As Trans Awareness Week comes to an end, a Chappaqua parent, lawyer and trans woman spoke to News 12 about what it's like to be on the front lines of a fight to make the U.S. safer for the trans community.

Kristen Browde publicly came out as a trans woman five years ago and says she has been using her visibility as an activist to try and normalize what it means to be trans.

"What are we going to do to show America, to show the world - that being transgender should be no more significant than whether you're right- or left-handed," she says.

Browde says that it's also urgent to shed light on the life and death issues the trans community faces.

"People are killed because they are trans, primarily trans women of color are murdered by people who believe being trans is too much," she says. "Your transgender neighbor is no different than you, they just want to live their lives in peace and achieve as much as they are able to achieve."