Supporting Parents to
Support Their Children

My husband and I had two daughters before our son was born. Nothing in her childhood was a clear indicator that she was just born in the wrong body. At the age of 16, miserable and having had 18 months of poor attendance at her all-boys school, she finally told us what was going on in a note left for us to find. At first we were devastated, and mixed messages were being given and received. My husband struggled to be in the same room with her as he felt he would cry, so would often leave the room. My daughter thought he was rejecting her and got really upset. Nothing in our lives had prepared us for the shockwave that reverberated around our home those first few days.

Alice (mtf) is part of a blended family. We live in Wellington. Alice is my youngest child (aged nine) with an older brother (12), and sister (18). Alice lives between our home where my partner and his daughter aged eight and son five, live part time. She also visits her dad who also has an older son (half-brother) who no longer lives at home.

Before I had Alice I can't say I knew much at all about the LGQTBI community, and I am embarrassed to say that if I saw someone who I thought was transgender in the street I would stare in confusion.

We are a family of five. I'm a kiwi born in Lower Hutt, and my husband is English. Two of our children were born in the UK, and we moved back here when they were tiny so that we could take them to Playcentre and be involved in their earliest years. My wonderful rainbow was a child that was destined to be born. There is a five-year gap between him and his brother. X has never been defined by gender. He has always been ‘he' but his early influences were not gendered at all He had a wonderful child-led Playcentre education, and has had the benefit of being part of a very community minded, and open family.