First of all, I want to sincerely apologize if this is the wrong place for me to post, but I am looking for help and support. If anyone has any suggestions, I would appreciate it greatly.
My story-I have recently realized that my 5yo daughter is very likely transgender. She is the youngest of my 9 children, 5 girls and 4 boys. (I am fairly sure one of my boys is gay, but will wait for him to make the determination himself.) Right now, I am looking for information regarding my daughter specifically.
When K was 2yo, and beginning to talk, she began telling us she was a boy. She asked me to buy her a penis at the store. I have never stifled my kids sexuality, so we talked about it often. I told her she was born with a vagina, not a penis, and that I wasn't able to buy one for her at the store. At the time, I gave it some thought, more along the lines of her discovering the differences between boys and girls, but not much beyond that.
Over the next couple of years, she continued to say she was a boy. She would not wear "girl" clothes, no "girl" colors, although she did like her baby dolls (and so did my boys, so I don't think that counts for much). I tend to not assigned gender to things in general, but she likes things that have always been traditionally "boy". She will pick the dinosaur coloring book over the princess one every time.
Through this time, I figured she was probably lesbian. We tried to not impose our feelings of gender on her. She has never been made to do anything "girl" if she didn't want to. Within the family, we discussed that K would probably have a female partner when she grew up, and it has just been accepted as who she is.
My concerns for her always stemmed from how the world would accept her. I didn't want to stifle her, but how would school be? Kids can be cruel. We hoped that with our acceptance, she would accept herself and be able to find her way through growing up knowing that she was never alone. I know lots of people say "I have friends who are _____" as if that somehow makes them able to understand. However, I really do have many gay, lesbian and bisexual friends. I talked to them about K often. They were always glad that she was born into a family that would always love her and never try to change her.
When she started kindergarten, I asked her what kind of clothes she wanted to wear. Boy clothes. Easy enough. I will fully admit, I didn't know how to handle everything. Should we let her dress like a boy, but make sure the other kids new she was biologically female? Would she be teased, made fun of? I basically decided to not worry about it. To let her go to school and just be whoever she was.
She started school in September, dressed as a boy. Several things she has said have driven home the feeling that she is not lesbian, but transgender, and I want to help her.
We were talking about something one day, and she said "When I grow up and I'm a boy...." Not when I grow up, I want to be a boy. To her, it is a foregone conclusion that she is male.
She said only 2 people at school know she is a girl, and she doesn't want anyone else to find out.
The things that were most impact-full for me recently, were when she said "Mommy, when I go to high school, how will I go to the bathroom?" I asked her what she meant, and she said "I have a vagina, so I would go into the girls bathroom, but I'm a boy." She was very distressed about this.
Then, when we were at the store a couple of days ago, someone said something about her hair, and how beautiful it was. She said to me "It's girl hair. It's not mine." I said something to the person making the comment about K wanting to be a boy (I know, entirely disrespectful of her, and I am sorry. Never said I was perfect). Later, K said to me "Mommy, why did you tell my secret?" I asked what was the secret? I said "You do want to be a boy, don't you?" She said "I am a boy. You told her I am a girl. I don't want people to know that." I can't express how much I regret saying what I did. I told her I am sorry.
At that moment, though, I realized that what is going on is much more than I understood. I realized that she needed more help and support than I understood how to give. I have an appointment with a therapist that specializes in gender identity with children, but we can't get in for a few weeks. In the meantime, we will keep going on as we have been, and I am scouring the internet looking for information and resources. I want her to be secure and confident in who she is. I am just looking for the best way to help make that happen.
If you read all of this, thank you very much. If anyone has any input, I would appreciate it very much. If this is not appropriate for this site, I do apologize. I mean no harm.
