This Friday will be my twentieth anniversary with my partner. Yes, you heard that right, 20 years. My partner and I have been together since we were fourteen. We went to high school and college together and have gone through our own respective gender journeys together. I finally figured out the words for my gender back around 2017 or so. I have always felt like being a woman didn’t fit me, and once I heard the term “nonbinary,” I realized that I had been feeling dysphoria for years and started to do things to make myself happier and more in line with my feelings regarding my gender. None of these were huge changes because I’m incredibly stubborn and refused to dress femme for years before that. Now, I am just more aware my dysphoria and less willing to please others while making it worse.

My partner, on the other hand, ignored the fact that she was dealing with dysphoria for years. She tried to double down on dressing masculine while in college, but it didn’t make her feel better. Last year, she thought she might be nonbinary because our discussions of gender made her more comfortable to explore her feminine side. And this year, she realized she was actually a trans woman, and we figured out how to get her gender affirming care. She is close to the three month mark on hormone-replacement therapy, and she is the happiest she has ever been. More than anything this year, I am so glad to have my partner feel more like herself and be on her way to being the person she truly is. Twenty years and two gender discoveries later, we’re still together.

I love my partner more than anything or anyone. She is my best friend, my biggest supporter, the best pet co-parent, the one I turn to when times are tough, and the one I want to see flourish more than anything. If you’ve never seen someone you love transition, it is a beautiful thing. Every day I see my partner become more herself. She is so much happier, even after a few months. She has new pronouns and a new name, but she’s still the person I have loved for twenty years. I look around at everything that’s going on with trans rights being under attack in the US and UK, and I cannot understand how people can see others transition and not think it is something beautiful. It is a righting of a biological wrong, and the mental health results speak for themselves. My partner has battled depression for as long as I have known her. She still has depression, but it is night and day since she started on estrogen and t-blockers. Her mood is better, she’s more emotionally even, and when she is sad, it isn’t the same level as past depressive sadness.

As if to spite the transphobes (and because I love her deeply), I have thrown myself into being as supportive as possible. What’s funny is so much of what I’m doing to affirm her has been dysphoria-inducing to me. I have sat here racking my brain about what she could need or what people tried to give me that I hated when I was hitting puberty. My partner has been collecting more feminine clothes for a while now, many of which came from my wardrobe because they were too feminine for me, but I have added to the pile. She now has a purse or two, bras, and my favorite surprise for her was a Kaboodle with some starter make-up. My partner will probably never come out to her family because she doesn’t think they’ll accept her, and I want her to feel as loved and accepted as possible.

When I first realized I was nonbinary, I was afraid my partner would be upset or confused that I wasn’t a woman. She was fine with it, unconcerned, and she has supported me in my weird little guy-ness ever since. That sort of acceptance paved the way for her own journey of self-discovery, and I am honored that I get to be on that journey with her to smooth the way and support her in every way I can. Being a t4t couple has only made us closer and stronger, and I will do anything to make sure my partner has the best life she can possibly have no matter the political climate and no matter what people who don’t know her say.

To my partner, may you have the best life and the life you have always wanted. Here’s to twenty years, and many, many more!