Transgender Aspergers Teen

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So my 15 year old (born) daughter has informed me she is transgendered and wants to become a male. While I am researching this in the trans world (and becoming much more educated) I'm also wondering if this may be an Aspergers thing? I know children on the spectrum often feel like they "don't fit in" but she (he?) feels this is "right" even though it is not what I have seen growing up and during childhood she never expressed a desire to be a boy or was even tomboyish. Just wondering if there are any other parents who have experienced both and could give me some tips? Thanks for the help

Look up Gender identity disorder and LGBT. It's not an ASD thing. It's totally separate.

Well, it certainly does seem to have a connection to ASD. There's a huge number of people around this forum who are in some form or shape transgender, way disproportionate if compared to the general population.

I would not totally agree into it. Certain behaviors that are supposed to be "normal" for an certain gender, are simply constructed by social habbits. Now if you have anyway problems to get instinctive feelings for social habbits, then this will apply as well for social habbits, according to gender stuff.

I had myself troubles, feeling well as woman, but later I simply realized that its not the body, that I have troubles with, but that social habbits that you get expected to know and mention by others. So it was that "but as a girl you have to lile this and that, and to dislike this and that, and you cant be thinking this and that, ...." nonsense, that gave me the feeling not to be right in my body, not my body.

I think its not an coincidence that among Aspergers, there are more people not truly feeling linked to their gender-role, as socially expected in their culture, then among NTs.

"List of Female Asperger Traits"
http://www.help4aspergers.com/pb/wp_a58 ... 83e339.JPG

Under the "Appearance/Personal Habits" it says, "may think of herself as androgynous half male/ half female" and may not have a "strong sense of identity".

Could also just be a phase because she hates girls in general and is ashamed to be one of them. Or she just hates women oriented stuff being engrained into her head when she doesn't relate to it, and she thinks that being a different sex can stop that. It's hard to say.


No one hate on me for suggesting these thoughts. I don't know the daughter or the whole situation, so it's hard to suggest reliable info.

There are people not on the spectrum who also have this and I seem to see lot of them in the AB/DL community as well so by that logic it must be an AB/DL thing too.

Being transgender does not mean breaking gender norms. It's not about your behavior, it's about who you feel you are, deep down inside.

There are women who like driving big trucks and doing weightlifting, but their identity is as 'a woman who likes trucks and weightlifting'.

Meanwhile, there are FtMs who like fashion and such, but deep down they feel like they're an effeminate guy rather than a girl.

Gender identity and gender expression are completely separate. They match up in a lot of people, but they are not the same thing. Gender identity isn't about how you act, it's about who you feel you are deep down inside.

I was tomboy when I was a kid and no way was I transgendered. I still did girly things like playing with Barbies and I wore girl clothes and played with Polly Pockets. I also wished I was a boy when I was little because I envied them peeing standing up and not have to pull down their pants and underwear. I thought having a penis was cool. No way did that mean I was transgender just because I wanted to be a boy.

Transgender and autism are separate things. I can imagine some scenarios where a person with AS may fixate on the concept, or imagine themselves to be transgender and obsess over this, for reasons that are different than the typical trans person. I think having her/him (enjoy the pronoun game) see a psychologist may sort this out. Make sure that it is a psychologist who is sex-positive: that is won't try to dissuade your child from feeling the way that he or she does. But I do think it's important for your child to clarify his/her thinking on this and be certain before taking any further drastic steps. I believe that legally this is a requirement in any case.

It is important to understand that gender/sex is not a simple binary as we are led to believe. It happens on many levels in development. First our chromosomes determine our sex to a large extent, two X chromosomes make a female, while an X and Y chromosome makes a male. Female is the default gender, but having that Y chromosome causes certain changes in hormone levels during prenatal and post-natal development. Having male hormones results in ovaries becoming testicles, and the development of a penis prenatally, it also changes the brain-sex. Brain-sex isn't very well understood, but there are certain parts of the brain that develop slightly differently in men than women. At different times in development, those hormone levels can change for a variety of reasons, and we can wind up with mismatches, such as hermaphrodites, who wind up with ambiguous genitalia - either because they somehow got a lot of male hormones at a specific stage in their prenatal development, despite being chromosomally female, or because they were lacking the right amount of male hormones, despite being chromosomally male. So the bottom line is that determining gender is a complex physiological process that can diverge at many different stages in development. One theory about transgender is that for many people it represents a physical difference in the brain-sex of the person, that does not match their physical-sex. I'm spelling this out so that you can understand that it is a very real and possibly physiologically based phenomenon. There are a lot of politics around this sort of research because it can easily be used to label homosexuality and transgender as diseases. I don't think that's the right approach either...the bottom line is people are that way, and the best we can do is help them live a content, healthy and productive life.

There are some theories about autism aimed at explaining its prevalence in males vs females (4:1), that intersect with gender. I'm thinking specifically of a theory called "extreme-male-brain theory of autism" which has been rebranded to "empathising-systemizing theory". According to this theory men tend to emphasize systemizing in their understanding of the world, while women tend to emphasize empathising. Both are capable of both, and some men are more empathic than many women, while some women are more systems oriented than many men, but it's a matter of average emphasis. According to that theory, people with autism, represent those that are farther toward the systemizing side of that spectrum. Since men already tend to be farther to that side of the spectrum, it takes less to get them over the threshold into autism, which supposedly explains why the ratio is 4:1. I want to emphasize that this theory describes population-level averages, and should not be a basis for prejudice (which falsely assumes that we can take population-level measurements and then apply them to individuals). I'm also not endorsing this theory, just explaining it here if you're interested because it seems somewhat relevant.

Being transgender does seem to be more common in AS people than expected. I just figured it was part of the general tendency to neuroatypicalities to cluster together.

Thank you all for responding.
The above quote from Schneekugel is exactly the type of situation what I was trying to ask about (sorry, if I was not too clear on that!).
Guess I'm just about ready to "say goodbye" to my daughter (and welcome my son!) but was just wondering if there might be a chance she would change her mind....I have been spending some time in the LGBT forum and loads of research in the trans community. Guess none of it really matters as long as my child is happy and safe; its more MY hang up from gender "expectations".
Thank you again for your input and views. It is very helpful to me!

Thats what I described further in the part you did not quote. I did not feel as a woman deep down inside, because of others reactions towards me. Once I realized that - everything fine. So the way I felt about me, deep down inside of me, was pushed on me. For me it was that. I never wrote, that it would be like that for everyone.

I fully respect and accept, that gender identity is linked to other influences as well, as hormon levels, physical caused reasons, ... I just wanted to say, that my personal probs with mine identity simply came from the outside, and might for outsiders still be existent, while they are not for me. I feel completely fine the way I am, while 90% of people might still refer of me having "probs with my identity", only because of me not caring for stuff, that I should care for, according to them.

It's great that you are being open to him. I have trans friends (both AS and not) whose families are not at all supportive, and it wreaks havoc on their mental health.

nope... Gender identity issues are not linked to autistic spectrum disorders

Androgyny is not the same as being trnas or cis gender