Love knows no bounds, even gender identity

When you see real love, you know it. And I recently had the honor of telling the story of two women whose love is so powerful, it transcends gender identity.

Amy and Cindy Hunter are two of the couples I profiled as part of promoting The Ultimate LGBT Wedding & Anniversary Expo hosted by Between The Lines, Michigan’s weekly LGBT newspaper.

Although the expo is in its sixth year, this is the first following the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage. The expo recognizes all the celebrations in the lives of LGBT people and their allies, including anniversaries, baby showers, adoptions, graduations and more.

As part of promoting the event, I had the pleasure of interviewing a number of couples who shared their stories of longtime commitments and what marriage equality means to them. But Amy and Cindy’s story is unique. They were married in 2003, when Amy was still living uncomfortably as the male she’d been assigned at birth. Three years later, her love for Cindy finally gave her the courage to say what she’d known in her heart all along: she knew herself to be a woman.

Their story not only demonstrates the depth of true love, it sheds light on the lives of transgender people — who are gaining greater visibility, but not always in a positive way. Transgender people face significant discrimination, largely because others simply don’t understand who they are deep inside.

Even with marriage equality, LGBT people — especially transgender people — still don’t have full equality in America, so the work continues. Part of that work means educating the public on what gender identity is. So it is my hope that while celebrating love, I can help reveal the truth that transgender people want the same things as everyone else: love and acceptance.

Read the full story here as it appeared in the special wedding edition of Between The Lines.

[Photo courtesy of Amy and Cindy Hunter.]