There hasn’t been enough investment financially and there hasn’t been enough respect or care to explore how we can make sports better and fairer for everybody.

Meanwhile, people are making big opinions about trans athletes, without the research to back it up.

I got rejected from one organisation when I disclosed that I was trans. They literally just said that I couldn’t compete. It was a flat 'No'.

It didn't matter that I said, "I'm willing to cooperate with you, I'm willing to do whatever I have to do, I'm willing to even be like the guinea pig for what works, what doesn't work.”

I think having a space to have real conversations would be a big help, rather than just going "No, you don't belong here."

It doesn't matter if you're a trans man or a trans woman, people seem to think we're always 'disadvantaging' everybody. That’s not true.

These perceptions sometimes come from people judging us from a place of ignorance; sometimes it is blatant transphobia; sometimes it's just that no one's done it yet, so they don't know what to expect.

I hope that in the future, we can make an informed decision, rather than just closing the door on us trans athletes. I'm hoping they would have the open-mindedness to be more like, "Okay, we don't have the answers right now. But how can we?"

That's what I want to hear, and I don't hear that being said as much. Mainstream media has been really scandalising transgender people and transgender athletes, and people don't realize how it impacts our real lives.

Let's be real, there's only a tiny percentage of trans people who are professional athletes. In general, most people just want to access sports on a community level, or for their mental health.

Whether you're cis or trans, no one is being disadvantaged in any way, shape, or form by having a trans person participate.

[As told to @Ragi Gupta — continued tomorrow]