StoryCorps Shorts: Love Lost, and Found

Special | Video has closed captioning.

Sue McConnell and Kristyn Weed are best friends and Vietnam-era veterans. Although they didn’t serve in the war together, they share a story of courage — on and off the battlefield. They met at a transgender veterans’ support group and became inseparable members of a powerful, enduring sisterhood.

Aired: 05/22/19

Rating: NR

Buy Now:

Problems Playing Video? | Closed Captioning

Funding & Distribution
Transcript

Major funding for POV is provided by PBS, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Wyncote Foundation, Reva & David Logan Foundation, the Open Society Foundations and the …

Major funding for POV is provided by PBS, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Wyncote Foundation, Reva & David Logan Foundation, the Open Society Foundations and the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional funding comes from Nancy Blachman and David desJardins, Bertha Foundation, The Hollywood Foreign Press Association's Charitable Trust, Park Foundation, Sage Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Chris and Nancy Plaut, Abby Pucker, Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee and public television viewers. POV is presented by a consortium of public television stations, including KQED San Francisco, WGBH Boston and THIRTEEN in association with WNET.ORG.

Open in new tab

Kristyn Weed (KW): I didn't start transitioning until I was 58.

Sue McConnell (SM): I guess I was 50.

KW: How did your family accept you?

SM: Well, my son disowned me.

He told his mother that he didn't want anything to do with the f----- freak.

So I don't get to talk to my grandson or my granddaughter.

KW: My family is similar to yours.

SM: Your daughter disowned you?

KW: Both my daughters disowned me, yeah.

SM: Yeah.

KW: Yeah.

SM: When I was growing up, I always knew there was something different.

I didn't like the same things the other boys did.

You know, they wanted to play Army and cowboys and Indians.

And I wanted to be the girl on the wagon that was sewing and making coffee [laughs].

KW: Right.

SM: But you know, I had to be who I wasn't so that I could survive.

KW: I spent 15 years in the Army and I enlisted of all places, as a paratrooper going to the 82nd Airborne Division.

And the units I was in, the soldiers were pretty hard-charging.

So that was the image you had to portray.

I didn't start wearing women's clothes until I was out of the military.

I wouldn't do it, because I was afraid.

SM: But then, we met at the transgender support group-- KW: Yeah, the VA support group-- SM: And we started joking and then just like nitpicking at each other and stuff-- KW: [laughs] SM:--and people said, 'Well you guys really are sisters!'

We do sit around and talk a lot.

We would sit in Denny's for coffee at like 2 o'clock in the afternoon and it'd be dark-- KW: And leave there at 10 o'clock at night SM:--10 o'clock at night.

SM & KW: [laughs] KW: The servers all know us, the managers know us.

SM: She flirts with all the waitresses.

KW: Me?

[laughs] SM: Yes, you do!

SM & KW: [laughs] KW: We get twenty percent military discount!

SM: Yes, we do!

KW: [laughs] You know, it hurts to have lost my daughters, but I found out love is not a two-way street.

And love is not unconditional.

SM: It is for some of us.

KW: You're always there for me.

There's never a doubt or question as to whether you would be or not.

SM: You are my sister.