-A memory from his childhood.

-I was 8 or 10 years old and, when I was alone, I would paint myself with my mother's paints. But I did it secretly, as if I were crazy.

-How did you get along at school, with your classmates?

-Those were different times. Boys who looked feminine were ostracized, laughed at, and I tried to hide it.

-And at school?

-I kept playing a role that wasn't mine, pretending to be a man. I even got married, at 24. The suffering kept accumulating, until there comes a moment when you say: "Either I live as what I am or I don't live anymore."

-And she decided to change her body.

"I'm 45 and I officially started the transition 6 years ago. Physically, it's gradual: every day you look in the mirror to see if your breasts are bigger. Mentally, you become more sensitive, your emotions overwhelm you. You take female hormones your whole life, and also male hormones, antiandrogens, until you have surgery."

-You already had a date set for the sex change operation.

-It was planned for 2012, but due to the cuts it has been postponed.

-And what are you going to do?

-To continue going out every day and enjoying my femininity, being a woman. Internally, externally, and legally, I am a woman.

-How many years has it taken you to speak with this conviction?

-Until I was 35, when I was referred to the gender identity unit at the Clínic, I was very confused. I felt like a woman and at the same time I was attracted to women. I didn't understand anything, I didn't understand the difference between sexual identity and sexual orientation.

-Could you explain it?

Many people believe that transsexuality is like homosexuality, but they're not the same at all. Gender identity is one thing, and sexual orientation is another. You're not a woman because you like men; first you feel like a woman, and then you can like whatever you want.

-Why are we women?

-Because we feel like women. I identified with girls from a young age.

-But does the essence of femininity exist? And where is it? In the vagina? In the brain? In the gaze?

"The feminine essence is felt deeply, but it's also in the body. Perhaps not for you, but I'm trapped in a male body, and when I look in the mirror, I don't recognize myself. There are many types of trans women, but unfortunately, we only see the ones on TV, the flamboyant ones, like La Veneno. Society has led these people to be this way, but a trans person can be an engineer, a journalist, a shop assistant..."

-At one point in the play he stands up and, pointing at the audience, accuses: "It's your fault."

People ask, "Why are you like this?" I found the answer in a documentary about Guernica. When the Nazis occupied France, Picasso was living in Paris, and the Gestapo came into his house and showed him a photograph of Guernica. "Did you paint this?" they asked. He looked at the photograph and said, "No, you painted this." But I admit that some of the blame is mine.

-Because?

After many years of therapy, and thanks to this play, I've reached conclusions I was previously incapable of. For example, that your self-esteem can't depend on the approval of others; if loving yourself depends on what others think of you, you're doomed. I struggle because I still seek my family's approval, but I can't always depend on their approval to feel good.

-Do you feel singled out?

-Pointed at, stared at. Less and less, but once a week I have to hear: "It's a guy!" I wish I could become invisible someday.

-What would you like to find in the eyes of others?

-Love, sincerity.

-And what do you find most often?

-Fear, resentment and, above all, loneliness, but I don't know if it's a reflection of my own fear, resentment and loneliness.