Seeing their toddler playing with scissors can be a terrifying sight for any parent but for Kerry McFadyen it was a moment that changed everything.
The 32-year-old came across the scene in the bathroom of her home in Strathspey, Scotland, when three-year-old son Daniel said he wanted to cut off his penis so he could be a girl.
It led to his parents making the difficult decision to allow Daniel to become Danni, in what is believed to be the UK’s youngest case of a child wanting to change sex.
Mrs McFadyen said he was stunned by what she calls ‘the bathroom incident’ but that she could not stand to see her child unhappy.
She said: ‘He was in the bath. And somehow he’d managed to find a pair of scissors. When I turned around he was holding them above his bits.
‘I tried to be calm and asked him what he was doing, and he told me he was about to cut off his willy so he could be a girl.
‘I told him he couldn’t because he’d hurt himself and bleed a lot and I calmly took them from him and gave him a big hug.
‘It was very upsetting to see him like that, no mum should have to see their child so upset in their own skin.’
Mrs McFadyen and her husband Craig, 34, approached the family GP in Inverness for advice and were sent to the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust in Leeds, where Daniel was diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
The condition is known as gender dysphoria and happens when a child or adult is distressed or uncomfortable because their sex does not match their gender identity. Danni tells other children she has a girl’s head and a boy’s body.
Mrs McFadyen said it was a relief to get a diagnosis and the family was told it would help to let Daniel live as a girl, so long as he knew he could change his mind.
She added: ‘We were worried he would be bullied at school. But in the end we agreed to let Daniel be who he wanted to be. Our fears weren’t enough to stop him being a girl, if that’s what he wanted.’
Now Mrs McFadyen wants to raise awareness of the condition by telling Danni’s story to help other parents who may be struggling with a similar situation, and has set up a Facebook page – My Transgender Child – to encourage parents to share their experiences.
She said she was ‘lost and helpless’ when the issue arose but with the right support any family can get through it and help their child.
The mother, who has four other children – Amy Leigh, 14, Ayden, 10, Dylan, eight, and Charlie, four, said the situation was overwhelming and she initially agonised over the decision with her husband.
Doctors told them they could give Danni, now six, drugs to postpone puberty as well as hormone treatments, and then have gender realignment surgery on the NHS at 18.
Family and friends have called her Danni ever since and, after talking about it with her teachers, her mother and father wrote to other parents explaining she would be coming back to school as a girl.
She said the response was very positive, with almost every other parent of Danni’s class offering support and praising the couple’s bravery, while the school installed unisex toilets to make her more comfortable.
It was that reaction which Mrs McFadyen says gave her the confidence to talk about the fact that she now considers her youngest son, a daughter.
She said: ‘I’ve chosen to go public with Danni’s story to raise awareness for other transgender children and their parents who may be suffering in silence.
‘It is a lot to go through as a family but with the right support it is possible to get the correct help for your child.
‘The first step is going to a gender specialist and getting your child properly diagnosed, then you can take it from there.’
Mrs McFadyen said the first step for parents should be to see a gender specialist and getting a diagnosis – even though medical experts were baffled by Danni’s condition at first when they went to a local children’s health clinic.
The couple then found support group Mermaids, who helped them when Daniel complained about wearing boys’ clothes and kept taking them off.
Danni has now grown her hair and wears girls’ clothes, and when her parents let her pick presents for recent birthdays, she chose a Barbie doll, Peppa Pig toys and a pram.
The parents will wait until Danni starts puberty, and then she will be prescribed hormone blockers until she is truly old enough to decide whether she wants to transition aged 16.
Then, Danni will decide whether to start taking oestrogen for two years before undergoing gender reassignment surgery, or not.
While Mrs McFadyen has lost some friends because they don’t approve of her decision to let her child transition so young, she stands by her decision.
She said: ‘Most people might think I’m a bad mother for letting my child transition so young, but I will do anything to make my child happy.
‘It wasn’t easy and it took me a long time to come to terms with losing Daniel.
‘But my daughter is so happy now and a completely different child. As a boy she was quiet, withdrawn and miserable but since she has been living as Danni she is a ray of sunshine.
‘It came to a point when I realised I could either keep the rest of the world happy, or I could keep my child happy. It was no choice at all and my husband and I know we’ve done the right thing.
‘I was more worried about what our parents would think as they are from a different generation – but they have been amazing and said they love Danni no matter what.
‘You would have no idea Danni was born a boy by looking at her and we plan to just let her be.’
