Transgender individuals often go through a series of changes, both physically and psychologically. I first became interested in the struggles of transgender individuals endure after watching a documentary about transgender children. I then began to watch more documentary and television shows about transgender adults and the process they go through with transitioning. A lot of transgender youth resort to running away from home and generally end up in foster care. Often times transgender people experience suicidal thoughts, depression, anxiety, bullying and self-hatred. California was the first state to enforce legal protections for transgender children in 1999. Many schools have enacted policies that enforce the use of appropriate names and pronouns for transgender children. I learned that many parents struggle with allowing their children to be who they want to be and encouraging their behavior. Although there are many parents that are supportive of their children being transgender and those that are totally opposed to it. From all the information that I found, the most important thing that people should recognize is that transgender people do not choose to be this way, it is who they are and they feel as though they were born in the wrong body. Once people accept that they are transgender they go through a process called transitioning in order to change their appearance to what they feel is their true gender identity, I discovered that there are many procedures for those that are transitioning. This is a personal decision, and some people spend their whole lives transitioning. I also found that several countries recognize transgender people by allowing them to change their legal gender on their birth certificate. In the past, transgender children went through therapy that was focused on trying to prevent the child from growing up to be transgender (Minter, 2012). However, it is now recognized that this is an ineffective and damaging form of therapy.
