This is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel

As a mother, I have often wondered how I would parent a child who was transgender. Would I say the right things?  Would I be able to help this child become the person that he or she needed to become?  What could I do to protect my child from those who have closed minds?  From those who hate?  From those who might intend to harm my child?

Rosie and Penn are the parents of five boys, but from the moment Claude is born, they know that Claude is not typical.  Claude is interested in wearing dresses, barrettes, and bikinis in the summer. "Penn knew in his heart that Claude should be who he was."  Rosie and Penn decides to let Claude be who he is, and Claude decides that she wants to be known as Poppy and be a girl. Penn and Rosie live in Madison, Wisconsin, and even though the Madison area is pretty open-minded, there were still those who would never understand why Poppy's parents would allow such behavior from a child. "How did you teach your small human that it is what's inside that counts when the truth was everyone was pretty preoccupied with what you put on the outside too?"

After a couple of very scary encounters in Madison, Penn and Rosie decide to leave Madison and move to Seattle so their family will be safe, and they can start anew.  But secrets cannot remain secrets forever, and the time comes when their family has to meet their secrets and the pain that those secrets have caused head on.

All around us is intolerance.  I see it every day.  I hear it in the words of those around me.  People share videos and memes on social media.  They think their views are black and white, right and wrong. They have no middle. But what this is really about is fear:  the fear of change and the unfamiliar. When Rosie travels to Thailand, she meets a transgender who explains how to live in the "middle way."  "All is change...The people who do not understand are change.  The people who afraid are change. There is no before and no after because change is what is life.  You live in change, in in between."

I loved this book.  I loved the characters, the poetry of the writing, but mostly, I loved the message.  "Dispelling fear.  Taming what was scary not by hiding it, not by blocking it or burying it, not by keeping it secret, but by reminding themselves and everyone else, to choose love, choose openness, to think, and be calm.  There were more ways than just two, wider possibilities than hidden or betrayed, stalled, or brokenhearted, male or female, right or wrong. Middle ways. Ways beyond."

The suicide rate for transgender children is 41.8% - and that statistic is just from respondents to the survey. (American Academy of Pediatrics) These children feel their families reject them; they endure bullying, and sometimes are the targets of violence. These children do not understand what is happening to them and why they are different from their classmates. When Poppy asks Rosie how to be happy in this life, she tells her, "The real trick is you have to forge your way straight ahead through the trees where there is no path."

What can we do?  We can be more tolerant. We can understand that we are not to judge. It's hard growing up, but it's even harder when we have to endure cruelties.  In the words of the author, Laurie Frankel, "For my child, for all our children, I want more options, more paths through the woods, wider ranges of normal, and unconditional love."  We have love within us.  Let's spread that around.