LOS ANGELES — Bruce Jenner’s much-anticipated ABC interview with Diane Sawyer kicked off Friday night with some tears and an expected revelation. “For all intents and purposes,” Jenner said, “I am a woman.”
Jenner teared up even before the questions began, telling Sawyer, “I’ve been thinking about this day forever and what I should do with my life and how do I tell my story” and reaching for a tissue.
“I’ve always been confused about my gender identity since I was this big,” said the 65-year-old, who Sawyer said wanted to continue to be referred to as “he” and “him” for the time being.
It was, he said, as if God had put a little boy together, adding smarts and athletic ability and more, and then said, “Let’s give him the soul of a woman and see how he deals with that.”
The two-hour special reviewed Jenner’s Olympic glory before stepping back in time for a look at an early childhood in which he would put on his sister’s dress and his mother’s scarf, taking care to put everything back exactly the same, so as not to get “caught.”
Jenner said this interview would be the last as Bruce Jenner. “She,” Jenner said, would be the next to speak publicly.