Schuyler Bailar Tells Ellen DeGeneres About Being A Transgendered Male Competing in the NCAA
Empty Lighthouse is a reader-supported site. This article may contain affiliate links to Amazon and other sites. We earn a commission on purchases made through these links.
The Harvard University Men's Swim Team has one special member who is paving the way.
Schuyler Bailar is the first openly transgendered male to compete on an NCAA Division 1 men's team and he stopped by the Ellen Show to share his experience.
Bailar has been written about and covered by almost every media outlet so far because of his story.
Before entering college Bailar was one of the top female swimmers in the country however, he came out as transgendered and is now competing on Harvard University's Men's Swim Team.
DeGeneres welcomed Bailar to the show and told him that she was very proud of him for what he was doing. Bailar says he thinks he has always known that he was transgendered but he didn't have the vocabulary to explain it when he was younger.
He says it took him awhile to find it because the word transgendered has a lot of negative connotation with it.
He told DeGeneres that he didn't feel comfortable in his body because it didn't represent the gender that he felt or identified with.
DeGeneres showed a couple of the before and after photos which were pretty amazing. She said that no one would have looked at him and thought he was suffering in any way.
Bailar realized how he wanted to identify himself after being treated for an eating disorder, which DeGeneres said she was glad he figured out.
Bailar says that he was initially identified as a woman and told his coach he needed a gap year to be treated for his eating disorder in April of his senior. His coached asked him to keep her updated and as time went on he told her what was going on. He said gender identity came up and he said he was working on what gender he wanted to be and all he knew was he was transgendered and he wanted to swim.
His coach rolled with him and was supportive of him. She said that she would be willing to make it work for him.
Bailar initially wanted to lead a double life and be a "woman in the pool and man in the school" but his coach saw through that and told him that he wouldn't be healthy if he did that. So, the male coach asked him to join the team and talked to all of the guys on the team.
Bailar says that all of the guys on the team were welcoming and open about it. He said that Kevin Tyrrell, the men's coach, asked the team before he talked to Bailar.
Bailar told DeGeneres that he was terrified to swim in a speedo after having his breasts removed. He said there were a lot of new physical sensations after having more of his body exposed to the water. Bailar says that since the change he hasn't been winning everything but he isn't awful. He is able o keep up with his teammates and everyone else but is humbled by not winning.
He says it has helped him learn to love swimming for what it is. He says his team was supportive of him in a 16th place finish because he had dropped a lot of time off of his personal best.
DeGeneres wanted to take the time to support Bailar, tell him how proud she was of him and ask that other schools and staff out there support students like this as well.
You can watch Bailar tell his story on the Ellen Show in the video below.