help me learn how to do that and showed me how to do that. And you know, I I learned

35:08 About self-advocacy from you. So I think it's kind of funny that you say that when the great thing I see now or when you know, sometimes I overhear a snip it up your conversations. I hear you doing that with your friends. I hear you teaching other people how to stand up for themselves and different ways and I love that.

35:33 I mean, I you've really just hope to instill in me the importance of you know.

35:42 That instead also helping other people when they need it because I need your support is what got me through life my difficult times and

35:58 You know, I try to be that for other people as much as I can as much as they want me to be. Well, you're really strong person and I think sometimes you feel that know that and then other times you you don't always see it, but I'm just I'm so excited to see what the next five years are going to bring for you when you really mature into adulthood and figure out what you're going to do with yourself and that huge brain of yours. And you know, I just I see like a wonderful Vista ahead for you and I don't know that you always see that but I do I do now, I really do see huge wonderful possibilities for you, and I'm so proud of you and it's made me want to be

36:58 Some kind of an activist for you know, as a parent of LGBT kids. I haven't figured out what that's going to look like for me, but I feel really compelled to try to help other people make good choices with their parenting in their kids and understands what this is all about cuz it is very conceited.

37:28 I really appreciate that that reminds me of I know if you remember but there is a. Of time where you had me every night say three or five things and I was proud of myself for yeah. I remember that and there's one that I I I still have tickets in my dorm right now, but it was on my wall that that says I am a strong person and I thought about getting a tattoo cuz it's in your hands say about being a parent.

38:10 LOL, you're learning more self adaptation of gosh, honey. Thank you for doing this with me a lot. And I know that we're pretty open with each other, but I'm glad we just stopped and took stock of the last few years cuz they've been huge and I'm so excited for you and I'm going to be so sad when you go back to college. Thank you as well for having this conversation. And also just for being the best. Mom ever best days ever. Okay, I think we're done.