When Louis was in kindergarten, they remember staunchly refusing to use the school bathrooms.
"As a three-year-old, I was refusing to go to the bathroom with the other girls in my kindergarten group," Louis says.
'I obviously didn't have the language at that age to describe why, but I just remember the fact that I wouldn't go."
Now 17 years old, Louis identifies as non-binary, and says the signs their gender was outside the binary were always there.
"It's such a cliche thing to say, 'oh I just always knew', but I did," they say.
Louis's parents were always happy for their young child to play outside the constraints of gender.
"Some days I'd play with my truck, some days I'd smash my barbies together … I was a pretty rough child," Louis laughs.
But at 14, when Louis came out to their parents as both non-binary and bisexual, it was a greater adjustment that they had anticipated.
"They said, like, 'you're too young to know this sort of a thing, you should be focusing solely on school'," Louis says.
Regardless, Louis continued their journey of coming out.
They cut their hair short and requested that teachers at school refer to them by a new name and set of pronouns.
"A lot of my teachers were on board to use my name and pronouns," Louis says.
Louis is in the process of seeking support at a gender clinic with the hope of eventually undergoing surgery to match their body to their gender.
But the process has taken so long that Louis has aged out of the paediatric clinic they had initially been referred to.
From time of publication, Louis still has about a year to wait until their next appointment.
They say a lack of resources is the problem.
"It's because there's no-one actually to support us, and it's a growing issue," they say.
Dr Ken Pang, an associate professor at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, agrees, and says a sharp increase in the number of people seeking gender support means resources are stretched.
"In Victoria in 2011, there were just over 10 new referrals to the Royal Children's Hospital of young people aged under 18; in 2020, a decade later, that number was just under 500, and last year in 2021 it was over 800," Dr Pang says.
Dr Pang says gender support is time-critical — in a physical sense, such as when puberty blockers come into the mix, but also for the mental health of the young person.
"Lack of access to speciality gender-related care can push some young people to take matters into their own hands and access hormones illegally and self-medicate in an unregulated, unsupervised manner," he says.
"We also know that unfortunately many of these young people struggle with depression and anxiety."
Dr Pang says it is important for a young person questioning their gender to see professionals who can help to support not only the young person but their parents or caregivers as well.
"Young people are supported to explore and affirm their gender identity by clinicians, underpinned by a belief that gender diversity represents a normal part of human variation," Dr Pang says.
"[But] the care that the young person receives does not inherently seek to promote trans identities over cisgender ones.
"Some young people attend gender clinics to explore their gender identity and subsequently do not identify as transgender, which is just part of their journey."
That was case for 17-year-old Rosie, who says seeking help at the gender clinic was life changing.
"They were very supportive and kind, and if I didn't have them then I don't know what would have happened to me, to be honest, because it was a really complicated time," she says.
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Rosie's experience with accessing that initial help was different to Louis's. She was already at the Royal Children's Hospital for issues relating to her foster care when she was transferred to the gender clinic.
For Rosie, exploring her identity was a journey that ended with the gender she was assigned at birth.
But through childhood, her impression of what different genders represented made that process confusing.
"I thought men were seen as strong and women were seen as weak," she said.
She also felt her gender excluded her from her friends at the time.
"My friendship group was all guys, and they would leave me out just because of my gender," she said.
"So, I thought, like, maybe if I wasn't a girl, if I wasn't weak, I'd be strong, and I would be loved and wanted."
When she started high school, Rosie chose to go on period blockers
"I had wonderful doctors and counsellors who supported me with these decisions," she said.
Over time, Rosie grew to embrace her identity as a girl.
"It took me a couple of years, maybe four years before I got comfortable with my gender," she says.
Rosie says her experience shows that questioning your gender does not have to be a daunting, life-long decision.
"If you feel like a guy then become a guy if that's what you want, and it doesn't have to be forever," she says.
Dr Pang says puberty will resume "as normal" once a young person stops taking puberty blockers.
"The temporary use of puberty blockers has been part of mainstream medical practice since the 1980s for children who commence puberty too early," Dr Pang says.
"As with any medical treatment, there are risks, but the available evidence indicates that these are relatively minor when it comes to temporary puberty blocker use."
Rosie says her journey was vital in identifying something that was missing in her life.
"I learnt after that battle that it wasn't actually about being a boy. It was about wanting to be something other than me," she says.
"It was finding out that I don't have to be strong, and that I am loved for who I am."
