After almost half a century living as a male, Joanne Herman transitioned in 2002 to live as a female in order to resolve a gender incongruity she had felt for as long as she remembers. She has since been an active spokeswoman for transgender awareness and understanding. Joanne is one of the first openly transgender alumnae of Dartmouth College, and a graduate of the last all-male class. Dartmouth’s president awarded her a Class of 1975 diploma in her new name in 2006. In 1975, when her name was Jeff, Joanne married Barbara Wermeyer. After Joanne underwent sex-reassignment surgery in 2003, Barbara helped Joanne get established in her new life, while Joanne helped Barbara battle a rare form of cancer known as carcinoid. She was widowed from Barbara in 2006 after 30 years of marriage. Joanne is currently financial controller at New England Foundation for the Arts and lives in Boston with her fiance.
The following is an excerpt from Herman’s book “Transgender Explained For Those Who Are Not,” published by AuthorHouse.
In much of the country you can be fired just for being transgender. According to the National Center for Transgender Equality, only 37 percent of Americans live in areas that explicitly ban discrimination based on gender identity and expression. For others, legal proceedings may be the only way you can establish your rights. This means that revealing your transgender status could have the same result as that experienced by Sarah Blanchette and Diane Schroer.
