u/DoubleAxelDVM

I had a baby girl on Christmas Day last year. Most of my energy has been focused on my teenager, who had a suicide attempt in March and came out to me as trans gender in April (I am extremely proud, I'm not complaining about this.) Our middle child and I have been bonding over her love for and curiosity about animals and going twice a week to volunteer at a dog rescue. We've gotten super close and I love it. She's a doll.

But I feel like I just have not formed that bond with my baby. Our relationship feels very...transactional. I love her fiercely, but I just don't feel that we've really bonded at all. I haven't been devoting the time to her that she deserves and that is a failure on my part that I feel terrible about and need to put in the work to fix. I don't know. Just feeling down on myself.

Last week my 15 year old came out to me as trans (female to male.) I've been as supportive as I can, but he told me to not tell anyone in the family about it. So in conversation with everyone else, including my own husband, I'm using feminine pronouns and his birth name. I really don't know what else to do but it feels wrong even though he told me not to out him.

For starters: I really don't know much about this subject. I will try to use the correct pronouns. If I slip up, it's not on purpose. I love my child and support them 100% always. My child was born a girl and said he thinks he'd prefer to be a boy.

He attempted suicide last month but survived. He didn't say anything about gender struggles in the note. I had noticed him taking on a less feminine style of dress and losing interest in the girly stuff we used to do together, but I didn't think much of it. But he's been depressed for a couple years and has been acting less open with me and my husband.

He's always been into sports and athletics but said last week he didn't want to do summer softball this year. This shocked me, but I chalked it up to depression and decided to check again about it. Last night he still said no and when I asked why was told "because I don't want to play girl's sports or be a girl, OK?"

From there he opened up. Saying that he thinks he'd be happier as a boy and feels very out of place and unhappy as a girl. Last softball season was a big source of the depression because it just reminded him how out of place he felt in a locker room of girls. He said he didn't want to tell me because he thought it would hurt me to not have my bestie anymore (I don't understand why he thinks we can't be besties if he were a boy) and thought that killing himself would have been easier.

I haven't told anyone yet. He's turning 15 tomorrow. I've set him up with a gender therapist and said I'm here for him. Just wanting to pick other parents brains here.