Jessica Platt learned to skate in a backyard ice rink her family built in a neighbor’s yard. She called it a back-rink. For as long as she can remember — so, since she was about 3 years old — Platt skated on that rink.
“Canada, right?” she joked in a phone interview.
Platt, 28, grew up in Brights Grove, Ontario, just outside of Sarnia, which is about 180 miles west of Toronto and just across the border from Michigan. Today, she plays for the Toronto Furies, a Canadian Women’s Hockey League team — something she didn’t exactly expect to happen when she first picked up a stick in her back-rink 25 years ago. That’s because, in reflection, playing professional sports is something that’s challenging for a transgender woman to consider as a possibility, if for no other reason than that there haven’t been any role models for Platt.
Katie Barnes 