These parents helped their son to reject transgender rumors and confirm his real identity.

The time “Brandon” When he was very young, many people would comment on his unusual boyish appearance. His babysitter informed his mother before he could walk. “He’s too good to be a boy,” by which she meant he was gentle, sensitive, and compliant — traits we stereotypically associate with girls.

His mother picked him from preschool every day and he played with the little girls, instead of the boys. Toy trucks and guns were not his thing. He liked to imagine playing with stuffed animals and forming complex social relationships. He was different than most boys from an early age.

He is now considered gender nonconforming. This is his story about how his parents stopped him from following a path that led to despair and genital surgery.

In elementary school, Brandon came to his parents weeping — repeatedly — because he did not fit in anywhere. While most of his friends were still young girls, they didn’t fully accept him as their child because he was a boy. He told his parents. “I feel the way girls do, I am interested in things girls are. God should have made me a girl.”

Brandon began his search for information about transgender ideology in his teens. So, what did his parents do for him?

They made sure that he understood they loved him exactly as he is. They did not attempt to change him. One of my seminary classmates was a homosexual and told me. “When I was young, I liked art and poetry, and my father kept trying to ‘toughen me up’ by pushing me into sports and other more traditionally male activities.”

But Brandon’s parents did not pressure him to be different. It is acceptable for a boy to be gentle, sensitive, and receptive, his parents said. This did not necessarily mean that he was a girl.

He was told it could mean that God has gifted him to be a counselor, psychologist, or other health-care worker. In the same way, of course, it is perfectly acceptable for a woman to be gender nonconforming — to be more take-charge, rational, and assertive.

His parents’ favorite line, which they said over and over again, was, “It’s not you that’s wrong, it’s the stereotypes that are wrong.”

My Body and My Self

Brandon’s parents encouraged him to base his identity on his biological sex. Sometimes our feelings can change. However, our body is a solid and empirically proven fact that will not change. Therefore, it is logical to view the body as a reliable indicator about our identity.

Contrary to transgender ideologies, they devalue the body. A BBC video Features a young woman who is nonbinary and says, “It doesn’t matter what living, meat skeleton you’ve been born in. It’s what you feel that defines you.” The body has been reduced to a meaningless mass of bones and flesh.

Gayle Salamon is a Princetonian