Li Wei, 22, is a transgender woman: her biological sex is male, and her gender identity is female.
At the age of 16, she came out to her mother, Lin Fang.
At first, Lin Fang was very scared and believed that her child was abnormal and “possessed by evil spirits,” and she sought help from gods and Buddhas everywhere. Under the fierce confrontation between mother and daughter, Li Wei suffered from severe depression and attempted suicide multiple times.
This was a process that both sides struggled with. After walking out of the dark tunnel, Lin Fang gradually changed her mind and decided to accompany her “son” to grow into a “daughter.”
In Li Wei’s view, the relationship between many transgender teenagers and their parents has completely collapsed. Many parents still love their children, but “this space was later lost to confrontation.”
She is the lucky one. With Lin Fang’s support, Li Wei went to study in Japan. Last Spring Festival, relatives in Shandong praised her excellent exam results—they had almost hated her in the past.
Becoming a top student may be the only way for Li Wei to be accepted by the mainstream. But for Lin Fang, the most important thing is that her child can be her true self and walk freely on the streets.
The following is a self-statement by her mother, Lin Fang:
I was also very scared.
When she was still in kindergarten, the child was watching an animation called “Rainbow Cat Blue Rabbit,” and suddenly said, “Mom, I am Blue Rabbit.” Blue Rabbit is a little girl. At that time, I corrected her: “No, you are a boy.”
She officially came out at the age of 16. One day I was working in the kitchen. The child said, “Mom, do you know? My heart is a girl. It’s just that my body is a boy. Mom, I’m in pain.”
I was stunned when I heard it. I said, “How could you be a girl?” During that time, she recommended some related foreign documentaries to me, but I really couldn’t accept it.
At that time, her male characteristics were already very obvious, 1.8 meters tall, 180 pounds, with a large frame, a very masculine face, and a very dense beard. Soon, she was very resistant to her male characteristics and secretly plucked all her beard. Her shoes used to stink every day, but she became very clean.
Later, she started taking hormone pills and also proposed that she wanted to have gender reassignment surgery in the future. I was very scared when I heard it, and immediately went to Shanghai to find a well-known doctor in the field of transgender. The other party said, “You have to bring your child.” After saying that, he drove me out. I was very angry at the time, and later I learned that this doctor had been beaten by a parent.
Another doctor believed that my marital problems caused all this. Because I was too strong at home, it led to my child wanting to become a woman. I immediately felt a strong sense of guilt. I have a college degree, and my husband is a worker. He always feels that I look down on him. We quarreled every day after we got married. The doctor said, “You should not divorce for the sake of your child.” I said yes. He said that it would be better for your child if you divorced.
After knowing this, the relatives in the family all blamed me for spoiling the child too much, saying that I caused the problem.
Later, I joined Beitong (a sexual minority community in Beijing), and I would see a common accusation—it’s all the mothers who have taught these children to be neither male nor female.
At first, my husband couldn’t accept the child like this at all. He beat the child and firmly opposed the child going to school. He said, “I would rather the child die than accept this.” I asked myself, can I accept it? I can’t.
I also slapped my daughter’s face, several times. I feel heartache now when I think about it. My daughter and I were both too painful, sometimes we would quarrel and fight, and finally the two of us would lie on the ground motionless.
The child used to study very well and planned to take the exam for Fudan University. After this incident, she didn’t listen in class, slept most of the time, and didn’t talk to others. You know, she used to be very outgoing and often participated in debate competitions.
The teachers all looked down on her and said she was a lunatic. There was also a teacher who prevented other students from associating with her. The school also arranged a male dormitory for her. She complained every day, saying it was too uncomfortable. The boys in the dormitory talked about yellow jokes all day long, which annoyed her to death. She felt very ashamed and disgusted. She couldn’t live with them.
In her senior year of high school, she didn’t go to school for a single day. The excellent, confident, and outgoing child was gone.
In fact, as a mother, I felt scared every day. I was afraid of the image of a man becoming a woman, you don’t know what kind of people are around you, and I was afraid of that unknown and vague feeling. But this feeling of fear usually lasts less than ten minutes. She is my child, and even if she becomes a devil, I will not leave her.
Later, my daughter told me that if we didn’t support her, she would be very discouraged. She knew in her heart that what her parents worried about most was that she wouldn’t be able to live in society in the future.
Now it seems that she is working very hard and has been educating us to convince us: this won’t make her life particularly bad.
Image source: Stills from the movie “The Danish Girl”
It’s really embarrassing to have such a child.
For a long time, the child was very lonely. People looked at her, neither male nor female, like a monster. A person with a boy’s appearance, with messy long hair, and not good at dressing up as a woman. She felt that she didn’t belong to either gender. Even her former friends didn’t associate with her anymore.
Grandparents, maternal grandparents, and all kinds of relatives all hated her. They said that the child’s suicide was actually a performance, a threat. My sister even wouldn’t let the child stay with her.
Her enemies also included me. One time during the Chinese New Year, my mother and I, the whole family, held a Hongmen banquet and criticized her together.
Sometimes I also feel that it’s so embarrassing to have such a child.
I was really confused, I couldn’t understand this. I asked her, didn’t you like a girl in junior high school? She said that she liked that girl because she wanted to become her, not because she wanted to date her or kiss her.
The confrontation became more and more serious. We and the child were arguing with each other like crazy. I said she was selfish, that she was sorry to us, and that all the illnesses on me were caused by her anger.
In order to prevent the child from taking hormone pills, we controlled her financially. She sold her books, guzheng, and other items. I put all the money into her meal card, and she exchanged cash with her classmates. She bought glucose online and drank it, and her weight dropped by 40 pounds in two months.
She studied hard while starving herself, wanting to prove to us that she could. At that time, something always hit her confidence. She wanted to become a woman, but she felt that her physical condition was too poor. For example, she wanted to learn to mimic voices, but it was always difficult.
I couldn’t see her pain at the time, because we, as parents, were also in the dark. Some parents would send their children to conversion therapy institutions, and send them to electroshock therapy. I also thought about it, but I couldn’t bear it.
Some parents would send their children to black clinics for surgery to remove the breasts that had grown due to taking hormones. This is an irreversible harm to the child’s body and mind.
In the Beitong group, many children were depressed and often took medicine and ran away. Especially those children who were fourteen or fifteen years old, their parents were especially painful because the children’s medication was unreasonable or excessive, and their lives were in danger. There are not so many regular hospitals in China to provide children with correct treatment. There was a mother in Shanghai whose child was only fourteen years old and took medicine while studying in Chengdu, and almost lost her life.
There was also a child who was only 15 years old. Because of self-medication, his emotions fluctuated greatly. Doctors unanimously believed that it was the emotional fluctuations caused by hormone drugs that led to self-harm tendencies. Some children, in addition to taking hormone drugs, began to abuse over-the-counter hallucinogenic drugs.
My child almost died too. She drank pesticide and also cut herself with a razor blade. Several times she stood by the window.
One night at ten o’clock, I called her to ask where she was. She said she was going to jump into the river. I said, Mom can’t live without you. I went to look for her along the river, and it was all wilderness. I drove like crazy, crying my eyes out. Later, she didn’t jump, she was afraid.
Another time, we were each at a window preparing to jump. The child said, if you jump, I’ll jump, and I said, if you jump, I’ll jump.
Later, she was despondent and wanted to give up. She said that for me, she wouldn’t change, she would still be a boy. But she couldn’t stand it again the next day (being a boy).
After two years, she gradually couldn’t hold on anymore. I took her to our hospital for a checkup, and the result was severe depression. She had no strength at all, could only lie in bed, didn’t eat or drink, and slept for three days and three nights. She said she didn’t want anything.
I felt that this child could no longer take care of herself. I would have to support her for the rest of her life, and her life would be over from then on. I couldn’t accept her living like this, and I hoped that she would regain her vitality.
Image source: Stills from the movie “The Danish Girl”
Buy you your first dress
Now, when I think about it, we were just pulling a tug-of-war with the child, wanting to pull the other person, and as a result, we fell into a strong confrontation. In fact, I have to lead her like leading a snail.
I started reading books and documentaries about depression every day. I reasoned with her, but she didn’t listen. In fact, it was wrong for me to educate her from the position of a parent. I should empathize with her feelings.
I took her to psychological counseling, 600 yuan an hour, more than three hours 2000 yuan, 10,000 yuan a month, which is not a low consumption for us working-class people.
What really changed my mind was a doctor in Jinan. She asked me, is your child a stupid child? I said no, the child is very smart. She said, which smart child would suddenly want to become a girl. She said that the embryo was already like this when it was developing.
She is a healthy child, but her soul is in the wrong body. I asked the doctor if this could be cured, and the doctor said no. She has already taken the medicine and can’t go back.
Sometimes people need an authority figure to tell you the truth. I can only accept reality and move forward. At this time, I began to accept it, to endure the arrangement of fate, but not really accept it.
After accepting the reality, I thought of ways to help the child. She took the medicine and developed a slight breast. I said, buy a bra. She showed a somewhat shy expression. The child also needs a process to accept herself, and she can’t immediately become another gender. I bought her underwear, and she wore it sometimes and sometimes didn’t. She gained weight again after being depressed, and I accompanied her to do aerobics. She lost more than 20 pounds from one hundred and eighty or ninety pounds, and her figure looked good.
I taught her how to dress up and bought her girl’s pajamas. I took her to cut her hair. Her hair was too long and she didn’t know how to take care of it. It looked much better after it was cut.
We also bought a little pleated skirt in a girly style, more than three hundred yuan a set. When she put on the skirt, she showed a long-lost happiness.
I usually say, “How are we girls doing?”
My son gradually became a woman. I also slowly accepted her from the bottom of my heart. Children are very sensitive, and they know very well whether their parents truly recognize them or not.
Slowly, she came out of her depression. At the same time, her college entrance examination results came out, only 365 points. I was thinking about what to do next in her life.
Image source: Stills from the movie “The Danish Girl”
Must wear a skirt to go abroad
One time, I was chatting with a classmate who teaches at Cornell University in the United States, and I told her about my child’s special situation. She said, do you know that my child is also special? It turned out that her child has autism. She said that her child would most likely become a fool in China, but now her child has graduated from college and is working.
We decided to go abroad. The child wanted to go to Japan. In order to raise the money for her to go abroad, my husband and I worked two jobs. I was a newspaper editor, and for a while I got up at four o’clock in the morning to work at a breakfast cart. I didn’t make any money, and I got sick. But this country must be left, and if worst comes to worst, we’ll borrow money.
When Japan opened up, I immediately bought a plane ticket. Some people said that the child’s depression hadn’t fully recovered, how could she go. I said I believe the child will get better there.
On the day of departure, I said to the child, let’s put on a skirt. That was the first time she had worn a skirt out, a uniform skirt, and she wore it very neatly. We also cut her hair short and made up.
Her father immediately turned his face and said, what do you want people to see at first glance? I said, I hope her first impression is that she is a girl.
Over there, no one looked down on her. Those old men and women, classmates, and teachers were all very kind to her. When she graduated, we learned that the teachers and classmates said it was best to pretend not to know (about the child’s situation), so as not to embarrass the child.
The child studied very hard and usually worked as a cashier in a supermarket. After graduating from language school, she received a scholarship and studied in the most prosperous area of Tokyo, majoring in her favorite history, and she also had a boyfriend.
She no longer struggles with her gender issues and is more confident than she was as a child.
Image source: Stills from the movie “The Danish Girl”
Now, she is the most recognized child in my parents’ home. She is studying at a university in a prosperous area of Tokyo, and most of her university grades are A, with 4 of them being full marks. Last Spring Festival. My dad said, when will your daughter come back. My mom said, how is your daughter doing. My sister has also changed, encouraging the child to study hard with my daughter.
Grandparents have always broken off contact with us. On the one hand, my husband and I were not getting along in the first place. On the other hand, my husband didn’t want to face the conflict and didn’t really solve the problem.
After this experience, my husband has also grown. In order to earn tuition for the child, he has been working two jobs. He doesn’t know how to express himself in other ways. If the child wants five hundred, he gives a thousand. He no longer says harsh words. He told her not to wear skirts because he thought it was for her good.
In the parents’ group of transgender teenagers, I saw parents struggling in pain. Many people still haven’t realized that, first of all, the child is already in a lot of pain, and we should see their pain. We brought this life with inconsistent body and mind into this world, and we should be responsible. Those parents who drove their children out of the house are the most unqualified.
I think people still have to learn to be tolerant. Only with tolerance will you find that the world is full of gray areas, and you can look at many things with a more open mind. Generally, mothers are easier to change than fathers. Mothers are more emotional, and fathers are more easily influenced by external evaluations.
I later felt that I didn’t want any face, I wanted my child.
My friends around me have basically accepted my daughter. My best friend is the leader of my unit, and she also recognizes her and will give her gifts.
I will act coquettishly with my daughter. I said, when you were in heaven, did you think your mother was good, so you chose me to go through the pain with you. I am very happy to have her as my daughter. Only after experiencing a lot of pain will people think about things about fate.
We have two cats, two stray cats born in the basement of my house. Considering that the child will not be able to have children in the future, I said that these are your two girls. One cat is like my daughter, sometimes lazy, sometimes ignoring people, and sometimes individualistic. My daughter believes that the best cats in the world are the cats in our house.
Whenever my daughter says that she misses the cats again, I know that she wants to video chat with me.
My child is far from being able to compare with the children at the University of Tokyo. What I compare is that she has made progress compared to yesterday, lived her own life, and is more respectful of life.
After going to Tokyo, she will tell me everything, including dating. I said to her, first of all, we must love ourselves. She said that in this life, she just wants to be an ordinary person. I also hope so.
Some concepts you need to know when reading this article:
Transgender person: refers to a person whose gender identity is different from their biological sex. Most people hope to get medical help to achieve a certain degree of gender transition, so as to accept their own body. The corresponding concept is cisgender person.
Gender reassignment technology: also known as gender-affirming technology, refers to the use of endocrine and surgical methods to make the biological sex of the treatment object consistent with the gender identity. According to the new regulations, the removal and shaping of the genitals is the main surgery of this technology.
Conversion therapy: by restricting behavior, injecting drugs, electroshock, etc., trying to “correct” a person’s cognition and behavior. For transgender people, that is, to “return to” the state of identifying with their biological sex.
A large number of clinical experiences show that conversion therapy is ineffective for transgender groups. Sometimes, forced and repeated conversion therapy may even aggravate the inner burden of transgender people. When it is difficult to bear, they may stop the treatment through some behaviors that seem to be effective.
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