In 2007, Thomas Beatie made headlines around the world when, after having undergone hormone
treatment in his early twenties to transition from female to male, he became the first documented
legal male to become pregnant.
Beatie later gave birth to one child in 2008 and two more in 2011, generating massive media
attention and public fascination about him and his family's groundbreaking story.
After years of nonstop scrutiny, the "Pregnant Man" has since taken a step back from life
in the public eye.
What prompted this departure?
Media spectacle
After a widely-viewed interview on Oprah in 2008, and numerous national and international
television and print appearances, it's entirely possible that Beatie grew tired of having
all eyes focused on him and his family.
Along with all the of the positive media attention, Beatie was lampooned in episodes of South
Park and Saturday Night Live.
"it's me, Thomas Beatie, the pregnant man that was on Oprah because I'm pregnant.
And I'm a man."
In the wake of all the press, Beatie told Hollywood Life in 2012, "We have had a rough
ride…We have had death threats, crazies.
I've been called a freak.
The really nasty stuff has come online, with email, Facebook and YouTube.
Some of it has been terrifying…The FBI have been involved and they monitor things for
us.
The world is full of crazy people and we have to have our wits about us."
New careers
In 2008, Beatie penned a highly personal essay for The Advocate that movingly detailed his
experiences becoming pregnant and giving birth, writing, "Wanting to have a biological child
is neither a male nor female desire, but a human desire.
How does it feel to be a pregnant man?
Incredible.
Despite the fact that my belly is growing with a new life inside me, I am stable and
confident being the man that I am."
November that same year saw the release of his widely-praised book, Labor of Love: The
Story of One Man's Extraordinary Pregnancy.
Lauded as "defiant and transformative" and "unforced and unpretentious," the book propelled
Beatie into a different phase as a public figure.
Along with writing, Beatie made yet another career leap in 2016, leaving the U.S. for
a period to take part in the tenth season of French reality TV series Secret Story.
Beatie eventually revealed his big secret, previously unbeknownst to his cast mates,
that he was the world's first pregnant man.
And it was quite a surprise to his co-stars, who weren't as up on their pregnant man gossip
as people in the U.S.
Beatie has also been busy building up a public speaking career and fighting for transgender,
LBTQ, and human rights issues.
"It'd be really cool if my voice sounded like this."
"Hi my name is Thomas Beatie."
You might not catch him on Oprah again anytime soon, but there's a chance he's coming to
a college near you.
Family woes
Beatie's marriage to Nancy, the mother of his children, ended after nine years in 2012
— but not without its fair share of drama.
The couple's divorce was initially blocked when Arizona's Maricopa County Family Court
found that the marriage itself wasn't legal in the first place, since Beatie had not shown
he was a man when he wed in 2003.
So that meant he couldn't show he and his wife were a heterosexual couple.
At the time, same-sex marriages were not recognized in Arizona.
"Going through a divorce is always difficult but I'm just trying to start a new life"
However, the Arizona Court of Appeals ultimately allowed the divorce to proceed because Thomas
Beatie's 2003 marriage in Hawaii was considered legal in Arizona, so the couple moved ahead
with their split.
As Beatie himself notes, it was a landmark case, as "the outcome of Beatie v. Beatie…set
a precedent for the ability of transgender people to get married, stay married, or be
granted a divorce."
More turmoil followed in 2015.
To settle things once and for all, Beatie was forced to hand over his prized shark tooth
collection to Nancy.
But that still wasn't the end of it.
Beatie was arrested that year and pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct in an Arizona
Court after being accused of stalking his ex-wife Nancy with a GPS tracking device.
"A couple of months ago I found a tracking device on my car when I had a blowout."
Not only had he had the device in place for years, but he used its signal to follow her
around and even replace its batteries to make sure it wouldn't run out of energy.
"He just wants me to disappear, and that's a scary thing."
Hopefully, a night spent behind bars helped Beatie learn his lesson about such creepy
behavior — because four years after divorce proceedings began, Beatie found love once
again with a woman named Amber Nicholas.
Nicholas had worked at his children's school, and the couple was married in 2016, with Beatie
gushing to the Daily Mail, "it feels wonderful to finally be Mr and Mrs Beatie."
Gender reassignment
Beatie's three children from his first marriage — a daughter and two sons — were all born
between June 2008 and July 2010 through artificial insemination using donor sperm.
In 2012, he decided to finally undergo gender reassignment surgery — but didn't rule out
adding a fourth baby to his family, telling The Mirror, "I would have to have a ­caesarian,
but I'd willingly do it to have ­another bundle of joy."
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