Tommy Dorfman explained how 13 Reasons Why delayed her transition

For Tommy Dorfman, a role on the hit Netflix drama 13 Reasons Why was a career boon but a personal challenge. Because of the role, the visibility, and the demands of shooting, she says, she didn’t begin her gender transition as early as she might have.

In the series, Dorfman played Ryan Shaver, a cis, gay male teen. Speaking to Rachel Bilson on a recent episode of Bilson’s podcast, the actor explained, “For me, I feel like I kind of got stuck in time for a minute…when it came to anything around dysphoria or gender or stuff that had already been really present, I was like: ‘Nope, that’s not for now. I’m working,’” she said, per The Huffington Post.

“I think if I hadn’t booked that job, I would’ve started transitioning a lot sooner. I think because my work being so tied to my body and face and identity, and whatever I’d been identified as it delayed some of my growth and maturation in my mid-twenties. I also think I made decisions that were just not aligned with who I really was or what I wanted, but out of fear.”

Things are looking better these days! Dorfman recently attended Lady Gaga’s Chromatica Ball with her 13 Reasons Why co-star Katherine Langford, and it looks like the two had a blast(off).

Tommy Dorfman is recently engaged, and while she didn’t reveal much, she did say that her fiancé is a cisgender woman. The actor spoke to Time a year ago about her gender, calling her announcement a “clarification” rather than the more typical “coming out,” and explaining that at that point (July 2021), she had already been living as a woman for a year. And now, she’s able to integrate her gender and her work; she appears in Lena Dunham’s upcoming feature Sharp Stick in her first female role.

This article was originally published on Glamour.com.