Reaction to Michael Berke

A story about Michael Berke, a pre-op male to female transgender, caught my eye because he has returned to his male gender with the help and guidance of Calvery Chapel in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. This was my story, different in some of the detail, but full of important similarities.

Will Michael and the church both have a happy ending?
 
I was blown away by how similar Michael story was with my own personal struggle to resolve my gender identity desires and face reality at the same time.
 
No two stories will ever be the same but the similarities are compelling between my walk to resolve issues in the psyche about my gender and Michael's troubling struggle.
 
I struggled with alcoholism and drug addiction and a long-running battle with my gender identity, never struggling with homosexuality. It was clearly an issue of gender comfort, that is, to have my outside to be consistent with how I felt inside. But my feeling continued to change back and forth from male to female, with some long periods as a female abruptly turning to male persona again and again.
 
After completing 4 months of treatment at a woman's rehab facility, I returned to attending church but this time as a female. I was warmly accepted within the church family as a transsgender. But my alcohol and drug recovery program demanded rigorous honesty in every part of my life. When I learned no true gender change could ever take place no matter how many hormones I ingested or surgical procedures I endured, I was and would always remain, a man. Nothing could change that. So I returned to my male gender.
 
I want to be an encouragement to Michael. I want him to understand that the world's view that a man can become a woman is a fraud. The world and all its skilled surgeons can only produce counterfeit genders. The surgery is not treatment, but it is a lifestyle choice.
 
I now serve in a large church as the director of care ministries guiding and helping others recover and have a new life in Christ. I want that for Michael also.

Both the church and Michael can have a happy ending--I'm the proof that in Christ is happiness.

Stay with it. You will have a win.
Walt