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‘It’s OK to be yourself’

10 min read
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Allison Barnhardt at a park in Washington Monday

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Allison Barnhardt works at RPM in Washington.

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Jimmy Barnhart before the transition to Allison Barnhardt

‘It’s OK to be yourself’

{child_byline}Natalie Reid Miller{/child_byline}

The year is 1977. Eleven-year-old Jimmy Barnhart is a quiet, awkward kid who constantly worries about pleasing his parents.

Every morning, Jimmy, who loathes the shapeless, utilitarian clothes of adolescent boys, pulls on loose pants and polyester shirts selected by his mother. But some nights, with the fear of being caught buried deep, Jimmy closes his bedroom door and sheds the bland uniform, exchanging it for the pretty garments of women – form-fitting shirts and tailored slacks.

Jimmy is hit by a stream of emotions as he situates each item on his pale limbs. Excitement. Angst. Gratification. He’s petrified of being discovered, but something about putting on his mother’s clothes makes him feel alive.

Fast forward 20 years. James is married to Shelley, a woman who shares his love of “Monty Python” and fast cars. Quick to laugh, Shelley has a proposition for her husband.

“She said, ‘I want to dress you up as a woman.’ A part of me was scared crazy, and another part was really wanting to do it. One day, I agreed to it. Basically, I let her dress me up – hair extensions, makeup, the whole show,” recalled the Washington County resident.

“When I looked at myself in the mirror, it was like looking at my face for the first time.”

Allison Rae Barnhardt, who on Oct. 14 legally changed her name from James Russell Barnhart – adding the ‘d’ of the old German spelling – was born male.

“A lot of people out there are probably still terrified of who they are. I’ve lived with that a good chunk of my life,” said Barnhardt. “I want to say, ‘It’s OK to be yourself.'”

Born Oct. 21, 1966, Barnhardt grew up with dad, whose job kept him away a lot, and mom, who kept house.

One of Barnhardt’s first memories is carrying around a Chrissy doll, whose auburn hair grew and retracted with the push of a button.

At 5 or 6 years old, extended family members started teasing Jimmy about the beloved doll, so he quickly abandoned her.

“I just went along with it because I wanted to be who everyone wanted me to be,” Barnhardt said. “I knew I had different likes than other kids, and I did always have an underlying unhappiness about me. I just wasn’t as happy as other kids.”

Moving from elementary, to middle and high school in Trinity Area School District, Barnhardt was socially awkward and had a hard time making friends. He started to gain weight.

“I increasingly was feeling like I didn’t fit in,” Barnhardt said. “I had a small, fairly close circle of friends. We were nerds, into “Dungeons and Dragons.”

As a teen, Barnhardt kept “waiting to wake up a girl.” He felt guilt and shame over those confusing thoughts.

“My self-esteem was horrible,” Barnhardt said. “I couldn’t hardly stand to look in the mirror. I was so repulsed by the reflection I was seeing.”

Working on cars was a distraction.

“It was a means of escape,” Barnhardt said. “I see now it was a pattern of just keeping myself busy.”

Barnhardt graduated from high school and enrolled in Washington Institute of Technology, earning an associate’s degree in electronics computer technology. Barnhardt worked for a couple of area companies, including for a Department of Energy contractor in South Park.

In 1994, Barnhardt met first wife Shelley, who had placed an ad in the Observer-Reporter personals, seeking a car enthusiast with a love of British humor.

“I thought, ‘She sounds perfect,'” Barnhardt said.

The following year was both a “good and bad time.” That summer, Barnhardt and Shelley spent their free moments together, laughing and growing closer. Then, in September 1995, Barnhardt’s father died of cancer. In November, James and Shelley married in a small ceremony. Shelley, who was pregnant, had a miscarriage shortly after the wedding.

“It was the closest I ever came to being a parent,” Barnhardt said.

That first year of marriage, Shelley made Barnhardt a proposition. She wanted Barnhardt to dress up. In her clothes.

“She would like to do different things, try different things,” said Barnhardt. “Another irony in my life is that I’ve been with women who were about my size.”

At home, Barnhardt began dressing as a woman more and more.

“(Shelley) was tolerant of it. She was just doing it to have fun. It was something she did for me.”

Although they had – and still have – a strong friendship, the marriage quickly fell apart.

“I blamed myself. I blamed dressing,” Barnhardt said. “I didn’t admit it to myself, but I was looking at transitioning.”

Shelley Barnhart said she had no idea her husband was struggling with gender identity.

“I never got a hint that it was more than just a fetish,” she said. “I thought, ‘OK. He likes to wear women’s clothes.’ It never bothered me.”

The divorce was finalized in 2002. Barnhardt met another woman, and they were married soon after.

Barnhardt never told her second wife about dressing as a woman.

“She had no idea. I was terrified she would find out,” Barnhardt said. “I was hiding more and more stuff and couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me. I wasn’t even honest with myself at the time.”

Their divorce, which Barnhardt initiated in 2011, was finalized a few months ago.

Barnhardt, who was dating women, continued to dress as a man in public, although, “A lot of days, I just wanted to get up and go to work as me,” she said.

In late 2014, she started to have some clarity about her gender and admitted her feelings to herself.

“Everything started adding up. I was reading stories of others and starting to see parallels with my own life.”

Barnhardt spoke to her therapist, then her girlfriend, about transitioning. Her girlfriend had a “curious” reaction.

“She wasn’t surprised. She said, ‘You have some feminine mannerisms.’ Internally, I thought, ‘Damn, I was trying so hard to hide it.'”

But Shelley Barnhart said she felt like she was “hit with a bomb” when Barnhardt told her.

“I support what she’s doing because that’s what she wants, but I’m still processing it,” she said. “When you’ve fallen in love with the male aspect of someone, it’s kind of hard to blend the female aspect. But I support everything she’s going through.”

In addition to working through her personal relationships, Barnhardt began working on her own issues, seeing a gender therapist. In 2015, she started estrogen therapy and later a testosterone blocker.

The first physical change was her smell. Then, she began to get tired quicker. Her upper-body strength diminished, and her eyes became bigger and rounder. Her body hair came in less coarse.

Unlike many who transition from male to female, Barnhardt, through eating healthy and exercise, continued to lose weight. She has lost more than 200 pounds since 2006.

“When I first started this, I was a (woman’s size 18). Now I’m an 8,” she said. “With hormone therapy, my proportions have changed. Now I have thighs, hips and a butt. Stuff fits differently. I prefer that.”

The physical transformation wasn’t the only change.

“Over time, I started to notice a sense of peace – a situation I never experienced before in my life. I spent a lot of my life not understanding. I was a mystery. I knew something was amiss. That has gone away. I’m happy being me for the first time in my life.”

Once shy and reclusive, Barnhardt now socializes regularly and has many friends, who give her advice on hair and makeup.

“I didn’t like shopping for clothes as a man,” she said. “I wore my clothes on a fixed rotation. Now, it’s completely different.

“It’s been a real adventure. My clothing started with hand-me-downs dropped off by my ex. Now, I don’t have an issue trying things on (in stores). I don’t think twice about it. It’s liberating.”

As for her romantic life, Barnhardt now identifies as pansexual, meaning she is attracted to people regardless of biological sex, gender or gender identity.

She recently went on a haunted house date with a transgender man.

“There will be a relationship in my life,” she said. “I’m not sure who that person is, but I’m sure they’re out there.”

Shelley Barnhart, who has been with her boyfriend for 10 years, said she will always love her first husband. Although she blamed herself for a time, she has talked to Barnhardt and researched transition. She realizes Barnhardt’s gender has nothing to do with blame.

“Most definitely, we will love each other until the day we die,” she said. “I won’t hesitate to say I loved her and I always will.”

Barnhardt plans to have gender confirmation surgery next year. The entire process, from medications to surgery to hair removal, is expensive. While insurances have begun to cover hormone medications, it will cost Barnhardt $20,000 to $30,000 for the surgery.

“To us, it’s a lot more than cosmetic,” she said. “I want to be as close to what I am as I can be.”

Barnhardt shares her story so others know they are not alone. She tears up when talking about the high rate of transgender suicides.

According to a 2014 survey by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and National Center for Transgender Equality, 41 percent of transgender respondents reported making a suicide attempt, compared to the 4.6 percent of the overall U.S. population and the 10 to 20 percent of lesbian, gay and bisexual adults who report an attempt.

Barnhardt attributes this to disapproval by families and loved ones.

“I’ve been told … to hide it. It’s heartbreaking,” she said. “I went through the majority of my life lying to myself and trying to be somebody I wasn’t.

“People hate people like me just because of who we are. I don’t understand how someone can hate someone they’ve never talked to,” she said. “A lot of people don’t understand this is not a choice. There is no choice about it. You live with it. It tries to tear you apart if you don’t deal with it.

“It’s what you do to yourself trying to bury it – that’s the mental health issue.”

It’s been a celebratory week for Barnhardt, who, in addition to her name change, turned 50 Friday.

“I’m just a middle-aged woman trying to define herself and finally live life,” she said. “I got tired of the spiral I was in. I wanted to get past whatever was blocking my life and my potential. I wanted to be who I really was. I’ve never been happier in my life.”

For information on Persad, an organization whose mission is to improve the well-being of the LGBTQ community, visit www.persadcenter.org. For immediate help, call 1-888-873-7723.

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