- So, I gotta ask you about this, this intersectionality of like, combat, being in the Navy, Desert Storm, plumbing, engineering, being the senior supervisor of a power plant.

All of these things scream out stereotypical, man things, right?

- Yes.

- Right.

And so, how did that kind of translate over after you transitioned as far as male privilege, male white privilege?

Did you see any of that being taken away?

How did you adjust to those type of things that, you know, only white men experience after transitioning?

- You know, I do a fair amount of public speaking, and it's one of the things that I always put as my topic I speak of and the very first thing is, the first thing that happened to me that rocked my world, the absolute most in my transition, was a loss of my white male privilege that I had no idea that I possessed.

- [Jerome] Mm.

- I've listed my resume, you know what I'm qualified to do.

- Right.

- I was under the impression I did all that on my own.

- Mm.

- I'm the one who showed up on third shift and got the third shift guys to teach me how to weld.

And I'm the one who went in off the clock to meet with the high voltage electrician to say, "Can you teach me how to do this?"

"And how does this work," and this, that, and the other?

And it was me who did that effort.

- [Jerome] Yeah.

- But I learned that had I been a woman, I probably would've never been hired in the power industry.

- Mm.

- And when I'd have showed up at three o'clock in the morning, said, "Can you teach me how to weld?"

They'd have said, "Honey, won't you go make us some coffee - Right.

- and let us men do the work".

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