Mike Penner

Mike Penner (October 10, 1957 – November 27, 2009) was an American sports writer for the Los Angeles Times. Penner self-identified as being "transsexual" in a 2007 column and returned from a vacation writing with the name Christine Daniels, before resuming his self-identification as male and original name in 2008. In 2009 he died by suicide.

Early life and education

Born Michael Daniel Penner in Inglewood, California, Penner graduated from Western High School in Anaheim and from California State University, Fullerton.

Professional career

Penner began his journalism career at the Anaheim Bulletin as a writer and sports editor. He then joined the Los Angeles Times in 1983 as a staff writer for the paper's Orange County edition. Initially reporting on high school sports, Penner went on to cover a variety of national and international sporting events including the Olympics, Major League Baseball, tennis, and World Cup soccer.

Transsexuality

Later in his career, in addition to covering sports, Penner also began writing about transsexual identity and the process of gender transition from an autobiographical perspective. The first such piece he wrote for the Times was an essay entitled "Old Mike, New Christine" that appeared in the paper in April 2007. In it, he wrote about his lifelong struggle to come to terms with his transsexuality:

I am a transsexual sportswriter. It has taken more than 40 years, a million tears and hundreds of hours of soul-wrenching therapy for me to work up the courage to type those words. ... When you reach the point when one gender causes heartache and unbearable discomfort, and the other brings more joy and fulfillment than you ever imagined possible, it shouldn't take two tons of bricks to fall in order to know what to do.

Penner lived and wrote as Christine Daniels for more than a year, continuing to document his own experience with gender transition in the LA Times' blog "Woman in Progress". Daniels' writing became a source of hope for people across the country with gender-identity issues.

Penner wrote as Christine Daniels from July 2007 until about March 2008; without elaboration, he resumed using Mike Penner as his byline in October 2008.

Penner was a member of the Times' sports staff at the time of his death.

Personal life

Penner was at one time married to fellow Los Angeles Times sportswriter Lisa Dillman although at the time of his death they were divorced.

Penner was found dead in his Los Angeles home on November 28, 2009 of an apparent suicide. The coroner's report determined that he died of carbon-monoxide poisoning after running a hose from his car's exhaust pipe into the car while it ran in his apartment building's subterranean garage.

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