since 2004. We are writing to you for two reasons: 1) To share a simple version of our family’s story and our parents’ struggles on the road of supporting our transgender daughter, to show why it is so important to keep Policy #5756 as a lifeline for some transgender students and their families. 2) To request one or more private meeting sessions with any board members who are willing to hear more details of our story, or to engage in any discussions about the lessons we learned in the process. We got to know about this voting only a couple of days ago from our friend Dr. xxxx. We feel that this is a very important policy that any action to it will send a big message to our whole Holmdel community, and our families with transgender students will be most affected. More discussions with members of this community are clearly needed before the final voting. We can be reached at xxxx by phone call or text to schedule an appointment at any time. Our xxx town story started with us moving to this lovely town in 2004, with two beautiful children, at that time, a 6 year old daughter and a 4 year-old son. We attended numerous award ceremonies in those BOE meetings as proud parents while our kids thrived at xxx and xxxx schools. They truly loved our schools. When our second child was in 7th/8th grade, things started to go wrong. She (her current pronoun) became socially anxious, afraid to speak in classes, and had panic attacks. Although she seemed to be doing OK academically in high school (she attended xxx Highschool), she stopped going to school activities and started to shy away from people. She went through most of her adolescent years anxious and depressed. We as parents were of course very concerned and tried to help in whatever ways we knew how, including talking to teachers and counselors, but nothing seemed to help. She finally came out to us as transgender when she was 17 in the spring term of her junior year in high school, when she told us she felt she couldn’t go on living anymore without hormones. And she told us she had started to struggle with her gender identity ever since she was 11 years old. When she started to grow taller and taller, she felt her body was terribly wrong, and she wanted to stop it, but she couldn’t, she felt afraid, ashamed, and alone in countless dark days and nights. We were shocked at the revelation to say the least. Although as supporting parents we thought we were, we reassured her that it was fine, that we accepted her 100%, and that everything would be fine. But we remember many nights after that, we dreamed about our son coming back. We grieved the loss of the imagined child we had, and felt our lives were falling apart. Our own fears hidden behind the shallow words of support of course were sensed by our child, and she tried to please us by not mentioning her transitioning needs anymore. During two years following her coming out to us, she continued to be depressed and not socially transitioned, no energy to study or make friends, extremely anxious and stressed. Our whole family felt afraid and alone. The school at that time had no policies to protect transgender students’ needs. The simple action of going to the bathroom in school could bring huge stress, even panic attacks. With our dear child suffering everyday, we as parents were still in a dream, having a secret hope that maybe when she went to college, or when she got a girlfriend, she would finally get less “confused”, and our son would eventually come back. We finally woke up two years later, when our child, who had been hiding in her college dorm room at her college most of the time, texted us: “Mom and Dad, it’s too late. I know I’m a girl, and my life will never work”. That night, when our child’s life was in danger, we finally realized that what we needed to get back was not a son, but a dear child who would be happy and alive! We asked her for the first time: what is your name, my girl? She answered without hesitation Grace. I called myself Grace since I was 11. We think that question we asked may have saved our child’s life. A new child and a new family were born that night. We drove to her college overnight to get her to a nearby hospital, and she was prescribed hormones right there. With full support from her family, and the people around her, Grace started to smile again, after suffering in the shadows silently for more than eight long years. Those were precious years lost for her social growth and development. Even if Grace gradually felt better about herself, the years of self loathing and struggles during those adolescent years took a big toll on her mental health and self esteem. But we feel really happy and lucky that she is still alive today, happy and healthy, gradually healing from her wounds by spending time with the kids she now tutors math every day. This is the story of us as “loving parents” we thought we were, and our 23 year old transgender daughter’s life and struggles with her gender identity. From these experiences, we have learned the following lessons we would like to share with all of you: 1) Yes, all parents love their children, but they may not have the tools and emotional capacity to support their childrens’ gender explorations. We thought we were loving parents. But we made costly mistakes. We thought we would do anything for our kids, but when it came to gender identity, our ignorance about the issue at the time and our own fear and grief prevented us from truly being there for our child for the first couple of years after she came out to us. We later learned from support groups that parents were usually the last people that those kids dared come out to because the stake was simply too high for them. If our daughter could find somebody to talk to in school without being worried about parents being informed, it would have saved her years of utter isolation and shame. How we wish there were a policy like the existing 5756 that served to protect those sensitive and vulnerable souls like our daughter, when we parents could be frozen with fears of their futures and our own loss of an imagined child, which prevented us from providing adequate support they desperately need. LGBTQ kids need our schools to be a sanctuary for them so badly, because they are young and powerless, they spend a large amount of time in school, and teachers and counselors are usually the only adults they trust other than their parents. Since talking about gender issues with parents usually feels very scary and has a very high risk for them, they would have nowhere to turn if our schools shut the door on them. 2) Our daughter’s story is not an isolated case, but rather represents a common pattern. Many LGBTQ students and their parents are still suffering in total isolation. Since Grace came out, through her sister’s college friends, we got calls and messages from many parents struggling with the same issue: how to go through fear and grieving processes, and eventually reach true acceptance and fully be able to support our LGBTQ children. We also went through several support groups, talking and sharing with transgender kids and their parents who were in the same processes. We had volunteered with the Trevor Project as a suicide prevention counselor serving LGBTQ youth, answering heart breaking chats from many LGBTQ youths who suffered to the point of self-harm, or even thinking about ending their own lives. The fact is that numerous kids are still suffering. They need anybody, in any place, that they can trust, to talk to, and our school counselors would be a great first person for them if they could trust that the counselor would not be obligated to share it with their parents, which is the major point stated in our current school policy 5756. A listening ear in our schools can be the lifeline for those kids who would be otherwise suffering in total isolation, like how Grace spent her whole teenage years. Thinking of our daughter’s long painful years still brings tears to us. There are still many of those currently in and out of our community, judging from the calls and texts we got from Chinese parents we never met, and the chats we got from Trevor suicide prevention hotlines. 3) We understand that people may have fears about things they don’t understand. They may fear that when schools have protective policies for transgender kids, more kids may become transgender. And they want the schools to be safe for every student. We get that. But based on our experience and our understanding as parents of a transgender child and our experiences with tens of other LGBTQ youth, it doesn’t work that way. Our daughter tried to be “normal” so badly. They all do. They don’t want to follow anybody because inherently they know what a terribly hard path they have to walk through. They didn’t choose the path. They had no other ways to live. Our daughter didn’t get this “idea” from anybody, or any media outlet. If the society were not accepting enough, we guess we would find a lot more people committing suicide without clear reasons, or a lot of people going through life without truly being able to be engaged, or simply depressed and anxious throughout their lives. An LGBTQ person is just like any of us; We believe no matter how we fear the unknown, we need to go through it, examine it, and accept it as part of our humanity. And our schools can serve as the place where children find safety and comfort, where fear of the unknown is addressed instead of avoided. After we reached the light at the end of the tunnel, we have been building beautiful memories as a new family. We would love to show you our family photos if we get a chance to meet in person. With love shining as light in our lives, fear has no place to hide anymore. 4)Latest data shows that our LGBTQ population, especially transgender people, is still a very marginalized and vulnerable group. Quoting from GLAAD website: “Growing up is hard enough without being targeted, harassed, called names, or physically harmed — and LGBTQ youth are at extremely high risk of all of the above. 76% have experienced verbal harassment at school, and 50% didn’t report bullying because they didn’t think anyone would intervene”. According to a reseach paper published on NIH’s National Library of Medicine (Suicidality Among Transgender Youth: Elucidating the Role of Interpersonal Risk Factors), 82% of transgender individuals have considered suicide, and 40% have attempted one, with suicidality highest among transgender youth. Reading those shockingly high percentage numbers and imagining so many suffering children’s faces behind those numbers can break any parent’s heart. From Grace’s case, we know exactly how vulnerable and sensitive those kids are. If Policy 5756 is repealed, for some kids it could mean a door being thrown shut in their face, and keeping the policy could mean lighting a candle in darkness to lead their way. In extreme cases, it can literally mean life or death of a beloved child. How would we feel in our heart if God forbid one of our trans students did something to hurt themselves because of our vote today? To conclude this heart to heart sharing, we would like to emphasize that it’s our belief that our LGBTQ policy profoundly impacts us all. Although LGTBQ students are a minority, we never know if our children or their best friends are one of them — I never thought my daughter would be one until she told us. As Mahatma Gandhi is credited with saying, “The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members.” The way we treat LGBTQ youth serves as both a reflection and determinant of our community’s moral fabric. And repealing policy 5756 would send a strong message against the very values our xxxxx community prides itself on. We strongly urge the Board to recognize the gravity of your decisions with the message it sends, and to actively engage with the narratives of our LGBTQ students and their families before casting your votes. Let’s send the message of love, and fear will have no place to hide. Thank you for your attention and we look forward to hearing from you! 来源：加美财经lg...
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