Intersex teacher with size-z breasts put on leave
Reports that employee was seen without prosthetics angers parents after school board gave their support
‘Halton parents are outraged at what’s taking place. The welfare of our kids should prevail in our judgments’
A CANADIAN teacher has been placed on leave after months of criticism from parents about her size-z prosthetic breasts.
Kayla Lemieux, an industrial arts teacher at Oakville Trafalgar High School in Ontario, was reportedly photographed by the New York Post dressed as a man, without breasts, walking down a street. The teacher has maintained that she was not the person in the photograph and that her breasts are real. She has also insisted that she suffers from a rare condition called gigantomastia and that she was born “intersex”, as opposed to transgender.
According to the US’S National Institutes of Health gigantomastia is a “rare condition characterised by excessive breast growth”.
After the photograph was published, a spokesman for Halton District School Board told the Toronto Sun newspaper: “While not currently on an active assignment, the teacher remains employed.”
Controversy surrounding Ms Lemieux began last year when it emerged she was teaching classes wearing a wig and a tight top stretched over her breasts and protruding nipples.
The row led to heated school board meetings, at which parents complained her appearance was inappropriate for children, and the school received bomb threats.
In a separate interview with the New York Post, Ms Lemieux said: “I can’t tell you who that is [in the photograph] because I don’t want to bring anyone else into this. This is who I am. This is how I look. I am always going out looking the way I am. I’m not wearing prosthetic breasts. These are real.”
The teacher told the newspaper that she began hormone replacement therapy in 2021 and was “in transition”.
However, she said she was “not a transgendered person” and was born “intersex”.
Expert estimates of the number of people born intersex range from 0.02 per cent to 1.7 per cent of the population.
Ms Lemieux said her gigantomastia had been brought on by the course of hormone therapy she had undertaken.
She told the New York Post: “It’s rare, there’s no doubt about it. It affects women on a very rare basis, but in my case, I believe, and my doctor thinks, because I have XX chromosomes as well, that has something to do with it, and hormone sensitivity to oestrogen has caused it.”
In a subsequent email to the Toronto Sun, she wrote: “I decided to break my silence and put my name next to my statements, and now I am being asked to provide proof. I really don’t know how to help you with that.”
Halton District School Board has previously supported the teacher by allowing her to work.
In a statement in September it said: “Gender identity and gender expression are protected grounds under the Ontario Human Rights Code.”
At a recent protest, parents carried signs saying “I feel mocked”, “too far” and “student teacher role model”.
Stephen Lecce, Ontario’s minister for education, said: “Halton parents are rightfully outraged at what’s taking place. The welfare of kids should prevail in our judgments.”
The school district said it would “prioritise education and a learning environment for our students” but “at the same time, we’re holding firm to our values of inclusion”.