The New World I Navigate

It’s my youngest daughter’s 16th birthday tomorrow. What she really wants most for her birthday is testosterone. Because we’ve had this battle before, usually ending in tears for both of us, she doesn’t ask me for “T” for her birthday this year. Instead she settles for the other front runners on her list of things she wants most in the world:

1. Five Nights at Freddy’s collector figure set $99

2. A Five Nights at Freddy’s Pillow Pet (Foxy to be specific) $35

3. Athletic basketball shorts: Adidas. $25 (I’m guessing cuz they’re comfortable asf. And because they’re from the Boys section)

It’s the first year she hasn’t asked for silly putty or sparkly slime. Or Lego’s. Or stuffed animals. Although I feel like the foxy pillow pet kinda still counts.

I can only refer to her as “her” and “she” when I’m not around her. Or when I’m writing in my journal. Like now. But it always has to be “he” and “him” when I’m speaking to her/him. Or when I’m being observed/overheard by my ‘Little Hitler’ who will bring the hammer down on me swiftly and without room for error should I slip.

God forbid I ever utter the dreaded “deadname”: Eliana. The name I gave her when she was born. Soon thereafter to take various forms over the years: “Ellie”, “Jellybean or EllieBean”, or sometimes just “bean”. Or “peanut”, or “peanut pie-face” (not sure where I came up with that one-it is kinda weird. Lol)

At 16, she is old enough to drive a car but she can’t vote. She’s not considered mature enough to drink alcohol or to be allowed inside certain businesses or venues without a parent or guardian present. But according to most of the medical professionals in this country, she is old enough to take cross-sex hormones that will alter her body permanently. And she’s old enough to make the decision to have her healthy body parts removed (as long as a parent consents). And my ex-husband, her father, consents. He even tried to go behind my back and get her testosterone without it showing up on the insurance that covers the kids which I pay for through my employer. I am the only person standing in the way. I am the only person protecting my child, even if it’s from herself. Which makes me the enemy. She’s lived full time with her father the past two years because “I don’t support her…errr him.” I’m being punished. She thinks that if she doesn’t come home, if she shuns me, that I’ll fold; that I’ll give in and give her what she so badly thinks she wants right now - testosterone. But what she fails to see is that I LOVE her so much that I will endure the pain of physical separation from her rather than do that. Because that’s what a Mother does. That’s what a parent who loves their child more than they love themselves, does.

And it seems that the politically correct world has all drank the Kool-Aid. And the rest of us, who ask ourselves if the whole world has gone mad, just sit back stunned and shamed into silence. I’ve had seemingly intelligent professionals affirm my daughter as my son behind my back and in front of my face, knowing full well how I feel about it. Teachers, therapists, pediatricians. They’ve ALL affirmed her delusion that she can magically become a boy. And to a child, that’s powerful “evidence”. I want to SCREAM at them “You don’t even know my child!!” But I know my child. In fact, I’ve known her nine months longer than ANYONE in this world. And she has never shown any signs while growing up that she felt like a boy trapped in a girl’s body. That is, until age 12, when she announced she was gay which was not a surprise-those signs had been there. And we embraced her, waving the rainbow flag in easy support of that declaration. But a couple of weeks later, she learned from the Internet what the word transgender means. And then, with a few questioning searches, social media, Tumblr, Tik Tok and god- knows what other content the algorithm provided all of the confirmation that a 12-year-old confused kid going through puberty needed.

Even science proves that her frontal lobe (the part of the brain that governs logic, reasoning and the ability to grasp long term consequences) isn’t fully developed until age 25, at best. But hey, what is science in the face of political agenda and ideology?! So I gratefully take the crumbs that she still allows me to have. While she won’t come home, she still Facetimes me almost daily. Despite her initial intentions to fully shut me out, my baby still needs her mama. And I find my only peace in that. Because somehow, despite the efforts by the rest of the (politically correct) world and her father in their mission to make me into a terrible mother in her eyes, they cannot fully break our bond. And one day, she will see the truth and I will forgive her easily because she is an innocent VICTIM in all of this madness and selfishness. And she is a Child. Who still wants toys and stuffed animals for her birthday.

Someone once told me, “Love builds a bridge over which truth can travel”. So, for now, I just continue to love my child and hope that one day she comes back to me. That one day she comes back to herself.