I'm A Great Uncle!

[TheEldritchGod]

Anna just arrived an hour ago. Healthy and apparently quite loud.

Damn I feel old.

 

[Fox-Trot-9]

Congrats!

 

[TheEldritchGod]

I'm gonna have to torture my nephew at the family reunion this weekend. Lets see... Ah.

I'm going to start off with asking, "What gender did you assign the child at birth?" I don't know if I can keep a straight face, but I'll try.

 

[RepresentingCaution]

I'm gonna have to torture my nephew at the family reunion this weekend. Lets see... Ah.

I'm going to start off with asking, "What gender did you assign the child at birth?" I don't know if I can keep a straight face, but I'll try.

That's funny. I maintain that we don't really know my kid's gender yet, but we're treating him as a boy for now because there's a high likelihood that he is a boy since his biological sex is male. If the kid tells us otherwise, we'll respect that and proceed carefully from there.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

That's funny. I maintain that we don't really know my kid's gender yet, but we're treating him as a boy for now because there's a high likelihood that he is a boy since his biological sex is male. If the kid tells us otherwise, we'll respect that and proceed carefully from there.

Children don't have a gender. That's why they are children. You don't get one until puberty. It's why the phrase is Men, Women, and CHILDREN.

Just... do me a favor. Because I got two suicides I'm still dealing with. If your kid starts acting like "the wrong gender" assume you just have a perfectly normal homosexual (About an 8% chance). Don't go chopping off body parts, doing hormone replacement, or even mentioning body dysphoria. Don't even put that idea in their head. (and damn the Canadian government for paying for it.)

I don't know why, but some parents would rather mutilate their kids to be the 'right body' then accept maybe they just have a gay/lesbian kid. It never ends well. Over 4 years of counseling and they both still wound up killing themselves. Well, I know one of them did. Haven't confirmed the other. I'm told she did about what... 2 weeks ago now? Time has no meaning anymore.

What a roller coaster of a month.

 

[RepresentingCaution]

Children don't have a gender. That's why they are children. You don't get one until puberty. It's why the phrase is Men, Women, and CHILDREN.

Just... do me a favor. Because I got two suicides I'm still dealing with. If your kid starts acting like "the wrong gender" assume you just have a perfectly normal homosexual (About an 8% chance). Don't go chopping off body parts, doing hormone replacement, or even mentioning body dysphoria. Don't even put that idea in their head. (and damn the Canadian government for paying for it.)

I don't know why, but some parents would rather mutilate their kids to be the 'right body' then accept maybe they just have a gay/lesbian kid. It never ends well. Over 4 years of counseling and they both still wound up killing themselves. Well, I know one of them did. Haven't confirmed the other. I'm told she did about what... 2 weeks ago now? Time has no meaning anymore.

What a roller coaster of a month.

Sorry for your losses.

Brain chemistry is a complicated thing, and we'll definitely take a lot of time to figure things out before jumping to medical interventions. It's pretty normal for kids to want to experiment with their genders with pretend play and temporary things such as clothing. Also, you can enjoy hobbies and things typically enjoyed by a certain gender without actually being that gender. I can teach him to crochet and to use power tools safely and to cook and enroll him in some martial arts classes and music lessons etc. Grandma is already teaching him how to garden. Hobbies shouldn't be reserved for one gender or the other. It's about having fun and learning new skills.

Personally, I'm totally cis, but I don't like the color pink, and I think it's a waste of time to put on makeup every day. I like nail polish, though. That stuff lasts two weeks if applied properly, and I get to look at it whenever I want without reaching for a mirror. I want to introduce my kid to nail polish too because it's a good exercise in patience as well as fine motor skills. He can choose any colors I own, but if he wants pink nail polish, he can spend his allowance on that because I'm not buying it for myself.

Rest assured we won't be chopping. I want grandkids! My child can make that choice after 18 when it is no longer my decision, though I'll still caution against it. I wanted to get rid of my uterus for a long time because I hated periods and I didn't think having kids would be worth it, but things changed over time.

If my kid does express an interest in being a woman, I can introduce my kid to my best friend, who was my boyfriend in high school. She hasn't done any chopping but uses the word "outie" to refer to her genitals. It's kinda like how some people have an innie belly button and some people have an outie.

There's a high likelihood I have a cis boy, just based on statistics, but it's good to have a game plan just in case.

 

[ShrimpShady]

How did a thread about someone becoming a great uncle turn into this?

 

[Erysion]

How did a thread about someone becoming a great uncle turn into this?

Carefully.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

How did a thread about someone becoming a great uncle turn into this?

Because when you reach half a century, you find yourself focused on everything that can go wrong. That's kinda your job, to worry about everything that can go wrong so the kid and parents don't have to.

 

[RavenRunes]

Congrats on little Anna and her pipes!

I have a boy (9), but if he tells me otherwise one day that's fine. It's fine if he's gay. I don't care. If he marries a man one day I'll have a son-in-law rather than a daughter-in-law, that's all. I'll be responsible for nothing but a willing and open ear if he wants to tell me anything, and support when he needs it. Not going to push anything on him.

I hear about more and more trans kids whose lives and bodies have been ruined, it's heartbreaking.