Laylah Beattie has been a vocal advocate for the trans community in Ireland since her teenage years when she wrote a series of personal essays called Who Cares?: Life as an Irish Transgender Teen.
Soon after, she appeared on The Late Late Show to speak with host Ryan Tubridy about her experience of growing up in Ireland. A year later, she walked into the First Dates Ireland restaurant, becoming the show's first transgender dater, where she spoke openly about her experiences of dating in Ireland.
From there, she then went on to contribute to Brendan O'Connor's Cutting Edge, where she tackled topics such as street harassment and puberty blockers, detailing just some of the issues she had faced throughout her young life.
Now 25, and with many hard life lessons learned, Laylah is bringing her incredible story to the stage in a one-woman show called Predrinks at Laylah's.
"It's kind of an imaginary pre-drinks at my house where everyone has arrived early and I'm nowhere near ready and rushing to get ready," she tells me over the phone.
"As I'm doing that, I'm talking about the last few years of my life. During COVID, and before that, my life got very serious. I kind of found myself again through nightlife and through partying, so this is my way of telling quite a vulnerable story in a way that I'm comfortable to do it."
In just 60 minutes, and in the comfort of her constructed home of Smock Alley Theatre, Laylah will bring audiences through stories of heartbreak, hospitalisation, and her recent gender affirmation surgery.
"I thought the worst part of the surgery would be the pain, but it's actually been rediscovering myself," she explains. "I feel like I'm almost back to being an adolescent in terms of having this whole new part of my body - and quite a complicated one at that - and finding out what works for me.
"I definitely felt disconnected from my body for a while and that was not an easy feeling considering I had worked so hard to get to that point. Thankfully, I'm a year on now and I'm really happy, but I definitely had moments of doubt and difficulty."
As well as going through a number of physical changes, Laylah says that she had to put a lot of work into her mental health over the past couple of years.
Having spent so much of her life battling for representation and working in advocacy, she says that when life finally began to calm down, she realised that she had some big personal battles to take on including an eating disorder and feelings of depression.
"I was in and out of psych hospitals for a good few years trying to get that sorted, but I think that was a symptom of struggling for so long without anybody knowing."
Although the more serious topics will be given their due diligence throughout the show, Laylah insists there will be plenty of levity throughout the night. It is pre-drinks after all.
According to the performer, nights on the town have become a kind of self-care ritual where she can let go of the week's stresses - something she wants to share with the audience.
"In the last couple of years, I've been taking care of my grandmother who needs full-time care. I do three nights with her a week, and it's so much responsibility and very difficult, so the thing I turned to was definitely partying.
"It was kind of where I found my people. Obviously, LGBTQ people are really good at partying," she adds, laughing. "A lot of my friends now are gay men just because I think I relate to their style of going out.
"I want the audience to hear some new points of view - depending on who they are - but most of all, I want the show to be uplifting. It's going to get into vulnerable territory, and I'm going to be telling some difficult truths about life as a trans woman and how harsh this world can be, but at the end of the day, I want to feel like we've all had a gas time and are walking out to a night out."
For more information and to get tickets to the show, click here.
If you have been affected by issues raised in this story, please visit: www.rte.ie/helplines.
