Son has just told us he is non binary

[Chipshopninja]

13 years old

Wants us to use they/them

He came out as Bi a a couple of years ago and I was fine with that but this has really hit me hard

I'm terrified that this is going to lead to hormones and surgery.

Don't know why I'm posting tbh but feeling crappy because I didn't handle it well. I cried.

I can't call him my son anymore

He's my only child

Has anyone else been through this?

Totally agree

No way would I be going along with this absolute bollocks

Turn the WiFi off. Get him into more hobbies outside of his current social group. Keep going and keep taking a relaxed approach. Change his environment, wait for the hormones to kick in and puberty and his emerging sexuality will do the heavy lifting.

and? why does it need to be such a big drama? say thank you for sharing, maybe a hug and then get on with whatever you were doing.

leave them to then sort it out for themselves.

Just ignore it. It will be something else next month

I like the we are all non binary thing. I may try and go with that.

It's the pronouns bit I'm really struggling with. Wants to be referred to as they/them. If I call him my son it upsets him. I've already told him I'm going into it with his extended family and not to expect them to go along with it

I would look closely at what he is accessing online, restrict access if neccesary. I'd also contact school to ask them what the hell they are playing at.

Exactly.

I was about to say the same about is all being non binary.

No one is a gender because that's a social construct.

He will always be your son because you can't change sex.

"Oh ok" is about all it needs.

And as we generally use names when talking about people we know to people we know and you won't address him by anything other then his name the whole pronouns thing is just not worth worrying about!

But surely you are primarily talking to your son using his name? How often are you talking about him within earshot?

Try to stay calm b/c as PPs say. Don't feed this.

Tell 'them' you love 'them'. Remind him/her that all these words are just labels. Ask how his friends are doing. Ask what his friends are doing - often it travels in packs.
Then move on and just keep your ears peeled.

I disagree. I think your sense of sexuality is quite innate and that most people know very early. It's certainly normal for a 10 year old to have crushes and start exploring their body. I'm actually gay (grew up in the 90's), but never figured it out until I was like 20+, as the default sexuality was just straight. I thought I had crushes on boyband members, as that's what other girls talked about. There are more gay people etc in the media now, so people just recognise it younger. It just wasn't an option for me to be a lesbian as a teen in the 90's.

Of course it's too young. He has no idea about sexual preferences at 11. He's not even hit puberty.

He may well be bi. But he has another 3 years before the law allows him to do anything about it so why worry?

I’m sorry but so what if it upsets him. We can’t expect to raise kids who never get upset by anything or to pretend facts don’t exist in order to avoid upset.

Cane out as bi a couple of years ago? Abd he's only 13 now? 🤣🤣

He knows fuuck all about anything!

Just smile and wave and cut off or drastically reduce his Internet usage.

Let me guess . ..

Is he autistic?

Absolutely this.

Respect his sexuality, but don’t feed into this nonsense

Well yes of course I use him a lot

If his dad asks where he is I say "oh he's just gone upstairs"

"Can you ask X to get his shoes on I've asked him 3 times already"

"X can't find his school bag any idea where it is"

Just examples but of course it happens a lot

No

Pronouns are used when you are taking about someone not to them.
You can decide for yourself if you want to talk about them as them to other people but when you’re taking to them you just use their name.
He is still a boy.

How have we reached a point where fear of upsetting our children overrides our responsibility to safeguard them from harm?

You are the adult and he is the child. It is your responsibility to put boundaries in place and help him navigate difficult feelings, not pussy foot around the situation because you don't want to upset him.

100% this!!!!!

So just use his actual name? Can you ask Peter to put his shoes on/ Peter where he's gone? etc.

👏🏻 yep

It doesn't genuinely upset him though.

My now 20 y/o DD announced she was non binary at 15. Two days later came home in a foul mood because it was "distressing her that her English teacher misgendered her".

It was literally manufactured faux upset because all her wee mates on Discord had fed her the idea that it should be distressing to be misgendered. There was not one ounce of her that genuinely felt that way.

Within three months (and with the appearance of a new boyfriend) suddenly she was resolutely female again and this apparent distress over being misgendered was nowhere to be seen.

Pay it no heed. Non binary is not a real thing. 25 years ago we were all allowed to be as non conforming as we wanted without having to adopt an entirely new "gender". Many of my best friends were happy male makeup wearing goths and emos.

Get your son off the internet. At 11 he may well have known he was attracted to both males and females. But he absolutely should not have had unsupervised access to online forums discussing sec and gender identity.

Nearly all my son and daughter’s friends have been at one time or another bi/gay/trans/NB from around the age of 11. It seems to be the age for the start of all this but most of their friends are now coming out (ha) the other side at 17/18. Some are gay or bi, one remains NB, most are very clearly bog standard heteros.

I don’t think you’ve missed to boat to ignore, I think I’d say something like “I’m sorry I didn’t handle our last conversation too well, I’m really pleased you feel you can talk to us. Now what would you like for dinner?”.

You’ve acknowledged on here that you aren’t happy with your response before and it tells your DS you’re on his side but the label he chooses at 13 isn’t the be all and end all.

I don't want to push him away, not that hard to understand surely

I'm not saying I won't try to safeguard him. I'm asking for advice from anyone who has been through it, not judgement but cheers