Tommy Dorfman says her “spirit was attuned to whatever it means to be a woman” for a long time before she came out as transgender last month.
The “13 Reasons Why” star came out as transgender in July, and has now said she always saw herself as a woman, and even knew she’d be a “mother or a grandmother” in the future.
She said: “A trans elder asked me what I see myself as when I'm older, when I'm 60, 70, 90. It was so clear, I just saw Cate Blanchett. But I really couldn't imagine not being a mother or a grandmother.
“My spirit was so attuned to whatever it means to be a woman. I've walked in the privilege of a male body, but [being a woman] is all I've known on the inside. Trans women would clock me all the time and be like, 'Hey, girl, what's up?' because it's sort of a thing you recognise."
And Tommy has received positive reactions from unexpected places since coming out, including from people she grew up with that she thought she would “never see again”.
She added: "There are some people that I grew up with in the South who I thought I was never going to see again.
“So it was nice to get text messages and calls from people I grew up going to NASCAR with or who you would expect to be incredibly conservative and not accepting.
“But to see me, someone they knew as a child, stepping into this space in a public way helped them wrap their heads around it."
The 29-year-old actress has now started taking hormones, and is already seeing the positive effects.
She told InStyle magazine: "I just switched my hormones, and I've never felt better in my life.
“I spent 28 years of my life suicidal and depressed and recovering from alcoholism and drug addiction.
“I don't think I've ever been genuinely happy until this past year.
“I look at the Internet chronicle of photos of me since I started working, and I can see how f****** unhappy I was in every photo. It's wild."