The story of William, who at the age of three began battling the establishment.
William, born female, has always known he was really male.
At age two, his mother was dressing the family's children -- three daughters -- for a Christmas Eve party. William, who then had a girl's name, was having none of it.
"He said, 'Little boys do not wear dresses,'" his mother told The Province. "That was one of the last times we ever put a dress on him."
His real name isn't William, but the Fraser Valley teenager, now 19, says he's suffered discrimination because of the kind of person he is, and using his real name would expose him to further bigotry.
As a child, William wanted to play hockey, but young girls couldn't. He settled for ringette.
When one sister annoyed him, he bashed her head into the wall. When the other angered him, he broke her thumb.
When his sisters and their friends wanted to play with Barbies, "I wanted to play with Hot Wheels," he says.
His parents began to realize there was something different about their daughter, who wouldn't dress like a girl, who demanded that her hair be kept short and who kept battling the establishment until she was allowed to play hockey. They thought William must be a lesbian.
"His father and I thought he was just very butch," his mother said.
Today, in the family room, a shelf holds an old hockey photo of William as a pretty adolescent girl with dark hair a little longer than that of the average boy. His father had promised him new hockey gear if he grew his hair out for a month.
"I hated it," William said. "I wore a hat to school."
His genitals repulsed him. He used bandages to flatten his breasts and got his grandma to buy him the boys' clothing his mother refused him.
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