Trans European Parliament Member: 'I Was in the Wrong Body'

English Parliament member Nikki Sinclaire made a splash this week when she revealed that 20 years ago, she underwent a sex change operation in order to make her physical body align with her gender identity.

"It sounds weird, but I knew something was wrong even then -- I've always felt I was in the wrong body. I remember dressing up as a girl on my first day of school. It then started to happen every day. The other kids knew I was different," the 45-year-old Sinclaire told The Sun.

Sinclaire was a party secretary of United Kingdom's Independent Party, until a falling out with leader Nigel Farage led her to resign. She went on to found the single-issue We Demand a Referendum party, that is campaigning for the British public to have the right to decide on membership to the European Union.

She told the Sun that she first realized she identified as a female when she was just 3, but suffered years of agony as she was unable to undergo gender reassignment surgery until she turned 21 years old.

Years of sex and clubbing were a "crutch," Sinclair told the Sun, something to help her after her parents rejected her chosen gender identity. When she began hormone replacement therapy before the surgery, it caused her to develop deep vein thrombosis, from which she almost died.

"I was immobile for nearly a year," she told the newspaper. "I suffered from depression, was on 21 different tablets and felt like I wasn't in control of my life. Gender reassignment nearly killed me -- but it was something I had to do."

Without it, said Sinclaire, she would have led a "lonely, neurotic life, forever out of place."

According The Independent, Sinclaire is overwhelmed by the volume of support she has received since making the announcement in her new autobiography "Never Give Up," released on Nov. 25.

This is the first time Sinclaire has publicly shared the "great secret" of growing up as a boy. She told press outlets that since she had the operation, her life has gone from being "tormented" to "happy."

"I have become a happy, fulfilled achiever, and I have repaid, in tax, the cost of my NHS operation many times over," she told The Sun.