It began when she was just two.

Evie Macdonald always knew she was a girl but was assigned male at birth.

From age nine, she was ready to end her life.

From Ethan to Evie – Thirteen-year-old trans child shares her story of being assigned the wrong sex at birth. (Supplied)

“I wanted to die,” Evie, now 13, told 9news.com.au.

“I would’ve rather gone to heaven and been a girl than live here as a boy.”

Evie is one of an estimated 45,000 school-aged Australians who identify as trans, with horrifying new figures showing four out of five will self-harm and at least half will attempt suicide.

Born as Ethan, Evie remembers always feeling “different” at school.

Evie (centre) with her younger brother and older sister. (Supplied)

Evie (right) with her three siblings. (Supplied)

“I had this feeling I was a girl and something was wrong with me,” she said.

“It was really confusing. I wanted to be a princess and I wanted to play with Barbie dolls.

“I always felt as though I was a girl.”

Evie’s parents, Meagan and Scott, from Melbourne, thought it was just a phase.

But for Evie, it was a matter of life and death.

“One time I made this really pretty necklace, bracelet and ring in class with pink and white tones,” she said.

“I had them in the car and mum said ‘Is that for me?’ and I said ‘No, it’s for me’. We got into a fight because she said they were for girls and she then threw them out the window.



“When we got home I was really angry and upset and said: ‘Why can’t you accept me for who I am?’“

Evie with her biggest supporter - mum Meagan. (Supplied)

Months later, Evie shocked her mum by sharing her darkest feelings.

“I went to mum and said ‘I need to tell you something but I can’t say it’ so she passed me her phone and told me to write it down,” Evie said.

“I wrote: ‘I want to die’.”

Those four words changed Evie and her family’s lives forever.

“Mum then said she’d rather have a daughter that is alive than a son who is dead,” she said.

Evie is currently in stage one taking hormone blockers. (Supplied)

The Macdonalds, finally understanding it was not just a stage, turned to The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne for help.

“My child was really struggling with her mental health and with her life because I was unsupportive,” Ms Macdonald, 36, told 9news.com.au.

“I knew it was then me who had the problem. If I didn’t support Evie, I know she wouldn’t be here today. She would’ve at least attempted suicide multiple times or even worse, completed it.”

REFERRALS ARE SKYROCKETING

The number of children who identify as trans, like Evie, is growing.

At least half of these children are suicidal.

According to The Royal Children’s Hospital, 1.2 per cent of the adolescent population identify as transgender with children as young as three expressing concerns about their biological sex.

Gender clinics across the country, including all major children’s hospitals, have seen a huge increase in GP referrals of children with gender dysphoria.

Figures exclusively provided to 9news.com.au show that at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, there was 54 new referrals last year compared to one patient in 2013.

Evie Macdonald says her favourite movie when she was younger was The Little Mermaid. (Emma Leslie)

“The increase in referrals is partly due to increased awareness of gender related conditions,” a hospital spokeswoman said.

“Specialised assessment involves consultation with specialists in adolescent medicine, psychological medicine and endocrinology.”

The spokeswomen said an additional $160,000 has been set aside for the hospital in 2018-19 to build a multidisciplinary gender dysphoria service.

“NSW Health is committed to providing world-class clinical care for children and adolescents with gender dysphoria,” she said.

Referral numbers have grown at The Royal Children’s Hospital from one patient every two years from 2013 to more than 250 referrals last year.

The average age of children referred to the hospital is 12.

Research at the hospital shows that 96 per cent of children diagnosed with gender dysphoria have continued to identify as gender diverse and no patient who commenced stage two treatment has wanted to transition back to their birth sex.

Dr Elizabeth Riley is a specialist in gender identity. (9news)

“Parents are supporting their children, they are recognising what’s going on and they’re seeking professional support because they can see they need help and I think that’s the most significant change,” Dr Elizabeth Riley, who is a specialist in gender identity, told 9news.com.au.

“My first transgender client was in 1998 but a shift started to happen about 10 years ago. Social acceptance is increasing and parents become stronger advocates for the needs of their children.

“This is vastly different to the climate of fear, judgement and ignorance that was around more than 20 years ago when children were punished, beaten, abandoned or institutionalised for expressing gender diversity.”

PROCESS OF TRANSITIONING

In a landmark 2017 ruling, gender diverse youths were no longer required to go through The Family Court to access hormone treatment – making transitioning much easier.

The charge was spearheaded by teenager and transgender advocate Georgie Stone, who was the youngest person in the country to be granted hormone blockers at just 10 years old.

Transgender advocate Georgie Stone was the youngest person in the country to be granted hormone blockers at just 10 years old. (Supplied)

The first step in the transition process involves undergoing gender affirmation sessions, including changing their names and clothing.

Stage one of treatment involves the use of puberty blocking drugs usually taken in early adolescence and stage two is irreversible cross-sex hormone treatment and surgery.

Evie is currently in stage one, taking hormone blockers.

“It’s our first generation of children in Australia who have been able to live as their true selves from a young age,” Ms Macdonald said.

“But what kids have to go through if they’re trans is not an easy thing. Evie’s had psychiatric care since she was nine. She’s had fertility specialist appointments. Evie has a paediatrician and now that she’s on hormone blockers, she has to do that every three months.

“If Evie doesn’t do the medical transition she wants and has asked for, what’s the other side of that? The other side is I don’t have a child who will even make it to adulthood.

“She’s openly said to me: ‘If my voice breaks, I’ll kill myself’.”

‘THESE CHILDREN ARE JUST CHILDREN’

As the number of children identifying as trans increases, so too is the range of available support services.

Ms Macdonald and her friend, Karyn Walker, set up Parents of Gender Diverse Children to provide peer support and connect families across Australia.

The four words written on Meagan's phone by Evie changed Evie and her family’s lives forever. (Supplied)

“There was a lot of distress among families. For some parents, there is a period of grief of saying goodbye to the little boy or girl they were so excited to be having,” she said.

“The life I envisioned for my child was a happy one, free of discrimination but because of society, that is different.

“They don’t want any special consideration. Trans kids don’t stand out. They are just normal children who don’t want to be singled out in class and in the schoolground.”

Dr Riley said she had visited about 50 schools across New South Wales to educate staff on the needs of trans children.

“These children are just children,” Dr Riley said.

“The truth is any school that has a few hundred students, there’s going to be at least a couple of transgender children.

“I go to schools to educate the staff so they feel more comfortable. They begin to change their language so they’re not saying ‘all the girls go and do this’. We want them to say ‘all the children that are doing this activity come over here’ and that way it opens it up so there’s not that gender divide.”

Photographer Emma Leslie put trans children issues into focus with her Transcend portrait series in 2016.

She photographed 10 children aged five to 17 years old, including Evie, to make public the struggle many children faced about their identity.

(From left) Korra, Oliver and Taleem who were photographed in the Transcend — Portraits of Transgender and Gender Diverse Youth exhibition. (Emma Leslie)

“I wanted to photograph something that challenged the norms and something society was scared to talk about,” Ms Leslie said.

“It has created a lot of awareness and made the children feel happy because I photographed them for who they are.”

For Ms Macdonald, one of the hardest parts of Evie’s transition has been people not accepting her daughter for who she is.

But her daughter’s happiness has always been her top priority.

“The amount of times I’ve been called a child abuser because I allow my child to live in the gender she identifies as,” she said.

“When I look at the situation of what we were in when we were stopping her doing that, that was actually child abuse in my eyes now.

“She got to the point where she thought suicide was the only way out.”



*Evie Macdonald gave permission for 9news.com.au to use her old name.