When I was 11, I began identifying as transgender. I had gone down a rabbit hole of websites and niche online forums. There I met a friend"an artist who was 14"whom I admired and looked up to. We both felt different, out of place in society. Born 10 years earlier, we would have been called tomboys. Instead, we writhed under the pressure of the "female role." The internet told us the logical conclusion of that struggle was to identify as boys. I come from a broken home. While my mother and stepfather always loved me, my stepfather became severely disabled when I was 3, leaving me feeling as though I had to raise myself. I eventually reached out to my biological father around a decade later. When he and my stepmother saw my distress"and were told by a psychiatrist that this distress was related to my transgender identity"they began to consider the benefits of affirming me in my transition.