Emma Symonds says her son Logan is completely different from his brother Alfie, and has been wearing girls' clothes for the past 16 months
Standing side by side, twins Logan and Alfie Symonds couldn’t look more different.
While four-year-old Alfie loves dinosaurs, fire engines and cars, Logan prefers sparkly dresses, wands and Frozen’s Princess Elsa.
But what makes their differences all the more striking is that these two are brothers. While Logan was born a boy, he is so sure he is a girl that mum Emma has taken the incredible step of letting him live as one.
For the past 16 months he has been wearing girl’s shoes and dresses. He even has his nails painted his favourite colour – pink.
It’s not a decision Emma, 33, took lightly.
She told the Sunday People: “At first I was a bit unsure. When he first started saying he was a girl I thought it was just a phase. But he’s never grown out of it.
“It’s still hard to get my head around the fact my son wants to be a girl. But it’s part of our everyday life now.
“There is no explanation for him. Logan is just Logan.”
In fact his love of girly things has taken over their home in Gloucester.
“When I found out I was having twin boys I thought my pink days were over, but it’s gone to the extreme where everything in the house is pink,” says single mum Emma, holding up a pair of pink pyjamas.
“I bet you can guess whose these are.”
As she talks, her four children – Daisy, 10, Charlie, five, plus Alfie and Logan – are eating dinner.
Aware he is being talked about, Logan runs over in his black patent ballet shoes and High School Musical dress, starts to dance and says: “I’m not a boy.”
Emma laughs: “You can’t call him a boy. A woman said to me the other day, ‘What lovely boys you have’ and Logan piped up saying, ‘I’m not a boy, I’m a girl’.”
From the moment they were born in April 2011 Emma says the non-identical twins were completely different.
“As babies they always had different temperaments. Alfie was more chilled and laid back while Logan was always highly strung. He was very, ‘I’m here, look at me.’”