(Picture: Erin Anderson/Caters News)

A transgender woman has finally found love – with a man who once rejected her.

Erin Anderson, 22, from Owensboro, Kentucky, first approached Jared Norris, 28, on Facebook, when she was living as a man named Aaron.

Jared rejected Erin, but two years later, after liking a photo of her when she had come out as a woman, the romance rekindled.

The couple are now happily in love, ever since Erin transitioned.


Erin knew she was born in the wrong body from the age of three, wearing her mum’s shoes and always drawing herself as a girl in sketches.

At school, while living as Aaron, she was bullied by the boys who found her overly effeminate.

18-20, Erin while living as a male named Aaron (Picture: Erin Anderson/Caters News)

Erin said: ‘At three-years-old I was an artistic child, I would always draw myself as a girl all the time.



‘Then I would wear my grandma’s high heels, put mom’s makeup on and more, all of these are things a little boy wouldn’t do.

‘I was bullied by both the boys and girls, the guys would ask why I would act like a girl and make fun of me, making me feel less than what I was.

‘Then the girls would see me as a boy and not want to hang out with me.’

Erin tried to suppress her feelings until the age of 18, when she started questioning her gender.

She said: ‘By then, I was not happy in my born gender as a boy anymore, but I was dumbfounded about how to change, I had no knowledge on the subject or where to begin.

(Picture: Erin Anderson/Caters News)

‘I thought I was too old to start transitioning until my friend reminded me that life is too short and that I couldn’t keep living my life so unhappy.’

Now Erin has undergone two years of hormone replacement therapy, breast augmentation, and is hoping for gender reassignment surgery.

After being on hormone replacement therapy for seven months, she noticed Jared had liked an Instagram image of hers, after he initially rejected her, and she decided to approach him again.

The couple met up and really enjoyed each other’s company. They quickly decided to have a relationship and within the first couple of months, went public with it. Since doing so, the couple have received hateful messages and even death threats.

Erin, a graphics design student, said: ‘While still living a boy, I messaged Jared on Facebook saying “Hey what’s up”, I knew of him and added him on Facebook because he was cute.

(Picture: Erin Anderson/Caters News)

‘But he was having no part of it and didn’t seem interested at all, so I decided not to try anymore with him.

‘It was two years later when he liked one of my pictures on Instagram, by that time I had come out as trans and a woman.

‘I decided I was going to be up front, so I sent him a message with my number and within five minutes, I got a message from him and we started talking.

‘The next day was my birthday, I hung out with him and a week later we were dating officially on Facebook and have been together ever since.

‘Prior to dating Jared, I had been seeing people but nothing serious came about because they were afraid to tell their family or friends.



‘They would tell me they really liked me but couldn’t risk their family knowing I was trans and that was what hurt the most.

‘But Jared didn’t fear that, he told his family that I was trans and everything, he doesn’t care what other people think.’

(Picture: Erin Anderson/Caters News)

She added: ‘We talk about our love story and us getting together often actually, I admitted that two years prior I wanted him and now I finally have him, which we laugh a lot about.’

The couple have now been dating for two years, and have chosen to ignore the trolls, stating that ‘love is love’.

Jared, a computer science student, said: ‘I hung out with her a lot and really enjoyed it, we had a lot of things in common even after talking for just a couple of days.

‘I was thinking, I could fall in love with this person, at first I didn’t know where it was going to go, but one day while lying in bed with her watching TV I told her how I felt.

‘I was like, “I love you and think we could make this work easily” and despite all the haters I wanted to go public and proudly show everyone we are dating.’

He continued: ‘It wasn’t really well known that I was dating a trans woman at first, but when everyone found out, it was a big shocker.

‘I received a lot of death threats online with one guy saying ‘I will beat you up f*****’ which kind of sucked and was depressing.


‘It’s always the same rigmarole things like, “I hate you” , “you’re disgusting”, “you’re dating a dude” and other comments.

‘After getting all these death threats we talked about it and decided to ignore everybody, whether they are sending love or hate.

‘Thankfully I had some messages encouraging us and telling us to ignore the haters, it reminds us that people like that are not worth our time.’

Erin still hopes to get gender reassignment surgery in the future, despite her partner remaining indifferent.

Jared said: ‘She wants to look more feminine, but to me she already looks beautiful, I understand it’s not about me but at present we couldn’t afford surgery for her to become fully female.

‘I will still love her exactly the same, she is still the same person regardless, I think she looks feminine enough, but understand gender dysphoria is a big thing.

‘I love the fact that she is willing to be herself even with the ramifications of that, I’m glad she can put herself out there.’

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