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LEANNA
BRADLEY
HAS
HAD
a
difficult
life.
The
transgendered
activist
and
founder
of
the
organization
“Stop
Hate
Now”
has
suffered
through
many
lifetimes
of
pain.
Born
Donald
Daryl
Alfred,
Bradley
says
that
even
at
the
young
age
of
3,
she
knew
something
wasn’t
right.
She
didn’t
address
that
“something”
until
years
later,
when
at
the
age
of
60,
she
had
a
sex-change
operation.
Eight
years
later,
the
Wilton
Manors
resident
is
about
to
get
her
15
minutes
of
fame.
Last
week,
Forever
Films,
a
New
York-based
company,
arrived
in
town
to
film
a
documentary
about
Bradley’s
life.
They
filmed
Bradley
at
New
Moon,
a
popular
lesbian
bar,
and
at
Bradley’s
home.
“They’ve
already
done
documentaries
on
transgendered
young
girls,
so
they
wanted
a
senior,”
Bradley
explains.
“Someone
with
a
horrific
life — and
that
was
me.”
IT’S
ALMOST
IMPOSSIBLE
to
imagine
even
going
through
half
of
what
Bradley
has
gone
through
in
her
life.
A
male
cousin
molested
her
when
she
was
a
little
8-year-old
boy.
If
that
wasn’t
bad
enough,
her
school
life
wasn’t
any
better.
“I
was
bullied,”
she
says.
When
Bradley
turned
15,
she
decided
to
take
control
of
her
life
and
went
into
the
National
Guard.
“I
wanted
to
be
one
of
the
boys,”
she
says.
But
things
didn’t
get
any
better
for
Bradley.
In
fact,
they
took
a
turn
for
the
worse.
At
age
19,
while
in
Philadelphia,
she
was
beaten
and
raped
by
three
“professional
thugs,”
she
says.
“I
was
left
for
dead
at
the
Philadelphia
airport,”
she
says.
“A
woman
found
me
and
brought
me
in
to
the
hospital.”
Bradley
later
found
out
that
her
attackers
were
professional
killers
who,
just
six
months
prior
to
her
attack,
had
killed
two
sailors.
“That’s
what
the
FBI
determined,”
she
says.
“That
started
the
negativity
in
my
life.”
AT
AGE
24,
BRADLEY
married
a
woman,
but
the
marriage
only
lasted
90
days.
“That
turned
into
a
fiasco,”
she
says.
“She
left
me.”
In
her
late
20s,
still
trying
to
live
her
life
as
a
man,
she
married
a
woman
who
had
three
children.
That
union
lasted
18
years.
“The
marriage
was
a
disaster,”
Bradley
recalls.
But
one
good
thing
did
come
of
it,
she
notes:
They
had
a
son
together.
Right
after
the
divorce,
Bradley
began
exploring
cross-dressing
and
looking
into
sex-change
information.
“I
began
to
do
research
secretly,”
she
says.
Then,
Bradley
was
sent
to
Vietnam
for
the
war
for
31
months.
When
she
came
back,
she
began
going
to
cross-dressing
meetings
and
took
a
job
driving
a
bus
and
limousines.
“Over
a
lifetime,
I’ve
had
over
56
jobs,”
Bradley
says.
“Some
lasted
five
minutes,
some
lasted
five
years.”
IN
1983,
BRADLEY
WENT
to
a
doctor
and
told
him
that
she
had
always
felt
like
a
woman.
She
was
sent
to
the
University
of
California
at
Los
Angeles,
where
they
were
doing
research
with
transgendered
people.
“I
found
out,
I
had
15
percent
more
female
hormones
than
male
hormones,”
she
says.
“They
did
body
scans
on
me,
and
I
had
some
female
anatomy.”
The
news
that
she
was
intersex
was
alarming
to
Bradley,
but
also
made
sense.
“I
didn’t
know
what
to
do,”
she
says.
After
doing
exhaustive
research,
Bradley
decided
it
was
time
to
live
the
life
she
had
always
wanted
to
lead.
At
age
60,
she
finally
had
the
operation
that
changed
her
life.
It
was
definitely
a
new
beginning
for
her.
“From
zero
to
60,
it
was
all
negative,”
she
says.
“I
didn’t
know
who
I
was
or
where
I
came
from.”
She
says
at
first
the
change
was
daunting,
especially
since
it
was
all
happening
rather
late
in
her
life.
“At
the
age
of
60,
I
felt
like
a
little
girl
going
through
puberty,”
she
says.
THINGS
HAVE
GONE
uphill
for
Bradley
ever
since
making
the
change.
She
began
to
meet
others
like
herself,
and
with
all
of
her
accumulated
knowledge,
she
began
to
offer
help.
“I’ve
had
a
lot
of
support,”
she
says.
She
has
given
her
support
to
others
as
well
with
her
“Stop
Hate
Now”
program,
which
is
a
lecture
series
geared
toward
doctors,
social
workers
and
teachers.
She
is
also
a
local
chairperson
of
the
annual
Transgender
Day
of
Remembrance.
She
started
the
local
observance
three
years
ago
with
the
help
of
the
Sunshine
Cathedral.
The
day
is
intended
to
raise
awareness
about
anti-transgender
violence.
Statistics
show
that
transgendered
people
are
disproportionately
the
victims
of
murder
and
assaults.
“My
goal
is
to
help
stop
homophobia
and
hate
in
schools
and
throughout
the
country,”
Bradley
says.
The
Gay
&
Lesbian
Community
Center
of
South
Florida
recently
recognized
Bradley’s
efforts
at
its
...
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