Study find trans kids thrive after early transition

Hormones might be the word?

I don’t think drugging teenagers in a way that causes damage and stops development is anywhere close to ethical. We need puberty, physically and emotionally, to grow , to literally mature. There is no reason at all for blockers at 16 for girls anyway, as almost all will have completed physical puberty by then. So will many boys. No one knows the impact on emotional development as the effect of puberty on the brain is fairly recent science. 16 in terms of the body is a horse, stable door situation. To halt physical changes in girls you would need to get in much earlier, and in boys a year or two after girls. This is what the trans lobby are pushing for, and they clearly see the 80% of children who would be permanently damaged by this as no problem at all. What does that tell you ? I want children to get to adulthood intact, unmediated, fertile, sexually functional and reconciled to their physicality.

Natluc...homeones for a 17 year old girl will be about 5 years too late to stop physical changes.

If 18 is the age where one becomes an adult and can begin cross sex hormones anyway is already the way things are, I do not think pushing a pause button at 16 is that unreasonable?

It is unreasonable. To take a very provocative analogy would it be Ok for a thirty year old to have sex with a 14 year old because it’s legal in two years time?

Blocking puberty at any point has massive effects. The only time it’s acceptable is severely precocious puberty (ie puberty starting years before it’s normal.) even then , children who have had these drugs experience problems.

They are not a harmless pause button. I really can’t stress that enough.

It also takes a lot to be diagnosed with gender dysphoria

So you say. But kids are buying hormones online. And detransitioners report not having had sufficient counselling.

Halting puberty for a year and then choosing to begin cross sex hormones at 17 wont prevent that person's brain from fully developing.

What are you basing that on? Where are the studies please?

And can you please stop calling Lupron a pause button. That's marketing speak, designed to make you think it doesn't have any effects, it's just pausing things, what could be the harm? ]

Really dangerous, manipulative language.

@gendercritter - It also takes a lot to be diagnosed with gender dysphoria.

Perhaps my analogy was not a perfect one, but I think it is applicable seeing as medical consent is already set at 16..

It is fucking outrageous that adults with metal health problems are allowed to promote sterilising childrenas if it is a thing.

This!

In any other avenue adults who promote anything remotely harmful to children have the door rightly slammed shut in their face.
BUT the tra's have done such a good job at making those in power to scared to say no this kind of child abuse is allowed under the umbrella of exceptance and inclusivity.

I genuinly fear for our children. They are experiments. They are being used to promote adults ways of life.

If any one of them really cared about children they would not promote this madness.

@SirVixofVixHall - I am presuming your comment was wrt to my comment?

I am not saying that the brain is fully developed at 16. But the age at which a personal sense of self if achieved happens much sooner than 25.

Halting puberty for a year and then choosing to begin cross sex hormones at 17 wont prevent that person's brain from fully developing. It will however prevent unwanted physical changes but allow the person to still mature into a mentally healthy individual.

If 18 is the age where one becomes an adult and can begin cross sex hormones anyway is already the way things are, I do not think pushing a pause button at 16 is that unreasonable? I am not advocating for children at 10-12 to be put on Lupron.

Sperm and Ova are viable and storable

Again, ova for 10 years only. If you bank them at 16, that means you have until 26 to use them. Many people don't want children at 26 or aren't able to afford them yet.

And again....surrogacy isn't necessarily ethical. I can't have children and however excuciatingly painful that is, I really don't believe I could actually go through with using a surrogate in reality. It's all very easy to talk about things hypothetically. It's much more complex in real life.

In the UK you can pass your driving test at 17. So why not give the option to drive your own body?

Driving a car isn't comparable. Yes at worst there is risk of death but most drivers are safe. It takes quite a lot to get a license in the first place, you take out insurance. We have police who are ideally ensuring bad drivers get taken off the road.

Driving isn't making serious, damaging changes to your body which aren't reversible and which will leave you sterile.

And young male drivers probably statistically do the most damage. There are restrictions on how many of them can drive simply because insuring them is extortionate and thus out of reach to many.

Oh and re the post talking about forcing trans people to have painful surgeries , well on a statistical level far fewer people will face painful surgeries if we leave children alone to grow up.
Brain not fully developed until 25, suggesting 16 is an adult is insane.

Yes surrogacy too. I know of a male couple who chose a country for their surrogate on the basis that it was “the cheapest” . . Men who feel women’s bodies are theirs to purchase, rent, appropriate, carve up and use are sadly all too common. We are walking useful parts, not fully human.

@Bowlofbabelfish. Yes, precisely that.

Grim.

I believe someone asked OP on another thread where the wombs for womb transplants would come from, and OP declined to answer.

But yes, just like the question of where the surrogates will come from, it's all more than a bit creepy.

Basically if your idea of social justice is advocating for the sterilisation of children, you have some seriously screwed up ideas.

Not just womb transplants but to blithely say 'oh they can use surrogates' as if there are zero ethical issues with renting women's bodies out to gestate babies

This is only just beginning to be discussed in relation to rich gay couples from Western countries who use surrogates, especially surrogates from Third World countries. It's a tentative discussion so far and almost exclusively limited to feminist discourse but I believe it will become more widely discussed in the next few years.

That's because there are multiple ethical issues surrounding this and flippantly saying the resulting infertility in trans kids doesn't matter coz they can use surrogacy means to ignore those issues. You don't make up for medically inducing infertility in otherwise healthy children by saying they can always go down the rent-a-womb route.

Surrogacy is an emotionally, mentally and physiologically challenging measure of last resort, not a simple remedy.

Many on these forums are divided on this topic. Some come from a position of 'children should be allowed blockers' and some from 'we should watch and wait until they are mentally mature enough to decide themselves'. Some sit on the fence and are more 'case by case basis is important'.

Obviously there are risks, pros and cons of all three approaches.

Risks involved in delaying puberty:

a. The adolescent is at risk (though not certain) of infertility or sexual dysfunction should they change their mind and turn out to not be trans.

b. If LONG TERM delaying of puberty then there is a risk of Osteoporosis but this is generally only in the longest of duration to my understanding?

c. If they turn out to not be trans then they will be years behind their peers in puberty and there is the risk they won't reach what would have been their natural pubertal potential.

However; 'watchful waiting' also carries with it some pretty devastating long term effects.

MtF:

Increased bone length and density, widened shoulders, facial bone development, male pattern hair loss, hormonally induced facial/body hair, a permanently deepened voice. To name but a few.

FtM:

Breast development, the distress of periods, pelvic development, stunted height and bone length (apologies I am less knowledgeable on the FtM side of things).

So.. many on these forums advocate for the watchful waiting strategy.

I understand that you believe 'trans people can come to terms with the body they were born with'. However if you have never experienced dysphoria I feel that you do not understand how naive this approach is. You are then condemning that individual to a lifetime of misery.

Forcing a a transman to go through having a mastectomy or a transwoman to have a breast augmentation (not paid for by the NHS in most cases for the latter) because the breasts they managed to develop on hormones never developed past tanner stage 3 (but on a male developed chest/rib cage.. ).

Forcing a transwoman to have to endure hundreds of hours of pain for facial and body hair removal, which costs a small fortune, only a small amount of which is covered by the NHS under the current schemes (it is my believe that PCOS sufferers should be able to access these funds too) and then days of embarrassment and pain totally hundreds more hours walking around unable to cover up the swelling and spend weeks feeling bruised and tender from electrolysis.

Not to mention the fact that vocal therapy is incredibly difficult. Vocal Surgery is highly variable in success rates. And also not covered on the NHS. Therapy is a nightmare to be referred for with incredibly long lead times.

Would 'watchful waiting' advocates therefore be happy for all surgeries and treatments and therapies to be completely covered on the NHS because trans people were forced to wait until they were already well underway through their sex designated puberty?

Because the way I see it, is that if trans young people are forced to be powerless with regards to their own body decisions then 'the system' should pay for forcing these young people to undergo otherwise avoidable changes. Not just some of the treatments, but all of them. And see them through to completion (for example, 30 hours of electorlysis paid for on the NHS and also £2500 worth of laser our of my own pocket for facial hair removal is not enough. I will likely need another 40+ hours to totally clear the hair I have due to puberty at £60 an hour).

Personally, I would have been happy to undergo the early stages of puberty until in a position I could have stored viable sperm or ova (if I so chose to) and then be given the option to halt puberty with blockers. The side effects so often touted are generally from long term use, again to my understanding. Then once I was sure of who I am, I should be allowed at the option to begin cross sex hormones to give myself the best possible chance of achieving a body that will allow me to be rid of dysphoria.

www.nhs.uk/conditions/consent-to-treatment/children/

Surely at 16, the age of medical consent should come in to effect? Sperm and Ova are viable and storable.. At this point I can press the pause button. In the UK you can pass your driving test at 17. So why not give the option to drive your own body?

My belief is that sometimes in doing nothing, harm is done. I wish I had known that blockers were an option growing up.

I know some will take great offence to my opinion but I am open to discuss my stance respectfully.

Somebody's making a great profit out of other people's misery. Drugs, surgery, facial feminization, hair transplants, surrogates. It's obviously a very expensive undertaking, to be your 'true authentic self.

Do males talking about this have any idea how deeply sinister they sound ?

I know. I read stuff like this and all I can think is ...Ed Gein

Not just womb transplants but to blithely say 'oh they can use surrogates' as if there are zero ethical issues with renting women's bodies out to gestate babies

I think that men genuinely think that a womb is like a backpack and not in any way connected to the whole of a woman.

Please could you link to the study on the impact on the peer group of transitioning children?

Here is an article I came across earlier discussing the side-effects that some women have had from taking puberty blockers.
I have no idea how to paste links on here so apologies in advance if it doesn’t work
www.statnews.com/2017/02/02/lupron-puberty-children-health-problems/

Oh God womb transplants. Do males talking about this have any idea how deeply sinister they sound ? It is really sickening. Appropriating our bodies to this degree. not envy, obv. Although maybe that is a dual purpose emoticon..

There are however 20,000 or so Women in the US severely damaged by Lupron given for premature puberty, there are various support groups for them.

GenderApostate

I read this article at the weekend & it references the women's groups. I wasn't aware of this issue with Lupron.

I know nothing about its validity, the publisher or author but it seems quite detailed and the embedded links and references may also be of interest:

www.statnews.com/2017/02/02/lupron-puberty-children-health-problems/