Iowa News Reporter Goes On TV To Reveal That She’s A Transgender Woman: “For A Long Time I Didn’t Think I Would Get To Say That”

Lynette Rice
·1 min read
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A news reporter for an ABC affiliate in Des Moines, Iowa, who felt like she was previously “splitting myself in two” told viewers this week that she is a transgender woman.

Nora J.S. Reichardt appeared in a live package on WOI-DT (watch it below) to talk about her personal journey and how she used to be “just a person almost wearing my body, not living in it.” She’s worked for the station since July 2021.

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“I am a transgender woman living in Des Moines,” Reichardt said. “For a long time I didn’t think I would get to stay that, at least not on air like this. I didn’t know there was a place in a space for me to do this sort of work I have come to work and enjoy while getting to be myself when doing it.”

Reichardt recalled growing up in a rural Minnesota town and not having the “language to describe” how she was feeling. She also recalls being “anxious for as long as I can remember.”

“Awhile after I started being on air, I kind of just reached a personal breaking point where I thought, ‘Why don’t I like the person that I am seeing every time I am going out in the field? Why don’t I connect with that person? Why don’t I want to be that person?'”

She began counseling in September and sought “medical intervention,” which included hormone replacement therapy.

“Everyone in my life knew me as Nora except viewers at home,” she said to the camera.

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