They Could’ve Just Asked Me

It’s been 31 months since any of them have spoken to me. Christmas Day, 2022. 
 
No texts. No calls. No apologies. No love.   
Just silence. 
 
It’s been even longer since they’ve seen me in person. Not a single one of them, aside from my youngest sister, has seen me—really seen me—since I came out publicly as a transgender woman on September 18th, 2020. And even she abandoned me.
 
They’ve never sat across from me as I am.   
They’ve never hugged me, or smiled at me, or said my name out loud since I transitioned.   
All they’ve seen are pictures, filtered through secondhand screens or social media algorithms. 
 
They don’t see me as a woman.   
Not as a daughter.   
Not as a sister. 
 
They see only what they want to see: a ghost of someone they used to know.   
Someone who no longer exists. 
 
And yet, this weekend, I found out that one of my estranged sisters bought the Kindle version of my book, Reborn In Shadows: From The Ashes. 
 
She never reached out. Never said a word.   
Just bought it. Started reading it. And started asking questions—not to me, but to my daughter. 
 
One of those questions?   
“Does the main character kill her stepfather?” 
 
They’re treating my story like it’s a crime scene, like they’re detectives searching for clues.   
But they don’t want understanding. They want confirmation bias.   
They want to gossip. To speculate. To paint their own picture of who I am without ever looking me in the eye. 
 
They could’ve just asked me. 
 
They could’ve called. Messaged. Showed up with humility. 
 
But instead, they’re sneaking around the perimeter of my life, unwilling to step through the front door.   
And worse, they’re putting my daughter in the crossfire—cornering her with questions that were never hers to carry. 
 
This is not what family does. 
 
I grew up in Dickenson County, Virginia, in a town where everyone knew your business before you finished conducting it. My stepfather and mother ran an auto-body shop together. I was known back then—loud, clever, always hustling, always cracking jokes, always hiding something. 
 
That something was me. 
 
I carried the truth like a splinter under the skin. And now that I’ve finally pulled it free—now that I live openly as myself—they’ve turned their backs. 
 
But the world didn’t. 
 
Reborn In Shadows is now in the Library of Congress. It was named Best LGBTQIA Fiction in the 2025 National Indie Excellence Awards. Strangers across the country have embraced this story. They’ve embraced me. Literally and figuratively.   
And they’ve told me something I never heard from my own blood:   
“I see you. And I’m glad you exist.” 
 
I’m a trans woman, a queer amputee, a parent, and an author.   
I am not ashamed. I am not broken. I am not alone. 
 
So to those who turned their backs on me—   
If you want to know who I am, ask me.   
If you want to understand my story, read the book.   
But don’t interrogate my daughter. Don’t lurk. Don’t whisper. 
 
It takes courage to repair what you broke.   
It takes love to see someone fully. 
 
Until then, I will keep moving forward.   
I will keep protecting my peace.   
And I will keep living—boldly, loudly, beautifully—as the woman I was always meant to be. 
 
—Maya Fisher