Awareness, laws help transgender youths flourish

AB1266 allows transgender youths such as Logan Henderson access to activities and facilities based on their gender identity. AB1266 allows transgender youths such as Logan Henderson access to activities and facilities based on their gender identity. Photo: Michael Macor, San Francisco Chronicle Photo: Michael Macor, San Francisco Chronicle Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Awareness, laws help transgender youths flourish 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

When Catherine Lee used to take her young child to the grocery store, other shoppers would often comment, "Oh, what a nice son you have, helping you pack the groceries."

She would sometimes just let it pass and exchange a glance with her child. But other times, she would correct them: "Oh, no, this is my daughter, Kimberly."

"I tried to take him shopping to get girlier clothes, dress him in pink, help people understand he was a girl," Lee said.

But her child, now 16-year-old Ashton Zaine Lee, came out as transgender to his parents about two years ago, and Lee had to learn quickly that "this is it - this is my new reality."

Lee, a 46-year-old therapist from Manteca (San Joaquin County), is part of a growing group of parents navigating - sometimes at crash-course speed - the complexities of raising a transgender child.

More transgender people are coming out as children, a sea change that doctors and therapists say could be caused by increasing awareness among parents and advancements in medical options for transgender children. And as their ranks grow, so does the push for laws such as AB1266, signed last week by Gov. Jerry Brown, to allow transgender youth to use school sites and join groups associated with their gender identity.

Ashton lobbied hard for AB1266 and delivered thousands of support signatures to Brown's office this month. He has a solid build, sports a close-cropped Mohawk dyed blond, and looks at home in a suit and male clothing - so much so that using the girls' bathroom at school caused more problems than using the boys' would have.

"Part of why it was so important to get into the men's room is because when he was in the women's room, girls would walk in, they would be startled and flustered, walk out and check that they went into the right bathroom," Lee said. "Sometimes the yard duties that didn't know him would scold him for going into the women's restroom because he looks like a boy."

Parental concerns

The new law has drawn ire from parents worried that it could be abused by students who pretend to be transgender in order to catch a peep at the opposite gender in restrooms or open showers.

But much of the fear is based on misinformation, said Wendy Hill, the legislative aide to state Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, who introduced the bill.

"We have people calling up saying, 'I don't want my daughter to see a penis in the girls' bathroom,' " Hill said. "Let's think logistically. There's no way your daughter would see a penis or a vagina in a bathroom. They have stalls."

And public schools almost never have students shower at school anymore and haven't for decades, because of the costs of the water and the staff needed to keep them running and clean, Hill said.

Several school districts, including San Francisco, have had policies for years that accommodate transgender students without incident or abuse. Being a transgender student is "very scary," Hill said, and not the sort of experience taken lightly.

"We have never had the randy boy pull this so he can get into the girls' locker room," said Kevin Gogin, the district's director of safety and wellness. "I think there's a misunderstanding that students are going to be jumping on this as a joke. That's not going to happen."

Ashton was using a staff restroom before the bill was passed, and some transgender youths prefer to use a separate bathroom. But for many others, access to the right restroom - and sports teams, cabins at camp, other sex-separated groups - can make all the difference in feeling accepted at school.

A smaller percentage

Most children who show gender-variant behavior at a young age won't end up living as a different gender. In studies, only about 15 percent of children who were brought into gender clinics before puberty eventually identify as transgender.

Many of the other 85 percent are gay, said Diane Ehrensaft, a child psychologist who helps lead the Child and Adolescent Gender Center at UCSF. Often, they or their parents had confused gender identity with sexual identity.

But studies also show that patients who continue to identify as transgender past puberty are much likelier to live the rest of their lives that way, Ehrensaft said.

Transgender or gender-variant children now have the option of using hormone blockers to stave off unwanted puberty and its accompanying body changes. The blockers can also buy time for children who aren't yet sure of their gender identity - a comfort for parents who worry that children might be too young to fully grasp such a life-altering decision.

Every incident is unique

Each child's story is different. Shay is an 11-year-old transgender boy who lives in the South Bay and whose parents, like many with young transgender or gender-variant children, want to keep some details of his identity anonymous. His parents call him "gender fluid," and from just a few years old, "I didn't feel like a girl at all," he said. He thought that on his fifth birthday, he would turn into a boy.

Instead, he transitioned socially between third and fourth grade, is on hormone blockers for now, and plays soccer, basketball and flag football on boys' teams, often with teammates who don't know his transgender status.

"Over time, the issue is just, where does he fit in?" Shay's father said. "With what group does he fit in? That's his biggest challenge. He doesn't quite hang out with the girls, and when he hangs out with the boys, he just has to be tougher."

Social transition

Logan Henderson, an 18-year-old transgender man from Santa Monica who is starting college at Dartmouth in the fall, came out as an eighth-grader and has been on hormone therapy since high school.

"Socially transitioning was the hardest part of transitioning because you have to deal with other people," said Henderson, who was allowed to use the nurse's restroom and was given alternate ways of fulfilling his physical education credit. "I think I was very, very fortunate that I went to my school, where they wanted me to be safe and comfortable."

Lee's son Ashton first came out as a lesbian in seventh grade, then came out as transgender a few years later. He talks about wanting to start hormone therapy, but his mom is more hesitant.

"I've asked him to wait a few years," Lee said. "He's around a lot of peers right now. Some have had treatment, some haven't. He's at an age where he's trying on a lot of different hats."

Lee, like many parents in her shoes, loves and trusts her child, wants to support him, and is "his biggest advocate," she said. But that support didn't come easily.

"Having a transgender child, initially for a lot of parents, is really heartbreaking - I know it was for me," Lee said. "I worried, 'Who's going to love my son? What kind of life is my child going to have?' I know as a parent I had a lot of dreams, and still do, about how my child is going to turn out. It kind of turned that all upside down for me, but now I've had a chance to rebuild what life could look like for Ashton as a male."

'Very mature for his age'

Growing up transgender is a difficult experience, and Ashton is "very mature for his age," Lee said. But he's 16 - and picked a name that "sounds like a name a teenager would pick," she said with a laugh.

Lee and Ashton still disagree on the nuances of his gender identity. He feels he's a man, while Lee's motherly eye sees some ways that he'll always be female. She wishes he didn't have to pick one gender identity or the other, and knows that it could change in the future. But one thing is for sure.

"I don't think Ashton will ever say he was wrong, that he's not a man," she said.