Jamie Williams sits on the couch in his Cologne apartment and looks at pictures of his former self.
"That's soooo cute, I love this picture," he says while looking at old family photos on his laptop.
Today, the 21-year-old is happy - with his appearance and life.
But that wasn't always the case.
"Back then, I wanted everything to be deleted and no pictures of me with long hair to exist. I wanted to somehow erase my former self," he says thoughtfully. The long hair is now a thing of the past. "I now look back fondly on what I've achieved. I'm proud to see that I don't look like that anymore."
Williams' birth assigned sex was female but he is now living as a transgender man. While Jamie Williams did not have to worry about changing his gender-neutral first name, others do.
But that is changing. In April, the German government passed its Self-Determination Law that is intended to replace the Transsexuals Act of 1980, which was deemed largely unconstitutional. Many affected by that law found it humiliating.
The new law makes it much easier for people to change their sex on official documents.
Williams' journey is similar to many trans people who do not feel they belong to the gender assigned to them at birth.
Williams grew up with two brothers in Brandenburg. The three look alike, have the same hobbies and the same taste in fashion. A happy family.
But at some point, Williams realized something was different.
"The moment came when society made a distinction between us. Suddenly I had to wear quasi-feminine clothes and was told that my hobbies like playing football or building LEGOs didn't suit me."
Williams initially bowed to this role model, not wanting to cause any problems. But internal pressure was growing and turned into turmoil, he says. The gender he was assigned at birth simply didn't fit with his identity.
"I felt that I was doing something that wasn't good for me and that I wasn't me. I felt like I would be acting my whole life and that was very difficult."
Williams lived with this feeling for over three years, didn't speak to anyone about it and then, at 15, confided in his mother. The two talked intensively for three hours. Many tears flowed.
"Whenever I think about that moment, I cry again myself because it was a very emotional moment. I realized at the time: it doesn't matter which way I go" - Williams breaks off and has to hold back his tears.
"No matter what decision I make for my life, my mum is there for me. No matter how hard it is, she's with me every step of the way."
At a time when others his age are partying, pursuing their hobbies and falling in love, Williams' journey to find himself begins. He undergoes psychological counselling, has expert reports drawn up, starts hormone therapy, has his female mammary glands removed with a mastectomy and changes his gender on official documents.
In 2018, he started to become active on social media. Today he has more than 80,000 followers on Instagram and almost twice as many on TikTok.
As a content creator or "influencer," Williams has been talking openly about his life for some time now, giving workshops and answering questions from young people or their parents.
"I constantly get messages from people who have managed to come out thanks to my posts or who finally know who they are."
But he's also used to receiving hate messages. This is also a sign of how comfortable Williams now feels in his body. In the interview, the young man is open-minded, self-confident and laughs a lot.
"I'm doing very well today. I feel like I've arrived. I'm the only person I have to get up with in the morning. I'm the only person who has to get on with me for the rest of my life. That's why it's so important to go your own way."
The Brandenburg native, who has been living in Cologne for six months, expresses his feelings through music, writing songs and playing the guitar. He also goes to the gym up to six times a week. He is proud of his masculine body - including the scars on his chest - and often shows his shirtless body to his followers.
Williams believes that the new self-determination law is a step in the right direction, but there has been criticism from conservative circles.
The deputy leader of the opposition Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union conservative parliamentary group, Dorothee Bär, fears that young people could be encouraged to undergo gender reassignment surgery.
Williams says Bär shouldn't worry about that.
"If I didn't have to go down this path, then I wouldn't have gone down it. It's not a path you choose voluntarily. It was emotionally exhausting. It was mentally exhausting. It was socially exhausting. It did so much to me. I wouldn't wish this path on anyone," he says.
It was "an incredibly wonderful feeling" to come to terms with yourself. "But I would never have got there if it had just been a phase. You don't do something like that for attention," he stressed.
Williams would like to see more acceptance and tolerance from society in general. "The most important thing is that everyone is happy and can go their own way. Why does everything always have to be commented on and criticized?"
