Essay Questions

What makes Kelly’s response more problematic than Wayne’s response to Wyatt appearing in his princess dress at the party?

One of the most dramatic moments in the story precedes the twins’ entering first grade. The family holds “Get to Know the Maineses” party to which anyone in the neighborhood who wants to come is invited. Things start to go very bad when Wyatt appears at the top of the stairs ready to join the festivities wearing his favorite princess dresses—his pink princess dress. Wayne angrily scolds him, but it is Kelly’s attempt to console Wyatt that is more potentially more damaging.

Her attempts to console his complaints about Jonas never getting in trouble for being himself are met with protestations of the party not being the “right time” and the need “get to know people first.” Admittedly, Wayne’s almost violent verbal overreaction is a shock to Wyatt, but one that lives only in the moment whereas Kelly—despite the best intention—succeeds merely in replicating society’s alienation and isolation of transgender kids while also reinforcing the idea that it their fault since they are the ones being punished, not those with a failure to understand or demonstrate tolerance.

What is the significance of the shark and the mermaid in Wyatt’s safety book?

For a school assignment, apparently, Wyatt is assigned to write and illustrate a safety booklet titled “Things to be Careful Of.” Inside, the book lists typical things that a child is taught or learns to fear: strangers offering candy, slippery ice, vampires, playing with matches. The cover features an ocean theme including a happy crab and fish, a red-headed mermaid a la Ariel sitting on a rock under the sea and a fearsome man-eating shark. Although it appears early in the narrative, by this point it has already been well-established that Ariel is a symbolic stand-in for Wyatt’s fantasies of himself looking like a girl. The shark prove to be symbolic representatives themselves as the very thing the booklet warns to be careful of relates directly to the imagery on the cover: “You can have a bully. You know, the boy or girl who bosses you. Bullies are mean to you so stay away from them.”

Which single statement in the entire book is arguably the most revealing about the difficulty parents of transgender children face in seeking help from the health care industry?

For the time being—who knows how long—the first idea that usually comes into the minds of parents seeking assistance in dealing with gender identity problems manifesting in young children is getting advice from a qualified mental health specialist. The first problem is the “qualified” part, of course, while the bigger problem is the assumption it is a mental health issue. There is no way of knowing how long this larger problem will exist, so in the meantime the more immediate issue for parents become at least finding a qualified mental health professional who is actually educated and trained and as steeped in the biological side of gender science as possible.

The extent to which this remains problematic for parents in America in the early decades of the 21st century is made abundantly clear by the experience of Kelly and Wayne searching for such a qualified person. The first psychologist turns out not even to deal with gender issues because by “kids’ sexual issues” is meant dealing with abuse. The next therapist does, unfortunately, qualify as a “gender specialist” but even the resistant Wayne recognized quackery when they are asked if Wyatt stands up or sits down on the toilet when urinating. To the response that he stands, the “specialist” confidently asserts “Then he’s not transgender.” Such was the state of the mental health care system offering assistance to parents on the issue of gender identity in the early 2000’s.