Amber Lavigne

Thanks for having us.

So she was 13 at the time.

I didn't know much about breast binding at the time, but I knew it wasn't like a typical sports bra.

I knew that it wasn't something I had purchased for my daughter.

So I was very curious where it came from.

And I knew it was going to take a conversation or two to kind of parcel out with my daughter where it came from.

But I was confused and concerned for sure.

I learned that she received this binder from a social worker at her school.

Not only did she receive the one, but she received a second one as well, which raised great concern and lots of questions because I didn't even know she was meeting with this specific social worker at the time.

So I immediately reached out to the school for answers.

She didn't say much, to be honest with you.

She was a little embarrassed, a little taken aback that I had found this binder, and she was keeping it from me.

And like any 13-year-old, when they're caught in a lie with their parents, she didn't have much to say at first.

But she did know that I was pursuing conversations with the school at the time about it.

But no, she wasn't necessarily saying that at the time she was socially transitioning.

She was just...

kind of trying to cover her tracks in the moment.

I knew that she was feeling some anxiety, not necessarily surrounding gender, but I had connected her with a therapist, a community therapist, the spring prior to finding these binders in December of 2022.

So the spring of 2021, she began seeing a community therapist that she and I found for her, mostly for some anxiety and depression she was experiencing.

It was more the school.