Stereophonics star Kelly Jones praises son for coming out as transgender: ‘I’ve learned a lot from him’
Stereophonics singer Kelly Jones says he has “learned a lot” from his 15-year-old son, Colby, who came out as transgender earlier this year.
During an appearance on The High Performance Podcast with hosts Jake Humphrey and Damian Hughes, Jones praised his son’s “courage” and opened up about how people would tell him “it's just a phase”.
“I’ve learned a lot from him,” Jones said, explaining that he has been trying to educate himself about transgender issues to help Colby.
“I’ve learned a lot from all my kids. You can’t stop learning from them really. I mean Colby’s episode was, you’ve got a young kid telling you something’s not right. And you think it’s about a sexuality thing, and it slowly trickles into a gender situation. And then I look around and I’m thinking: ‘Well, who can I talk to about this?'”
Jones added that he struggled to find someone to speak to who could relate to his family’s experience.
“I can talk to people about having kids from different mothers. I can talk to people about most things, but this is like, I’ve got no idea what’s going on here,” he explained.
“Once I realised that was actually happening, it was a case of, I have to do my research and go and talk to some therapist to get help, to get him therapists because he’s at an age where you’re not an adult, but you’re not a child and this in-between.”
The singer said that before Colby came out as transgender, people said he would “grow out of it”.
“‘I went to watch a carol service at the school last summer, and people are going: ‘It’s just a phase, he’ll grow out of it’,” Jones said.
“I went to this carol service and watching all these teenage girls singing with long hair and the little spots and all the stuff they’re doing. And he walked down with a short-cropped haircut, like David Bowie, wearing trousers and a shirt.”
Jones continued: “He couldn’t look more different from the rest of the girls there. And I’m thinking: ‘Well, that takes a lot of balls that.’
“And there’s no way you would be doing that if it wasn’t something for real, you know? So there’s a lot of courage involved in that whole thing. Yeah. It’s incredible.”
Jones first spoke about Colby’s transition in April, during an appearance on Fearne Cotton’s podcast, Happy Places.
The singer admitted to “getting upset” and “going through a grieving process” after struggling to “work out what was going on” at first.
“You feel like you’ve lost your daughter and you’ve gained a son, and then you get responsible for the siblings and how they’re going to deal with it and the grandparents,” he explained.
Colby is Jones’ first child with his ex-partner Rebecca Walters. Their second is Misty, 12, and Jones also has a three-year-old named Riley with wife Jakki Healy.
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