‘Widows’ whose husbands came out as transgender women during their marriages claim their partners sexually and physically abused them if they did not ‘affirm’ their new identity

Women whose husbands came out as transgender during their marriage have spoken out about their grief and alleged abuse they endured at the hands of their partners as they struggled to accept their new gender identity.

Behind The Looking Glass, a documentary from Lime Soda Films, claims to be the first deep dive into the stories of “trans widows” – women who are separated, or seeking a divorce, from their transitioning male partners.

In the film, the women say they are forgotten victims of domestic violence and that their partners often cheated on them and exploited them financially.

The women explain that while their partners received therapy and support during transition, they themselves did not have access to the same resources.

“But often it feels like our stories are just whispers in a storm,” confessed one widow who chose to keep her identity secret.

Behind The Looking Glass tells the stories of 18 women and explores the impact of their partners’ transitions on their wives and children.

Anonymous ‘trans widows’ have revealed their heartbreak after their husbands came out as transgender, sharing their real voices but using cartoon aliases (pictured here for Marigold)

Most of the women chose to remain anonymous and let their real voices be heard, but used a cartoon-like alias to protect their identity.

A woman named Ginny said she is now reduced to a “crying wreck” when she recounts how her husband, with whom she has four children, indicated they wanted to transition.

She is now part of a support group after caring for the child with her husband.

She said she would have the children with her for three weeks over a four-year period, while her partner would only have them with her for one week.

She said her partner was “living like a single person” while she was trying to pay twice the rent and was “broke.”

Others spoke of the abuse they experienced during the transition process, especially when they did not “affirm” their partner’s new identity.

Julietta said, “It didn’t take long for me to end the marriage, especially after Jack physically attacked me for not affirming him. My son and I moved out of the family home and slept on the couch for a few months.”

In addition to physical attacks, there was also emotional manipulation. One woman, identified as Dinah in the documentary, said she “knew” she was “being cheated on” during the transition process.

Julietta said she was forced to sleep on the couch for months after her husband began physically assaulting her

Julietta said, “Over time, he convinced me that I was mentally unstable and too damaged to repair. It took months after the divorce for me to see that this was mental and emotional abuse.”

Julietta has a domestic violence restraining order against her ex because of the physical assault, but her ex is still allowed to have contact with her child.

Meanwhile, Angela said her partner began stealing her diaries, causing her to lose her “ground” in reality.

Her partner then told her lies and she had no concrete evidence that those lies were not true. As a result, she was ‘increasingly manipulated’.

Another, Marigold, said the abuse even extended to their children. She said: ‘He would come home and scream for hours, about all the ways I had let him down.

“And then it got to the point where if the kids touched something, he would grab their hand and bang it on the table. He blamed me and said that my lack of good parenting had forced him to take more action.”

Marigold claims her partner told her she had to identify as bisexual if she wanted them to stay together, despite her protests that she is a heterosexual woman.

Dinah said she knew she was being cheated on and that her husband was unfaithful

Her partner then told her that they had taken strong painkillers (which she had been prescribed but which she had never taken) before the couple had sex, claiming that they had to be in an ‘altered state of mind’ to be intimate with her.

Marigold continued: ‘I felt like a body, like it didn’t matter who I was in bed. He was like another person to have sex with, he was a stranger.

“And then I asked him to stop, but he wouldn’t. Or he wanted to do something that was painful for me, but he didn’t seem to care.”

In addition to the emotional turmoil that comes with the transition process, the group of ‘trans widows’ also highlighted the financial impact it had on them.

Julietta said her partner “emptied” her accounts with his “irregular spending” during those years.

Uno says that her husband was unemployed when he came to live with her in Tokyo, having quit his job.

Uno was forced to pay both parents’ rent and although her husband occasionally worked part-time, he said he couldn’t find a full-time job unless “as a woman.”

“I had to quit my job because of the stress,” she said, adding that her severance pay quickly disappeared and two of them were living off it. “He told me over and over that he wasn’t going to pay back the money he owed me.”

Uno faced financial problems and eventually had to stop working due to stress

While the husbands apparently received targeted therapy and support to cope with the changes of transition, their wives received virtually no support—even when a fundamental aspect of their marriage changed.

Julietta shared that she and her husband had tried both couples therapy and individual therapy, but she was expected to simply ‘accept’ and ‘tolerate’ herself, while her own individual feelings were not ‘validated’.

Shannon, another transgender widow, said, “In a marriage where a man starts using drugs or cheating on you, you will find therapists, support groups, and other women who will say it’s not your fault, but when it comes to this topic, people are quick to question whether you handled it appropriately.”

Lime Soda Films, which made the documentary, is headed by Vaishnavi Sundar, an Indian filmmaker who describes herself as a “radical feminist.”

A biography on her website states: “I put women first in every project I undertake.”

In a clip posted on YouTube channel Lime Soda Films, Sundar reveals that it took her three years to make Behind the Looking Glass, which she began researching in late 2021.

She says her film aims to combat “persistent misogyny” in what she describes as a “first of its kind” story.