Mumbai Parents Raise Two Neurodivergent Trans Kids With Love

A Mumbai teacher discovered that the hardest part of raising trans children wasn't accepting who they are, but unlearning who she thought they'd be.

Meghna Kulkarni has two children: Rit and Shreesh. Both are neurodivergent, and both came out as trans within a few years of each other.

Rit came out first in 2019 during Class 10. He told his mother he was questioning his identity, and over the next three years, he navigated his journey to understanding himself as transmasculine and non-binary.

Meghna admits her first response wasn't rejection but fear. She worried about a world that might not make space for her talented, thoughtful child.

That fear became clarity during a parent-teacher meeting when Rit's grade teacher complained that he was "always with the boys" and asked the parents to discipline him. Meghna and her spouse Prasanna stood firm and told the teacher they found nothing wrong with their child's behavior.

Shreesh came out at 21 in 2021 as transfeminine and non-binary. This time, Meghna's response was different, and not in a way she's proud of.

Her first reaction was disbelief and silence. She had carried unexamined stories about her firstborn without realizing it, imagining a future that didn't match who Shreesh truly was.

But when they had a heart-to-heart conversation, Shreesh revealed how exhausting it had been to mask her real self. That changed everything for Meghna.

Sunny's Take

Both children experienced bullying and misunderstanding at school while navigating their neurodivergent identities alongside their gender journeys. But they never navigated alone.

Meghna credits her teaching career with preparing her for parenthood. She learned that every child arrives as a complete individual, not as a project to be molded.

The experiences of helping raise her younger brother and a cousin with Down syndrome taught her to pay attention to difference and individuality. Those lessons became the foundation for accepting her own children.

Today, Meghna describes herself and Prasanna as "rainbow parents." They've moved from fear and silence to fierce advocacy and wholehearted acceptance.

The love she felt holding her newborns remains exactly the same, she says. What changed is her understanding of who they are and what it means to truly accept them.