Pink Hair

I saw my daughter at the train station today. It was the first time I had seen her in 16 months. It’s been that long since she ran away from home (on the day after her 18th birthday) and subsequently cut me out of her life. She looked good. She has dyed her hair bright pink and it has grown out into a lovely long bob – so much nicer than the shaved head she had in the year before she ran away. Her hair looked shiny and clean, and I couldn’t help remember the countless times I had brushed it for her as a child.

She was on her way to college and was dressed in a bright pink top, a flattering above-the-knee black skirt and black high-heeled boots – the overall effect was very feminine. Funny that, given that she identifies as trans, or maybe it’s queer now, or something else. Who knows? She’s always been a very feminine girl, always loved anything pink and wearing frilly, twirlly dresses; until she hit puberty and got sucked into gender ideology that is.

From the ages of around 15 to 18 she changed her name multiple times … first to Alex, then Grey, then Clay. She talked in a deep voice and started binding her breasts. She pretended to have a range of different mental disorders, from multiple personality disorder to anorexia, anything to get attention – and was then upset when the doctors wouldn’t admit her to hospital. She made a big deal about her new gender identity and expected loud applause from everyone. Of course, she got that at school – the teachers went along with the name changes and her preferred pronoun, and her friendship group was made up of half a dozen girls who all identified as a different letter of the alphabet. 

The story was different at home though. I was not supportive of the changes and, even though I initially tried to keep my opinions to myself, I don’t have a very good poker face. She very quickly turned herself into the victim in her story and I was the wicked witch. Why? Because I refused to take her to a gender diversity clinic, because I refused to approve cross-sex hormones, because I did not want my teenage daughter cutting off healthy body parts. Gee, what a terrible mother I was.

I know I’m not perfect, and that I could have handled the situation better. There was a lot of yelling at the time, a lot of frustrations being released on both sides. She just wanted me to accept her, and I just wanted her to see how ridiculous it all was. How does a mother accept that her child, who had never shown any signs of being anything other than the girl she was born as, suddenly identifies as a boy and wants to cause irreversible harm to herself?  She was throwing a lot of tough stuff at me over this time period – there seemed to be a new thing to deal with every few weeks and I just had no idea what to do.

My husband is the peacemaker in the family, and he just goes along with whatever she says. I guess that’s worked out well for him because she still sees him. But it’s been very divisive to the family unit and is breaking us apart. I have accepted that there’s nothing I can do to fix or even slightly improve this situation. It’s completely out of my control. But I don’t like where I am, I don’t think it’s fair, and I know I don’t deserve to be treated this way … and yet, here we are.

I’ve been crying all day after seeing her on the train this morning. I just can’t help myself. I still love her even after every hurtful thing she’s done to me. I know that I will fall asleep tonight with the image of that pink bob in my mind and sadness in my heart.