Catriona Innes

6 days ago | cosmopolitan.com | Catriona Innes

Content warning: This story contains implications of suicide. We speak every day. She’ll record me a video message, telling me what she’s been up to, how she’s feeling. Normally, she’s laughing. Or showing me the color of Edinburgh’s sky, the birds that flock around her window. April 16th was different. She messaged: “I am just so tired of having to prove that I exist.”She exists. She, like all trans people, has always existed. She is my dad. And she’s the strongest, most wonderful woman that I know.

1 week ago | cosmopolitan.com | Catriona Innes

We speak every day. She’ll record me a video message, telling me what she’s been up to, how she’s feeling. Normally, she’s laughing. Or showing me the colour of Edinburgh’s sky, the birds that flock around her window. Yesterday, was different. She messaged: “I am just so tired of having to prove that I exist.”She exists. She, like all trans people, has always existed. She is my dad. And she’s the strongest, most wonderful woman that I know.

1 month ago | cosmopolitan.com | Catriona Innes

The snow felt like a blank page. The temperature, which should have been biting, at minus 25 degrees, instead provided clarity. Its crisp sharpness made me feel as if I was breathing properly: how we should breathe.

1 month ago | cosmopolitan.com | Catriona Innes

I can’t do it. I’ve tried. I have put my trainers on, got a podcast lined up and headed out the door for my local park. But after around five minutes of determined strides, I find myself turning back around and heading for the safety of home. However much I try, I just can’t bring myself to do that walk. It’s too loaded. Too heavy with memories. This particular walk is just one of the seemingly tiny and insignificant reminders of the intense two-and-a-bit years when our lives turned upside down.

1 month ago | theguardian.com | Catriona Innes

There’s a stereotype about young men and sex. I see it play out across social media, and over wine-fuelled chats with my friends: that men only want one thing, that they all cheat and that, ultimately, they’re selfish in bed. It’s an idea that has been fuelled by the rise of toxic masculinity influencers such as Andrew Tate, who discuss sex as something they are “owed” and encourage other men to think similarly.