and i think that was one of them. reporter: eight years ago michelle and travis welcomed a son into the world, but very early their child was insisting she was a girl. she chose her name when she was very young. it just felt right to her. how old was she when she did that? about two and a half three. young. very young. reporter: melissa drew pictures of herself as a princess with long hair then one halloween a family friend gave her a long dark wig. she was six. she put it on and she started to kind of pose and realizing, hmm, this matches. when you looked in the mirror, what did you see? i saw the person who i really was. reporter: so last summer her parents sent an e-mail to family and friends asking them to accept her as melissa. and they did. michelle and travis say melissa melissa s personalnalty changed. it was almost like a night and day.
reporter: melissa s family say they ve eleven add lot and they hope their story promotes acceptance for transgender kids. congressman honda, grandpa, told me he believes the country is at a tipping point on this issue, jose. and, kate, have you been surprised by the overwhelming response to your stories? yeah it s been incredible. on social media we ve had millions of people sharing both melissa s story now and the first story we told about, young jacob. it s been pretty incredible. most of it i would say positive. a lot of people saying thank you for sharing something i didn t know much about and a little bit of negative. a little bit of people saying i don t understand this and i don t understand how they transition so young. and then, you know these decisions that parents have to take, right, as you were talking just today. at some time you have to make a decision for your child that s as you saw today, they re waiting. they have a lot of help though.
harder now to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. a final decision on his plea to be released full time may not come for months. jose? now to a storyline getting a lot of reaction at multiple sclerosis nbc. the parents of transgender children going public with their very personal stories. kate snow brought us the story of five-year-old jacob yesterday. a child born female but says he always knew he was a boy. kate joins us now with the second part of her fascinating series. kate good morning. good morning, jose. there aren t reliable numbers on how many children are transgender but specialists say they re seeing more and more kids transition to the other gender at a young age. that usually means a new name new pro nouns, maybe a new school, changing clothing and it all has a big impact not just on the child but the whole family. reporter: mike honda is an involved grant pa. he was there when his granddaughter melissa was born. he goes to a lot of his grand
kid s events including melissa s meets. she s a gymnast. they love him unconditionalbly. they know he s a funny, crazy goofy grandpa. reporter: back in february honda tweeted about eight-year-old melissa. as a proud grandpa of a transgender grandchild i hope she can feel safe at school without fear of being bullied. reporter: melissa was born in a boy s body. i think a lot of grandparents who are social media savvy talk about their grandchildren all the time. they post pictures about their grandchildren, their families. he did nothing different. reporter: except this was different because mike honda isn t just a grandfather he works with the president and he s a congressman. you have a very public job, member of congress you can choose to keep things private. why did you decide? i think there s a time when you have to determine when there s a good teaching moment