Well 2015 wouldn’t close without at least one more unique pregnancy story.
A transgender Ecuadoran Father-to-Be will be carrying the baby of his partner, a transgender Mother-to-Be.
That’s right. Fernando Machado was born a female with a birth name Maria. His partner Diana Rodgriguez was born a male with the birth name Luis.
The couple, believed to be the first of its kind in all of South America, announced on social media earlier this month that Machado was pregnant. Although both of them take hormones, neither has undergone gender-reassignment surgery so the child-to-be was conceived the old-fashioned way and it is not expected that there will be any medical complications.
Rodriguez is one of Ecuador’s most prominent LGBT activist and she said they decided to publicize the pregnancy to help change attitudes in the very devout Roman Catholic culture in that country, and Latin America, generally.
“We’re trying to break the myths about transsexuality,” Rodriguez told The Associated Press.
There hasn’t been a peep from church leaders thus far, which surprises Rodriguez.
“The church is always criticizing gays and homosexuals for adopting children, so it would be a contradiction to criticize us for giving birth naturally,” she told AP from her Guayaquil home.
There has been some advances in Trans rights in South America. For example, earlier this year, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos issued a decree which permitted individuals to change their gender on their national ID cards and so far, about 340 people in the massive nation have switched their gender.
Meanwhile, Argentina passed legislation that provides for free hormone treatment and gender reassignment surgery.
It’s a small step against the stats which show that 70% of the 664 transgender people murdered in the world were killed in Latin America, according to a study by the International AIDS Alliance.
h/t Japan Timnes