Michael B 💎🇺🇸

My 90s childhood was beautiful. I was a tomboy for many years, and then all of a sudden I wasn’t. No one cared. I wore boys clothes for most of my childhood, and then one day I switched to dresses. I loved fishing and comic books, and I was also a boy-crazy flirt. I always had a crush on someone. Sports were everything to me, but I also sang in talent shows and took ballet classes. I loved mythology and reading novels. No one tried to pigeonhole me into any box because I didn’t fit into one. My parents gave me space to figure myself out. They let me follow my interests. My mom wasn’t worried about my tomboy phase because she had been a tomboy too. There were no deep discussions or therapy sessions. I was just a kid. It’s breaks my heart that so many children today aren’t actually allowed to just be children. They are pressured into making life altering decisions before they can even get a driver’s license. Kids go through phases. They change and evolve on a daily basis. Taking one thing your child says and altering their entire life is so extreme. Do you know how often I used to tell my parents I wanted to be a boy when I was a kid? I didn’t want to physically be a boy, I wanted to play touch football with the boys at recess and I wanted the same opportunities they had. But I couldn’t fully explain that thought at nine years old, so I would just say that I wished I was a boy. I said it often. But I grew up to be a woman with varied interests and a few masculine personality traits. I shudder to think what my life would be like if I was a child in today’s world.