00:00 It is 100% the hardest place I could imagine to transition.
00:04 My name is Jackson Feeley.
00:10 I'm 28 years old.
00:12 I am approximately 12 months into transitioning
00:16 from female to male.
00:17 And I've spent the last year returning to work
00:19 as a prison officer.
00:21 Jess was someone who really, really wanted to be happy,
00:25 but really wasn't.
00:27 I think that's something I've realized recently
00:29 because I had an amazing childhood, amazing family.
00:34 So to me, there was no reason why
00:37 Jess should have been unhappy.
00:39 I've only really accepted and realized
00:41 that I was transgender in the last two years.
00:46 I think I was in denial for a long time.
00:49 It was like I was always chasing something,
00:51 always trying to fill a void, always
00:53 trying to just find something that would make me go,
00:56 that's me.
00:57 This is me now.
00:58 I feel OK.
00:59 And I could never, ever find that.
01:00 It was, I'll buy a house, that'll fix it.
01:03 I'll change my job, that'll fix it.
01:04 I'll move schools.
01:05 I'll leave uni.
01:06 I'll join the RAF.
01:09 I'll do this.
01:09 I'll do that.
01:10 I'll buy that.
01:11 It was always something that was sort
01:15 of an immediate satisfaction, but would never really
01:17 fill that pain.
01:19 I only really started to believe and accept
01:24 that it was to do with my gender in the last few years,
01:28 since I left the military and I came back off tour.
01:30 And my mental health just massively deteriorated,
01:34 and I had to sort of figure out why.
01:36 And then I joined the prison service, which
01:38 sort of filled another sort of void.
01:41 It was in uniform again, and it gave me that feeling of pride.
01:45 And I think a uniform allowed me to hide behind it.
01:48 I started to struggle a lot quicker than I did before,
01:53 even though I was loving this job.
01:54 I was at the point where I didn't want to die,
01:57 but I didn't want to live anymore.
01:59 I think that's probably something a lot of people
02:01 go through.
02:01 And what do you do with that?
02:04 What do you do with that?
02:06 The few months after coming out was
02:09 the worst in trying to navigate that
02:11 and trying to figure it out.
02:13 And I thought, you know what?
02:15 I loved being in the prison service, loved my job.
02:19 I loved the people that I was around.
02:20 I loved what the job entailed.
02:22 It is 100% the hardest place I could
02:25 imagine to transition.
02:28 Regardless of any sort of different protective
02:32 characteristic or anything like that,
02:34 you are sort of under the spotlight for abuse
02:37 because you're in a prison.
02:38 And will I still have the backing of my friends?
02:41 Will people feel comfortable enough to stick up for me
02:45 if it goes wrong?
02:45 And am I just going to end up completely alone and in danger?
02:48 And from the moment I walked back in,
02:51 I was addressed as Jax.
02:54 I made that decision then that I was going to let the prison
02:57 come on this journey with me.
02:58 All these people want to be there for me.
03:01 I need to let them because I can't do it on my own.
03:05 Last week, we put together a transgender awareness event.
03:08 It left people in tears because they watched the video
03:11 that I made and they listened to stories.
03:13 And it made people understand so much more about what goes on
03:18 and why I was such an angry person before
03:23 and why I'm not now.
03:25 And six prisoners there who walked into that event
03:28 with these t-shirts that I'd made on with so much pride.
03:32 And they were stood up tall and they were so--
03:35 they were really proud to be there and support me.
03:37 And it's not often that you get those relationships
03:39 between prisoners and officers because they do just see you
03:42 as a uniform sometimes.
03:43 And it's so hard to break that barrier.
03:46 And I think them seeing me so vulnerable and being open
03:52 and answering questions and teaching them
03:55 about gender and sex and all these things
03:58 that they wouldn't have a clue about,
04:00 it's really changed their mindset.
04:02 And I thought I would just be bombarded with abuse.
04:06 And it's been the complete opposite.
04:11 Allow yourself to be vulnerable and allow yourself
04:15 to take people on the journey with you
04:18 and accept that support because people surprise you.
04:21 And people will be there if you allow them to be.
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