I’ve never felt like I was or should have been a different gender. Though I’ve blurred the lines of my sexuality — even after marrying my husband, I still continue to identify as a bisexual woman — I’ve never thought twice about my gender. It wasn’t until my stepmother, Carly, transitioned that my conception of “gender” began to shift.

My family and I are part of a television docuseries called Becoming Us. It ran ten episodes on ABC Family, and it features my 17-year-old brother, Ben, my mother, myself, and my stepfather. It’s a story of love, communication, friendship, understanding, and most importantly how my family “dealt” with my stepmother’s transition. Everything is completely unscripted — you get a birds-eye view of real families (ours and another) learning about their new relationships with each other.

Now, as I reflect on my childhood and think more about all that I’ve learned through my stepmother’s transition, I realize that my initial thoughts about living my life as another gender may not be entirely true.

I grew up in an extremely open-minded, liberal household. My fabulous mother raised my brother and I with a very “hands-on” parenting technique: She always made sure that our thoughts and feelings were being paid an incredible amount of attention. Because of this, I went to a shockingly unconventional school called The Children’s School; it was like Montessori on speed. It nurtured my instincts as an independent human no matter what age I was—I planned my day and I was the master of my own timeline.

We didn’t have tests or homework, and we took field trips every Friday. All of the students, some 20 of us at most, studied together, regardless of age. We requested assignments from our teachers and learned at our own pace. I didn’t learn to read *gasp* until I was 10 years old! Instead of reading the “classics” and doing times tables, I was acting as the March Hare in the school’s rendition of Alice in Wonderland and playing make-believe during recess.

As strange as it may sound, this type of environment allowed me the opportunity to fully exercise my creativity, and live my kid life with little to no judgment.

The more I think back to my childhood days of playing make-believe, I remember that I was almost always in my mind… a male. If we played “everyone is a horse running through the forest,” I was always a boy horse. If we were monkeys, I was a male monkey. I chose to play the March Hare over Alice in the school’s production of Alice in Wonderland. All of which now makes me think, what would my life look like had I been born a boy?

To be honest, I think it would be pretty similar. As a boy attending The Children’s School, I would have been given the exact same opportunities to be creative. Perhaps life would’ve been even a little more difficult for me as a boy? I’m an extremely sensitive human being, and could imagine being bullied more as a young boy. I might’ve been teased when I eventually went to public school in eighth grade, but being the free spirit that I am, I would’ve done my best to ignore it and be as authentically myself as possible, male or female.

The biggest question for me is this: Would the relationship between myself and my trans stepmother have been different? Would it have been easier or more difficult for Carly to raise a little boy than it would have been for her to raise, Sutton, the girl? We definitely had a slightly strained relationship when I was younger. During my childhood, Carly was an extremely unhappy person. She drank a lot, smoked two packs a day, was combative and frustrated. Believe me, I am sure I was no angel, but we never had a great parent-child relationship.

It’s HARD to say if IT would’ve been better or worse; our relationship since her transition has never been stronger. Would it have been easier or harder for a trans-woman to raise a little boy? Rather than the crazy, sensitive, brave little girl I was? I don’t know.

All in all, I think my life would have looked fairly similar. I would be an actor living in New York City, with a very similar life path. The only difference may have been the relationships I’ve developed with the people around me.

I hope that we, as human beings, will soon learn to understand each individual not based on what gender was assigned to them but who they are.