A
female
age
26-29,
anonymous
writes:Hello there!I'm 24 and transgender female-to-male (ftm). I've been questioning my gender since I was 16 (didn't know being trans was an option until then), and came out to them as trans, and therefore their son rather than their daughter, when I was 19.I had come out to my parents (63M, 58F) as bi when I was 14ish and that actually went over really well, saying that they didn't think anything of it. Both of them were actually heavily involved in the theater scene as adults, so they were friends and co-workers with a lot of gay people. So, seems like a good start, right?Fast forward, I come out to them as fully trans, and it was a shitshow. They totally didn't understand, were fully unsupportive. Mom couldn't understand "why in the world I would ever want to be a boy." I tried to explain to them how I felt, like, in my soul, but it just didn't register. I told her about my depression that stemmed from the gender dysphoria, and told me, "Well, if you hate yourself so much, then I'm sorry I ever gave birth to you."Yikes.On the topic of top surgery: they called it "mutilating my body" and were wholly unsupportive of hormones. It took 5 years, up until present day for them to really put in effort in calling me by my chosen name, but there's no hope in the horizon of them calling me their son. On that topic, actually, when asking my dad to do just that, he said something along the lines of "if [I] want to be treated like their son, then [he] would be a lot less lenient with me, and tell me to suck it up more."I'm still the same person on the inside. I don't understand why trying to help them meet and understand the true me was met with being shut down so harshly. Or, why it would be met with such coldness.I haven't moved forward with transitioning even though I've been out for 5 years, and this is a major part of it, I think. Like, I need their acceptance first before I can move forward. Honestly, though, I'm pretty sure they still think this is a phase that I'll grow out of.Does anyone have any advice on helping them open up to it? It's been so long, it feels like I've tried explaining it a thousand times. Or, are they a lost cause with this? My parents and I haven't always seen eye to eye, but I still want them in my life, just without feeling so hurt and misunderstood. I also don't want them going ballistic on me, especially since I'm still on their insurance (I'm not financially stable enough on my own yet) and have severe asthma that needs medicating.
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male
reader, rat_._boi +, writes (11 April 2022):
i suggest you start going on either hormone blockers or testosterone depending on what you're comfortable with and what you can afford. you might just have to start your medical transition for them to understand who you are as a person. it can be hard but you have an entire community to back you up even if you don't realize it. good luck, lots of love from canada.
A
female
reader, Youcannotbeserious  + ♥, writes (10 April 2022):
 While I have no first hand knowledge of what YOU are going through, I think I can understand what your parents are going through. You seem to think you are the only one having a hard time here and that your parents are being deliberately obtuse in not accepting you as their son. Your parents are having just as difficult a time as you are.
Your mother gave birth to a daughter and, understandably, your parents assumed they would always have a daughter. To now be told to consider you as their son must be very difficult for them to accept, especially as they come from a generation where you were born male or female and stayed that way. If gender dysphoria existed, it was seldom talked about and even less understood.
I don't think your parents love you any less, just because they are finding it difficult to get their heads around your gender issue. This is about THEM, not YOU.
You are an adult. If you are mature enough to make a decision about gender transitioning, you are mature enough to do it without your parents' acceptance or approval. I wonder, are you delaying transitioning because you are not 100% sure, so you are using your parents' refusal to acknowledge you as their son as an excuse to delay? If you are adamant that you need their acceptance to go ahead with this, you could be waiting a very long time.
Perhaps your immediate priority should be to become financially independent so that you are not reliant on your parents for medical support, then that would be on less worry on your plate?
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A
female
reader, RubyBirtle +, writes (9 April 2022):
Try posting your question on a forum for transgendered people - - there are plenty of them (do a Google search). As you have already experienced it's very hard for people who aren't transgendered to "get" what people who people who are.
This is a site with very little traffic these days and I doubt you will find anyone on here who can truly empathise and give you advice worth having.
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