Actor Elliot Page shared his ‘joy’ at wearing swimming trunks for the first time in five months after publicly coming out as transgender.
Elliot, 34, celebrated the milestone moment on his Instagram account when he posted a smiling photo of himself wearing red swim shorts and showing off ripped abs.
“Trans bb’s first swim trunks,” he captioned and added the hashtags #transjoy and #transisbeautiful.
Elliot’s post was flooded with supportive comments from his fellow Hollywood stars, including Miley Cyrus, Nina Dobrev, and his Umbrella Academy co-star Justin Cornwell.
“Dude I see why you crushed me in that workout!” Justin wrote.
“You look amazing… and most of all happy,” Nina added.
Miley also praised the actor’s transformation, by simply commenting: “Hot” and added a heart emoji.
The actor’s latest post comes two weeks after he spoke out about his life-changing upper body surgery in a candid interview with Oprah.
Elliot explained that he chose to open up about his own experiences in the hopes of showing others how ‘life-saving’ gender-affirming surgery is for trans people.
“I wanted to talk about it for a couple of reasons,” Elliot said. “I wanted to share with people just how much it has changed my life. And I want people to know that not only has it been life-changing for me, [but] I do believe it is life-saving and it’s the case for so many people.”
In his first interview with TIME magazine as transgender, the actor revealed that he had undergone a subcutaneous mastectomy in which the br*asts and br*ast tissue is removed to create a masculine chest.
The surgery is usually carried on transgender men who have already started hormone therapy. Such therapy is used to create more masculine characteristics like developing a deeper voice, facial hair growth, and muscle growth.
Elliot said at the time that the results of the surgery have ‘completely transformed his life’ and helped him feel like his true, authentic self for the first time since enduring the ‘total hell’ of puberty earlier on in his life.
“Getting out of the shower and the towel’s around your waist and you’re looking at yourself in the mirror and you’re just like, “There I am,”‘ Elliot said. “And I’m not having the moment where I’m panicked. I’m not having all these little moments that used to be just being in a T-shirt. It’s being able to touch my chest.’”
In 2014, Elliot came out publicly as gay in an emotional speech at the Human Rights Campaign’s Time to Thrive conference for LGTBQ youth. During that time, he hoped the news would help others struggling with their sexuality.
“I’m here today because I am gay,” he said at the time. “And because maybe I can make a difference.”
Four years later, Elliot married dancer Emma Portner, however, the pair quietly separated in the summer of 2020 and divorced earlier this year. The reason and the news of the split were not revealed until after he publicly came out as transgender.