As a kid, I wanted people to know I was a boy. I loved judo, cricket, football. I hated skirts and frills. But now, as a mum, I’m glad no one asked me then why I liked being a tomboy
WRITER REVEALS HER CONCERNS OVER YOUNGSTERS HAVING SEX CHANGE
It has been one of the most controversial subjects of 2016.
Transgender support services across the UK have seen a sharp rise in child referrals, meaning youngsters are deciding they want to change sex.
New documentary Kids on the Edge: The Gender Clinic reveals the stories of two children, aged eight, attending the NHS-funded Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service.
The Gender Identity Clinic in Glasgow last year reported a significant rise in referrals over the past decade, including youngsters aged under five, and a GP in Wales has set up a clinic to prescribe cross-sex hormones to children as young as 12.
It’s a phenomenon that concerns writer and mum Fiona Russell. Here, she explains why.
Stare a bit more and you might conclude I was a typical male child of the 1970s and early 80s.
I used to like that. In fact, I loved it when people ruffled my hair and called me a laddie.
Although I was born a girl, the eldest of three siblings in the late 60s, I wanted people to think I was a boy.
I dressed like a boy and chose, wherever possible, boys’ clothes. I liked boys’ corduroys (this was the 70s), Star Wars T- shirts, checked shirts ( buttoned to the right-hand side), boys’ tracksuits and blue trainers.
I recall a favourite jacket, a motorsports- repl ica anorak, before upgrading to a dark blue boys’ parka.
I loathed clothes that were pink or pastel- coloured, sparkly or depicted princesses. I shunned frills and, above all, I hated skirts.
I even left the Girl Guides in protest because they insisted we wear skirts as part of the uniform. I thought they were stupidly impractical.
I joined the local boys’ footba l l club ( g i rl s’ teams did not exist then), I enjoyed cricket, riding my bike, skateboarding and go-karting. I also competed to a national level in judo.
I recall a happy childhood with plenty of friends, both female and male, and I was a high achiever in school. I was not bullied for being a tomboy.
Thinking back, and after viewing programmes and reports about transgender kids, I suspect that if anyone had thought to ask me when I was aged six to 14 if I would like to become a boy full-time, I’d have probably agreed.
From my childish outlook, I would have imagined a life playing football. I was desperate to play after being told to leave the boys’ team at 11 because I was a girl.
I would have envisaged an uncompl icated wardrobe of trousers, T- shirts and trainers instead of uncomfortable and impractical girls’ clothes. I might well have considered the advantage of peeing more easily, standing up or when playing outdoors.
However, my desires to live like a boy would have been based on my simplistic, stereotypically child-like views of the world – and, poignantly, without knowledge of the adult I was to become.
For example, I would have had no concept, as a child, of what it would be like in my adult life to fall in love and have sexual
Anyone looking at photos of me as a child would easily mistake me for a boy.
relationships, nor the deep emotions created by giving birth to a daughter and the joys of motherhood.
How could I ever have known then that as a woman I would enjoy wearing skirts and dresses and embrace the wonders of make-up and long hair?
To d ay, when I wat ch documentaries about transgender kids, I feel fortunate no one asked me how I felt about my gender or why I liked being a tomboy.
No doubt, helped also by the internet, there has been a huge shift in awareness of transgender individuals in wider culture and this is surely a good thing. Young people faced with transgender feelings should be able to find tolerance in society and be protected in law from discrimination.
But are children, even those approaching puberty, able to make informed decisions about the consequences of a complete, life-long shift in their gender?
Are our gender identities fully created before puberty, or by puberty? And can the longer-term psychological consequences of these decisions possibly be known?
I asked my mum recently whether my parents thought to question me but she said they just accepted me as I was: A girl who was simply quite boyish.
And I’m truly thankful they did not ask me about being a tomboy – because I have another strong and long-lasting memory of my childhood.
Aged 14-and-a-half, I suddenly realised I wanted very much to be a girl. As I started the process of puberty, I decided I preferred being a female to a male.
I believe most of this was a subconscious reaction and most likely an awakening of my sexuality.
I discovered I fancied boys and
I wanted to look more like a girl. When my family moved to Scotland because my dad had a new job, I took the opportunity to reinvent myself.
At 15, I turned my back on a childhood of being a tomboy and fully embraced life as a young woman.
I grew my hair, fashioned it in a more feminine style, wore make-up, chose female clothing and started my first relationship with a boy my age.
I did feel a bit conspicuous for a while, like a zebra with no stripes, and I had concerns that I hadn’t had the same learning process as other girls, such as how to do my hair and make-up.
I know I tried too hard to start with and made some awful errors with make-up and clothing.
In time, however, no one would have known my extreme tomboy- ish ways, unless they
looked at photos in the family album.
In my 20s – and still now – I relaxed a little and, while I am still feminine-looking with long hair and a bit of make-up, I do display some boyish characteristics, again in a stereotypical sense.
For example, I took up playing football again at university in a mixed five-a-side team.
For general wear, I prefer trousers and sports clothes. I choose trainers and boots over heels and court shoes. These are more practical for my way of life.
I still prefer sports and outdoors activities to shopping and beauty but I also like skirts and dresses for going out and parties.
My daughter nicknamed me tom-mum when she learned what a tomboy was. But while I enjoy some tom- mum tendencies, I really do like being a woman.
I love being a mum and I have taken great pleasure in sexual relationships with men and fantastic friendships with women.
Of course, it may be that if I’d known about and chosen the transgender route, I might well have had a rewarding and satisfying life, too, as a man.
But the fact that at puberty my feel ings of who I was, the genderge I was born, and my sexualse ity felt so strong reassuresre me it was right for mem to remain female. I am very much in favour of living in a society that is accepting of everyone, including lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender individuals, and gives rights to people to live as they wish. I have witnessed the strength of feeling of some adult transgender people and how their lives are changed for the better after reassignment. But my feeling is that they are adults and, crucially, have made their decisions post-puberty. Surely, a more commonsense approach is that we are all on a spectrum somewhere, from overtly female to strongly male. As a child, I was more boyish than girlish but with no sense of my sexuality. As an adult, I am still quite boyish, if you frame this in stereotypical terms, but I’m a heterosexual female. I believe I did not know or think about this until puberty.
At 15, I turned my back on being a tomboy and fully embraced life as a young woman