I Am Jazz Teen Jazz Jennings on the Three Biggest Misconceptions of Being a Transgender Kid

About halfway through our 45-minute conversation, 14-year-old Jazz Jennings confides that she’s worried about how her new docu-reality series, I Am Jazz (premiering tonight on TLC), will be received. She’s hoping for a positive response from viewers, but she also knows that the subject of her series—her journey as a transgender teen—is still new territory. Will audiences understand that being transgender wasn’t a choice? Or that gender dysphoria is a real thing?

But spend just a few minutes with Jazz and her mom, Jeanette, 49, and the answer is unequivocally yes. Warm-hearted, authentic, and deeply understanding, Jazz and her family may not generate the amount of publicity that Caitlyn Jenner and the Kardashians do, but their story is just as powerful—maybe even more so. The Jennings family is more like yours and mine than the Jenners/Kardashians will ever be, and with that comes a greater understanding of what it means to be transgender in today’s world, and especially for today’s kids. How do people know they were born into the wrong body? When should parents take their kids’ wishes seriously? And how should family handle such a sensitive topic? Nothing was off-limits as we sat down with this mother-daughter duo to talk about the most pressing questions, life in a new spotlight, and the Barbara Walters interview that started it all. Prepared to be amazed.

Glamour: What made you decide to sign on to your own reality series?

Jeanette Jennings: We’ve been thinking about it for a while, but Jazz was too young. It’s hard enough to wrap your mind around the idea of a transgender child, so it’s easier when they’re a teenager. People think it’s a choice [to be transgender and it’s not], so TLC gave us this platform, and we couldn’t pass up such an opportunity to share our story in such a real way. Like Jazz says, we wanted to normalize transgender kids. So we hope that comes across to people and that they are less judgmental.

Glamour: Jazz, I remember when Barbara Walters interviewed you on 20/20 in 2007. You were six years old. Did you remember having the queen of journalism come into your house and talk to you?

Jazz Jennings: Yeah, I definitely remember parts of it. I remember her asking me certain questions about whether I’m a boy or a girl, and me definitely being sure I’m a girl. At the time, I didn’t even know who was Barbara Walters was, so I would…

Jeanette: She called Barbara her friend.

Jazz: I did. My friend Barbara is coming!

Glamour: And, Jeanette, what was that like for you having Barbara Walters come in to your home?

Jeanette: It was surreal. My husband is really conservative and so we worked with [ABC] for months and he said, We want the most credible journalist ABC has, and we want Barbara Walters to do this.’ So it was him. It worked out great. I mean, it was like, If Barbara says you can have a transgender kid, then you can have a transgender kid!’

Glamour: Jazz, at a very young age you said, ‘I have a boy body, but I think like a girl.’ What did that mean?

Jazz: Right from the start I knew I was a girl, and I really just expressed that and conveyed that message by gravitating toward Barbie dolls, dresses, everything feminine. But I also knew I was different as well. I knew I was a girl, but I knew I was different. The way I knew that was because I knew I didn’t have a girl body. As I got older, I started learning more about different private parts, and I would take baths with my brothers and my sister and wonder why I didn’t have my sister’s body. I have a boy body but a girl brain, and once I learned the differences between the bodies, I knew I wanted a girl body.

Jeanette: People would say, Oh, how would a two-year-old know?’ but you know, one of the first things you teach your kids are, Where are you eyes? Your nose? Where’s your mouth?’ And you teach them all their body parts. She wondered why she didn’t look like her sister. People don’t give enough credit to two-year-olds. They know what they want.

Jazz: But it also wasn’t just about the body parts for me. It was a transition where I just wanted to live my life authentically, and be the girl I always knew I was. So that’s how it was for me at first. When I was young, I asked my mom when the good fairy was going to come and change my body parts.

Glamour: What’s the biggest misconception people have about you?

Jazz: There are three big ones! First one is people think that this is a choice to be transgender and it’s not. It’s not a choice at all. They think one day I woke up and said, Mommy, I don’t feel like being a boy anymore; I want to be a girl,’ and that my parents made me do this. I knew who I was and that was a girl, right from the start. Another huge is misconception is surgery. Oh my gosh it’s so annoying! People are always so concerned what’s in between my legs. They’re like, So, is it this part or that part? Has she had the surgery?’ But this isn’t just a medical journey. Sure, there are medical aspects that people should understand and be educated about, but it’s also much more than that. And being transgender, it’s about really finding yourself along the process and finding the courage to live your life authentically. I think people have to understand that. It’s not about what’s between your legs, but what’s between you ears.

Jeanette: And what’s in your heart.

Jazz: And the last misconception is the one about being too young, which we clearly expressed. People don’t know what’s going through my head. People don’t define me. I define myself. I knew I was a girl.

Glamour: Where does your confidence come from?

Jazz: Because my family always embraced me right from the start and showered me with unconditional love and support and acceptance, that’s why that confidence was able to blossom and I was able to be who I am proudly. So it’s thanks to them. If I was shut down at that time and didn’t have such a supportive family, I couldn’t be who I am, and therefore I probably wouldn’t be as confident.

Jeanette: If she was forced to live her life as a boy, I don’t think she’d be as confident. She’d be a completely different person, and hopefully alive, because so many of these kids…

Glamour: How did you prepare the rest of the family for this transition?

Jeanette: If you think about it, the boys are a couple years older than Jazz, so when they were four-years-old, Jazz was two, and acting like a girl. So they never had a little brother. In their minds they never had a little brother. But for Ari (Jazz’s older sister), Jazz was her little baby, her little brother, and she loved it like a doll. In Ari’s mind, this was her brother, but a girly brother. When it was time for Jazz to transition, it was hard for Ari because she was like, I’m the girl, I’m the princess, I’m the only girl.’ It was her and three boys, and she wasn’t ready to share that spotlight. We explained to Ari that this was the situation, these were the statistics, and it was like tough love. We explained that it was going to be a tough road [for Jazz] and she would need her big sister. And she said she loved Jazz and was going to be the best big sister to protect her. She completely turned around. She was eight years old, and Jazz was almost five.

Glamour: You explain in the show how you decided on the name Jazz, but tell our readers.

Jazz: My sister was Princess Jasmine in the play, Aladdin, so since she was my role model, I chose Jazz. We didn’t want to use my birth name when we did the 20/20 special with Barbara Walters, so we chose that name.

Glamour: Is Jazz the name you go by privately, or just publicly?

Jazz: Yes, both.

Jeanette: I just recently started calling her Jazz.

Glamour: Really?

Jeanette: Yeah, once we started filming the show because I didn’t want to [split the two]. She has always been Jaren to me, which is her birth name.

Glamour: How has it been with the cameras following you around for the series?

Jazz: It’s definitely overwhelming at first. You don’t have these people living in your house, but they’re there almost five days a week! I guess they are kind of living there, using your toilet paper and everything. [Laughs] I remember at the end of the season, they bought us tons of paper towels and toilet paper! It was a lifestyle change [at first], but they really do capture our normal lifestyle, so it’s great.

Glamour: Jazz, we see your friends appear on the show. Was that hard for them to get used to the cameras?

Jazz: Sometimes my friends don’t love it and sometimes they do, but they do it because they want to help me share my story. That’s very sweet.

Glamour: When you get older, what would you like to do for a living?

Jazz: When I was younger, I would say, everything,’ because I love doing so many things, and am so passionate. I love to explore and travel, I love movies, I love writing, I love math and science, so maybe I’ll be…

Jeanette: A nuclear physicist?

Jazz: No! Not a nuclear…

Jazz: But I love to write, I love poetry, I love so many things. But I’ll just see what happens. I definitely want to continue sharing my story and hopefully helping people to the best of my abilities. I always say I want to leave this world in a better state than the one I arrived in, and I want to live by those terms.

Glamour: The transgender community has unofficially appointed you as a spokesperson of sorts, which is wonderful because it is a gift to help others, but I would imagine it’s difficult too.

Jazz: You know, sometimes I do feel like there are expectations set for myself in my community, and I have to do the best I can. But then I come to this realization that I’m human and I’m not perfect, and I’m going to make mistakes, and people will have to realize that. And then I come to another realization which is that this isn’t just about me anyway. This is about the whole community, united together to achieve equality for all and make a difference. Even though I might be [publicly] out there more or well known, it doesn’t make me more important than someone who is doing something in their local community. It’s just that we’re all trying our hardest to create change to the best of our ability, therefore, we are all equal, and all working our hardest to create a more loving and accepting society.

Glamour: Before we leave, what message would you like to leave our readers with?

Jazz: I just hope the universal message is really expressed, which is about embracing who you are, respecting yourself, living your life authentically and being able to find happiness and love throughout your life. This isn’t just about transgender people. Maybe for now it is, but in the future, I want to make sure that all people can live by those terms and express their natural rights and live their lives as they are. So hopefully the show can start that off.

Jeanette: I can’t top that. I don’t want to let other moms down, so I feel a lot of pressure.

Jazz: But even if people have expectations set for you, or you feel that way, just push them all aside, because you have to be who you are and accept the fact that not everyone will agree with you, but it’s just the way you are, and you can’t change that.

Jeanette: Yes, ma’am!

Jazz: She’s the best mom in the whole wide world.

Jazz has her own mermaid tail company, Purple Rainbow Tails, which raises money for transgender children. TransKids Purple Rainbow Foundation is devoted to raising awareness about gender dysphoria, offering support to families of transgender children, as well as trans kids directly. The foundation works to education and enlighten the educational and legal systems, and society to make it more inclusive and supportive of all transgender individuals.I Am Jazz premieres with a one-hour episode tonight on TLC at 10 P.M./9 P.M. CT