Bruce Jenner, the Olympic gold medal-winning decathlete, transitioned into a woman and that decision caused quite a stir back in the day.
Jenner, a father of five, including two of the sisters of the Kardashian clan, Kylie and Kendall, was forced to undergo several surgeries in order to achieve her feminine looks. Before having the most important surgery of all, gender reassignment surgery, Jenner had her beard removed and got breast implants.
Wanting to be an inspiration for others who are afraid to confess how they truly feel about themselves, Jenner wrote a book, “The Secrets of My Life” where she wrote, “The surgery was a success, and I feel not only wonderful but liberated. So why even consider it? Because it’s just a penis. It has no special gifts or use for me other than what I have said before, the ability to take a whiz in the woods. I just want to have all the right parts.”
The former elite athlete, however, still believes that the “old Bruce” is still inside her.
Born in Mount Kisco, New York, on October 28, 1949, Jenner suffered from dyslexia as a child but it was sports that saved her life.
Growing up as Bruce, she was into many sports and excelled in most of them, but it was track and field she was best at. Jenner was given a football scholarship from Graceland College in Iowa, but after suffering an injury she turned to being part of the track team.
Ever since the school days, Jenner experienced issues with gender identity.
“I look at guys and I go…’ He’s comfortable in his own skin,’” Jenner recalled. “And I thought, ‘Wouldn’t that be a nice way to go through life?’ I look at women all the time thinking, ‘Oh my God, how lucky are they that they can wake up in the morning and be themselves. But me, I’m stuck here in the middle.”
In 1971, Jenner achieved a surprising victory at the Kansas Relays and earned a spot on the US Olympic team in the following year, where she secured the tenth position in the Munich Olympic Decathlon.
Recognizing the significance of her achievement, she understood there was room for improvement in her performance. Consequently, she embarked on an intense training regimen, dedicating eight hours each day for the subsequent four years to practice.
Eventually, she geared up for the 1976 Summer Olympics held in Montreal, Canada.
At the age of 26, she won the decathlon at the Olympics, setting a new world record with 8,618 points on July 30, 1976.
Against the backdrop of the tumultuous period marked by the aftermath of the Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal, and other pressing national issues, Jenner’s Olympic gold medal took on immense significance. Jenner emerged as a symbol of American resilience and strength, something like a superhero.
Speaking to ABC, Jenner said, “I see a confused person at that time, running away from my life … with big-time fear. [I was] scared to death. I didn’t realize what my future held at that time.
“That is me. That is her,” she added, referring to her gender identity. “[you can be a woman] and still kick butt.”
Her success opened many doors for her and Jenner appeared in commercials, TV series, and even motion pictures.
But beneath the persona that at the time was Bruce Jenner, she was someone else.
In 1971, seven years before her Olympic victory, Jenner tied the knot with her college sweetheart, Chrystie Scott. While Scott pursued a job selling insurance during the evenings, she also worked as a flight attendant, wholeheartedly dedicated to supporting her then-spouse in achieving their shared Olympic dreams.
Their first child, Burt, was born in 1978. Two years later they welcomed their second child, Cassandra. However, by the time Scott was expecting Cassandra, the couple had already parted ways.
In an interview with ABC, Jenner disclosed that her first wife was likely “the first one to know” about her struggles with gender identity.
“I didn’t go heavily into it back then,” Jenner explained. “I said ‘these are my issues. This is what I deal with.’ And they think I do a little cross dressing, I do a little of this, a little of that, you know, ‘it’s going to be fine, we’ll work all this stuff out.’”
In 1981, then-Bruce Jenner married Linda Thompson and the couple welcomed two boys, Brody and Brandon Jenner. They divorced five years later.
Jenner, grappling with depression, made the choice to seek professional help following her divorce from Linda. By the late eighties, she began hormone therapy with estrogen, underwent electrolysis to remove facial hair, and opted for a nose job as part of her transition journey.
She, however, chose to halt the procedure at 39. In 1991, Jenner married Kris Jenner. The two remained married until 2015 and welcomed daughters Kendall and Kylie Jenner.
The family gained extreme popularity with the reality show Keeping Up With The Kardashians which aired in 2007.
Jenner divorced in 2013 and continued her transition without alerting her kids four months later.
“That night I thought, ‘oh, it’s, like, over. Heart’s pounding… and I thought wouldn’t the easiest thing to be right now,” Jenner recalled.
Nowadays, Jenner lives her life as a woman, but her daughters Kendall and Kylie still call her “dad” at times.
“I know we had a talk a few years ago and you were ok with us still calling you dad. How do you feel about that now,” Kylie questioned Jenner about how she felt about that at the time in a video posted on her YouTube channel.
“I feel it was one of the best decisions I made. Sometimes this community can be pretty tough, especially when it comes to pronouns, and everybody’s got an opinion,” Jenner replied.
“But I really felt from the beginning that I’ve got to do it my way that works for me, and everyone out there can do it their way that works for them. Some people would say, ‘You’re the mother’, but I’m not. I’m the dad, I’ve been the dad the whole way, I will be their father until the day they die or I die.”
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