Cher has been an advocate and ally to the LGBTQIA+ community for decades. But during an interview with CNN‘s Christiane Amanpour, the Oscar-winning actress and beloved singer, 74, spoke candidly about what she learned about herself as her son, Chaz Bono, 51, transitioned from female to male in 2009. “It was very unlike me to, in the beginning, have a problem with Chaz being gay, and it disappeared like that,” Cher said of when her son came out to her prior to his transition.
“Then we talked about (whether Chaz was) transgender for many years,” she revealed. “And (he) would say, ‘No, I don’t want to (transition). And then he went and said, ‘OK, I want to do this.'” As proud as Cher is now of her son living his most authentic, true life as the person he was meant to be, she admitted that, at first, “it wasn’t easy. I remember calling, and the old (voicemail) message … was on the phone, and that was very difficult,” she recalled.
.@cher reflects that when her son Chaz first revealed to her that he was transgender, “it wasn’t easy.” But it didn’t take her long to come around. “You have one child, but you don’t really lose them. They just are in a different shape! And Chaz is so happy.” pic.twitter.com/SeZlkcg7qW
— Christiane Amanpour (@camanpour) December 16, 2020
Since that time, however, Cher has really come to know something so important about being the parent of a child who is transgender. “You don’t really lose them,” she thoughtfully mused to Christiane. “They just are in a different shape.” Beyond his activism and willingness to open up about his lived experience, there is so much for Cher to be proud of when it comes to her son.
Chaz was the first transgender person to compete on Dancing With The Stars. He appeared on the reality TV competition’s 13th season. Chaz made it to week six with his professional partner Lacey Schwimmer in 2011. Since then, Chaz has also appeared on two seasons of FX’s American Horror Story and offered his thoughtful perspective on how the trans community has been represented in entertainment media in the 2020 Netflix documentary Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen.
