Sophia Young: a friend among strangers, a stranger among friends
The Australian hermaphrodite model had a buoyant start to her modeling career despite being subjected to horrendous bullying at school. “I was suspended and bullied a lot, it was disgusting,” she said.
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Ms. Young had Asperger's Syndrome and was unable to walk or talk until she was 5 years old.
“I was behind in development, I couldn’t get better, I was bullied and teased so much that I isolated myself from children on playgrounds, became an outcast, and other children perceived me as a creepy freak.”
“I punched other kids in the face, broke school property, damaged school laptops because I was trying to deal with my pain that way. I was very angry."
From 2003 to 2011, Ms. Young attended several preparatory and public schools in New South Wales and wanted to take her Abitur but was expelled due to poor academic performance.
“Actually, my mother wanted me to go to a special school, but I refused, because such children always made too much noise and I did not want to be treated like all of them. I just wanted to be like everyone else."
Ms Young told Daily Mail Australia that the relentless bullying she experienced resulted in six suicide attempts. In 2014, Miss Young moved to Sydney. She was only 21 years old when she entered the modeling world.
“One of my friends told me that I looked very interesting and that I should start a modeling career, but I didn’t seriously think about it because I kept a very stern image and had a sharp, rough personality, unlike other models.”
As a result, Ms. Young signed a contract with several agencies, but it was a very difficult search for herself.
“Every company, every client is looking for male models or female models, and if you are of both sexes, they don’t need it,” she says.
"Big sex and androgynous models are still considered taboo in this industry."
Ms. Young's only reason for starting her modeling career with her first agency was because she needed money for a gender reassignment surgery, which costs around $60,000 in Australia.
She initially raised money for a remedial operation on Go Fund Me (an Australian crowdfunding platform), where she received her first $500 in donations.
However, not so long ago, Miss Young deleted her page and returned the money to everyone.
“I don’t want to feel like I’m borrowing money from someone. I returned them because I feel guilty about taking money from people who earn it with great difficulty. Now I want to try to get money by working in the modeling business.”
But Ms. Young doesn't want to be a model forever and hopes to find a "real" job over time.
Keywords: Two-faced | Woman | Model | Model business | Man | Gender | Fashion model