Love Knows No Gender.
Source: Twitter @KatieRainHill
Finding your soulmate as a teenager is a difficult task. Now imagine going through the difficult process of realizing you might be vastly different from most kids your age, that you might actually be the wrong gender, and you think you might like to transition. This is the emotional and physical state Arin Andrews and Katie Hill were in when they met one another and fell in love back in 2012.
Arin and Katie have a unique story and the two have shared their relationship online with the world through social media as they’ve grown and changed since first gaining attention in 2013, inspiring other trans teens looking for romance and healing in their own lives.
Start the slideshow below to find out how love and their courtship helped guide them through their changes and led them to a better understanding of themselves, then SHARE their inspiring story.
Serendipity
Source: Barcroft
Arin, now 19, and Katie, 21 met back in 2012 when Arin was still named Emerald and Katie was still named Luke. The two were struggling with their identities separately — Hill had major difficulty with bullying — and they serendipitously met one another at a trans support group after they’d both begun the transitioning process.
“Being transgender myself, I understand Arin better than anybody else —- how good he feels and how complete he feels,” Hill told British tabloid The Sun.
Arins says about his procedure, “I hated my breasts. I always felt like they didn’t belong. Now I finally feel comfortable in my own body… And I’m so lucky to have my family and Katie to rely on.”
Undergoing Surgery
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The duo stayed together through their full surgical transitions, and comforted one another through the physical and psychological changes they underwent. “Seeing Katie go through her surgery was helpful to Arin,” Arin’s mother said about the process. “It was being around it and seeing her getting to transform. And being a couple at the time was I think just the cherry on the cake.”
The couple charted their changes online, inspiring thousands of followers to be true to themselves and to not give up on the search for romance. “I don’t think anyone unless they know our story would come to the conclusion that we’re a trans man and a trans woman dating. They would just see us as a boy and a girl dating.”