In the Life: Becoming Jay

[Music playing]. My name is Priscilla and I'm the proud mother  of Jay, who's an eight year old transgender boy. [Music playing]. The very first time that Jay said anything  was with a self-portrait he had done and in that self-portrait he had short hair. So I asked him, "Do you want your hair cut?" And he said, "I would love my hair cut." So I took him to the hairdresser's. I gave him the book of the kids and he picked out the picture of a little boy and he said, "Can I get my hair cut this short?" And I said, "If you want? It's your hair. It'll grow back if you don't like it." The moment the hairdresser turned him around and he looked at himself in the mirror for the  first time with that haircut his whole face lit up and I will never, ever forget that moment. That night he made it very clear. He said to me, "Mommy, I'm a boy stuck in the wrong body." [Music playing]. [Narrator] Jay socially transitioned from girl to boy during second grade. [Jay] "I want to bring ice cream." [Priscilla] "You want to bring ice cream?" [Priscilla] One afternoon Jay woke up from a nap and he caught me crying and he climbed up on my lap. And he said, "Mom, are you crying because I'm not a  little girl anymore?" And I said, "No, son. I'm not crying because you're not a little girl." And he said, "Good 'cuz I'm still the same person so you would just be crying for my pony tails." He knew at that moment I needed a little bit of clarification and he gave it to me. [Jay] "Five. One, two, three, four, five." I've had people that have been close to us call me, "crazy in the head." They can't believe I'm doing this to my child. All of those statements prove to me that there's ignorance out there. [Priscilla] "Were you nervous about telling me? Yeah. "Were you afraid to tell me?" [Jay] "Uh-huh." [Priscilla] "No. You were just nervous?" [Jay] "Yeah." [Priscilla] "And how do you feel now?" [Jay] "Very happy." [Priscilla] "Do you think you'll ever want to be that person again?" [Jay] "No...maybe." [Priscilla] "No...maybe? And what do you think will  happen if you decide to?" "You think I'd support you?" [Jay] "Yeah." [Priscilla] "Yeah. Do you want other transgender children  to be happy?" [Jay] "Yeah." [Priscilla] "If you could help their parents, what would you say to their parents?" [Jay] "I tell them to support their children." [Priscilla] "Yes. And what... how would that make their children feel if they supported them?" [Jay] "Happy." [Priscilla] "Happy. That's right. And is that the most important thing?" [Jay] "Mm-hmm." [Jay] "Yep." [Priscilla] "I think so too." "We make a good team, don't we?" [Jay] "Yep." [Priscilla] "That we do." [Silence].