5 days ago
High school athlete details 'traumatic' incident with trans rival that left her feeling 'violated'
A female high-school swimmer has opened up on the 'traumatic' moment she found out she had been sharing a locker room with a transgender opponent after being kept in the dark by a rival school.
Glencoe High School junior Lilian Hammond claims she unknowingly competed against and changed alongside a biological male on another swimming team during her sophomore year, having initially assumed they were also female.
'It wasn't until the last meet that I realized, "Oh, that is a trans person," and by that point it was too late,' Hammond said in an interview with Fox News.
'The shock that came was the mistrust and the lying, I felt very betrayed, I felt betrayed by the adults and the coaches on the other team that let it happen without my consent and my knowledge.
'My team didn't know, my coach didn't know… I felt very violated knowing that a man could have seen me changing.'
Despite already dealing with trans students at her own high school using the girls' restrooms, Hammond was left traumatized by her experience on the swim team.
'At the time it was overwhelming and felt traumatic since I was kept in the dark,' she added.
Hammond is far from alone in experiencing the issue of trans athletes in women's sports first hand, with more and more female athletes continuing to speak out.
Riley Gaines, a leading voice in the fight against biological males competing in women's sports, has previously discussed the feeling of being 'violated' by sharing a locker room with a trans athlete herself.
Last year, San Jose State University dominated headlines when their women's volleyball team reached a championship final thanks to the help of trans player Blaire Fleming.
Oregon athlete Alexa Anderson, who recently went viral after refusing to stand on the same podium as a trans opponent, also spoke with Fox News about the 'scary' backlash she has received over the gesture.
'When me and Reese stepped down there was definitely some confusion, there was definitely some anger and just a lot of people who didn't understand why were were doing this, and it was scary. Everyone was looking at us," Anderson said.
'There was a lot of people on and off the field. I heard shouts of them telling us to get out of the way.'
Hammond, meanwhile, admits her ordeal will influence how she votes in future political elections, given Donald Trump and the Republican party have openly taken a stand against trans athletes in women's sports over the past year.
'Just this last election, looking at the different beliefs between the two candidates, you had one candidate who openly believes biological men should be allowed in women's restrooms and women's sports, and was not doing anything, and then you had another candidate who said, "This will be one of the first things I change," and that's what Donald Trump did,' she said.
'In the future, that's something I'm going to look for.'
