Army Pfc. Bradley Manning was sentence to 35 years behind bars after he was found guilty of the 22 charges against him including theft and espionage, he will serve his sentence at the Fort Leavenworth prison, but he has decided that during three decades he wish to live as a woman opting to be called Chelsea Manning from now on and began hormone therapy right away.
Manning expressed his wish in a letter he send thru his lawyer to NBC a day after his trial on Wednesday , and this is what he wrote…
The Next Stage of My Life
I want to thank everybody who has supported me over the last three years. Throughout this long ordeal, your letters of support and encouragement have helped keep me strong. I am forever indebted to those who wrote to me, made a donation to my defense fund, or came to watch a portion of the trial. I would especially like to thank Courage to Resist and the Bradley Manning Support Network for their tireless efforts in raising awareness for my case and providing for my legal representation.
As I transition into this next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me. I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition. I also request that, starting today, you refer to me by my new name and use the feminine pronoun (except in official mail to the confinement facility). I look forward to receiving letters from supporters and having the opportunity to write back.
Thank you,
Chelsea E. Manning
Hormone therapy might not be available for Manning in order to become a more womanly Chelsea E. Manning at the prison facility he has been assigned to, and any inmate who have not has genital surgery served their sentence at the facility with inmates who share the sex at birth.
“All inmates are considered soldiers and are treated as such with access to mental health professionals, including a psychiatrist, psychologist, social workers and behavioral science non-commissioned officers with experience in addressing the needs of military personnel in pre- and post-trial confinement. The Army does not provide hormone therapy or sex-reassignment surgery for gender identity disorder.” said Kimberly Lewis fort Leavenworth spokesperson.
Bradley Manning hasn’t been shy about revealing how he looks a a woman after all he did send an email with the subject line “My Problem “ telling him he was suffering from gender dysphoria with a photo of him attached wearing a blonde wig, eye shadow and red lipstick to his former master sergeant Paul Adkins on April 24, 2010.
This is my problem. I’ve had signs of it for a very long time. It’s caused problems within my family. I thought a career in the military would get rid of it. It’s not something I seek out for attention, and I’ve been trying very, very hard to get rid of it by placing myself in situations where it would be impossible. But, it’s not going away; it’s haunting me more and more as I get older. Now, the consequences of it are dire, at a time when it’s causing me great pain it itself.
Not long after that he attacked his female superior, Specialist Jihrleah Showman, the attack came just hours after he was was found curled in a fetal position in a storage cupboard; with a knife at his feet and had cut the words “I want” into a vinyl chair.
But Chelsea Manning is not the first female name Bradley has used, there is also Breanna Manning his a female alter ego he created and used to set up accounts on Twitter and YouTube and he did so just for the purpose of giving Breanna a digital presence or so did Manning expressed it to Adrian Lamo.
“I wouldn’t mind going to prison for the rest of my life, or being executed so much, if it wasn’t for the possibility of having pictures of me … plastered all over the world press … as [a] boy … the CPU is not made for this motherboard …”
