My Child Might Be Non-Binary: What Experts Say Parents Need To Know

Answers to Questions Parents Have About Non-Binary Children

In today’s society, the concept of gender is quite fluid and not much of a taboo. However, an individual, especially a child, might feel the societal pressure and its backwardness and refrain from properly accepting their true nature.

As a parent, this is when you should always support your child and help them get through however they are feeling. Understanding how a child identifies can be quite a time-consuming process and unclear long after they have been born. This blog further answers some critical questions parents might have about their non-binary child and how to deal with it.

Who Identifies As Non-Binary?

Before helping your child, you need to understand the concept of non-binary gender. Genders are groups of socially constructed traits of an individual that fit them best. While most people know this to be a binary system, many often do not fit in those rigid boxes. There can be a number of genders where they don’t identify with either gender.

They might be a combination of the two genders, somewhere between or outside the binary. Whether you have found your child going outside the generic norms of gender, or they have come and confided in you, it is your duty to make them feel safe and confident about it.

Can A Child Be Binary?

Contrary to popular belief, a child can surely identify as a non-binary individual. This is as normal as them identifying with one of the predetermined genders. Once they start talking and understanding the world around them, they also start understanding themselves. This is when they can begin feeling like they do not fit in with either gender.

How Can You Know?

As per gender experts, there are some signs that can tell you if your kid is non-binary. Some of them are:

• Wanting to pee in a different manner
• Referring to themselves in a different gender
• Not liking their name
• Disliking activities that are more conventionally assigned to their gender

What Should You Do?

Although society is moving quickly towards acknowledging such differences and possibilities, it still has a long way to go. So it is most likely that if your child identifies as non-binary, they will come to you first, as they trust and love you the most. You should always reciprocate this feeling. Try learning about how they feel more, researching about it, and helping them own up to it.

You should be more open to understanding what they are going through without judgment. This will make them feel more accepted, ensuring they do not feel neglected or ashamed of who they are. Little children often do not have a language for how they identify.

They are more innocent and just go with how they feel at the time. However, they also are very receptive and understand when a caregiver might shun them. This is why you must be very careful about how you might impact their self-confidence, especially during the years they are learning to understand themselves.