Ash Lammin says she felt that she was a girl as soon as she could speak.
The 12-year-old, from Kent, says that it has been difficult growing up as a transgender girl but feels that she is firmly on the right path.
Now Ash is beginning to transition her gender from male to female at an NHS-run clinic – and is one of the youngest children in the country to do so.
Ash – who changed her name by deed poll to Ashley when she was eight – will start by taking hormone blockers to halt the onset of puberty.
She eventually wants a womb transplant so she can be a mother when she is older.
She said: ‘The journey is long and it’s still going, but I feel like the sense of victory is there through it all. I do feel accepted sometimes, but other times not.
‘Not everyone is going to understand and people have to have their own opinions and I understand that. Some people might not like the idea of trans.
‘I hope I inspire others but I just hope that love and acceptance comes through everything.’
Mum Terri has said that Ash will take the blockers until she is 18. At that point, she herself will decide whether to go ahead with gender reassignment surgery.
If she decides not to go ahead with it, Ash will come off the blocker, and her puberty will kick in just a few years later than her peers.
She said: ‘I never thought it was a phase, Ash was just Ash. When she was three she said to me, “I’m a boy because you gave me a boy’s name – it’s your fault”.
‘I remember feeling horrible, because she blamed me.
‘I’d never come across it before and I just went along with it. I just thought at the time “if he’s happy, well that’s the main thing”.’
When Ash turned 11 and went to secondary school, she became a target for bullies who would throw things at her on the bus and shout abuse at her, forcing Terri to take her out of the school after just one term.
Ash is now being home-schooled and Terri is calling for better education within schools to teach children about transgender people.
She said: ‘I’d like to see the subject of transgender people included in some lessons, like there are about same-sex families.
‘There needs to be more about liking people for who they are, not what they are.’
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