Gender Identity In A Girl: Boy Meets Girl

Gender Identity

Using a restroom is something that everyone does every day. Most people do not think twice about which restroom they will use. For some people they have used the same gendered bathroom their whole lives. They were assigned a gender at birth, and they still identify as that gender. Those types of people would be called cisgender. Other people switch genders from the one they were assigned at birth, and they would be called transgender people. For some people, their gender identity varies day to day. Those people are called gender fluid. There are also people who do not identify with any gender. These people are called androgynous. There are more gender identities that people can have. Gender and sex are often confused

Many people are kicked out of their families for being who they are. Frank Bidart is a poet who frequently writes about his experience growing up gay. In his poem “Queer”, he writes, “If I had managed/ to come out to my/ mother, she would have blamed not/ me, but herself” (Bidart). This is also applicable to transgender people. When someone comes out, it may be seen as something that could have been prevented. The parents may blame themselves for their child being LGBT+. In the movie “Boy Meets Girl”, Ricky, a transgender girl, has no fear telling anyone about her gender identity. This is because when she came out when she was eleven, she was accepted by her entire family. She was able to be welcomed as a daughter instead of as a son. The movie did explain how she dealt with many suicidal thoughts because she was bullied for being “different”. It was important to Ricky’s mental health that her family supported her, because otherwise she may have killed herself. The parents that do not support their children may lead to severe mental trauma in the future for their

Suicide is the leading cause of death among LGBT+ people (“LGBTQ”). Much of this depends on the amount of support that the person received when they came out. The National Alliance of Mental Illness writes, “Someone who faced rejection after coming out to their families were more than 8 times more likely to have attempted suicide than someone who was accepted by their family after revealing their sexual orientation” (“LGBTQ”). It obviously can be very traumatic for someone to be rejected for coming out. Imagine if this person was a child. Children depend on the support of their family, and without this support it can cause extremely dangerous behavior. It is no surprise that if a child is accepted by their family they will be better off mentally that those who are rejected. A study done by the psychology department at the University of Washington compared the rates of anxiety of seventy three transgender children and seventy three cisgender children. All of the transgender children’s parents were members of a support group. Not all of the parents supported their children when they initially came out, but have since changed their views. The study found that the anxiety rates were only slightly higher than the anxiety rates of cisgender children (Tanner). This is most likely caused by the rejection that transgender children most likely face every day from strangers. By finding that transgender