10 year old Dd says she's a lesbian.

[Freeasabird76]

My 10 year old Dd came to me this evening with her friend on a WhatsApp call saying her friend had something to tell me,as she passed me the phone she cuddled up to my side and looked scared,her also 10 year old friend said quite matter of factly,Dd is afraid to say it but wants you to know that shes a lesbian.
At this time my Dd broke down in tears,I told her friend thank you for telling me but I had to hang up now to comfort Dd.
I obviously comforted her and told her like I have before that she should never be afraid to tell me ANYTHING and like I've said in the past I love you no matter who you like,be it girls,boys or girls and boys or neither.
I asked her how long she'd wanted to tell me this and she said a long time.Now I honestly do not care one bit if she likes girls,all I care about is her happiness.
I have questions though,there's been a lot of talk in Dds class this year about girls being lesbian boys being gay etc,obviously different generations so I dont have any experience of this,when I was a child this didnt come up until we were at least say 15.How sure can you be at 10 about your sexuality? I dont recollect being so self aware at that age.

I knew at 10 that I was heterosexual. I’m fairly sure I knew before then, but can’t say for certain that socialization played no role before that age.

What a heated topic this still is! I thought we’d come so much further - clearly I’ve buried my head in the sand. Don’t see why some can’t be respectful though. Opinions are like assholes, we all have one! 😂

OP I’d just say what you said and let her guide you through when she’s ready to talk and looking for support. I experimented kissing a girl when I was 11, we wanted to practise because we’d never kissed before. It felt ridiculous and we laughed hysterically. Did I know I wasn’t gay? No, but I knew I definitely didn’t look at her that way cause it felt very silly!

Could she know she’s gay and be right? Yes. Could it be something she sees and hears people speak about and wants to try it? Sure. Just don’t stress about it- what would you say to your best friend who said her kid was gay? I’d be like “Okie dok, glad she’s so comfortable with you she’s shared her secrets. I never told my parents anything”. And conversation over. :)

I don't believe there is a particular 'label culture' among young people - I just think we older people are realising (as our parents, grandparents, and so on realised before us) that the young people have words all of their own, and we're a bit past it. It's disorienting, but it's only new to us.

If you don’t believe there is a label culture among young people, then I don’t think you do know much about current youth culture at all. It isn’t a particularly new culture, in fact: but it definitely isn’t a positive one.

There is, however, a “lesbian checklist master document” that circulates among young girls on social media - so that you can handily check off if you are a lesbian depending on how many tick boxes you meet and how much “comphet” you think you suffer from. (I’m not sure I’d even make the grade despite many years of being an actual lesbian.)

Perhaps we should issue all ten year old girls with one; and then their lives could be handily funnelled into gay and non-gay as early as possible? (Pity the poor bi girls, who have been entirely left out of the discussion here. Sure though, we could get them to pick a side at ten - no waiting around or anything - got to get going!)

For me the annoyance is that a 10 year old girl could tell her mum she has a crush on a boy and the response would be 'that's nice dear'/aww first crush, sweet.

No big deal is it.

But if she has a crush on a girl then
-it's a phase
-it's mixed emotions from friendship
-it's the media oversexualising kids
-theres too much exposure to rainbow flags
-she's too young to understand what that means
-she's too young to be attracted to another girl
-she can't POSSIBLY Know that she likes girls at that age (when these people would have no issue with knowing a boy likes girls at that age)

Sorry, I'm possibly missing something ... but why do you think that people on this thread imagine ten year olds are all the same, or all at the same stage?

Of course they will all be different.

But the reason people are pointing out that it is possible for a ten year old to feel they're gay, and for that to be an accurate assessment for the future, is simply because early posts stated categorically that this wasn't possible.

We're not saying all ten year olds are in this boat. We're not even saying most of them might be. We're simply pointing out that, if any of them have this experience, then we have disproved the hypothesis that it is impossible for a ten year old to know they're gay.

I don't see what this has to do with sexualising children. Do you think when a four year old says he wants to grow up, marry mummy and eat cake for breakfast every day, that is because we are sexualising children (or encouraging incest, not to mention obesity?)? Of course not.

I'm sorry, but we're just trading anecdotes here. You have one perception; I have another. You can't just say 'oh but I definitely totes know better' - that's not an argument.

Tick box lists for teenagers have been a thing for absolutely ages - look at early issues of Cosmo. Or read Karma Lochrie's Heterosyncrasies, which describes just such tick-list exercises for young women being circulated almost a century ago.

I don't understand why you think that a ten year old saying she's a lesbian has to do with being 'funnelled' into anything? Surely, the vast majority of us, at 10, think we're straight - and yet, we all managed to come out just fine, didn't we? So why do you imagine that this would be impossible for this current generation?

But the reason people are pointing out that it is possible for a ten year old to feel they're gay, and for that to be an accurate assessment for the future, is simply because early posts stated categorically that this wasn't possible.

But that is just simply not true. I’ve just reread the thread and nobody was saying “categorically that this wasn’t possible”. The thread is actually full of posters not saying that at all. I don’t quite know why you want to present it as the opposite.

(On reflection I don't know why I say lesbians my (our) age came out 'just fine' - lots of us didn't, and had pretty horrible experiences. But I don't know whether there is much correlation between the age someone recognises their sexuality, and the degree of discrimination they subsequently face.)

@dangerrabbit absolutely not,I'll love and accept her not matter who she loves/is attracted to,my main aim is not to fuck her up navigating this stage of life.

She's probably just confused"

She's too young to know

Essentially kids are being groomed and it's quiet scary that adults are encouraging it. Same as the shit surrounding trans/gender neutral/etc. FFS. She's not a lesbian.

All the ‘lesbians’ I knew at secondary school are now married to men and have kids. Even the one who did pride marches and was engaged to a woman. Just sayin 🤷‍♀️

Plus the deeply disturbing:

If this were my daughter, I would tell her that she is six years too young to be even thinking about a sexual relationship, that her brain and body are still developing and neither you nor she have a clue what it’s final state will be, that she doesn’t even ovulate yet so of course she isn’t attracted to boys, and that she may or may not one day settle down with a man or woman or no one - but there is no need, and it is deeply unhelpful, to give herself a label now.

(You know, because of course the entire point of women is to bear children, so you literally can't experience sexual desire unless you ovulate. Ugh, imagine it! If you could experience sexual desire without ovulating it'd mean those disgusting post-menopausal women were still, like, interested in sex, which is clearly revolting.)

I have only selected the most out-there quotations - there are plenty more that imply that it's not possible for someone to know that they are gay at this age.

I mean, honestly, how much more 'categorical' do you want to get than someone saying 'she is not a lesbian'? I'm really struggling to understand why on earth you think that isn't a categorical denial?

Bingo, correct, 💯.

But still the wide-eyed yet unseeing homophobia in that.

Pretending that it's only homophobia if you say 'I hate gay people'.

Good for her! She was very brave to want to share this with you as that isn't easy! Just by responding well to your daughter means she will be able to talk again to you about this when she needs to.
I was always confused about my sexuality as I liked boys.... and girls. I can remember all of my crushes at school, of both sexes.
I am married to a man, so I may appear straight, but I definitely fly the bisexual flag with pride, and it's who I am.

If this 10 year old told her mum she liked a boy, never in a million years would she be told she's too young to say that and she needs to wait till she's older to really know if she actually has heterosexual feelings.

It would be deemed totally normal and acceptable and their preference in attraction would not be questioned at all

It's blatant homophobia.

Exactly those examples @SarahAndQuack and you didn't even need to use the one who compared fancying girls to wanting to marry their horse which to be honest was as worrying as it was irrelevant!

The thinly disguised homophobia followed by the inevitable wide eyed naive "I obviously didn't mean anything by it, I have no issue with gay people" follow ups are so disappointing in 2022 aren't they?

100% @DirtBag and I genuinely don't know how anyone could argue otherwise... though I'm sure they will! There wouldn't ever be this reaction to a ten year old girl saying they fancy a boy / boys.

You may not personally read them, but there are plenty of threads when posters post about that, and the whole thread tells them ten year olds are too young to be thinking about “boyfriends” and at that age they are confused about sexuality and don’t know anything about it.

Too many people here projecting their own experience onto the OP’s child, and suggesting any dissent from that is “phobic”. I’m a lesbian and would actually be delighted if my DD was, but I also don’t think that a ten year old’s knowledge of sexuality is set in stone. Plenty of lesbian and bi women don’t realise their sexuality until later in life, and that doesn’t make them somehow wrong or not gay just because they didn’t magically know at ten. Sexuality is far more varied than that!

For those looking for evidence about the deeply negative influence of social media on children and young teens, I recommend Johann Hari's book Stolen Focus. It's stuffed full of evidence, including whistleblowers from the major platforms - they all know how very damaging it is. What stood out to me was how those who work in silicon valley keep their own kids away from smart phones and social media. (Sorry I know this was a sub thread from this discussion, but can't be bothered to find the exact reference).

No, no one is projecting their experience.

You are not listening to what people are saying.

Some people on this thread have stated that it is not possible the OP's DD is a lesbian, and have said that, at 10, she cannot know.

Of course, we can all agree 10 year olds vary hugely, and many of them won't know their sexuality, and that's absolutely fine.

But, you only need one counter-example to disprove a categorical statement, don't you?

I’m a lesbian and would actually be delighted if my DD was, but I also don’t think that a ten year old’s knowledge of sexuality is set in stone. Plenty of lesbian and bi women don’t realise their sexuality until later in life, and that doesn’t make them somehow wrong or not gay just because they didn’t magically know at ten.

Well exactly. Not every ten year old. Not every lesbian woman. Not every bi woman.

Yet some people on this thread insisting on saying to people who say they did know at ten that they were gay / bi, that that isn't the case as you can't know at that age.

But some kids can. And some of us did.

You may be completely understanding and respectful of that fact. That's great and you're being reasonable in doing so.

However other posters saying in response to people sharing that at ten they knew they were gay / bi, "well when I was ten I wanted to marry my horse" etc are being nasty.

Even the fact you say 'magically know at ten' has an unnecessarily sarcy and dismissive undertone. I didn't 'magically know at ten', I just knew at ten. What is magical about knowing something? It wasn't a crystal ball prediction, it was my sexuality.

One that I did know. I really, completely did. It wasn't that big a deal to me, I just fancied both boys and girls and knew that before I was ten. And for me, it hasn't ever changed for me. I'm not saying it doesn't change for anyone.

I'm saying that those posters who have responded dismissively or made bizarre and unfunny jokes like the horse one are being mean spirited, small minded and quite simply wrong.

Well said. I thought the phrase 'magically know' was nasty too. FWIW, I don't think I had the slightest idea at 10. But my DP absolutely did. And I did know at 13 or so. And, like most people, I was told that this was all to do with the damaging effects of modern media, and I was just confused, and it was indicative of a worrying tendency in the modern world, for children to be sexualised too early and to label themselves. And we were all told it had to do with the epidemic of mental illness.

Turns out, nope, I was just gay. Now, this post absolutely is about my experience, but I'm not projecting it. It could well be the OP's DD is straight, or bi, or all sorts of other things I'm far too middle aged to understand. But she is ten - what on earth possible harm can it do for her to be able to say something, and to have adults around her say 'oh yes, that's great'?

You’re both now calling other gay women “nasty” as well as “homophobic” for pointing out that not everyone knows they are gay at ten? I don’t think that’s either rational or reasonable, but there you go. As I’ve said repeatedly, not everyone’s experience of sexuality is the same. I certainly haven’t called anyone names or slurs, though, for having a different experience to mine. 🤷‍♀️

Huh? You don't 'choose' your sexuality.

Also, wanting to be like a fictional character in a book is nothing like realising you have same sex attractions. Dismissive much?

What a horrible thing to say to a child.

If this were my daughter, I would tell her that she is six years too young to be even thinking about a sexual relationship, that her brain and body are still developing and neither you nor she have a clue what it’s final state will be, that she doesn’t even ovulate yet so of course she isn’t attracted to boys, and that she may or may not one day settle down with a man or woman or no one - but there is no need, and it is deeply unhelpful, to give herself a label now.

Ok, so if your 10 year old had come along and said, 'mummy I think I fancy boys, I've got a crush on James at school', you'd give exactly the same speech would you? Telling her basically not to be silly, she can't possibly feel that way and she won't until she is 16?

Even if she’s wrong what’s the worst that can happen? If you want to discuss sexuality with her the series ‘heart stoppers’ might be a good in. It’s a 12 but there isn’t anything sexual beyond kissing. They have a bi-sexual story line and gay characters. So you can discuss how some people might only like one sex some people might like both and some people find it changes over time. But that’s a conversation I’d have with any kid about that age.