Raising a child with gender dysphoria

The analogy to anorexia is fascinating. I've never thought of it like that before, but totally agree.

One other thing I wanted to add is that this sort of thing can become an obsession. Sometimes seeking "help" actually reinforces the obsession and keeps you thinking about it when ordinarily one might have forgotten about it and moved on to other things

There is an interesting Oliver Burkeman article in the Guardian today which makes exactly this point, though using the example of noise complaints - same underlying psychological phenomenon though.

If DS and DD grow up and find they are not comfortable with their gender or sexuality I hope to Christ that I can find a way to get them to adulthood without the current trans narrative influencing them to take irreversible action, when with time they might just find themselves gay but fertile and unmutilated.

I'm on a lot of these thread too, GreenMouse, some I post on, some I just lurk. I often find this whole subject upsetting, with the way women's rights are being overturned all over the place, and one of the things I specifically find upsetting is unjust accusations, so.

No sorry annie i don't have links. I dont tend to linger on threads like that because they upset me.

Oh, Ophelia I have just read your post.

GreenMouse well, where, what and by who? Can you provide links?

It's entirely possible you can provide those links, but at the moment I am seeing too many peculiar misreadings of what other women have said to just accept vague accusations as gospel.

I can remember when I was about 4 the boy next door showing me what looked like a small purple sea anemone and saying 'Don't you wish you had one of those?'. And thinking 'Eurgggh NO!'...

When I was 4 I kept demanding my mum to "cut my hair like a boy".
"I want to be my brother"
"Cut my hair into a boy's haircut"
"I want you to call me Sam not Samantha" *namechage obvs

On and on I went at her. She kept saying no no you have lovely hair.

Eventually you know she bloody did it. Cut me a short back n sides and I bloody loved it. Was well proud.

On the playground I'd pretend to be a boy and play with the boys.

After growing into a (beautiful lol) female adolescent I grew to love my female form. And by age 17 I was selling it for sex. In hindsight I'm sure my gender play was a response to being sexually molested and abused.

In this day and age I would have transitioned too, but I know I'd be more fucked that way than I am now.

I've had so many cocks shoved up me I am fully aware of the difference between man and woman and people who just look like one.

This trans trend is wiping out everything that being a woman involuntarily means. Stop encouraging children to buy into this shit.

(Obviously disclaimer to genuinely have a child with the feelings I had in today's climate must be hard)

ArcheryAnnie it hasn't been said on this thread, but I have seen these sentiments expressed on Mumsnet more than once, maybe not in these exact words but to the same effect.

Datun I see the hate directed at her, and think, damn, she was one of the women that saved me.

A teenager with anorexia would not be prescribed appetite blocking drugs and offered stomach stapling. They just wouldn't

I really cannot see a significant difference between a body dysmorphic disorder that tells you you are too fat even whilst you know you are starving to death and a body dysmorphic disorder which tells you that you are a woman with a penis.

Both conditions are horrendous and sometimes fatal. But why do we collude with one and not the other?

OP, I've read your heart string tugging explanation on another thread haven't I?

I am sorry for your difficulties but I will never say that lying to your child that they can change sex, or that medicating and sterilising them is ok. Perhaps if you didn't think of lego and Star Wars as "boys things" your child might not feel like they have to be the other sex to enjoy the toys and interest they do.

ArcheryAnnie

Ahh, Germaine.

I can't tell you how upset and annoyed I get when I read comments on various websites who say who the fuck is Germaine Greer, I've never heard of her?

Telling them to get over it and move on would irreparably damage our relationship and their mental health.

GreenMouse I don't see where anyone here has said this. I certainly would not say this.

I put off puberty for several years by having a mild eating disorder when I was a teenager. As a much, much younger child I had a male alter-ego, took a male name and wore my brother's cast-offs.

Girls not wanting to be girls, and not wanting to grow into women (and who can blame them, when the world treats women and girls so badly) is a fairly common girlhood experience, at least it was amongst many women I know. Those girls need love and support, not to be told that they were broken and need fixing. (FWIW I eventually stopped dieting after reading Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch at 16, and realising the world needed fixing, not me.)

Very wise, Choc.

When we went to see CAMHS with DD, I made the point that if my DD was suffering from anorexia nervosa, they would try to encourage her to accept her body, as it was, but with gender dysphoria, it seems they try to change the body to try to make it more acceptable to the "patient".

regarding body acceptance as an ideology - I think that by getting to the place in your head where you accept yourself as you are, you can move on to make conscious decisions to change things that you don't like about yourself, rather than doing it in desperation, with realistic expectations around that.

I'm short and fat. I finally accepted that when I was about 26. There's not much to be done about the short thing, and the fat thing, no, I'm not happy I'm fat, but I also don't beat myself up about it like I used to. I'm able to make reasoned decisions around dieting and not feel despair when I fail, because dieting is hard.

I think if we can help kids and adults get to the point where they are able to take a breath and really make informed decisions about surgery and medication then that can only be good.

An excellent post Kro- and one I can really identify with. Being (undiagnosed) ASD I always felt I was performing being a girl- not always liking the correct things, saying the right things, much happier playing with boys. I loved Star Wars and got mocked by the other girls at school- and the boys.
Getting my periods and starting puberty was the worst time of my life- I just wanted it all to stop. I hated the male attention, the messiness of it all, the way my body was escaping from me. My family have always put huge pressure on me to a 'proper woman'- not to be so unemotional, so independent, so solitary.
I guess what I am trying to say the idea that there are 'trans' children and that every one else is 'cis' (hate that word- okay with their body, perfectly in tune, no issues with being female is utter bollocks and simplification.

Thank you so much for that post, Kropot. I really appreciate your honesty and openness about your experience.

Great posts, kro

My DD loves lego.
my other dd loves starwars football and the colour blue......
what in the world is non-binary??? How do CHILDREN even know these terms exist?? Sorry but boys are boys and girls are girls....gay straight whatever you fancy but god gave you what you have for a reason - don't mess with it!

Kro thanks for your post. What you say about loneliness at school is very perceptive. It must have been tough

I can only wholeheartedly agree with you Kro

It must be horrific going through all of that. All parents want is for their child to be happy and healthy.

However, mental health care is the option that should be taken until the child is old enough to commit to life changing surgeries and a lifetime of medical intervention. Along with them having the maturity to understand that the decision effects them in a huge way, its not just about looking pretty. Its about never having your own children. Its about being a 'copy' of the sex they wish to be, not the same as. Its about endless hours spent at doctors.

Organisations such as mermaids actively encourage children/their parents to go down this route, and that is fucking wrong. It may well be the answer for a small minority of GNC children, but definitely not all and sadly it appears with the 'support' of Mermaids the 'transition or die' view of tumblr and reddit is drummed into families by people claiming to be experts.

"One other thing I wanted to add is that this sort of thing can become an obsession. Sometimes seeking "help" actually reinforces the obsession and keeps you thinking about it when ordinarily one might have forgotten about it and moved on to other things".

Yes - utterly agree with you here.

I also accept that 'body acceptance' is an ideological position. I've read a little about this in the context of weight related issues and I have to admit that I find it quite confusing. But in respect to trans issues, I do think that a starting point is in help towards accepting what you have, rather than having it surgically altered. If this isn't possible then there may be other options, including surgery. But least invasive first...