Scarlett’s Gender Affirming Feminization Fund

Most of you know me as Scarlett Letters, but it’s my pleasure to introduce myself to the world as Quinn Monroe.

As an active participant in queer nightlife for the past decade, it’s been my pleasure and honor to meet many individuals at different stages of their gender affirmation journeys, from barely started to fully realized.

From the time I started going out, many people placed a tremendous emphasis on the value of my face and body, and its proximity to my cisgender counterpart - these comments were always meant as praise and validation. While it is affirming to be told you’re beautiful, in a way each comment was like a knife in my heart because I never truly felt that what I was seeing in the mirror, especially after I got out of drag, was reflective of what I felt was right. The discord between what other people were seeing, especially when I presented as female, and what I was seeing caused a great deal of turmoil within me for a long time.

The truth is I never saw myself as being the person who would do a community ask, because I’m deeply afraid of appearing vulnerable in front of others. When I was at my lowest and most fragile, crippled by depression, unable to function and desperate for help - most people drew away, which made me especially wary of reaching out.

For many years it was easier to convince myself that it was better to go without rather than ask for help, and although I’ve been comfortable identifying as non-binary for many years I always felt like in some way to want more was in some way unfair or untrue - and maybe in a way, I wanted to petulantly refuse what many others in similar positions seemed to see. In some way, I felt like I was proving to myself that I didn’t need to change anything, as long as I didn’t change anything.

But something changed this year when I realized that my two choices are to either live the rest of my life, grow old, and die - hating my face and hating my body every minute of every day - or I had to make the drastic kind of change I was always afraid to admit I wanted to make.

So this is me, admitting that I need help, and asking for it - the costs of what I’ve always wanted to do have made the reality of attaining it unrealistic, and though I have worked hard for several years to save some money for gender affirmation, I’m still a ways off from the total goal I have to live my life comfortably, day to day in the sun.

If you have ever appreciated the work I’ve done as a performance artist, or you’ve ever found comfort or inspiration in what I do, it would mean the world to me if you could donate to my fundraiser. 100% of the proceeds from this fundraiser are going towards medical aesthetic gender confirmation procedures, including electrolysis and facial feminization surgery.

Thank you for taking the time to read my story and please feel free to share and spread on your socials.