Former volleyball player in San Jose’s state, balant Fleming, publicly admitted to being a transgender athlete and spoke of her last tumultuous volleyball season with the Spartans in a long interview recently published with the magazine New York Times.
The senior season of Fleming was spoiled by plans, frequent online abuses and legal action while it and the Spartans have involuntarily became central personalities of a national transgender athlete debate which has become a subject of division of the presidential campaign of Donald Trump.
In history published on Sunday, Fleming spoke publicly for the first time about a gender transition that it started in adolescence and remained quite private until it was revealed by a conservative website in April 2024.
The fire storm that followed was so chaotic that Fleming planned to do what so many opponents wanted: to leave the team. She told Times writer Jason Zengerle that even if she played well and the Spartans qualified for the title match of the conference, partly helped by six opponent packages, the whole event was “the darkest moment of my life”.
Fleming talked about the realization of her childhood that she was different from other children, saying that she was initially thought that she could be gay, but when she heard the word “transgender” in eighth year, “I felt this huge relief and a weight on my shoulders. It made so much meaning, “she told Times. She started her gender transition at 14.
Fleming and Brooke Slusser, senior teammates and former roommates swept through the media and political attention that followed, also shared new revelations about how their friendship has suffered in the past year.
While Slusser initially supported Fleming as IMI, despite a personal conviction that transgender women should not compete in female sports, their relationship was worse in September when Slusser joined a trial aimed at preventing Fleming from playing for the state of San Jose.
When Slusser discovered a story of Reduxx magazine last spring that Fleming was transgender, she said to Fleming: “I hope you are well, because no one deserves this hatred on the media. They do not know you as a person,” reported Times.
But when the two went to Europe with a team from Mountain West All-Star, Slusser heard opposite players that their schools could refuse to secure against SJSU if Fleming was still on the list.
It seemed to be a turning point for Slusser, who pressed the San Jose state coach Todd Kress, on how he intended to respond to potential packages.
“There is a certain point where it is like” OK, the only person in this scenario that causes all this should be deleted, and we can play this game “”, reportedly told Kress.
Months later, in September, Slusser joined a collective appeal, the complainants of which included the former swimmer of Kentucky Riley Gaines and other members of the Independent Council on Female Sports, a non -profit organization that defends transgender prohibitions in female sports.
Slusser’s decision to join the Fleming distress trial, which said: “I felt betrayed and perplexed. I did not understand how she could worry about me and do it at the same time. ”
The choice of Slusser to join the trial transformed the state of San Jose and the participation of transgender athletes in National News and, finally, in a subject of discussion in the November elections and the presidential race.
Within the team, the dynamics have also changed. Initially, Kress had expressed a certain disdain that he and his staff had inherited a transgender player from the previous coach of the SJSU, Trent Kersten. In an email unearthed by the Times, Kress responded to a reader of the original article who released Fleming by saying: “Maybe you should do your research and discover which coach and coach staff were there when this (student-athlete) was recruited / brought to SJ.”
But over time and that the external pressure increased, Kress has become someone in whom Fleming could confide. Finally, he defended his right to play.
“He was so empathetic,” said Fleming. “He tried very hard to be there for me.”
But Kress and Fleming’s communication was the exception, not the rule.
The players began to jump practices, citing mental health breaks, according to the former associate coach Melissa Batie-Smose. Match by shouting would have taken place among the training sessions, Kress at some point calling for what happened a “slutty festival,” reported the Times.
Kress and Slusser have ceased to speak, leaving Batie-Smose as an intermediary. Then, Kress and Batie-Smose, her first hiring in SJSU and long-standing assistant coach, ceased to speak, and she filed an IX in title alleging a preferential treatment towards Fleming.
After the filing of this complaint, Batie-Smose was suspended indefinitely in the State of San Jose and did not renew his contract during his expired in February.
During all this time, the Spartans continued to play when they had opponents who would face them. Fleming would have “cried almost every evening and planned to leave several times during the season”, at some point, feeling suicidal.
The Spartans finished second in the West mountain and reached the match for the title of the tournament via a FORFHET wooden state in the semi-finals. With an NCAA tournament berth on the line, they fell to Colorado State in the championship match.
Fleming and Slusser, the former roommates at the center of the chaotic season of the Spartans, end their SJSU courses remotely from their states of origin, preparing for the post-diploma life will bring.
San Jose state volleyball also evolves.
After the season, seven players were reportedly transferred from SJSU. Six stay in the team.
If you or someone you know with feelings of depression or suicidal thoughts, 988 suicide & Crifeline offers free support and 24 hours a day, information and resources for help. Call or send an SMS to Lifeline at 988, or consult the 988Lifeline.org website, where the cat is available.
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