Children who believe they are transgender are secretly beginning the process of changing sex behind their parents’ backs by buying drugs on the internet, the Mail can reveal today.

As part of our investigation, we were offered a range of transgender medications online, with no questions asked, for as little as £25.

One mother, whose identity is known by the Mail but who wishes to remain anonymous, told yesterday how she discovered her teenage son developing breasts after ordering pills containing the female hormone oestrogen from an online pharmacy based in the US.

Children who believe they are transgender are secretly beginning the process of changing sex behind their parents’ backs. Anna Friel and her son Callum Booth-Ford are seen talking about transgender issues in a new documentary series, Butterfly

The drugs, which she found in the schoolboy’s bedroom, were sent in a plain wrapper to his local Post Office in London where he collected them using his ID card.

She said: ‘I noticed one day that my son was growing “breast buds” like a young girl. I looked on his bedroom desk and found the packet of pills, with an import duty slip.

‘They had come from America to a mail box he had set up at the Post Office in his name.

‘He told me, at 16 and in the sixth form, that he “felt like a woman”. He thinks he is in the wrong body and should not be male. He then he went on to buy the drugs online.’

The Mail received a packet of pills claimed to be male hormone blockers two weeks after we bought them using an ordinary bank card from a Thai pharmacy for £34, including postage and packaging

She added: ‘I don’t know how he paid for them but online hormones are so cheap. Like other kids doing this, he could have used his birthday money from Granny or pocket money.’

The Mail also found the do-it-yourself sex change drugs easily available over the internet with no age checks on buyers.

Scores of online chat forums for would-be transgender children explain how to order them and which pharmacy sites to use.

The Mail received a packet of pills claimed to be male hormone blockers two weeks after we bought them using an ordinary bank card from a Thai pharmacy for £34, including postage and packaging.

The label says the tablets contain ‘natural oestrogen’ to promote ‘transgender breast growth’. It took a half-minute internet search for ‘transgender hormone’ to find them.

We were not asked about age and no prescription was needed.

On another website based in India we were offered sachets of testosterone gel, marketed under the name Cernos. It is sold as transgender hormone therapy for females transitioning to male.

The warnings on the order form said some effects of the tablets in girls, such as deepening of the voice, are ‘irreversible once they develop’.

Scores of online chat forums for would-be transgender children explain how to order them and which pharmacy sites to use. The Mail also found the do-it-yourself sex change drugs easily available over the internet with no age checks on buyers [File photo]

A third pharmacy site, in the American state of Florida, offered us a drug called Triptorelin for £25. It acts on the pituitary gland to pause sexual development in boys and girls reaching the early stages of puberty, which makes it easier for them to undergo a full transition later.

Triptorelin is the same drug prescribed for some children by gender identity clinics in the UK, according to the results of a Freedom of Information request seen by the Mail.

Stephanie Davies-Arai, who runs Transgender Trend, a parents’ group worried about a huge rise in the number of children wanting to change sex, warned last night that the internet is fuelling the phenomenon.

Mermaids, a charity supporting transgender children, said the drugs ‘can subject a young person to distressing bodily changes that can lead to an increased risk of anxiety, depression, self-harm and suicidal ideas’ [File photo]

‘In my experience, it can start with a teenager going on to websites like Tumblr or Reddit, where they are convinced in linked chat rooms by total strangers that they must be transgender, even if what they are feeling might be little more than normal teenage angst,’ she said.

‘There are young transgender “celebrities” with hundreds of thousands of followers on internet sites where youngsters are encouraged to want to change sex and then told how to go about it.’

Transgender Trend said the waiting lists for gender identity clinics are long, especially for children under 18. It can take more than a year for a youngster to get an appointment for advice from a medical expert.

Miss Davies-Arai added: ‘Children don’t want to wait so they turn to the internet. Some even do so with the help of their parents who believe they should not challenge their boy or girl if they want to change gender.

‘Parents who do object are called transphobic and face a society that cheers their children on because it’s now “cool” to be “trans”.’

She demanded the introduction of parental controls to block sites that push sex change medicines aimed at children and teenagers ‘just as you can block the anorexia and self-harm sites that vulnerable young people are drawn to’.

However, she warned that 15-year-old girls and boys are getting their older friends, often away at university and away from parental control, to order the drugs online for them.

The Tavistock’s Gender Identity Development Service for under-18s also says it is concerned about the online purchase of trans drugs by youngsters because it is ‘completely unregulated. They don’t know what they have been taking.’

‘It is incredibly dangerous to buy these online,’ said the spokesperson, who pointed out that many young people later change their mind about changing sex. ‘By getting drugs off the internet, adolescents may start on a path they don’t want to tread later on.’

Transgender Trend said the waiting lists for gender identity clinics are long, especially for children under 18. It can take more than a year for a youngster to get an appointment for advice from a medical expert [File photo]

A spokesperson says the waiting time for children and adolescents to start treatment now stands at between 14 and 18 months. ‘That seems a very long time when you are young’, she added.

A lot of these under-18s have already socially transitioned – for instance, changing what they wear or their first name to reflect the sex they wish to become – by the time they get to see the experienced medical experts at the clinic.

The Tavistock GIDS now runs an online advice service for youngsters on the waiting list. It hopes this will help those who might otherwise be tempted to turn to the web to buy hormone drugs. ‘We are also trying to get the wait to see us down’, says the spokesman.

Last night, the 50-year-old mother who spoke to the Mail, who chose not to be named to protect the identity of her son who has just started university, said: ‘These drugs for trans kids are completely unregulated and any child can buy them. I want to warn families of that.

‘I have been on these pro-transgender sites myself. I believe my son has been brainwashed by them. They have made him believe he is in the wrong body and then told him how to go about doing something about it without any checks at all.’