Poor kid

ResistanceIsNecessary: "I don't understand why a parent would want to put their child onto this path without being absolutely sure that they'd already exhausted all other options."

I think there are two kinds of parents. There are those who are deeply homophobic, possibly for religious reasons, and for whom the idea of a trans child is less awful than a gay child.

The other kind are people who just don't understand the implications. All the literature from charities like Mermaids and so on is celebratory, all about how being wonderful being trans is. They don't understand the dangers of puberty blockers, or the likelihood of permanent sterility, or the probability that their child won't have any kind of a sex life.

I don't understand why a parent would want to put their child onto this path without being absolutely sure that they'd already exhausted all other options.

I as a tomboy growing up. I liked wearing dresses and having my long hair put up. But I also spent most of my days climbing trees and building dens. I occasionally played with dolls, but was more interested in reading or being outside running about. I can remember being about 5 or 6 and going through a phase where I insisted on standing over the loo so that I could pee standing up - because I thought it was unfair that boys could go to the loo so much quicker and more easily than girls. I also remember being around the same age and pretending to 'shave'; my Dad would lather up my face and I'd use the end of my toothbrush whilst we stood side by side in the bathroom in a morning.

When I was in my teens I had relationships with other girls. I know how to use various tools because my Dad taught me. I have never been particularly interested in 'girly' things. I do a lot of manual and heavy work when I garden, which would traditionally be associated with males - at the moment I'm in the middle of a project which involves building a retaining wall.

I absolutely shudder to think that if I were growing up right now, there's a real risk I would be labelled as 'trans' because my behaviours and interests didn't neatly fit the gender stereotype. That liking climbing trees, imitating some male behaviours, having experimental lesbian relationships alongside having boyfriends in my teens and not being 'girly' means that I must be in the wrong body and need to be a man.

I am happy with my body, I am happy being a woman, I am happily married to my DH.

I feel so desperately sorry for children being taken down this path. The physical effects are often irreversible and I genuinely worry that for every child who really does want this kind of intervention, there will be several dozen who, if left alone, would come through the other side and be happy. I wonder if the NHS has considered the possibility of class action lawsuits in future years, when some of these children reach adulthood and realise that they weren't trans and have been left sterile and with permanent physical damage.

I was convinced dd was going to be a boy too.

Id bought everything white and blue and green and yellow etc

It was eveeyone else who then basically vomited pink and dresses over us....alot was just put on photo taken and removed again

I got handed down a load of stuff so I won't complain as it was a lovely thing to do. But omg the pink...

It is not about being one or the other (part time GC or NGC girl), it is all about the NGC part - that is what gets you marked as 'weirdo girl'. I certainly did a mix of things, even from early primary school, but was really a bit bored with most of the 'girl things' as far as play. With one exception, I did like designing clothes for the (not barbie, but similar) doll. But it was the designing part, because I also liked doing the lego thing even more. Building, creating, making, was my real thing. And that carried on to woodwork and metalwork (and art) in high school, but was a bit bored with home ec and needlework!

All children should be able to explore all avenues of play and interests, without the agenda attached to them, or the expectations that they are not conforming to 'good girl' or 'good boy' by doing certain things or not doing certain things. This is Feminism-101.

And that is primarily what is so wrong with 'transing kids'. Just let them be kids, and explore their interests, without pressure and expectation.

giles

I thought dd was going to be a boy and had nothing

I had a c section on the Thursday morning and on the Saturday morning i was in mothercare BUYING HER A DRESS GODDAMIT!!!!

so i see your point

I had a Grifter.

betty

I had very similar.i wanted a mountain bike. I still remember my first bike I loved it but I think it had been bought with handing down to my brother in mind . When I got my bike one birthday or Xmas I didn't get the mountain bike I got a baby blue thing with basket. Similar to the Bianca.

To this day they have no idea how much I wanted a different one.

Grifter -photobucket.com/gallery/s153.photobucket.com/user/VST502L/media/10340074_716670008376996_146815523092692606_n_zps0cuguftf.jpg.html

Bianca -
www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/318066792412473626/

Sorry pressed post too soon.

By the time I’d hit 12 I’d started my periods with little pre warning from my mum about how shit it would be. I was developing breasts that my dad mocked me about relentlessly and crassly. I hated my body and how I was constantly being labelled and shamed and poked and prodded for it.
I was living in a rural village and the one thing that made me happy was being outside in nature. I roamed for miles through farmland, woods and chalk downs. I climbed trees, wore what clothes were comfy, made forts and prided myself in my ability to identify plants and birds. I got interested in Wicca and magic. If I hadn’t had that, I’d have been miserable, utterly miserable, and a prime candidate these days for YouTube and Tumblr to make me feel like my hatred of my body, the gendered violence it made me subject to, and my general feelings of otherness was somehow tied up into not actually being a girl at all.

I still remember the Xmas I got my first brand new bike (as opposed to a hand me down). I desperately wanted a Raleigh Grifter. I’d been talking about it for months, and even forgo a birthday present that year so that the money could go towards the bike I so desperately wanted.

When I got up that morning I was absolutely beside myself with excitement at the sheet-covered-bike-shaped-object in the living room.

Only when I pullled off the sheet I found instead of a coveted ‘Grifter’ my parents had bought me a Raleigh Bianca.

I tried not to appear ungrateful, but I crept off for a bit of a cry. Luckily my sister got it.

Whilst we are all discussing our childhoods: I wasn’t exactly a “tomboy” but I wasn’t a girlie child either.

I was a strange child, always an outsider. I moved around a lot as a kid, went to 5 different schools in three different countries in my primary years. I was sexually assaulted for the first time at the age of 7 by a boy a year or two older than me. I was sexually assaulted the second time at the age of 9, by a boy the same age. Different country, different school, same shit. I guess my small size and lack of friends due to moving all the time had me marked out as a victim. The third time I sexually assaulted at age 12, I grabbed the boy by the arm and threw him over my shoulder across a playground. He flew through the air in slow motion for what seemed like miles, and I thought “YES.”

Could some of this be about parents unable to say no to their children?

Giddy, you said I hope the mother does not ever read this post as its just vile to see another women being slated in such a way when she is only doing what her child wants.

I believe that parenting isn't about what a child wants, it's about doing what's best for the child, and guiding them though their childhood, even if it means that the child doesn't agree and causes friction in the relationship. Parents primary focus isn't to be their kids friends, it is to be their parents. IMO this is a case of lazy and selfish parenting, amongst other things....

"Stalking as well as judgemental. You really need to get a life,"

It's not stalking to look someone up on Facebook.

And I don't have any kind of issue with being 'judgemental'. If we didn't make constant judgements we would have been eaten by sabre-toothed tigers tens of thousands of years ago.

Let's not have too much of this 'mustn't ever form an opinion' bollocks.

It's so strange how overall to this day girls are still seen as lesser. But yet people seem to want girls so badly. They "keep trying " for a girl. People experience disappointment at scans if it's not a girl. Get actively upset if people mistake their baby for a boy. I don't know if anyone else notices but when people have 2 or three boys then have a girl often there is almost pressure on the girl to be the stereotype pink sparkly child hundreds of photos posted of said child in dresses and at ballet and duck face selfies etc. People have drawers full if dresses and sparkly shoes before the poor thing is even born.

It's no wonder so many think there's something wrong with them.

It’s pretry terrifying where this is heading, and the ramifications when these children reach adulthood. It seems to me that this is a “quick win” for parents who want to be in the spotlight or want their children to be seen as special, without much effort on their part in the way of time, investment, learning or skills.

It’s like social media turned reality.

HubrisComicGhoul

I could not agree more with your post!

nauticant that’s very sad, makes sense though. That’s what’s behind breast ironing. Sudden obesity and poor personal hygiene are also known to be potential indicators of CSE.

I find many things about this story to be disturbing, but the fact that the mother has splashed her child's personal struggle all over a newspaper is the one that stands out as abusive.

I genuinely can't think of another way to describe such a blatant breach of a child's privacy. That story will be online forever, how could anyone do that to their child?

And sadly for some, it is an attempt to escape being the victim of CSA. Particularly if the abuser says "how pretty" the victim is, you can bet your bippy the girl will do anything she can to make herself "look not pretty".

This was reported on From Our Own Correspondent in exactly these terms yesterday. A child of a prostitute, surrounded by predators, was told by her mother's friends that to reduce risks she should bind her breasts, have boy-like scruffy hair, and be generally dishevelled.

I wasn’t that child, I’m not that adult. Apart from being gobby and outspoken I’m very gender conforming.

I agree with the fact there are certainly a lot of shit bits about growing up female, I never did the ‘tomboy’ thing though and was always very ‘girly’. It has always enraged me that girls being GNC was considered a good thing and more socially acceptable than boys being GNC.

I have several daughters, when some of them wanted to shop in the ‘boys’ section for toys and clothes I just bought them what they wanted. It never occurred to me it meant they were really boys and that I should try and get them medicated and call the local paper

People talking about their experiences of rejecting the things that were imposed on them in childhood are relating their experience of their family's sexist attitudes. Or the sexist attitudes of the society that they grew up in. That's where it comes from. They haven't invented it. In their experience/upbringing girls and girls things were treated as lesser.

It's great that Lass and others had childhoods where they were free to be feminine and not treated as lesser. But that isn't what many other people here are reporting. I'm sure now as adults they know that pink is just a colour, and it is possible to ride a Rayleigh Chopper in an elegant skirt.

The great female cyclists of the '30s & 40s rode wearing shorts on 'men's' bicycles.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Barry
www.cyclingweekly.com/news/latest-news/billie-fleming-happy-100th-birthday-121964
www.lavelocita.cc/la-velocita-rides/billie-samuels-1934-melbourne-to-sydney
www.cyclinguk.org/article/cycling-guide/eileen-sheridan
sites.google.com/site/boltonclariongroup/_/rsrc/1256588866588/home/bygone-times-pictures-1896-1960/1936-JUNE-SAT%20AFTERNOON%20RIDE%20TO%20BROCK.JPG

I agree with Lass.

There is some confusing posting by posters who seem to think it is a badge of triumph to reject dolls and pink. Or that ‘we’ all struggled with these girly things imposed on us.

Being a girl can involve riding a bike and loving pink and climbing trees and liking dolls and playing football and liking mermaids and unicorns. All of it.

The crossbar on a bike gives it structural stability. Dropped crossbars on bikes for women were introduced for reasons of decorum, or so I have always understood - integrity of design was sacrificed for societal reasons.