‘Why shouldn’t I utilize what I’ve got?’
A transgender dad who breastfeeds his baby boy has hit back at trolls who say it makes him “less of a man”.
Tanius Posey, 31, who was born female, made the transition six years ago after feeling like “something was off” from an early age.
He was shocked when he found out he was pregnant in the spring of 2021, and gave birth to his son, Za’nius, in early 2022.
Unperturbed, he decided to raise the child as a ‘seahorse dad’, in reference to the sea creatures which carry the babies using some of the same genetic instructions as mammalian pregnancy.
@transking30I’m low key over it how do y’all go years doing it cause this ain’t it ??♂️?
The 31-year-old has continuously shared his journey on his TikTok account – gaining more than 928,000 followers and 10 million likes across his videos – but it has sparked a slew of backlash from nasty commenters.
Among the criticism, some people have said he “doesn’t belong on this planet”, while others have claimed his son will “die” because he’s consuming breastmilk that Tanius produced while taking hormones.
He recently responded to the criticism during an interview with Truly, while encouraging other seahorse dads to ‘utilize what they’ve got’ without feeling any shame.
“I’ve got the parts to be able to [breastfeed]. Just because I transitioned does not mean I stripped myself from wanting to give my child nutrients,” he said.
“I’ve got it, why not utilize what I’ve got? My child has to eat. I can’t sit there and starve him. He’s gotta eat and he doesn’t take a bottle, so I’ve got to feed him.”
Some of the terrible responses that Tanius has received include messages like, “Men don’t carry babies” and accusations that the child might resent him when he finds out he was the one who carried him.
He admitted that he’s even received a lot of negative comments from people who are part of the trans community, telling him things like, “You are not trans enough because you carried your baby,” or, “You’re making the rest of us look bad.”
But the hate has not brought the TikTok star down. He added, “I got a lot of backlash, it got the best of me real bad [at first]. But I’m like, maybe if I continue sharing I might be able to help the next individual.
“My response of the haters is that we gotta stop living under a rock, we’ve gotta open up our eyes and realize there’s more than one way to live.”
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