Intro by Carla Ann

“Tiffany, I’ve asked you how everything is going with people and the activities you’re involved in, but you haven’t mentioned how you are coping with everything.” She emphasized the ‘you,’ when she asked that.

“Well, better than I was last year,” I started. “Way better than last year… I have a lot of friends now, and I’m not getting picked on every day.” I saw her eyes boring into me looking for something else. “Alright, I don’t know how I’m doing right now.” I told her honestly.

“What do you mean?” She asked.

“Well for one I’m really tired of everyone guessing I’m five if I wear the wrong clothes.” I told her hesitantly. I was sure my parents had filled her in with everything anyway, “Tuesday was pajama day. Mom and I had found some cute pajamas with feet on them that would fit Amy and me, so we wore them for pajama day. We really did look cute dressed like that, and I was having a lot of fun with it. That was until the sub in English class thought that I was someone’s little sister that had come them to school that day.”

I was really surprised Dr. Reynolds didn’t laugh about it, but I continued, “Then the next day the whole squad was wearing shortalls and our hair done in pigtails and I looked to be about five again. One of my best friends even brought a doll to school to play a joke on the sub that we’d had. I don’t think she knew that it really upset me though. I’m not five, I’m twelve! Amy has grown about five inches here in the last couple months, but I’m still the same height I was last year. It’s good for cheerleading stuff because people can toss me so easily… but…” I was doing my best to not go into tears over all of this. “as long as we’ve got my puberty stopped then I won’t be doing much growing. That’s all on top of the fact that I’m never going to be able to have periods like my friends… and I’m stuck with this stupid thing between my legs,” I told her with a great deal of exasperation. “I’m so tired of having to look at it, or hide it, every time I turn around. I know you can’t do anything about it till I’m eighteen – but I wish it could be gone now!” I had gone to tears now.

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The Legal Stuff: Dreaming of Cheers  © 2010 By Tiffany Shar
 
This is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright  © 2010 By Tiffany Shar. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission.
 
 
Preface
 
 
It’s been a long road to publishing this third book in my Standing Up to Life Series. I began writing the first book over two years ago, putting the first two books out in a quick succession of six months work. The third book became more challenging to finish as I had set my sights on only writing a trilogy. I declared myself finished last August, but found myself unhappy with the ending. Well seven months later I feel this is ready to give to you, my readers, and I hope you will enjoy it. It has not gone on the track I had expected, and indeed there will probably be at least one more book following this in order to complete Tiffany’s story. I hope you will find that your wait has been worth it.

Like the first two books I posted here, I will be posting a full copy here on BigCloset. This time I am going to upload two chapters per week to the site. The full version should be completely posted by August. For those that cannot wait however, I have an e-book version of the full book available from Lulu.com as of today. You may find it at My Store. My assumption is that the majority of my readers would be more interested in this edition of the book rather than a hardback or paperback. If you enjoy this work perhaps you will consider supporting me by purchasing it ($5.95 for the eBook).

Thanks again, and I hope you enjoy reading Dreaming of Cheers!

Chapter 3:

THE NEXT MORNING when Amy and I arrived at school I was feeling fairly self-conscious. I knew that footed pajamas are definitely something for little kids… but I thought I looked way more like I was five today than I did the day before! Since even Amy looked like she was about eight, I didn’t stand a chance! As we walked in I was really glad to see another girl on the squad, Amanda, looked at least as young as I did. She and I actually spent a couple moments giggling about it in the hallway before Amy and I went inside.

As I sat down in first hour though the day became fairly normal. Before I knew it I was in choir and having a great time singing a piece for our Christmas concert. I knew we were pretty close to that concert already… but it still seemed like so long away! After we sang through the new song Ms. Beecher told us we could sit and chat for the rest of the class.

Kristina, Amy, and I were chatting about a bunch of different things for a bit before she said, “Oh! Hold on a second — I have something for you Tiffany!”

She ran over to her bag and came back with a baby doll dressed in a cute dress and said, “Here, this is for you!” She said that with an evil little gleam in her eyes.

“Uh…”

“Ooh! Cute!” Amy exclaimed.

“You want me to look like a kindergartner?” I asked Kristina.

“Yep!” she said cutely.

I shook my head. What else could I do? I mean my friends were conspiring against me!

“You do remember I’m a captain right?” I told her with mock-menace in my face.

“So?” She sneered.

I started laughing, “I can’t win can I?” I said.

“No,” she told me.

A few minutes later, just before the bell rang, she told me, “Actually Tiffany I mainly brought Cali,” her doll, “as a joke against your sub. She’s still going to be there today — it’s so funny that she decided you must have been someone’s little sister!”

“That actually makes me feel better. Thanks for telling me that,” I told her. She grinned and gave me a hug just as the bell rang.

When I came into fourth hour with the doll, Nikki and Ashley just laughed non-stop. Mr. Martin, the algebra teacher, finally asked me towards the end of that hour, “Tiffany, why did you bring a doll to school today?”

“Well… actually I didn’t bring it. Kristina Jones did.” I told him. He still looked just as curious and clueless about everything so I decided to tell him the story. He was mostly cool about these kinds of things after all. “Yesterday I was wearing those footed pajamas right?” I asked him.

“Yeah, I remember that,” he told me.

“Well when I went to English yesterday Ms. Damien was gone so we had a sub. Before class started she asked me, ‘who’s your big sister?’ or something like that. She thought I was a little five year old that had tagged along to school with her sister on Pajama Day.” I told him.

He looked somewhat incredulous about it before starting to laugh. “That’s pretty funny. I could see that happening on any other day I guess. She should have known better on Pajama Day though,” he told me.

“Yeah, she should have. Anyway, we’d already had these outfits picked out for the dance squad for today anyway, but since everyone decided to put pigtails in their hair they all thought I’d look just as young today.”

“Actually I think you look younger,” he teased me.

“Not fair! Teachers aren’t allowed to pick on students!” I told him.

“That’s part of our job description,” he told me. He was actually acting like a younger teacher that day. Since he was actually in his sixties I was amazed. “I’ll have to give her a hard time about this later myself, that’s pretty funny.”

I was glad that he was being cool about it. A few moments later he wrapped up class and we all put that day’s assignment into the box. Going to lunch I was actually enjoying myself. Amy, Nikki, Ashley, and I had our arms linked together as we walked through the hallway to the cafeteria. The four of us were smiling and having a great time.

That was until I felt Kristina’s doll yanked from my hand as we were just getting ready to enter the cafeteria. I turned around and stopped Amy from pulling my arm off, “Hey,” I said, while looking into the eyes of the kidnapper.

It was Lucas.

I was just getting ready to say something to him when I saw another hand come and yank it out of his hand. He looked incredulously at Kristina who was just a bit taller than him. “Leave Cali and Tiffany alone,” she told him. “I’ll tell your mom if you keep this up.”

I didn’t think anything could faze Lucas — but that actually did. She turned around and led all of us inside to the line. She handed Cali back to me and we all just started chatting. After we sat down I learned that Kristina’s mom used to babysit Lucas when he was younger. Because of that her mom and his mom were actually really close friends. On one hand that really disturbed me, on the other I’ll take help anywhere I can get it!

The rest of lunch went smoothly without any major hiccups. After we’d finished our food Amy told me to turn around as she fixed my pigtails that had shifted. Following lunch, home-ec was broken up by all of the dance squad members meeting in the gym to take a picture together. They put me in the middle of the front row and made me hold the doll for the picture. I could have crawled under a rock and stayed there… but it couldn’t have lasted until after the yearbooks came out so it wouldn’t do me any good!

The icing on the cake for that day though was definitely English. Our sub just looked at me and shook her head before asking, “Are you sure you’re really a seventh grader.”

“Yep!” I told her. I couldn’t resist bringing it home though, “Do you like my dolly?”

Amy, Ashley, and Nikki were all standing around me at that moment and were nearly at the point of passing out from their laughter. The sub couldn’t seem to figure out what was going on. I think she almost considered yelling at us and sending us to the office… but instead she smiled and started laughing.

“You brought that today because of me didn’t you?” She asked.

Amy popped in, “She didn’t actually bring it, a friend of ours did... but it was because you thought she was five yesterday.” She was grinning.

“I guess I should have known better… but you really did look like you were too young to be in seventh grade. Actually if I saw you somewhere like a store dressed like you are today I would assume you were in early elementary school…” she said.

I grimaced as Amy and Ashley both laughed. Part of me wanted to cry, but I just laughed with them. I buried my head in the desk eventually and worked on the work that Ms. Damien had left for us. The rest of the day I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. Mrs. Remar had us all marching outside again to get ready for the parade on Friday. I swear she changed from being an evil Mr. Hyde to being eviler Mr. Hyde when she began having us march around the track. I did my best, and thankfully I was better than most.

After school I found myself beginning to think of dance and cheer practice as routine. I was still being worked incredibly hard by Coach Holt, but it didn’t seem as novel or as strenuous as it had been at first. I found myself surprised when practice was over so quickly that night. Following a quick dinner Mom took me to ballet.

This was only my second week of being in the second level class my teacher had wanted me in. Initially when I began coming a month before she had thought I’d studied at least a year. When I had told her that wasn’t the case she had still worked to convince my mom and I that I should be in the next class. It had made even more sense with the dance squad practices since I could actually eat before practice.

However ballet class was anything but routine, it was really hard! The other class had been easy, but this one somehow seemed way more difficult. A lot of it was probably due to not practicing for it at all… but still. At the end of practice I fell asleep in the car on the way home.

Mom woke me up as we pulled into the driveway, “Hey Tiffany, wake up. We’re home now,” she told me as she shook my shoulder gently.

I just kind of groaned and forced myself to walk inside and take a shower. When I had gotten dressed into my pajamas I went out to the living room and sat down on the couch. I had homework to do, but I was so tired! About the time I thought I could do no more my mom brought me a cup of hot tea.

“Here sweetie,” she said to me as I took it from her.

“Thank you,” I said with a tired smile.

“Other than being long, how did your day go?”

“Well… for the most part okay. Kristina heard about the sub thinking I was someone’s little sister yesterday, so today she brought me one of her dolls and told me to carry it around with me.”

Mom giggled a bit then.

Part of me wanted to scream about it though… it was funny… but at the same time it wasn’t funny! I was twelve! I shouldn’t be getting confused with being five! I thought about pouting but decided to continue on with the story. “Of course that meant that I really looked like a little kid with the shortalls, my hair, and carrying around a doll…”

“Not to mention your height,” my dad said as he came in chuckling.

I was mad. How could he do that to me? I stuck my tongue out at him. “You’re both supposed to be on my side!”

“We are sweetie,” my Mom said. I think she realized how upset I was actually getting. “It’s just kind of funny.”

“But at the same time it’s not!” I whined.

“You’ll begin to grow here in a few years Tiffany,” my dad said.

“Not at the moment though…” I said. All I could think about was that while I was on the hormones blocking me from growing up as a man, I also wasn’t growing as a girl either. I couldn’t help it, I began to cry.

Mom hugged me at that moment. Through the tears I could just barely see that Dad had a really puzzled expression on his face. I knew he was trying to figure out what he had done wrong.

I just cried for a couple minutes before Mom asked, “Did something else happen today that bothered you?”

“Kind of…” I sobbed, “Lucas gave me a hard time and tore Kristina’s doll out of my arms at one point… but that didn’t even bother me that much because she took care of him…” I was still trying to figure out why I was crying myself.

“Is there something else?” My Mom asked again.

“Well… yes… no… I don’t know,” I told her.

She hugged me more and waited for me to continue.

“I think it’s just this whole thing with me looking like I’m five just reminds me more that I’m not growing as a girl yet. The other day Lindsey was really upset because she was having a bad day… And all she was doing was venting about stuff… but then she started talking about how she thought it was awful that she was having her first period. And I guess that’s part of it. I’ll never get to have a period — I know they’re awful and gross and annoying and everything, but still!”

“And in the mean time if I wear the wrong clothes I look like I’m a kindergartner! When they start me on hormones at least I’ll have a chance because I’ll grow breasts… but…” I just sobbed at that point. I was exhausted. I was stressed. I was scared. And, more than anything I needed a break to cry.

“It’s okay sweetheart,” Mom told me as she rocked me back and forth. “It’s okay.”

After what seemed like eternity I finally calmed down. I rubbed my palms across my tear stained eyes and went to the bathroom to rinse my face off. As I looked at my reflection I looked like a wreck of a five year old. That almost made me cry some more, but I kept control of myself. When I returned to the living room I sat back down on the couch and drank some more of the tea.

By this point it had gotten cold… but I didn’t care. It was something to do. I needed to go to bed but I really wasn’t done with my homework yet. Mom came back in and sat beside me, offering to help me with my homework. I let her know there wasn’t anything she could do. She was terrible at math after all! I worked on it for twenty more minutes before deciding I just didn’t care anymore and went to bed.

All night long I kept having nightmares that made little sense to me.

WHEN I WOKE up the next day, Dad reminded me that they would be pulling me out of school at ten or to take me to see Dr. Reynolds. I remembered them telling me about it at some point, but had completely forgotten about it. Thankfully they were pulling me out of a couple classes instead of making me miss the football game that evening. Maybe my priorities were a little messed up… but I was getting A’s in all of those classes!

I was quiet when I got into the Hancock’s car that morning. I said ‘hi’ to Amy and her mom, but didn’t really say anything else. I think Amy noticed that something was wrong, but she didn’t push the issue — letting me sit quietly in my seat. I didn’t even know exactly what was wrong with me… I just was mad for some reason today. Between last night and my nervousness about seeing Dr. Reynolds today I wasn’t in a good mood.

‘Why was I even nervous about seeing Dr. Reynolds?’ I kept asking myself. I’d met with her more than a dozen times already. It wasn’t like she was going to change her opinion of what I was supposed to be doing…? Was she? I knew that my parents were both supposed to be at this meeting today, and they were bound to talk to Dr. Reynolds about what had happened last night. Of course I wasn’t even sure what had happened last night, I shouldn’t be this messed up from that.

I ended up sitting in my first hour class doing work while on autopilot the whole time. Kyle eventually broke through to me for a couple minutes. “Hey Tiffany, are you alright?”

I looked at him and said, “I guess.”

“Are you sure?” He asked.

“No, not really.” I told him with a shake of my head.

“Do you want to talk about it?” He asked. I could see that he genuinely was concerned about me.

“Not really… I’ll just have to talk about it more in a little bit anyway,” I said as I watched his face show more concern. “I really appreciate the offer though,” I told him as I forced a fake smile onto my face.

“Anytime,” he said, the concern still on his face. When I looked at Amy a few minutes later she had the same expression.

What could I tell them? At least today I didn’t look like I was five… or at least little less like it. Today was ‘war and peace’ day at the school. Our squad had decided to dress in camo pants and green shirts. I had my hair in a plain pony-tail. We were all going to be dancing at the pep rally today — so we were all in the same uniforms. That was part of why we were going to see Dr. Reynolds so early — I needed to be back by one-thirty.

Second hour I was still in the same kind of mood, but found myself chatting with Amy about the pep rally. She was worried about me, I could tell, but what could I tell her? Especially here at school. Before long I was called to the office and went with Mom out to her car.

“How are you feeling today, sweetie?” Mom asked me as she unlocked my door.

“I don’t know… better I guess,” I lied to her. I wasn’t feeling better, and I had no idea why I was feeling the way I was.

She gave me a look as if she knew I was lying, but let it slide as we drove off. “So I think you’re free this weekend, right?” she asked me.

“I don’t think there’s anything going on,” I told her.

“Why don’t we go shopping Saturday?” She suggested.

I could tell she was still feeling me out. I shrugged and said, “Sure,” with little enthusiasm.

“I think it’s about time we got you some winter clothes, it’s getting cold in the mornings already,” she said.

“Yeah, tomorrow night in my cheer uniform it’s going to be freezing!” I told her thinking about the high school game that we were going to be at.

“Well at least you guys got a long sleeve top for your uniform…” she continued to make small talk to me as we made our way to the hospital where Dr. Reynolds office was. We went up the elevator to the floor where her office was and sat down in the waiting room — Dad was already there.

“Hey sweetie,” he told me as we walked in. I sat down in between the two of them and waited for us to be called.

About ten minutes later Dr. Reynolds came in and said, “Hey Tiffany! How are you doing today?” She was being pretty perky today.

“Okay, I guess,” I told her.

Her eyes didn’t flash anything, in fact she made no reaction except to say, “Good. I’d like to go ahead and speak to your parents for a few minutes before I talk to you, do you mind?”

Like I honestly had a choice? “That’s okay,” I told her, my parents both squeezed my hands and then headed off to her office.

Left alone in the waiting room I began looking through the magazines. I’d already read the issue of Seventeen they had there, but decided to start flipping through it anyway. There were a couple things I’d missed before, but not many. I’d killed as much time in that magazine as I could and they still weren’t back in thirty minutes later. I was beginning to wish that I’d brought a book to read. They’d never spent that much time in her office before me when we’d come to other appointments. It made me nervous.

Bored, I began looking through whatever else there was there and ended up picking one of the Highlights magazines for little kids. I amused myself for another ten minutes with that before Dr. Reynolds finally came back in for me. “Tiffany would you come with me now?” She asked.

I got up and followed her down the hallway, passing my parents who she said were going to go wait in the waiting room for a bit while we talked.

She had me have a seat in her office in a comfortable chair away from her desk while she sat in another chair like it across from me. “So Tiffany how have things been going for you? We haven’t had a meeting in a few weeks because you’ve been so busy.”

“Well I’m sure my parents told you that I made the dance squad?” I asked her.

She nodded, “Tell me everything anyway, they may not have said it all — and I’d prefer to hear how things are going from you.

“Okay, well a few weeks back I made the dance squad. Well, not only did I make it but I’m also co-captain with Amy, my best friend. We’ve been working really hard since then to get ready for different things. Last week we had our first performance at one of our school’s football games. We did our routine at half-time, it was pretty cool.” I went on to explain everything that we were up to with that, told her about band, told her about jazz band, mentioned gymnastics lessons, and mentioned ballet.

“And I guess that brings you up to today when we’re doing our routine at our pep-rally and then at the game this afternoon. Then tomorrow we’re going to perform for the pre-game at the high school game, and we’ll do cheers with the high school cheerleaders during the game. Oh… and before that I’m marching with the band for the parade — I decided that I would do that since I had said I’d do that first,” I actually continued on for several minutes beyond this.

“So Tiffany, how have things been going at school other than all of these activities that you’re participating in?”

“Well I’m getting all A’s in my classes right now.” I told her.

“How about the other kids? Are they picking on you a lot like they were last month?”

“Well… for the most part no. There are a few kids that are still causing problems…” I told her about Lucas and the few other encounters I’d had. “Most of that seems to be going away now that I made the squad though. I have too many close friends that are ‘popular’ for people to make too much of things.”

“So do you think you’re becoming popular yourself?” She asked me.

That question kind of jolted me. “I doubt it. I mean who in the world would consider someone like me popular?” I asked.

“You may be selling yourself short there Tiffany. It sounds like you’re definitely doing way better with friends than I ever expected at this point. I’ve got some colleagues that would like to get a chance to meet with you at some point if you would be willing.” She told me.

“Why?” I asked her. Was this a good or a bad thing?

“Well in all honesty you seem to be a good example of the best case scenario for a girl like yourself. They would like to get a chance to figure out why things are going so well for you, and how they can help others do as well as you are.”

So now I was to be a lab rat? “Umm… I’ll think about it. The idea of other people studying me like an animal in a zoo doesn’t exactly sound like fun,” I told her as politely as I could.

“I can understand that,” she told me with a smile and a nod of her head. The way she did it was so disarming, even if I’d thought about getting upset about the idea, that look somehow managed to keep me calm. “Tiffany, I’ve asked you how everything is going with people and the activities you’re involved in, but you haven’t mentioned how you are coping with everything.” She emphasized the ‘you,’ when she asked that.

“Well, better than I was last year,” I started. “Way better than last year… I have a lot of friends now, and I’m not getting picked on every day.” I saw her eyes boring into me looking for something else. “Alright, I don’t know how I’m doing right now.” I told her honestly.

“What do you mean?” She asked.

“Well for one I’m really tired of everyone guessing I’m five if I wear the wrong clothes.” I told her hesitantly. I was sure my parents had filled her in with everything anyway, “Tuesday was pajama day. Mom and I had found some cute pajamas with feet on them that would fit Amy and me, so we wore them for pajama day. We really did look cute dressed like that, and I was having a lot of fun with it. That was until the sub in English class thought that I was someone’s little sister that had come them to school that day.”

I was really surprised Dr. Reynolds didn’t laugh about it, but I continued, “Then the next day the whole squad was wearing shortalls and our hair done in pigtails and I looked to be about five again. One of my best friends even brought a doll to school to play a joke on the sub that we’d had. I don’t think she knew that it really upset me though. I’m not five, I’m twelve! Amy has grown about five inches here in the last couple months, but I’m still the same height I was last year. It’s good for cheerleading stuff because people can toss me so easily… but…” I was doing my best to not go into tears over all of this. “as long as we’ve got my puberty stopped then I won’t be doing much growing. That’s all on top of the fact that I’m never going to be able to have periods like my friends… and I’m stuck with this stupid thing between my legs,” I told her with a great deal of exasperation. “I’m so tired of having to look at it, or hide it, every time I turn around. I know you can’t do anything about it till I’m eighteen — but I wish it could be gone now!” I had gone to tears now.

Dr. Reynolds came over to me and gave me a hug and handed me a tissue. When I got control of my tears she left for a couple moments and returned with my parents.

My parents both gave me a hug and moved me to sitting in between them on a couch that was next to the two chairs that Dr. Reynolds and I had been sitting in. Mom kept one arm around my shoulder while keeping another hand in mine. Dad did the same, stroking my hair with one of his hands. I had mostly recovered from the venting I had done. I was feeling a lot better really. I guess maybe just saying that stuff had helped… but I was sure that there were going to be some repercussions from all of this.

“Are you doing better now Tiffany?” Dr. Reynolds asked.

“Yeah, I guess so.” I told her.

“Good. Now I want to talk about what we’re doing from here.”

I found myself suddenly scared, she wouldn’t even think of telling me to go back to being Brandon because of this would she?

“Tiffany calm down,” she told me looking at me. “I know your worst fear would be me telling you and your parents that you needed to go back to being Brandon — I don’t ever see me saying that. In fact, I’m certain that what we’re doing is the right thing for you.” She told me with a smile.

I relaxed a lot at that point, “Thanks,” I said while my mom wiped some tears off of my face that had escaped.

“We’d find another doctor if she said otherwise,” my dad whispered into my ear and kissed me on the top of my head. I looked at him and smiled, I was glad to see no matter what my parents were behind me.

“I have two things I want to talk about with you and your parents at this point Tiffany,” Dr. Reynolds said to me. “The first is that I think you need to cut back on some of your activities.”

I gasped. “What?” I paused before saying, “Why?”

“Well Tiffany, I think you are overloading yourself too much here. Before you joined the dance squad you could keep up with the evening activities pretty well… but now I’m afraid that if you keep it up you’re going to cause health issues to yourself.”

“Actually sweetie we were already going to talk to you about this,” my mom told me.

I thought about getting upset about this… but I knew deep down they were right. I was pushing myself too far. “What all do you want me to give up?” I asked calmly.

“Well obviously not the dance squad, you’ve worked way too hard for that,” my mom told me with a smile, “and I think you should keep doing Jazz band on Tuesday nights because it’s good for you. You’re already doing the dance squad so I think the classes on Thursday with Ms. Clemens are a little overkill,” she told me.

“Do you think Ms. Clemons will understand?” I asked her.

“Yes, I think she will. I don’t think she’ll hold anything against you for the high school tryouts in a couple years. In fact maybe we can work it out to where you can do the spring session with her again. You shouldn’t have a problem coming back in at that point.”

I thought for a second before nodding, “Anything else you want me to give up?” I asked.

“Well I think ballet, and maybe gymnastics should go too,” she told me.

“I’d really like to keep trying to do gymnastics. I’m okay with giving up ballet though… I guess.” I said reluctantly. I didn’t really want to give it up… but they were right. I hadn’t had any time the last few weeks to cool down for my sanity’s sake.

Mom squeezed my shoulder, and then Dr. Reynolds continued, “I think that’s a good compromise. You may find that you need to cut back on the gymnastics too, Tiffany.” She said the last part gently. “But I think being able to have your Wednesday and Thursday nights freer is a start. Now, the next thing I want to talk to you three about.”

She paused and seemed to collect herself a bit as if she was nervous to have this particular conversation. “I would like you to come here and meet with another of my colleagues next week. I’m sure that my diagnosis is correct… but I would like a second opinion before we move onto the next stage of Tiffany’s treatment.”

“What do you mean the next stage?” I asked with a mixture of fear and excitement.

“Well honestly I would like to consider starting you on a hormone replacement therapy soon. You’ve demonstrated that you have absolutely no real problems fitting into your school as a girl, and I think that is the way that you should continue. There really are no doubts in my mind that you are going to grow up to be a lovely young lady,” she said to me.

“But…?” I asked.

“But I want a second opinion to confirm mine before I order the treatment. It is really unusual to consider doing this with someone so young. Almost always we start this after a couple more years… but I’m concerned that if we don’t start it you may have more problems fitting in than you do — and I’d rather help you continue to do well than to hurt you by holding back.”

“When do you want to have this second doctor interview her?” My mom asked.

“Well I would actually really like to schedule a full day next week for them to do so.”

“Them?” My dad asked.

“Well it’s actually a friend of mine that specializes in child psychology and another psychiatrist that has a lot of experience in gender dysphoric patients. Both of them have had numerous patients like Tiffany in the past. I think it would be beneficial to seek their advice on her.”

“I guess that’s possible, when would we do this? Where would we have to fly?” My mom asked.

“Well they’re actually both willing to come out a day early to a convention that we’re having here in town just so that they can meet her. That would be Wednesday if you think that you all could be available.”

“We’ll make it happen,” I said for them. I might be able to get on hormones sooner rather than later? And then I could maybe grow at the same rate as the rest of the girls? The biggest problem as I had seen it was that boys always grew later than girls… and I was being passed so far at this point I felt like I’d never catch up!

“I know I’ll be able to get off that day,” my mom said. “Joe, do you think you can?”

“I don’t know, we have a really important job for a client that day… I don’t know if I’ll be able to get free or not.” He told us.

“If you can’t that’s okay Mr. Jacobson. It would be better if you could though. Even if you maybe had a half-hour, for them to interview you really quick.” She told him hopefully.

“I’ll see what I can arrange.” He said.

“So for now?” I asked.

“Well I’ll see you and your mom at least next Wednesday, so that we can meet with them. If the meeting goes well, and I think it will, then we’ll go ahead and start setting up a treatment for you the following week.”

That made me smile. I got up and went over to hug her. “Thank you,” I told her.

We spent a little longer in her office clearing up some details about next week before leaving together. I joined Mom in her car, while Dad left in his. We met for a quick lunch at Burger King before Mom drove me back to school and Dad returned to work. Lunch that day was pretty quiet, I think we were all busy thinking about what she had said. It wasn’t like I didn’t want it — I really really did, but it was something that once we began it there wouldn’t be any real going back.

If we did this I would never be able to have kids of my own. That thought alone really bothered me. But, I supposed, there were plenty of kids out there that needed to be adopted right? I was so unsure about all of that I forced myself not to think about it. Sure my parents had me when they were really young… but I could definitely wait until at least after college right?