KANSAS CITY, Mo. – 240,000 views on YouTube and rapidly growing, is the number of times people have watched Debi Jackson’s speech about her transgender daughter a couple months ago during the “Listen to your Mother” program in Kansas City.
The video hit the Huffington Post and was passed along to superstar Ricky Martin. His followers showed overwhelming support for Jackson’s speech, and in the last 48 hours, her life’s been inundated with media requests and emails from strangers.
Jackson wanted to help parents going through the same situation, but the international attention, is something she’s not so sure about.
“My daughter, then my four-year-old son, said these words to me, ‘Mom, you know I’m really a girl, right? I’m a girl on the inside.’ That moment changed my life,” Jackson said in her speech.
It was the moment Debi Jackson says she knew her child was transgender. Since then, Jackson and her family have been making the transition along with A.J. her now seven year-old daughter. Jackson was grateful for the help the internet offered.
“For two and a half years we had never met another child our daughter’s age who had gone through this,” Jackson said.
So she was cautiously optimistic that giving a speech on the subject might help one or two people with their own child’s transition. Instead she’s reached hundreds of thousands.
“A vast majority of these people are saying this is my story, I have a child just like this, or this is my story, I wish I had you as a parent, I wouldn’t have suffered for the last thirty years,” Jackson explained.
After years of being depressed and defiant, Jackson says A.J. is now confident and fearless, but her parents are worried about the new-found exposure.
“There’s part of me that wants to just say no- go away, I wish this had never happened,” said Jackson.
Still Jackson hopes sharing their experience helps others.
“Other people putting their stories out there is what gave us hope and allowed us to come through this with a happy healthy daughter, and that’s what we want to do. We want to give back,” said Jackson.
She knows there will be critics, some she’s already heard from.
“One, we are liberals pushing a gay agenda. Nope, sorry, I’m a conservative Southern Baptist Republican from Alabama,” Jackson said in her speech.
But Jackson hopes the lessons her daughter has taught her family about how being yourself is something that soars above negativity.
“I think she’s taught us more than we would ever be able to teach her about being a great person,” Jackson said.
To find out more about A.J.’s transition and to see Debi Jackson’s full speech, watch the video below:
