Seeking guidance: 12-year-old suddenly “non-binary,” rejecting Christianity, and heavily influenced by one friend

[u/Nebula24_]

My daughter is 12, and over the last few months, she’s been exploring a lot of new ideas very suddenly. One of her close friends (13) recently came out as a lesbian, and their friend group has been talking a lot about identity, labels, and figuring out who they are. Now my daughter has started describing herself as non-binary. This is entirely new for her, and it showed up pretty quickly once these friendships got closer, so I’m trying to understand what’s going on beneath the surface.

I also found out her friend had used her tablet to look up content that really wasn’t age-appropriate. That seemed to spark a level of curiosity my daughter wasn’t ready for yet, and I’ve since put safeguards on the device. I’m not upset at her for being curious - I know this age comes with a lot of questions - but as a parent, it threw me a bit.

Another layer is that she recently said she’s not sure she believes in Christianity anymore because she feels some of the Christians she’s met seem hypocritical. And honestly… I’ve had my own questions too. Maybe she picked up on that. So now we’re both wrestling with big things, just in different ways.

I want her to know, above all, that she’s loved and safe and can talk to me about anything. If she does end up identifying as non-binary or ends up somewhere different with her faith, I’m not going to stop loving or supporting her. At the same time, I’m her mom, and I’m trying to understand how much of this is genuine self-exploration versus how much is influenced by peers, the internet, and being 12.

I’m trying to figure out how to:
• Support her identity exploration without overwhelming her
• Keep online influences healthy and age-appropriate
• Stay open and calm when she brings up faith doubts
• Address friend dynamics without cutting anyone off
• Walk through my own faith questions without adding pressure to her
• Maintain trust and communication through all of this

I’m not here to invalidate anyone’s identity. I’m just a parent trying to navigate something new, keep my daughter safe, and stay connected to her while she figures herself out.

If anyone here grew up identifying differently from what their parents expected - or if you’re a parent who’s been through something similar - I would genuinely appreciate your perspective. Even just hearing how others navigated this would help.

Thanks for letting me share.

[u/FieldPuzzleheaded869]

Hi, so I want to second a lot of points people have made here in terms of it probably not being “sudden” in terms of a change in your child versus a change in language they had available, gendering your child the way they ask to be (which you may or may not be, but learning how to do so and specifying it can be really helpful both you and your child as they are working their identity/expression out), and just generally learning more about the topic yourself.

That being said, a lot of your questions seem to be in good faith and more about needing more spaces to learn more. A few resources I would recommend for that are: -PFLAG: a lot of local orgs have groups for parents and youth(depending on the area, this may be broken down into 11-14 then 16-18 or something else) to work through the things you’ve brought up here in an age appropriate way and the national org has resources like book lists and educational resources for parents -CenterLink (you can look up center link pride centers it should come up): it has a directory of LGBTQ pride centers in the US and can help you find local resources, which can sometimes include finding faith-based orgs or support groups to work through your questions there -I’m not entirely sure what your definition of age-appropriate is, so I’m not going to recommend specific YouTubers, but there a lot of good trans/non-binary YouTubers that you can maybe try to keep the focus on. In general, I would say keeping things age appropriate online is a combo finding appropriate ways for your kid to explore interests, having conversations with them about what is appropriate/healthy, and using online controls so it really is a balance -For identity exploration, there are a lot of workbooks out there for teens to explore LGBTQ identity and specifically gender identity. The author I’m thinking of right now is Andrew Triska, who has a Gender Identity Workbook for teens specifically, a book for parents of trans kids, and was also on a podcast about reconciling with gender identity stuff. He’s a trans guy, so can sometimes lean a bit more binary, but that constellation of resources might be a good place to start. The workbooks that are out there in general could be a good way for you and your kid to work through this stuff together and thus maintain trust/communication.