“Deciding to tell the world - including my parents and closest family and friends - that I was transgender by making a video and posting it on Facebook, was a spur of the moment thing.
Sat in my bedroom, I was 15 and knew that I was finally ready to tell everyone that I was a boy trapped in a girl’s body.
With my heart racing and beside myself with nerves, I clicked ‘Post’ after recording my confession and waited for a response.
I had spent my life knowing that I wasn’t the same as other girls. I pushed it to the back of my mind when I was younger, assuming everyone must feel that way.
From an early age I refused to wear girly clothes. Only two photos of me wearing a dress exist, and my mum says I cried the majority of that day because I was so unhappy.
My parents were fine with it and never pushed me to be more feminine. I loved nothing better than going fishing with my dad, knife-carving and sharing our mutual love of aircraft and the military.
As I grew older, I shopped in the boys’ section when I needed new clothes and came up with idea of cutting my long hair off for charity as an excuse to get my hair cropped.
A lot of the time I was mistaken for a boy anyway, especially if we had a supply teacher at school.
It was only when I was about 13 and started using social media that I discovered that there was such a thing as being transgender.
It was a massive moment. For the first time in my life I was able to think, this is me.
It still took two years to come to terms with it and get to the point on May 4, 2015 where I filmed my video confession in my bedroom.
Only a handful of my closest friends knew my secret, I had never mentioned anything to my family.
Pressing the record button, I took a deep breath and began, ‘So there’s something I have been meaning to say for quite a while...’
Pausing frequently as I searched for the right words, I continued, ‘I feel like my entire life I’ve been living a lie’.
For me, filming a video was easier than telling people face-to-face. And it was the perfect way to let everyone know everything at once.
I was confident that my parents and good friends would be ok with it, but I did worry about what other kids at school would say. It was terrifying but at the same time it was a massive relief.
Soon after my video went live, positive comments started appearing on my Facebook page.
A couple of hours later, my mum - who was at work - phoned me to say she had seen it.
Her first words were that it wasn’t a surprise and that we should go to the doctors to talk it through.
She has always been really supportive of me and was really brilliant about it. My dad accepted it too but it took him a while to get his head around what it meant.
The person I was most worried about finding out was my gran. She is very religious and I had no idea how she would react.
She accepted it though, and laughed saying she had thought I was going to tell her I was pregnant.
The day after I posted my video, I went through a list of male names and decided that I wanted to be called Miles - after a character from one of my favourite books - from then on.
We went to see our GP who explained that if we talked to my school, they would be able to change my name on the register and make sure I could do boys’ P.E.
My headteacher at a secondary school in Cornwall dealt with it really well. All the teachers were told that I was now to be known as Miles and that I was to go by male pronouns.
I’ve since been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, a condition where someone feels they have been physically assigned the wrong gender at birth.
I’ve been referred to the Tavistock Clinic in London, the country’s only clinic for children experiencing gender identity issues.
I am hoping to be taking testosterone by the time I’m 18 and I eventually want to have surgery to transition fully.
This will include a maesectomy, hysterectomy and phalloplasty (plastic surgery performed to construct a penis).
In the meantime, I will continue to strap my chest down every day. I hope to be able to start taking the pill soon so that I won’t get periods anymore.
My dream is to become an RAF pilot one day. I have been advised to delay my application until I have transitioned because it would be difficult to do the training and have so much surgery at the same time.
For now, I am making it my mission to help other young people in a similar situation. I am lucky, I haven’t experienced much negativity but I know that very often when people are unkind, it’s down to a lack of understanding more than anything else.
I am working with Fixers, the charity that gives young people a voice, to raise awareness of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues. My campaign was even featured on the local TV news.
Being Miles, I feel like I can be myself. I don't need to hide anymore like I was. By speaking out, I hope that I may inspire other young people to find the courage to do the same."
For more information or to make a donation to fund more Fixer projects, visit www.fixers.org.uk