I&#x27;m a regular poster on HN. I have decided not to use my usual account, because this topic is toxic and breeds hatred.<p>I am now in my forties, married with children. I am now coming slowly to accept that I am trans. It is a hard and troubling realisation. It is (without doubt) a curse in today&#x27;s (western) society.<p>I&#x27;m also starting to realise that there are different kinds of transgendered people [1]. I have also come to realise that gender is not necessarily fixed, and it spans a range.<p>It is not a surprise that our society struggles to accept this, since people only outwardly see two fixed biological sexes from birth. Deviations from the norm are always the subject of derision in society.<p>Brain gender and physical sex do not always match. Gender and sexuality are also different. Many people confuse these two.<p>I like the existing methods for dealing with gender-dysphoric children. Delay puberty because it is extremely traumatic (from personal experience). Then wait and see which gender starts to settle. We don&#x27;t want our children to make mistakes they regret, nor end up forced into a gender that ends up damaging their entire lives.<p>However, it is incredibly important that children are not forced to be cisgender when they are not, no more than cisgendered children who have a fleeting period of trans-esque feelings be forced into being trans for the rest of their lives.<p>We need to get it right, otherwise you end up with secretly trans people in their forties with children and a partners who have their lives turned upside down, because something that should have been dealt with 25 years ago was brushed under the carpet.<p>My gut feeling is that there are a lot more transgendered people out there than we realise. Many of them sit in their &quot;assigned at birth genders&quot;, having their souls ripped in two, because they are forced to live with a shameful secret.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.avitale.com&#x2F;developmentalreview.htm" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.avitale.com&#x2F;developmentalreview.htm</a>