Advice for dealing with schools re trans child

[IamMrsElf]

My Trans DD is due to start school in September. I was wondering if anyone else has enrolled a trans child or has a trans child at school, what are your experiences and advice?

I'm just not sure what to expect or how to deal with it all.

I do have a child at the school currently, so I know the teachers and the school. Some of the staff are aware and so far my interactions with them have been positive.

I feel apprehensive for my DD and just want some thoughts and advice from those that have been there.

The reason you won't find any parents going through the same thing is because what you are talking about is not reality.

Ds2 spent 12 month insisting he was a dog, when he was 2.

He isn't a dog. We did not put a lead on him and put his food in the dogs bowl.

You have a son. YOU have decided he has "transitioned"
I don't have a whole load of knowledge about this but I would imagine this to be a complex thought process and not one that is dreamt up over night.

But you somehow think your son has managed this at 3?

I'd be very interested to know what advice you've recieved from health visitor / GP and what nursery nurses view is if your child attends, as I cannot imagine any child welfare professional advising that at this age you identify them as trans.

I have found his all heartbreakingly hard. My child's happiness and well being is of paramount importance to me.

Because I wanted a girl, I massively resisted letting DC play with dolls and wear dresses initially, but as I could see how unhappy I was making her I gave in and removed my feelings for her sake. She can play with whatever she wants and wear whatever she wants. All my children are free to get on with being kids.

Yes, she is very young, yes I have been to see the GP about this. There are are days when I think I am mad for allowing her to present as a girl every day of her life and even allow her to use a female name, but as this is what makes her happy I can't do otherwise.

I don't think it's trendy or cool. It's actually really fucking hard.

I used the word transition because that is the word people use. I don't know if she's trans or merely gender non conforming on an extreme scale. I really wanted to know how other people found schools in regard to this area.

I am not giving her hormone treatment or operations or any other kind of medical treatment and the thought of that scares the life out of me. I can't look at the tiny person she is and imagine all of that for her future. It's just too terrifying.

I just wanted to know how people found schools with regards to children who are different. My husband and I are Secondary school based and so it is very different there and very hard for anyone who is non conforming in any area.

Just because he persistently says that he is a girl, does not mean that you have to pursue this at 3 years old. Not yet. Lots of children say these kind of things and lots of children don't conform to gender stereotypes. The vast majority do NOT turn out to be transgender when they're older.

He cannot possibly begin to understand the consequences of going down this route. For example that the eventual hormone therapy would leave him sterile. A 3yo can't comprehend those concepts and what they would mean for him. That he would always be different. That finding a lasting relationship would be harder. That he would encounter prejudice and abuse throughout his life, affecting his career and his mental wellbeing. These are the ugly realities of being transgender.

If you carry on down this road it's going to be extremely difficult to turn back. Can't you just keep things neutral and just wait and see for a few more years?

You son is not different. Many young boys act as girls and vice versa. if you read what people have written here about their own experiences you will see that. Just get on with letting you child have a happy life. You ar e among something out of nothing .
You cannot predict what they will be like in 2 months time let alone as an adult.
My first son spent a huge amount of time dressed up as a girl and playing with girl's toys. At 17 is is most definitely male.

I have found his all heartbreakingly hard then stop it! Seriously, stop it! Your reference to not letting him play with dolls because you wanted a girl suggests to me you have quite rigid expectations of what boys and girls do and like - and that they are oddly mixed up in your desire for a girl.

Let your son play with dolls, and don't bring anything else into that decision.

Please get some counselling. Children of that age are not in a position to make choices much beyond red or blue toothbrush. They simply don't have the knowledge, processing power, understanding to do more. This is such a profound thing which will make the whole of his life very much more difficult, leave him to it for the moment.

It is so hard not to project firmly held desires onto our small children; they just seem to ingest them, exactly as they do with the values and beliefs that their family live by, like Catholicism or brutality or anything else. Please don't impose on him in this way.

I would give it more time OP. Honestly he's tiny it's not helpful to label so young.

I used to play army games with my 2 male best friends. I wore boys clothes. I had an action man. I'm still happy as an adult to be a woman. Life's hard enough without adding extra problems and obstacles.

Op have all the family started to call him " her"?

You sound really upset OP. I don't know the full background here obviously, but I'm wondering if you have read a lot of stuff written by adults who have changed sex, and they have said they wished their parents had taken them more seriously when they were younger. And so you're getting paranoid that if you don't treat your child as a daughter, tell everyone they're a girl etc right from the start, you'll be setting them up for a lifetime of angst and bitterness?

TBH - and I know it's easy to say - I think you need to take a step back and maybe stop worrying so much about it. Your child says they're a girl. But your child is absolutely tiny! I told my parents I stayed out all night every night with the fairies at that age, but they didn't feel the need to bar my windows.

Yes, when your child gets older s/he MIGHT want to make serious steps towards being one particular sex or another. But right now I think you need to take some deep breaths, and treat them as someone who "is" a boy (physically) but wants to be known by a girl's name etc for now. It's fine to tell the teachers that, and other parents etc.

You don't NEED to use strong words like transsexual or transitioning to describe someone so little they don't even know how to write their own address yet. Kids often aren't even quite sure what sex some of their friends are anyway, especially at that age. Boys with long hair etc.

I think you should be open to the fact that your child may announce s/he wants to be a boy again at some point in the future, and not overinvest in something that may be a fleeting stage of life. Imagine how hard it would be for your child to tell you that they "are

I know a child the same. The parents simply accept that their child wants to have long hair, and wear the clothes they want to. They havent said the child is trans, or anything at all, just thats the way they want to be.

Other children dont question it. Child is now 9.

My brother insisted on being called Louise for a whole year when he was three. He's now a man and appears to be perfectly happy with that.

Hey - let him wear dresses and have a girl's name as a nickname, play with dolls etc. That's fine. But don't think that is the same as transitioning. It isn't.

Your child doesn't even know his sex is permanent yet. He's not old enough developmentally.

There will be a whole induction process before they start reception. I'm sure you'll have the opportunity to speak to the class teacher and the head about this. Surely all you need to do is explain that at the moment your DS prefers to be called X and is exploring gender roles/norms, currently he is experimenting with a set of stereotypically girl behaviour. In reception the children will all change together, the toilets are likely to be unisex and next to the classroom. I would explain that he might like to wear a skirt to school, which I can't see there being a huge problem with. Isn't that all there is to it?

Then try and be as gender neutral as possible with him and all your children.

If you have to explain to someone the difference between boys and girls' bodies how can they be trans?

Surely a trans person knows that are so they can know what they, the person are?

Oh, thread's moved on.

Oh and they found a gender neutral nickname. So people dont question, they either think theyre a girl, or a boy who chooses "girls" clothes.

But i agree, dont label it yet. I think we are getting so strictly gendered these days some children think they are a girl if they like girls things, they dont realise you can be a boy and play with dolls...

OP please get some help. Please STOP referring to him as 'her'. He is a boy until he's old enough to decide what he wants. Creating a whole other identity for him as a three year old is wrong and dangerous.

Your 3 year old is not transgender. He isn't. He's a little tiny child who barely understands sex differences and really doesn't understand gender role differences. Calling him transgender is a projection of an entirely adult concept onto a tiny tiny child who has barely just developed a self concept.
He's not a girl, he's a boy. A boy who likes pretty things and dolls and what the fuck else. Please for the love of god stop telling him he's s girl with a penis.

Micah's approach sounds sensible

You remind me of a poster on another site who liked being the poster mum for kids who were different. Not that they were. Its just that she was determined they would be/were. She just loved to be seen as the laid back mum rising to any challenge that would have people saying 'oh look at her'. It seemed to pass her by that not all attention is good attention as long as she got the attention.

OP, you know your child better than anyone else.

However, my son gravitated to pretty dresses, dolls and anything bright and sparkly until he was around 7. After that they gradually receded in importance until he gave them up entirely. He is 13 now and the only vestiges of his early preferences is that he might change an old doll into new clothes. But he would hate me for telling anyone that in public.

Be aware that many children do act very similarly to the opposite sex for a good period of time before they pass it all up in favour for more gender orientated stuff.

Your son might be transgender but equally he might not be. Going to read the full thread properly to see what clues you have had from him to give you this idea.

Somewhere as gender neutral as possible where children can be children would be ideal for school. Then no stereotyping please about playing with dolls/liking pink/wearing dresses = female sex. Children are children. Some like pink some like blue some like green.

And a bit of psychological counselling for yourself might not be a bad idea if this is tied up in wanting a girl

Also, I genuinely don't understand this. What does it mean?

"Because I wanted a girl, I massively resisted letting DC play with dolls and wear dresses initially."