As a Woman: What I Learned about Power, Sex, and the Patriarchy after I Transitioned

by Paula Stone Williams Narrated by Paula Stone Williams

Overview

This moving and unforgettable memoir of a transgender pastor's transition from male to female is an “audacious, gripping, and profoundly real journey that speaks to the mind, heart, and soul” (Joshua J. Dickson, director of Faith Based Initiatives, Biden Campaign)-perfect for fans of Redefining Realness and There Is Room for You.

As a father of three, married to a wonderful woman, and holding several prominent jobs within the Christian community, Dr. Paula Stone Williams made the life-changing decision to physically transition from male to female at the age of sixty. Almost instantly, her power and influence in the evangelical world disappeared and her family had to grapple with intense feelings of loss and confusion.

Feeling utterly alone after being expelled from the evangelical churches she had once spearheaded, Paula struggled to create a new safe space for herself where she could reconcile her faith, her identity, and her desire to be a leader. Much to her surprise, the key to her new career as a woman came with a deeper awareness of the inequities she had overlooked before her transition. Where her opinions were once celebrated and amplified, now she found herself sidelined and ignored. New questions emerged. Why are women's opinions devalued in favor of men's? Why does love and intimacy feel so different? And, was it possible to find a new spirituality in her own image?

In As a Woman, Paula's “critical questions about gender, personhood, and place are relevant to anyone. Her writing insightfully reveals aspects of our gender socialization and culture that often go unexamined, but that need to be talked about, challenged, and changed” (Soraya Chemaly, author of Rage Becomes Her) in order to fully understand what it means to be male, female, and simply, human.

Editorial Reviews

JUNE 2021 - AudioFile

The gentle rasp in author Paula Stone Williams's voice speaks of how much she has used it as a minister, church leader, counselor, and singer. Her vocal control, specifically her alterations in pacing, intonation, and emphasis, reveals her remarkable intellectual curiosity and allegiance to honesty as she shares skillful observations of social relations in American culture. At one time, Williams was a white, male entrepreneurial evangelical minister who had access to all the privileges of the patriarchy. Having transitioned to female late in life, she now compellingly deconstructs those patriarchal privileges—ranging from male-centric biases to fashion chauvinism. In telling her personal story of transition, her attention to psychological and religious dynamics, as well as to gender realities and politics, leavens her excellent storytelling with wit and empathy. F.M.R.G. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine

Publishers Weekly

04/26/2021

In this earnest, empathetic debut, Williams aims to bridge her Christian faith with her transgender identity as she reconciles these aspects of her life. Raised by a pastor father and emotionally volatile mother, her path in ministry was all but preordained. Early on, she was ambivalent about her assigned (male) gender. “I did not dislike being a boy,” she recalls, and she felt she was meant to be a girl. She married her college sweetheart, Cathy, in 1972, and moved up in the evangelical church, raising three children and becoming CEO of the Orchard Group, a “church planting” ministry. But the call to transition was impossible to ignore, so she began hormone therapy. Her transition was met by a harsh rejection from the Orchard Group and eventually a divorce from Cathy. After making her living as part of an institution built on condemning LGBTQ individuals, she discovered that the authority she enjoyed as a straight white man was unavailable to her as a trans lesbian. She did manage, though, to carve out new leadership roles in affirming churches and continues to work as a pastor. While she examines her new perspective with humility and grace, Williams’s observations about patriarchy won’t come as revelations to most women and LGBTQ readers. Those haunted by evangelical culture will find much to ponder in this story. Agent: Roger Freet, Foundry Literary + Media. (June)

Briar Goldberg

This is a book for anyone who’s ever needed to make a change, and let’s be honest, that’s all of us. So, let Paula be your guide. Her beautifully told personal story mixed with her acute observations about privilege and authenticity will leave you feeling open and hopeful.

Soraya Chemaly

Paula Stone Williams’ critical questions about gender, personhood, and place are relevant to anyone. Her writing insightfully reveals aspects of our gender socialization and culture that often go unexamined, but that need to be talked about, challenged, and changed.

Brian D. McLaren

When I was a young pastor, a teenager dared to confide to me that the authentic person inside didn’t match the gender of the body seen by the outside world. I wish As a Woman had been available to me then. It not only helps us understand the experience of many of our neighbors; it also inspires us to listen for the "sound of the genuine," as Howard Thurman called it, in others—and in ourselves.

T. Scott Case

Paula’s storytelling is artful, funny, and inspiring. If you look like me—middle-aged white American man—you’ll understand your unique super-power to make our country better for our mothers, sisters, and daughters as well as everyone else who doesn’t look like us.

Joshua J. Dickson

This book is nothing less than an audacious, gripping, and profoundly real journey that speaks to the mind, heart, and soul. As we grapple with what it means to love people as Jesus did, As a Woman provides poignant insights into the beauty, complexity, and deeply intersectional nature of all God’s children. What’s more, Paula’s brilliant writing, discerning reflections, and incisive wit make this an important and accessible read. It will teach you lessons about loving yourself, God, and others—and challenge you in all the right ways.

Katrina Mathewson

As a Woman is a masterful and unflinching story that will challenge the ways in which you see the world, other people, and even yourself. Anyone on a journey of discovery will feel at home in Paula’s book.

Diana Butler Bass

As a Woman is a heart-rending and brave spiritual memoir of gender transition. Reading Paula Stone Williams, I wept then understood; felt angry then empowered. This book is ultimately about the joyful triumph of an authentic and faithful life, a profoundly human and humane story of love and justice.

Jeremy Duhon

Paula is one of the most courageous individuals you’ll find. Her wisdom is expansive yet graceful, and her story reveals an authentic journey that we can all learn from. In the end, she reminds us that at the heart of everything is love.

Sean Hanish

The honesty with which Paula tells her story is the foundation of all true art. It is an imperfect journey riddled with betrayal, sadness, and true loneliness, but Paula never doubts the love she has for her family, her community, or her faith. These stories are the kind that we all need to share.

Caitie Bradley Shea

As A Woman, at its simplest, is a story about bravery, and what it takes to follow one’s heart and authentic self despite the consequences. The impact of Paula’s transition is palpable, as she details losing the power, privilege and prestige that came with being an Evangelical Pastor, a successful CEO, and a man. However, it is through Paula’s unique lens - her life experiences on both sides - that she is able to so acutely pinpoint the realities of gender bias.

James Martin

Perhaps no human experience is as misunderstood today as that of the transgender person. That means we are called to listen and learn—first from transgender people themselves. I pray the world may begin to pay attention to the stories of people like Paula, and open our hearts to their struggles, concerns and dreams.

Colby Martin

The only thing more emotional than reading about Paula’s unceremonious severing from her job after coming out as transgender, is following along in awe as Paula took those shattered pieces and shows that truly death does not have the last word. And while her story inspires us to live for the truth of who we are, it is her unique insights into the differences between living as a man and a woman that empowers us to live for the greater good of all. What Paula has done in As a Woman is magnificent.

Cindy W. Anderson

Paula’s book is an essential read for any human who takes seriously their obligation to help close the gender equity gap. If understanding is the first step to action, then reading what Paula has to say about succeeding on both sides is the best place to start.

Joe Boyd

Powerfully and tenderly written with a poetic flair, As a Woman is in the end surprisingly practical for anyone ready to examine their own presuppositions about faith, power, sexuality and gender.

Linda Kay Klein

Fired, robbed, disowned and dismissed by the evangelical Christian world in which she once rose to power, Paula could have become bitter. But instead, she chose to become better—more thoughtful, more understanding, more self-reflective, more conscious of other people’s lives. Hers is a spiritual journey worth joining.

Library Journal

01/01/2021

Host of the popular advice column "¡Hola Papi!" on Substack, Brammer offers a memoir-in-essays, tracking what it's like to grow up as a queer, mixed-race Chicano kid in America's heartlands (75,000-copy first printing). In The Profession, originally scheduled for fall 2020 and written with Turnaround coauthor Knobler, Bratton tracks a career that led to his being police commissioner in New York City. Burns proclaims Where You Are Is Not Who You Are, sharing where she's been and what she's learned as the first Black female CEO of a Fortune 500 company (75,000-copy first printing). Former teen model Diamond (Naked Rome) reveals a childhood both wacky and cliff-hanging in Nowhere Girl; on the run with an outlaw family, she lived in more than a dozen countries, on five continents, under six assumed identities, by age nine (50,000-copy first printing). Twitter-famous Henderson offers The Ugly Cry to tell us about being raised Black in a mostly white community by tough grandparents after her mother abandoned her. Today show news anchor Melvin uses Pops to explore issues of race and fatherhood while recalling his own dad (100,000-copy first printing). Founder of Chicago's Dreamcatcher Foundation, which assists young people in disadvantaged areas, Myers-Powell recalls a childhood fractured by her mother's death and a life of pimps and parties before finally Leaving Breezy Street (75,000-copy first printing). Growing up scary smart if poor and emotionally unsupported, James Edward Plummer renamed himself Hakeem Muata Oluseyi to honor his African heritage and now leads A Quantum Life as a NASA physicist. In House of Sticks, Tran recalls leaving Vietnam as a toddler in 1993 and growing up in Queens, helping her mom as a manicurist and eventually graduating from Columbia (100,000-copy first printing). In As a Woman, Williams, a celebrated speaker on gender equity and LGTBQ+ issues, describes the decision to transition from male to female as a 60-year-old husband, father, and pastor (60,000-copy first printing).

JUNE 2021 - AudioFile

The gentle rasp in author Paula Stone Williams's voice speaks of how much she has used it as a minister, church leader, counselor, and singer. Her vocal control, specifically her alterations in pacing, intonation, and emphasis, reveals her remarkable intellectual curiosity and allegiance to honesty as she shares skillful observations of social relations in American culture. At one time, Williams was a white, male entrepreneurial evangelical minister who had access to all the privileges of the patriarchy. Having transitioned to female late in life, she now compellingly deconstructs those patriarchal privileges—ranging from male-centric biases to fashion chauvinism. In telling her personal story of transition, her attention to psychological and religious dynamics, as well as to gender realities and politics, leavens her excellent storytelling with wit and empathy. F.M.R.G. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2021-04-13
A transgender woman chronicles her difficult journey from "alpha male" and evangelical leader to life in the body that feels most natural to her.

Paula was born Paul in West Virginia, raised to follow in the footsteps of an evangelical pastor father. Paul went to Bible college and became a pastor, "guaranteeing a life of cognitive dissonance." Though he "did not dislike being a boy…from as early as I can remember, in my heart I longed to be a girl." He married and was ordained into the Christian ministry, raising three children. Then, by transitioning from Paul to Paula, Williams "exploded the family narrative and shocked a whole denomination." After transition, she lost employment, lots of money, most friends, and the privilege routinely accorded White men. Today, the author is a pastor and pastoral counselor in Boulder County, Colorado, as well as an activist for gender and LGBTQ+ equity. She has broken free from evangelism to "embrace a more generous expression of the Christian faith,” and consequently, the fundamentalist church has rejected her. Nonetheless, the author continues to describe her journey in religious terms, seeing her transition and life experience as a "sacred and holy adventure." As she notes, “healthy spirituality can be a solution to the damage done by bad religion.” However, the author has also discovered that living as a strong female is not as easy as living as an alpha male, as many of the same traits (confidence, decisiveness) are perceived differently according to gender. More often than not, men are judged by their content, women by their looks. Delivering lectures, progressive sermons, and TED Talks, Williams describes "the surprises of living as a woman, and particularly the shock of losing my male privilege.” After her own transition, Williams calls for even broader societal change around gender and sexuality.

Not just a compelling personal memoir, this book holds lessons for all of us.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940173138149
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster
Publication date:	06/01/2021
Edition description:	Unabridged

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