Transgender Snowy is well on her way to womanhood
“I WAS not born a male. I was assigned a male gender when I was born.” That is how Snowy Mamba, 28, described how she became “stuck” in the “wrong” body.
Mamba is a transgender female, born with male genitalia but living as a female.
“When I was born, doctors saw male genitalia and assigned the male gender to me. And because I was a baby, I could not express myself,” she explained.
Mamba, who lives in Soshanguve, near Pretoria, is full of confidence in the way she speaks, walks and chooses to live her life, but that wasn’t always the case.
From birth until the age of 10, she lived as boys were expected to, but always felt she was different.
“I was too soft, too neat, and loved girly stuff. I used to wear my sister’s make-up and clothes and play with girls,” she said.
It was then that people started pinning labels on her such as moffie, gay, drag queen and cross-dresser.
“It took me years and years to understand my sexual identity and my gender identity.”
From the age of 14, Mamba, who was named Mzwandile at birth, began living fully as a female, a decision she said was accepted by her family. “I come from a very open-minded family. My family were very supportive.”
Before understanding what being transgender meant, she told her parents she was gay, and they accepted her.
She is now in the process of transitioning from male to female and has already finished sessions with a psychol- ogist, a psychiatrist and an occupational therapist to mentally prepare her for the physical transition.
Mamba is in her second month of hormone replacement therapy, where she drinks certain pills and injects herself with hormones to change the balance of hormones in her body.
“When you want to be transgender, you don’t necessarily need to have a sex change. I just feel I need to get breasts.”
She said she would not have any gender reassignment surgery, but liked the idea of having breasts as well as a penis.
The hormone replacement therapy will help her achieve her dream of getting breasts, which should be visible by December.
Mamba said hormone replacement therapy should be freely available in public hospitals, but was not.
“I went to private hospitals and I paid R32 000. I will stop taking the injection as soon as my breasts have reached the size I like, but I will continue taking the pills.”
She said she didn’t feel the need to explain herself to anyone about her transitioning.
“Men are keen to try to experiment and to try new things,” is what she said when asked what happened when the men eventually found out that she was transgender.
With her more than a decade-long experience as a transgender female, Mamba works as an activist for sex workers and transgender people. “I am also a freelance consultant and a representative for the LGBTI health sector in the Gauteng legislature.”
‘I just became stuck in the wrong body’