How young is too young?

How young is too young to know your gender? Sounds like a silly question, doesn’t it? When I was a child, I knew I was a girl and no one questioned me. I was identified as a girl at birth based on my genitals. I had a vagina so I’m a girl. If I’d been born with a penis, I’d be a boy.

It is that simple in that I knew I was a girl but not because I had a vagina. I knew I was a girl because in my heart and mind I was and have always been a girl. It’s so easy when the gender one identifies as is the same as one is born. It becomes more complicated when those two are not in alignment.

So often, I hear people talk about a child being too young to know. But no one ever questions the gender of a cisgender child. Do we ask them, “How do you know you’re a girl/boy?” Of course not.

So, why then do we question a child who identifies as a boy or girl just because their gender assigned at birth doesn’t match the gender they identify as. If a cisgender child knows, so does a transgender child.

I have heard way too many stories of children of all ages who once they began to transition changed into a happy, contented child from one who was anxious, angry, confused. Allowing a child to transition doesn’t confuse them, making them remain a gender they know they aren’t is what confuses them.

Believe your child when he or she tells you their gender. They know.