The true danger of House Bill 2 means my son can’t come home

Twenty-three years ago, I mistakenly thought I had given birth to a girl. The private parts had me and my family exclaiming what a wonderful daughter we had. Imagine my surprise when my wonderful daughter realized that the private parts that made me and others assume she was a she were on the wrong person and on the wrong body. She discovered that she is a he.

I am sure you will not be surprised to hear that this was a difficult discovery for my wonderful child. Society put great pressure on my child to be categorized by genitalia, even though when he looked in the mirror and dove into his soul, those genitalia did not fit with how he saw himself. His body was wrong.

He came to us, and we were delighted that he understood who he was. We announced to friends and family our mistake and the birth of our son. You would never want our son going into the wrong bathroom or locker room for his gender. As he once told us, “Going into the girls locker room is soooo wrong. I am in the wrong place. My eyes, my eyes.”

I have met parents who have given birth to a boy only to have that child become aware that “his” body should be a girl’s body.

If children and their parents are lucky enough to be wealthy, those children can change their genitalia to match the gender they know themselves to be. For many, those operations are beyond their means. The choice these children have is to go into the bathroom that matches who they are and where they feel safe or, because of ignorance and fear, to go into the incorrect bathroom where they may be assaulted.

House Bill 2 puts every transgender child at risk because:

It fosters fear.

It fosters hate.

It fosters ignorance.

It fosters misunderstanding.

My son and the sons and daughters of others just want to be safe. The transgender daughter is not interested in your daughter or the women of your family. Well, she might want to know what fabulous shade of lipstick her wash-basin friend has on. The true danger is to our sons and daughters due to the ignorance evidenced in this bill.

I gave birth to a wonderful child 23 years ago. He is smart, creative, respectful of others, independent, loyal, funny and caring. It is now unsafe for him to come home.

This story was originally published April 14, 2016 at 5:18 PM with the headline "The true danger of House Bill 2 means my son can’t come home."