Trans Woman Takes Life By Walking Into Traffic After Posting Facebook Note

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A transgender woman from Utah posted a devastating Facebook note last week before she took her own life by walking into traffic, the Daily Mail reports.

Ashley Hallstrom, 26, died on Oct. 14 after she was hit by a dump truck on a highway in Logan, Utah. But before taking her own life, Hallstrom posted a heartbreaking note on Facebook, urging the world to change and stop the harmful ways trans people are treated.

"From a very young age I was told that people like me are freaks and abominations, that we are sick in the head and society hates us. This made me hate who I was. I tried so hard to be just like everyone else but this isn't something you can change," she wrote. She went on to say she realized there was a large trans community when she turned 20 and that they gave her the strength to start her transition.

Nevertheless, Hallstrom said she still faced adversity.

"Everywhere I'd turn I'd see the [hatred] that society had for us. I had already been poisoned by a society that didn't understand us and, even worse, didn't want to even try," she wrote. I saw the pain it caused to people like me and going though this same hurt myself it has just become [too] much for me to take anymore."

She asked her friends to share her story so she doesn't become "just another number of a tragic statistic."

"People need to know that I'm not just another face of someone they never met. I was alive," Hallstrom wrote. "I have a family and friends that I love very much and I'm so sorry to them for the hurt this will cause them. I loved being around those that I love. I loved listening to music and singing. I loved going out to eat with friends and enjoying good food. I was a real person...

"Please share my final words," she continued. "I believe my last words can help make the change that society needs to make so that one day there will be no others like me. Please help make this change because trans people are everywhere. You may never know who you're hurting until it's too late. Please help fix society."

You can read her post, which has over 2,000 shares, by clicking here.

The Daily Mail reports that after Hallstrom posted the letter, friends flocked to her Facebook, begging her not to take her own life. Police were notified but could not find her before she walked into traffic. The newspaper notes the truck that struck Hallstrom tried to swerve out of the way and that no one else was injured in the incident.

Hallstrom's close friend Dawn Blakely spoke with the Herald Journal and said Hallstrom appeared to be happy.

"Everything seemed to be good. She never one time in the conversations we shared, she never talked about - she always seemed so happy. She never seemed sad or hurt or confused," Blakely said. "She just didn't wear it on her sleeve, she just smiled and kept on going. That is what I found so amazing about her. That is why this whole thing is such a shock to me."

Hallstrom's friends have since launched a GoFundMe page to help raise money for a funeral.

The Daily Mail reports Hallstrom's death is the 20th suicide of a trans person in 2015.


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