My Trans Daughter Is in Danger I Ignored: Guest Writer T.C. Kaye
I hoped to raise my girl with the freedom my parents allowed me. When that delusion shattered, I was destroyed
Welcome to the latest installment of our Guest Writer series, featuring T.C. Kaye, in Mexico. Gender Defiant brings you real stories of real trans families every week. Consider a paid subscription to help underwrite our expenses:
I grew up free-range in the ’70s and ’80s. Like, very free range.
When I was 13, my free-spirited parents moved our family from western Colorado to Guatemala, which was then in active civil war, and let me travel all over that country alone starting around age 14. I got into a few dicey situations riding chicken buses around Central America, but I made it through. I had no adult to step in, no cell phone—there weren’t even land lines in people’s houses in Guatemala back then. I was truly on my own until I got home, so I handled it, whatever it was.
Frantic
As a mom, I’ve wanted my kids to have a (small) portion of the independence I enjoyed growing up. My son Eric, 22, craves that freedom, always has. He has such an independent streak that, when he was little, he would run off in crowded public spaces where I had to frantically search for him. But my daughter is another story.
Trina is 16, trans, and has always been extremely shy. She adores being at home and feels everything deeply. When she was 8, I signed her up for travel soccer, which involved weekday evening practices and hourlong drives to games every Sunday. She hated it. “How am I supposed to spend time with my family if I’m gone all the time?” she wailed. Never mind that her dad, brother and I came to games with her. I gave in and withdrew her; I don’t force my kids to do stuff they hate.
The pandemic, and our move to Mexico from the U.S. last year to preserve her access to gender affirming care, have only intensified Trina’s introversion. She adamantly refuses all school but home school. She spends her free time watching videos and gaming. She has online friends, but nobody local she can go have fun with in person, in real time.
Trina is much more than just an introvert, of course. She is bright, curious, a talented cook. We have fun together making pizza from scratch and watching Kim’s Convenience and Elementary. She has a wicked sense of humor, values justice, loves animals—our dogs are always piled around her on the sofa as she games.
Spiraling
But at times, I lose sight of all the wonderful things Trina is and succumb to anxiety. Will she graduate from high school? Have a career? Will she find a partner who sees how wonderful she is and become a mom like she has said she wants to? How do you begin to build an adult life if you stay home and only socialize with your parents and dogs?
Maybe I should push her more, force her to go to school, but where? Trina’s Spanish is still basic, which complicates things…. I can go to a dark place, obsessing about all this.
I have a wise friend whom I call when I am struggling. Rita and I have been close for more than 35 years, but she really didn’t know anything about trans people until she found out I have a trans daughter. Ever since then, she has been a total ally. Recently, spiraling about Trina, I called her.
Here’s what she said:
“You need to face the fact that your daughter is in a lot of danger when she leaves your house. She could die. And if you don’t process that, you can’t truly support her the way she needs you to.”
Reader, I lost it. I don’t know when I have cried that hard, and probably for more than an hour. Rita stayed on the line, listening and encouraging me to face the tempest of grief and rage her words had provoked. My friend knew what she said would destroy me, and she was ready to sit with me while I fell apart.
“You need to face the fact that your daughter is in a lot of danger when she leaves your house. She could die”
My daughter has been suicidal in the past. Is any parent of a trans kid not scared of their child falling victim to violence from within? But also, trans women are at risk of violence from without. This is real, and Trina is not exempt, even in a country that is not waging a public war against trans kids the way the U.S. is.
Staying silent
A friend of mine here in Mexico, a trans woman, has shared that she is careful to speak as little as possible during her commute on public transit because she is scared her voice will give her away. She’s incredibly brave, and she knows what she is risking whenever she sets foot outside her door. Mexico is considered the second-most dangerous country in the world for trans women, according to human rights groups.
Raising my trans daughter is a joy, but it’s also, honestly, terrifying. My experience as a free-range teenager adventuring around Central America does not apply to Trina for a multitude of reasons. My friend showed me that I might have inherited my parents’ willful blindness about the hazards a girl, especially a trans girl, faces in the world.
Like my parents, I want to assume my kids will always be OK somehow. But even though I survived my travels, my parents were wrong to pretend that the world was a safe place for their teen daughter. And I think I need to stop pretending it’s a safe place for mine.
Subtle shift
After exhausting my tears, I hung up with Rita. I was a bit shaky emotionally for the rest of the day.
Once that cleared, I noticed things begin to shift subtly with my daughter. We had a telehealth visit that week with her doctor, and Trina asked a lot more questions than she usually does. A few days later, she went grocery shopping with me and her dad. Baby steps.
I still don’t know what Trina’s future holds. I still can’t envision how she will build an adult life from a foundation of extreme introversion. But she doesn’t have to have it all figured out yet, and neither do I. She has time. And I will be by her side to keep her as safe as I can for as long as she’ll let me.
—T.C.K.
T.C. Kaye is the managing editor of a community newspaper. They live in Mexico with their partner and two young adult children.
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