I was that trans teenager
Over the last three years the media has entrenched this view that trans kids and teenagers are confused, mistaken, and do not understand their own gender identities, that in the end they are gay kids who have been misled by gender ideology. Not that changing your mind is ever a bad thing, but those who deny trans kids their autonomy forget that trans kids have internal understandings of self. I was one of those trans kids back in the 1990s. Having an understanding of yourself evolves over time, but in demonising trans kids and telling them that they are mistaken, confused, or under a spell makes their lives immeasurably more difficult and harrowing.
I was eight or nine when I discovered trans was a thing, and something just clicked inside me and that was that. Due to the UK government’s Section 28 schools were banned from discussing non-heteronormative sexualities and genders, and the only glimpses into trans identities was through magazines and the occasional television show. It was a taboo subject because being trans was treated as something either shameful or to be pitied, why would you ever conceivably want to be a woman when you had all the power as a man? Trans men were never given space to talk, so were not on my radar.
Growing up in an evangelical Chrisian household was complex. On the one hand my parents indulged my occasional cross-dressing when I did do it publicly, on the other there was no talk of anything other than the gender binary and heterosexuality. Indeed, I was given several talks about gay “lifestyles”, and that it was a just a phase some men went through. When I formally came out to my parents my dad said to me that there are plenty of effeminate men in the world, why could I just not be happy being a man. He meant well, there was no malice, but ever since then my parents have resolutely refused to affirm my gender or even my chosen name. Being me in a household where gender identity was not even discussed was a weird situation.
All of this meant that I had to scrap together an understanding from early websites, chat rooms, forums, and blogs. My trans education came from middle age trans women who wished they had transitioned in their teens but did not due to circumstances. None of the current resources existed, even social media was a few years away when I actually came out. I made a ton of mistakes, fumbled my way around womanhood, yet not once did I regret affirming my gender as female. I went from boy to woman, and never in the last 23 years have I doubted it was the right thing for me.
We all like to assume that our way of seeing the world is a good one, that we act in good faith, and the things we do matter. Many of the voices raising concerns about trans kids forget that what they see on the surface is just the very small tip of a huge iceberg floating below trans teenagers’ lives. Gender as a social construct has been atomised by the internet, with social media allowing folk to live and express themselves in ways that in the 90s would have been unimaginable. Femmeboys, dykes, butches, tomboys, trans girls, trans boys, you name it you will find it on all the socials. Teenagers consume content that is relatable to them, and then project themselves into the world. That there has been an explosion in gender non-conformity has, in my opinion, been a direct result in folk simply wanting to exist as they see fit rather than trying to force themselves into whatever normative box was only available before.
Being the trans teenager in the room, often the youngest by a decade in most support groups, or the only trans person on campus that I was aware of when I went to university in 2000 was a strange experience. It made me much more confident to be myself, but also caused me to have a world view of transness that took a decade or more to completely unpack. When you are literally the only person who can relate to a particular experience trying to convey that in ways that other people can understand means you have to adopt their language rather than the words you feel. For me being a woman is simply who I am, and my journey to get to that womanhood involved a transitional period in my life. English semantics call that trans, yet the trans label hangs by the merest thread in my mind. This is the hard part for cis folk to grasp, that womanhood is not something yanked away from them, it is simply something I grew into, and it fits me perfectly. I have to use their language because that is what they need to hear to understand, but it is only a fraction of my totality.
And this is the key point for trans kids. They have to communicate their inner selves in language that parents, teachers, medical professionals, and the wider world will understand. I can quote you chapter and verse on gender theory, but the applied nature of gender non-conformity is as broad as the world is wide. I was that trans teenager without support from teachers, parents or friends, I had to shape my own understanding of self based on snippets and half glanced articles, and I don’t think I turned out half bad. If a kid like me can become the woman I am today just think about how amazing all the trans kids with support and cherishment will be in thirty years time. If we nourish and nurture them to be the best they can be nothing can stop them. Being a trans teenager was the best decision I ever made, and I have led my best life since.
