'A lot of love': New book tells stories from transgender family
When her wife Zoe came out as transgender, Amanda Jetté Knox was ready to hear it.
After all, her daughter had already done the same thing.
"The door was open to my understanding of transgender people, because our daughter had come out about a year and half before," said Jetté Knox on CBC Radio's All In A Day last week.
Jetté Knox, who later came out as gay herself, is telling this story and others in a new book called Love Lives Here: A Story of Thriving In A Transgender Family.
She said she wants the book to serve as a roadmap for better stories about transgender families, ones that are "told in a way that honours trans people."
Jetté Knox said she knows she's made made mistakes along the way and said things to her wife that she regrets — comments she blames on "that tug of the emotional side of me, versus the logical side."
Nevertheless, she decided to share those unflattering moments with readers.
"I put it in the book, as hard as it was and as much as I know people might judge me for it, because I want to show that love isn't perfect," she said.
Reality show offers
Jetté Knox said her family has received several offers to be the subjects of reality shows — but unlike the book, it didn't feel like television producers wanted an authentic view into the life of a transgender family.
"These shows, they wouldn't further the conversation we felt. It was more just to gawk at, to look at and judge," she said. "We didn't do this to get famous."
Being an outspoken advocate for her family and for transgender people more broadly has also drawn plenty of hate. Jetté Knox said she ignores all the emails and social media attacks, because paying attention to them serves no purpose.
"Hate in a person burns out quickly. You can only shout and scream and hate a person for so long [before] you will get exhausted," she said.
"I have a great family there is a lot of love in our family and that is what keeps me going."
With all the changes her family has gone through, the end result, Jetté Knox said, is an openness and willingness to talk about anything.
"Having that honesty in the house, it just lifts everyone to a place where we can discuss everything," she said. "I never feel alone anymore. I never feel like I have to keep things buried."
Jetté Knox will be reading from Love Lives Here: A Story of Thriving In A Transgender Family on Oct. 27 at Christ Church Cathedral, as part of the Ottawa International Writers Festival.
