Real Talk with Dads

When a child comes out as transgender, every parent begins a journey. One of Mama Dragons' big priorities this year is building deeper community—making sure every parent feels seen and knows they are not alone. And while moms often find one another pretty naturally, dads don't always have those same spaces to ask questions, wrestle with big feelings, or simply hear another dad say, "Yeah, I've been there too." Today In the Den, Sara sits down with three dads to talk about those first moments of learning their child was transgender, the questions they wrestled with, the things they got wrong, the things they learned, and the ways their kids have expanded their hearts and their understanding of what it means to love unconditionally. Whether you're a mom hoping to better understand your partner, a dad looking for someone who gets it, or anyone who loves a transgender young person, we think you're going to find something meaningful in these conversations.

Special Guest: Mike Jones

Mike is a senior software developer in Boise, Idaho. He and his wife, Shauna, have three children and two dogs. He has been a dedicated supporter of LGBTQ+ rights since his oldest child came out over a decade ago. In his free time, Mike enjoys playing chess, hiking, watching movies, and reading speculative fiction.

Special Guest: Michael Alvarado

Michael works as a Sales Manager for Asana Climbing, selling padding systems to climbing gyms across the country. He loves being a dad and when he’s not working you can find him fishing, golfing and playing disc golf with his youngest and watching food shows with his eldest.

Special Guest: Chris Erwin

Chris Erwin lives in Idaho with his wife, two kids, two cats and a dog. He enjoys creating things with his 3-D printer, watching Arsenal, and biking near the river, as well as reading all things Brandon Sanderson. 

Links from the Show:

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Transcript

SARA: Hi everyone. Welcome to In the Den with Mama Dragons, a podcast and community to support, educate, and empower parents on the journey of raising happy and healthy LGBTQ+ humans. I’m your host, Sara LaWall. I’m a Mama Dragon myself and an advocate for our queer community. And I’m so glad to be part of this wild and wonderful parenting journey with all of you. Thanks for joining us. We’re so glad you’re here. 

When a child comes out as transgender, every parent begins a journey. So many of us have been there. And we hear a lot about the experiences of moms, particularly in this Mama Dragons community and on the podcast, but we know that dads have stories too. And today we're making space to hear them. We are talking about the real stories of parenting transgender kids with dads. You might remember that back in December we did an episode called Real Talk with Moms where a handful of Moms shared the honest, messy, beautiful reality of this journey, and it resonated with so many of you that we knew we wanted to come back and hear from another group whose voices don't always get as much airtime. One of our big priorities this year in Mama Dragons is building deeper community, making sure that every parent feels seen and knows they are not alone. And while moms can often find one another pretty naturally, dads don't always have some of those same spaces to ask questions and wrestle with big feelings or simply hear another dad say, “Oh yeah, I've been there too.” So we've invited some dads to join us for that conversation to share with all of you. We hope that you'll share with the dads and grandfathers in your life to hear about those first moments of learning when their child was transgender and the questions they wrestled with, what they got wrong, what they learned, and how their kids have expanded their hearts and understanding of what it means to love unconditionally. So let's jump in. This is Real Talk With Dads. Today I'm so honored and excited to welcome three Dads. With us is Mike. Mike is the father of three kids, a 27-year-old transmasculine kiddo, young adult, a 24-year-old cis son and 22 non-binary kid. Chris is the father of two kids, a 21-year-old cis son and 18-year-old trans daughter. And Michael is the father of two kids, a 20-year-old trans daughter and 17-year-old cis son. Welcome to the Den, y’all. It's so good to have you with us. 

CHRIS: Thank you, good to be here.

MICHAEL: Thank you very much, Sara. It's nice to be here. 

MIKE: Thank you for having us. 

SARA: I know that we're going to talk a lot about the experience of your trans and your non-binary kiddos. But I just also wanted to make sure that we gave a nod to the cisgender kids in your household as well. Sometimes they get a little short-shrift in these conversations, but they are part of the household and part of this whole journey. We just had a wonderful episode that was interviewing siblings. And that was really great. 

Just like we did on our episode with our moms, I want this to feel like a conversation. I want it to feel like we're all hanging out on the back porch talking about our lives and our kids. And so I want to invite you all to feel comfortable asking questions of each other. But I want to just start with how are you? How is life as a dad right now? Mike, let's start with you. 

MIKE: Yeah, that's a good question. I think generally good. I think in terms of my relationship to my kids and how they're doing, they all have their individual struggles as all kids do and as we all do, but generally on the right track and just wonderful people and super proud of them. I think to answer your question of like, how is it being a dad? I think is the way you asked it. I've been talking with my wife about this and some of the unique challenges both men and women feel and the whole gamut of course in relationship to these issues. And so maybe I'll save some of those thoughts for later but I do think that there are some unique things in my experience that the dads have faced and do face and in those situations. 

SARA: Yes, great. We will get into that and I'm really excited to hear more about that from you. Chris, what's done to you? How's life as a dad right now? How are you right now? 

CHRIS: Life is, I think, pretty good as a dad. I think that there are lots of challenges in parenthood that, irrespective of your child's gender. I'm getting ready to send him off to college and that has got his own set of stresses, and my wife is recently retired. Those are like two big transitions, empty nesting and retiring kind of all at once. And then when I look at, kind of as a parent, as a father, on top of that, things are going great. But right now, I'm a little more attuned to the fact that my time, my moments, this kind of things with my youngest child are limited. We just hiked to Blue Lake yesterday and had a great time doing that. And so I'm trying to take in as many of those events as possible at this point of time. So I think good as a father, but a lot of transition. 

SARA: Thanks. Michael, how about you? 

MICHAEL: Personally, I think I'm doing really well. It’s summertime, so it's hard to complain. It's hard to complain, two healthy kiddos and yeah kind of just echoing with what Chris had said, I just trying to squeeze as much juice out of this time with the kiddos. We had Junie go off to college and then come back and we can get into that later. But now I'm also trying to kind of just have that last year of high school with our younger kiddo, with G and just squeeze out that lot a little bit of I guess that like idyllic fatherhood, or whatever I'm holding wanting to be a great Dad. Just trying to make that happen and not get taken advantage of too harshly. 

SARA: Fair enough. And, you know, I just want to acknowledge that I really love hearing you just kind of acknowledge the general stressors of parenthood and this time. And also, we're living under this unprecedented moment of attack on our trans community and our kids, from our federal government, from conservative state governments. And I just wanted to name that. It's a strange situation to be both very hyper present in everyday life with kids which is everyday life with kids and all of those struggles regardless of who your kid is. But then also to have, to just know, that the outside world is pretty hostile right now. And that's such a strange negotiation in some cases. And I'm sure we'll hear more reflection on that. But now I want to take us back because I want to ask you about what you remember when your child came out to you. And what those moments looked like from your perspective and where you were in that time of your life. Chris, I wonder if we can start with you. 

CHRIS: Yeah, I think that I'm kind of the most, sort of, the youngest parent of a trans child here in terms of where we are. M came out to us about two years ago, just a little longer than two years ago. At that time, I think, M had been struggling socially a little bit to fit in. If I were to describe him just as a person, M is introverted and likes to have kind of one heavily-bonded friend and kind of sticks with that kind of one person. And so there had been things, there’s been lots of things over the years, where we wondered about M in terms of their/her relationship with other people and identity. M had a friend who was super supportive, and kind of encouraged M to talk to us. And she said at the dinner table one night that she was starting to see herself as non-binary and she would like to express as more feminine. And for my wife and I, for Kim and I, it was an obvious thing. We were not surprised. We were, I think, proud of her willingness to open up to us about that. We kind of let things develop. And one thing that I did after a few weeks, I asked her if she wanted to go thrifting and go thrifting and thrift for some girls' clothes. And that was kind of a first real, I think bonding experience for her and I in that context. That was kind of the first thing that we did that was sort of gender-focused with her transition. And from there, it's been a bit of a migration. I think after about six months, was when she said, well, she really kind of identifies more as female than non-binary. So it kind of evolved from there and our understanding and our relationship kind of came with some evolution. I struggled identifying her as female until really the last six months or so. We've had some experiences that really, I think, flipped a switch for me that this is my daughter. And so it's been a journey and it's still new. But I'm trying to be as supportive as I can be. 

SARA: Thank you. Thank you for sharing that struggle. And I hope you'll share more about that as we continue to talk. Michael, I'm going to jump to you and invite you to share the coming out story, your experience of your kiddo’s coming out. 

MICHAEL: Junie, I think, always just as a child, always kind of navigated the two genders in terms of just kind of stereotypical ways. So she would want a purple helmet. She would want the pink bike. She would take the pink towel. So it's just very, very stereotypical, what you would say, “Oh, that's a girl color.” Even though we all know colors don't have genders. So she had always kind of floated between the two. And I think she hit puberty, I guess very early, I don't know, like the beginning of junior high. And her voice changed and she did not want to speak. And I think for me that was the first kind of clue that, oh, something's going on. And she's always been kind of a hard nut to crack anyways. Like we used to oftentimes don't find out how she's felt about something until months later. And you’re like, “Oh, OK, well that's what was going on.” So she chews on things a lot. It isn't always as effusive or clear as our cis kiddo. G is, you always not how he feels. He's very clear and communicative about that. So she came out as non-binary or gender-fluid, 7th grade I think it was. So I think it might have been like 2018, 2019. And then switched from that, came out, decided she wanted to start high school as full female and really embrace that part of her. And it's just beautiful to watch her blossom and just keep growing and growing and shine even brighter. And all the while trying to not let my fear and my anxiety not have that impact her excitement or to give her tacit lessons on that it's actually not safe or that kind of stuff. So I think for me, it's just been rad. It's been great to see her keep going and keep going.

SARA: Yeah, it is really hard to navigate your own internal reaction with not wanting to project onto your child as they're trying to have their own journey. Mike, talk about your journey. I think yours is probably a little bit different than the other two dads here. 

MIKE: Yeah. I think I know what you're referencing there. I think you're referencing my religious background. Is that the idea? 

SARA: Yep.

MIKE: So yes, we came from a very conservative religious background, all extended family, very traditional, very conservative. So some extra baggage for all of us, I think. My kids had to sort that out. We had to sort that out as parents. For myself, I actually kind of started sorting that out before Beckett, my oldest, came out at all, kind of independent of what was going on with Beckett. So when he came out, I wasn't quite so burdened by all that baggage that can come with those kinds of beliefs. But it was still very much a process for me and I think for all of us. Beckett first came out as gay and I think – and I'm going to use “they” for Beckett. You might hear me switch to “he”. But Beckett will answer to either and is happy with either. But I think maybe secretly prefers “they” a little better. I think it's just easier to navigate and that's a whole separate topic. But I'll try and use ‘they,’ sometimes I slip and use ‘he’. – So they came out first as gay. And that was, I think, a big bombshell for us, again, coming from the background that we had. But also, I had some great examples in my life of some LGBT folks that helped kind of prepare the way for that coming out of Beckett. I think we reacted pretty well. You know, we didn't freak out. We maybe freaked out a little bit privately, but didn't show that to our kid. And of course, reassured Beckett that we would always love them and that we would figure it out together. And so that first coming out was a big deal for all of us, our whole family kind started to make this transition. And then it was about, yeah, let's see, I want to say that was about 14, Beckett was 14 years old. And I want to say it was about five years later, I could be a little wrong on the dates, but that Beckett came out as trans. And along the way, there were some shifts that should have, maybe, better prepared me for what was coming. I was surprised when Beckett came out as trans. They had started to present a little bit more neutral, even sometimes a little masculine, which we had no problem with. They tried out a few different names that were a little bit neutral. But yeah, when Beckett came to us – I think, again, I think it was about age 19. And I'll go ahead and share some of the details about Beckett, but he's been on the podcast before too, and they share a lot of his story publicly. So top surgery and hormones were two of the things that he talked to us about. And that was, really suddenly, frightening, probably the moment I think in this whole journey for me that I kind of panicked a little bit because it felt really new to us. Beckett had been, kind of, internally processing all of this all along the way. But anyway, we had some conversations. He explained to me the genesis of all this and how he had thought about it very carefully. So I was able to come around and not be an impediment to him, and just amazing to see the differences that happened as he made that transition. It was really wonderful, as I think, Michael, you said, beautiful to see Beckett kind of blossom into the person that he is, that they are. And then, just briefly I'll touch on my youngest who has not been as public, so I probably won't share as much there. But, again, it was kind of a surprise and a little bit difficult for me initially, which you know, surprised me too that I would startle again. But it was a little bit tough when they came and started to want to do some transitioning. And of course we wrestle with that privately and not at our kids or in front of our kids. And that's all resolved. But yeah surprisingly, both times was a little bit shocking to me and a little bit of a process to overcome those things. 

SARA: Yeah, Mike, you bring up something that we've talked a little bit about on the podcast but it's always such a helpful reminder – even to me, so many years later – which is what feels surprising to us, our kids have been ruminating on for a long time. 

MIKE: Yeah.

SARA: I think that there's some of that that feeds the mythology that it's all of a sudden out of nowhere, one day, bingo, they want this. But we forget how long they've been wrestling with it before they even utter a word out loud. 

MICHAEL: I want to be super clear about this. I have no idea what it's like to be trans or to ruminate that long. And the only thing that I can bring was kind of like my ethnicity to it, to where – like you were talking about, Mike – like, you know, going through a couple of different names. And June was like, “Hey, I want to use a different name.” And I have a different name, right? Michael's my nickname. It’s not my given name. My given name is Fernando Miguel. It was not great to be brown in Tucson in the late 70s. I became Michael very fast. So trying to navigate that identity for me, but ethnically you're just kind of being in between. When June started coming out. I was like, oh well, like I errantly started adding my own crap to the situation. I started bringing all of that, and not in a directed kind of way, but just in trying to relate or trying to pick up on what she was trying to lay down. I was like, “Yeah, have as many names as you want.” So I just, it reminded me of that, Mike, when you were trying on all the different names. 

MIKE: I love that, the way that you related, even if it maybe wasn't a perfect fit for your kid. I think that's really interesting and insightful to hear how you kind of processed it internally. When Beckett first came and had that conversation with us – and, like I said, I kind of internally panicked a little bit – and I asked him to go for a drive with me. We went and drove up in the mountains a little bit, and just pulled over and had a really kind of frank conversation. And I just kind of – I mean, we’re supposed to believe our kids, right? And I do. And I did. But it was really helpful for me to hear him relate some of that rumination to me and say, “Yeah, I've been thinking about this years ago.” And for me to have that, really helped me process the transition and calmed my panic about, well, what if you change your mind, or what if you, you know, all those questions that I had. It was really helpful for me to hear Beckett explain some of that. 

SARA: Yes, that's great. Chris, what surprised you the most in those first few months? 

CHRIS: You know, I think that in the first few months, I don't know, educating myself about what gender is and there's just so many layers to somebody’s gender identity versus their sexual identity versus so on and so forth. So really trying to understand the landscape, I came from a pretty liberal family. My wife comes from a pretty conservative family. So I think a lot kind of early on, came around the family acceptance and how we were going to broach and talk to the family. That was a big topic, particularly early on. But I think it's interesting, having two natural born sons, a lot of the parenting relationship activity burden kind of fell to me, the father. You know, the camping and the buddy relationships and the hijinks and the different things that I think traditionally we're expected to do father and son. One of the really interesting things that came in this dynamic is that as M was transitioning more fem, that relationship – that 16-year-old relationship of “This is my buddy and we kind of do everything together” – that continued. And so like I mentioned before, the thrifting or the first, hey, let's find a queer hair stylist or a queer supportive hair stylist and let's make an appointment. And let's talk about your hair and how you want your hair to be and develop. So a lot of, I think, those mother-daughters sorts of relationships, we had 16 years of not having any of that development. And so kind of the proximity of the relationship, of the activities, of the doing things together, a lot of that kind of early mentorship sort of fell to me. And that was very interesting. I can only look at that kind of in hindsight and ask myself about that. But I think if somebody's a new parent in these relationships, it's really surprising. Without a daughter or experience with a daughter, there is so much in terms of knowledge and skills and support that we've just been missing. We've had the benefits, Sara, of our group and getting a lot of support and ideas and leveraging on people's experience. And so, if I were talking to somebody new with the child just coming out, it would be definitely seeking and finding support as a parent. That was really important to us. But that's my biggest surprise was needing to take on this other mentorship role. 

SARA: Yeah, I wanted to get into that a little bit because I am curious to know how this journey has shifted your understanding of fatherhood, and particularly with ideas around gender and gender roles which are so culturally ingrained to us through our families and our religion and just society at large. So, Michael, I'm wondering if you can share a little bit of some insight in, how has it shifted your understanding and thinking about fatherhood and gender? 

MICHAEL: Well, I think growing up in my family, like with my sister and my mom and my dad, my dad was the oldest of nine. We, it was very all stereotypically the girls were treated one way, the boys were treated another. And not any kind of good or bad way, but there were 30 some-odd grandchildren running around for my grandparents to remember the names of. And all the girls were Miha, “my dear one or my daughter”. And all the kids were Gordo or fatty. So all the boys were, “Hey, Chubby, come over here,” regardless. Although I think for me being an older one, they remembered my name at least. So having that as a model has been something that I keep, I continually unpack. That it… how I parent our son is vastly different than how I parent our daughter. And then sometimes I have to go through – well, Sara, you know, we were talking about this earlier – but sometimes I have to remind myself that I wholeheartedly, with all my heart, and eyes, and brain, view June as a female, like as a young woman. But I also intellectually wonder, “Is her brain still a toddler, a one-year-old boy in my standard, such that I expect this feminine brain to be way more responsible, way more on top of it, then I would a one-year-old son?” And again, that's a me brain, right? That's me bringing my expectations and my ignorance, but again, that was just stereotypically. And then also just like, try to navigate the two of them and their opinions on how they get parented is also very, very interesting. 

SARA: Thank you for that, Michael. Yeah, that's really interesting to think about, has it flipped the other way, right? Has culture now influencing how we understand our female child and male child differently, you know, it's flipped. Mike, what about you? How has this journey changed your own understanding of fatherhood and gender? 

MIKE: I think it's a really interesting question, one that I think about a lot. And I, again, from my background, very conservative, very traditional, even in our marriage, I was the provider of the family. My wife was the homemaker, nurturer. And as we have progressed and kind of left behind some of those beliefs, it has been really fascinating to see how difficult it is to actually change some of those patterns. And as it relates to fatherhood and my own understanding of my kid and their gender and my own gender, I am just constantly finding new things where I realize I'm doing something that is a product of my culture and my background and probably not something I want to continue. Sometimes it's just hard to see those things. Like, I have this idea of what a man is and who I am. And I think we've been pretty flexible, maybe less prescriptive in terms of how we project that to our kids – although, again, I think I'm blind to so many of it, so many parts of that – But yeah, for myself, I still really struggle with some of the cultural things about what it means to be masculine and/or feminine, and/or gender fluid or non-binary, all those things. So that was definitely a journey for me and continues to be. I think, like I said, I'm still finding things and realizing things about myself and about gender in general. 

SARA: Chris, do you find that you are thinking about gender differently and those sort of prescriptives, even binaries, right, I think even how even for those of us who have trans children as opposed to non-binary children, are we continuing to put on those cultural binary expectations even in their gender identity now? Just flipped. 

CHRIS: My challenges thinking about gender are reflecting about my experience of this growing up and my experiences in high school with gender, and the idea that there were boys and there were girls and there were homosexuals. And what we have now is we've got the millennials have completely blown this idea up, right? And now the question of, were there ever homosexuals? Is it because it's like your gender is kind of independent of your sexual identity, right? Who you're attracted to is independent of who you identify with. And these labels, these categories that we've had, that my GenX upbringing and framework is within, it's all completely blown out of the water. And I sit back and I look at what these millennials are doing here – and Gen Alpha and so on and so forth – where it's just like, oh, well, this just makes a lot of sense. And I can look back at people that I have experience with over time, you know people that I went to high school with and people that I had professional relationships with. And I look back and I think, “Well, gosh, what was really going on here?” If we were to parse these intersecting Venn diagrams of a gender and sexual identity, where are people at. And so what it's done for me is just really blown up my whole concepts of male and female. One other thing I'll say within that is, this is against a backdrop of this sort of artificially created culture war idea, where the extremes of masculinity are becoming more and more extreme to the point of really kind of ridiculous caricature what it is to be a man. We were watching the world cup and there is this Dodge commercial that is just really the most offensive display of masculinity. But that's what they're marketing to. That's what they're trying to build. So to see the millennials, the younger generations, kind of rejecting this whole framework, while on the other hand are like, there are those in this cultural expectation that are doubling down on the framework. It's just kind of a weird space. But I think the kids have it right. 

SARA: Yeah. They're teaching us a lot. Thank you for that. I think it's such an interesting conversation that this journey invites, particularly, I think parents of trans and non-binary kids get to really go deep into this experience and unpack things that maybe you never would have had a chance to otherwise. But I'm going to shift a little bit now too because we've been talking about some of the challenges and some of the struggles. And perhaps we haven't quite got to the hardest part of this journey. But before we do, I'm curious to know what's been the biggest gift you've experienced as a parent journeying with your trans and nonbinary kids?

MICHAEL: That's a really good question. Well, we never had a little girl, right? So, I was always jealous about that relationship. I think back on my father's relationship with my sister. The nicknames that he would give her. She was Pumpkin. And I think about like some of that connection to my dad and his compassion. And I think that the biggest gift for me is to be able to engage in sort of that, spoiling your little girl kind of like meme. And maybe it's cringy to say that, but I get to do that a little bit. It's on the back end of adolescence, so not quite the same, but to me that's been the biggest gift for me is to be able to kind of act on some of these instincts and models that I have. 

SARA: Yeah, thanks. Mike, how about you? 

MIKE: It is a great question. And also I think a little bit difficult to pick the most amazing thing. I think one of the things that stands out to me is, as Chris was saying, is just – and referring the prior conversation we were talking about challenges to this gender idea – and the way that it has forced me and allowed me to just re-examine those things and to see the blurring of those lines and to apply that not only to my kids, all three of my kids, right? I have the freedom to do that, and to myself, and to my wife, and to anybody really. I mean, I don't know if I would characterize all of the traditional views about gender as necessarily bad or toxic, but certainly many of them are. And to be able to be free of those things is a real gift. 

CHRIS: For me, I think that in coming out of June's courage and honesty with herself, affords opportunity for some really amazing conversations and really hard sharing and insights. And so I think the biggest gift has been the possibility of those conversations, whereas before she came out, those conversations were just never there. She kind of is reclusive I guess. I guess maybe not. She was reclusive. The further she gets into this journey, the more I see her out in the world and interacting with the world and blessing the world with her presence. So I think that’s been, I guess that’s not a specific instance, but really kind of just the mode of interaction and the possibility of those deep conversations, I guess. 

SARA: And is there something that has been a particular struggle in this journey for you, Michael?

MICHAEL: Oh God. 

SARA: What's been hard? 

MICHAEL: Yeah, there's so many things. 

SARA: Just one thing, and maybe you can all reflect, particularly in the journey of supporting your trans and nonbinary child. Parenting is hard. I just want to name that. There are so many struggles. You all named a lot of that at the beginning. What has been a real struggle or what's been the hardest part of this particular journey? 

MICHAEL: I'm afraid it's dark, but I, also it's the first thing that came to my heart and my and my head.

SARA: We’ve been dark on the podcast before 

MICHAEL: I don't want to be the massive black hole. The really, where I feel the biggest challenge is as a personal challenge of what I'm just going to call like the existential dread of there is no safe space. We can argue that our home is a safe space and that's great. But what I mean to say is that living in Idaho – as you know, moving to Washington or moving to Oregon doesn’t make it all the sudden a safe space. So just kind of knowing that, my biggest challenge is going to be navigating that existential dread and not letting it inform decisions or support. And just knowing that that's what this journey is going to always have with this kiddo. And there's existential chatter with our other child as well, but I just mean legally, logistically, the threat of violence, threat of self-harm, just knowing that we can do everything “Right” and we're not going to nobody’s going to. I just want to be really clear. I've never had a 20 year old trans kid ever. I'm making this up as I go. I’m trying to listen as best I can. So I think that's the biggest challenge is trying to let joy and love inform our relationship instead of giving into the gravity of that situation. 

SARA: Yeah, what I hear you saying is that we all worry about the safety of our children and there is yet another layer when you have a trans kiddo that heightens that worry and existential fear. Mike, what's been a struggle for you? 

MIKE: Yeah, I mean, definitely that one. Definitely that one. We actually are planning a move out of Idaho. And Michael you’re 100% right. It doesn't resolve that issue, but yeah, we love it here in so many ways. And Beckett is not here. He's at school in Hawaii, and is thriving there, and amazing. But when he comes home to visit, we've had some really just ugly things happen. The last time that he flew up out of Boise – actually the last two times – he was harassed by TSA. And that's really hard to see and to feel so helpless to try to correct. And he's very stoic about it. And I know he shares some of those things with us, but I know he doesn't share all of those things that happen to him, all the little ways that he is discriminated against or harassed. So that one is definitely high on the list. I think, is it the hardest thing? I think maybe so. I think I've also talked already about just some of my own personal baggage. And sorting through that, it's definitely been a challenge. But yeah, it's tough. 

SARA: Yeah, and that is a huge challenge, Mike, as you know, a lot of this community has come out of conservative religion and has really had to struggle, not just with their own theology and existential questions, but also with losing community and family and all of those things that were so deeply tied to that religious identity. And that is its own really difficult struggle. 

MIKE: Yeah. And I haven't really talked a lot about that yet. But we have had mixed results with extended family as far as how extended family has reacted to this. And some of them have been pretty great and some of them have not been great. And that is definitely a challenge for us too. Some of them are kind, like will use Beckett’s name and pronouns, and kind to us, but then I also know how they're voting. I know they're voting against us. And that is really tough. 

SARA: That is hard, yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Chris, what's been the struggle for you? 

CHRIS: Well, I think, certainly living in Idaho is a challenge. And if somebody's listening from outside of Idaho, our children can no longer go to a public restroom in Idaho without it being a felony, and the reality of their environment. I think the biggest hurdle for me – well, a couple of things – mentoring my child to love themselves and love their body, I think it's something that is a gift that all parents can give to all of our children. Loving who you are and accepting that you're made the way you are that's different from the way anybody else is made and that you've got gifts so just the process of learning to accept the gifts that you have and the way that you have been built. And I feel like M's transition has short-circuited that process, that kind of mentorship, that growing up. And so my biggest fear relates to her existential crisis and identity and that it's really hard without a clear and fixed identity to find your place in the world and find that you belong and are important in the world. And that's been a challenge for me. That's the thing that I probably worry about the most. If you're going to be this young woman, it's like, own it. You know, get out there, put yourself out there. And you don't like your knobbly knees or whatever or your arms or whatever kind of body image ideas that are there. And it's like, learning to love yourself as a young woman when you never were able to love or accept yourself as a little boy, right? It's that process. And so that's a challenge. That's my ongoing challenge. Second challenge, as a parent, I need to mourn. I think of the old idiom with marriages: “Don't think of it as losing a daughter. Think of it as gaining a son.” Kind of thing. This identity, this person that was a little boy, that character, there's an element of that that's lost to me as a father, right? So, we want to be supportive, but at the same time we've got to give ourselves permission to mourn, permission that there is something lost in the transition. But there's also a lot of gain. And I think that even saying that out loud and if M listens to this podcast this is not a criticism, it's just a reality of who we are as people in transition. I've been thinking a little bit about the role of ritual in society and helping us with transitions. And I kind of wish that there was some sort of ritual that could help us with this transition that gave permission for us to say goodbye to one aspect of the person who is M. And then embrace this new aspect of the person that is M. And it's not new to M, but it's new to me. And so that sort of avenue. And I think as a father, I think our tendency is to push down those feelings and try to make those around us happier, perhaps, than to think about our own happiness in that space. I don't know, maybe it's just me. 

SARA: Yeah, I appreciate the vulnerability from all of you in sharing those struggles. I'm sure they are shared by many. In the podcast team, we've been having this conversation, I've been having this conversation with a lot of people recently in this particular moment around hope and hopelessness. Mike, I’m really struck by listening to you talk about how you're thinking about moving and just the challenges that Beckett has faced. And so I am careful to ask questions about hope. But if that resonates with you, I will invite you to share what gives you hope. Or rather, what keeps you going in this journey when it feels so hard, when those struggles rise up, when that existential worry, really, and anxiety starts to shoot up with all that's happening around us. Where do you turn? 

MIKE: For me, I think both with Beckett, and my youngest is actually in the thick of this transition base, right, and so watching them both just really become more sure about who they are and both Chris and Michael, I think, have talked about this in different ways, too. Just watching your kid just take off and blossom. And so both with Beckett and with my youngest, they both had different struggles as teenagers. And I think, looking back, I think Beckett’s was heavily driven by just some of the puberty stuff that was happening. And again, because of our background, I don't think Beckett even had the vocabulary to think about these things. And so it took some time, and a lot of pain too, to kind of work through that for Beckett. And just watching them come through those difficult times and then come out the other side, and you know there's still struggles of course, but, man, there is a big difference in watching them, you know, navigate life now versus before. And I think that is a definite gift and a reason for hope.

SARA: Thank you. Chris, how about you? 

CHRIS: Oh, I think the unconditional love that I have for my child. I mean, that's just it. There are lots of stories with queer kids and parents who lose their relationship altogether. The parents abandon their child. Or the parents, they kick the child out of the house. And that's just unfathomable to me. I want, and I think as Michael said, I want to squeeze every drop out of this relationship. This is one of the three most defining relationships that I have in my life. And I want to be unconditionally supportive. And I'm also going to give myself the grace of knowing that we get one shot at this parenthood thing. That's it. Every single thing we do, we're doing for the first time, and we could screw it up. We can absolutely screw it up. And we've got to give ourselves permission to do that. So am I screwing this up by being the too-permissive parent and not enforcing some societal thing that is going to, in all likely, make my child sever their relationship with me? I don't think so. I think that the best thing to do is to support and nurture the relationship and come together on that. And so I think that's what keeps me going is just how defining this relationship is for who I am as a person and wanting to get everything out of that I can. 

MICHAEL: Yeah. That's great, Chris.

SARA: That’s great. Thank you.

MICHAEL: I think like operating from that place of, I'm not going to get it right, but I'm not going to be shameful about it. I can feel guilty about it and try to do better next time. But trying to really kind of parent from that place of hopefulness. And what gives me the most hope is, like all my trans homies, like all of these amazing people out there, we are surrounded by some really badass people that will love our children as fiercely as we do and maybe even in a more beautiful, different way than we can with our limitations, of our experience and our lenses, right? We only have our eyes to view our children with them. Perhaps what gives me the most of there is an incredible community out there just waiting to embrace her whenever she’s ready with open arms. And I think that gives me the most hope because that's just going to open up her viewpoint of what's possible, right? And we don't know what's possible until we know it. And so hopefully that just even makes her grow even more. So yeah, I think of all the amazing trans friends that I have in my life that I continually learn from, and I feel an immense amount of love and support from.

SARA: Oh yeah, absolutely. Paving the way, showing our kids what thriving life can look like. I mean, Mike, you have one of those. Right yours is fast becoming one of those . . . 

MIKE: Yeah.

SARA: . . . who will be a model and a mentor to the next generation. 

MIKE: Yeah, and it is a really good point. One of the things that I think I lost in my faith transition was so much of my community was centered around my church. And so when we left our church, we lost a lot of that community. We also were able to find a new community and there's one woman, also trans, who tipped us off early on that said, “Hey, you might want to have some conversations with Beckett.” And I discounted it because I just thought that was, I didn't see it. But definitely a huge resource, both in terms of just showing a path, but also I think for us as parents too, just kind of giving us little nudges here and there, has been really really amazing and valuable. 

SARA: Yeah, this is a great spot to end this conversation on some notes of hope and what keeps you going and the beautiful trans community in the way that our kids can find community and we get to see some hopefulness in the way the trans community is thriving around us and the amazing people we've gotten to meet. Thank you so much for this conversation. 

MIKE: I just want to say to these other two dads. You guys are awesome and it's great to see other dads. I think I don't see that many. I think just in general we don't see a lot of dads in this space. And I think there are reasons for that. But it's great to see great dads. 

MICHAEL: Ditto. 

SARA: Thank you so much and for sharing so deeply and genuinely about being a dad and being a dad to your amazing kids, all your kids. 

CHRIS: Thank you, Sara. 

MIKE: Thank you. 

MICHAEL: Thanks. Hard to be like, how are we going to brag about our kids in this short amount of time?

SARA: You did a great job. Thanks so much for joining us In the Den. Did you know you can connect with our Mama Dragons community on our own free private, secure platform. In addition to our main support group we host regional groups for more localized connection and support and affinity groups to connect moms with shared identities and experiences: including groups for gender diverse parents, political advocacy, mamas of transgender children, mamas of children with special needs, Madres Dragones – our Spanish-speaking moms – and moms of color. We also offer religious-based groups from those grounded in faith to those navigating transitions out of it. Wherever you are, there's a group for you. You can learn more and join by visiting our website at mamadragons.org/join.

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