The Composition and Demographics of the Growing Trans Population

It's all good and well sitting here talking about it but you need to be showing those Dr's and psychiatrists that they have got it all wrong.

do you realise...
dozens of clinicians have resigned from the Tavistock because of this?
A clinical director resigned when the Tavistock board of governors tried to bury a report that was created by a member of their clinical staff that effectively said "they were doing it all wrong?"
A Professor of Evidence Based Medicine at Oxford has said there isn't enough evidence to support the pathway?
One of their former clinical staff is taking them to court to try to get them to stop?
A network of detransitioners is trying to get publicity for their situation despite intense aggression directed at them from the trans community?
The BBC and Channel 4 have done documentaries to draw attention to this question?

What more are you expecting Mumsnet posters to do? I'm pretty sure those of us who are in a position to try and expose this medical scandal are already doing it!

Justadathought

My precise situation is sat at home on the sofa looking after a boyfriend suffering from man flu however, the thrill of 'the dress' so to speak is not something I'm familiar with. My sexuality is homosexual as I do believe in sex although I'd be lying if I said for me that was an attraction to genitals and chromosomes. I just like men who well for want of a better word look like men. That said, I've been known to prefer a cup of tea recently.

I would go further and say the platinum standard for satisfaction is the experience of trans people who have transitioned. I''m satisfied in that my life has been improved in that I no longer really feel as though I am watching my life as a spectator from the outside. I'm pretty confident that in feeling better post treatment that I am not in a minority and if I am i would be equally confident that the NHS would be onto a huge hundreds of people turning up at the GP's every year saying they've made a mistake. To have a study with statistical validity it would likely require a control group that would consist of a group of people diagnosed with GD but refused treatment and then see how they got on 10, 20 and 30 years down the line. I'm not sure the ethics of that are founded in do no harm.

So when people assert that “talk therapy” doesn’t work, what they mean is that the modalities of talk therapy present in the 1940s-1980 don’t work.

other modalities: DBT, for instance.

There is some truth in this.

We’re talking long term here aren’t we? Long term therapies are not currently fashionable with the NHS. They’re not highly regarded by commissioners, NICE, or the department of health. Not seen as cost effective in many cases. Very few areas offer DBT on the NHS.

I agree it deserves further thought..

Gold standard

No, stats, you can’t assert a 98-98% satisfaction rate precisely because, as the Cochrane Review (which, by the way, is hold standard for evidenced-based medicine) found NO studies with statistical validity and/ or without disqualifying design flaws demonstrating that.

Bickerinbrattle

I can understand that you are saying there has been no research into alternative treatments but, they seem to have arrived at a point where in the majority of cases what they do now, leads to a reasonable level of satisfaction. As far as I can see post surgery it is around 98-99%. Not bad considering. I'm not sure it's consistent for the GC to argue on the one hand that blockers should not be used due to lack of evidence whilst at the same time suggesting trying out an array of medications that haven't been tested in what seems like a wish for them to make an effort to cure us in a way that doesn't leave some feeling uncomfortable.

Improvements are very welcome and I suspect they will come but in the grand scheme of medicine I think gender treatments are way down the list of concerns for the movers and shakers. We probably won't see it during our lifetimes but there will come a day when trans people aren't a root of discomfort for so many, that I am absolutely sure of.

I see the case in the news and it leaves with a bit of disappointment really. Not only for the few children who could be consigned to years of distress that could be avoided but, for the children down the line whose parents etc... could then use a judgement of this nature to prevent them exercising bodily autonomy over things such as abortion and contraception because if you can't consent to blockers it could certainly be argued that you can't consent to other medical treatments.

I personally feel that a judge has no place in deciding the child's medical needs. Hopefully, the NHS will defend their position robustly but maybe you'll be right and they won't and then they'll be left what on earth they going to do with the group not unlike myself who they spend a fortune on in mental health care only for them to pay again when they transition down the line. It'll be interesting to see what happens, I suspect one of us is going to feel sad either way.

The idea that there is no alternative to transitioning for gender dysphoria is simply not true — we don’t actually know, because since at least the 1980s there hasn’t been any research into alternatives.

So when people assert that “talk therapy” doesn’t work, what they mean is that the modalities of talk therapy present in the 1940s-1980 don’t work.

Since that time, therapists have developed all sorts of other modalities: DBT, for instance.

There is also an entire array of medications that weren’t available in 1980 that have never been researched.

A Cochrane Review in the US evaluating the efficacy of medical and surgical transition to determine if federal monies should cover it found that there were NO studies without significant design flaws demonstrating that transition was effective. They ended up staying that it should be covered simply because there wasn’t anything else available because nothing else had recently been researched.

My question is: WHY is nothing else being researched? Medical researchers study all
kinds of things and often achieve significant breakthrough by going against commonly accepted pathways. Who would have ever suspected stomach ulcers could be treated with antibiotics? Until someone raised the “What if we’re doing it wrong” question.

THAT’s the question activists, including WPATH, will simply not permit being asked. Witness what happened to James Caspian. Witness Marcus Evans’ statement when he resigned as head of the Tavistock.

There’s also Michael Biggs’ report on the Tavi’s “experiment with puberty blockers”

users.ox.ac.uk/~sfos0060/Biggs_ExperimentPubertyBlockers.pdf

I can't believe that the NHS would knowingly treat a cohort of people, especially children in the knowledge that 80 percent of them will grow out of it

It does seem unbelievable, doesn't it? But that's what happens when in-depth analysis of a young person's distress is seen as 'conversion therapy' and the only therapy given has to affirm the child's transgender identity.

We should all be outraged by what is being done to children.

It's all good and well sitting here talking about it but you need to be showing those Dr's and psychiatrists that they have got it all wrong. They'll ask for the evidence I suppose and as far as I am aware de transitioners are your best hope and they appear to be a tiny cohort of an already very small population group.

That's what's happening now. Were you unaware?

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/jan/05/high-court-to-decide-if-children-can-consent-to-gender-reassignment

There's a link to more information about the legal case to protect children from experimental medical treatment on this page:
www.transgendertrend.com/

Dockie

I agree with much of what you say and absolutely support robust investigation of the issues. I spent a good proportion of my time on the 'couch' so to speak.

The ultimate aim should always be to make thier lives better. Personally I believe those involved in the treatment of GD be it in a MH capacity, a medical capacity or a surgical capacity really do believe that they are doing the right thing. I tend to agree with them.

I wouldn't describe my feelings as being happy however, I am content that the NHS is currently helping a very small minority of children to feel more comfortable in themselves. I can't believe that the NHS would knowingly treat a cohort of people, especially children in the knowledge that 80 percent of them will grow out of it anymore than I believe they would give a clot busting drug to everyone presenting with a headache.

It's all good and well sitting here talking about it but you need to be showing those Dr's and psychiatrists that they have got it all wrong. They'll ask for the evidence I suppose and as far as I am aware de transitioners are your best hope and they appear to be a tiny cohort of an already very small population group.

However, for a cohort of people that despite recent increases in number is still proportionally very small, medical transition will be the only viable way to make life more bareable.

This seems clearly to be true. But advocating for it to happen in childhood or adolescence rather than adulthood clearly risks sweeping into the net large number of equally gender dysphoric people who would ultimately have been better without surgery. And that seems more of a risk than ever right now because of some of the social contagion that is going on (even if it didn't for you) and because of the affirmation-only 'anything else is conversion therapy' approach that has spread to many adults who encounter gender dysphoric young people. Both of those things are new things that are changing the current landscape.

I can understand from your perspective that you are very focused on the smaller subset who will always ultimately be better transitioning. But what happens to the rest of the unhappy gender dysphoric young people matters too, and if intensive psychological help that looks at everything in their life and not just the GD can heal their distress, don't they have the right to have that?

Exploring co-morbidities doesn't mean ignoring the GD and hoping it goes away. Sometimes exploring the co-morbidities will be how you discover the cause of the GD, and thus enable it to go away. Which is not conversion therapy or hating on trans people - it's making life better for the person suffering from the dysphoria. Surely that's the ultimate aim?

Personally, I believe they are doing the right thing by a proportionately very small number of children who would otherwise suffer needlessly.

So you're perfectly happy with children diagnosed with gender dysphoria being given treatment when 4 out of 5 would outgrow it after puberty? And it's worth making those 4 medical patients for life for the sake of the one out of the 5 who doesn't outgrow it? With all the impacts on their sexual function and reproductive capability as adults? When it isn't even clear whether the early treatment is the best solution even for the one out of 5 who persists after puberty?

I can see no reason as to why GD should be at the back of the queue and a diagnosis of last resort if it is clear to those involved with the child that this is a problem.

You have admitted yourself that we can't know which children will persist and which will desist until after they have gone through puberty. Until that time, the only treatments should be mental health support to help to ease their distress with their bodies.

Thepurported

You're right, I shouldn't take it personally, it would be ridiculous to think that KW was in anyway representative of trans people in general with regards to criminality.

Personally, I would have reported her as a trans woman which is what she seemed to be. I don't subscribe the TWAW position personally but I'm far from GC.

Old crone

I don't think something being new is reason to dismiss it. If we had to wait for years worth of outcome statistics for new treatments before going ahead with it we would be stuck in a vicious circle of nothing progressing and we'd all still be being dragged off to the local asylum for some electric shock treatments or worse. Personally, I believe they are doing the right thing by a proportionately very small number of children who would otherwise suffer needlessly. Others are of a different opinion, that's fine. That doesn't mean that I don't support robust investigation but I can see no reason as to why GD should be at the back of the queue and a diagnosis of last resort if it is clear to those involved with the child that this is a problem.

*Epidemiology (because I can’t spell)

If anyone is interested in research in this area, the absolute best person you can follow on Twitter is Hasci Horvath (@givethemseeds). He’s just left (I believe, or is going to soon) his position as adjunct lecturer in the department of Epidmology and Biostatistics at the University of California. He was a TW for 13 years before detransitioning and he has an absolute wealth of information on the topic. He also disseminates research papers and is pretty much a walking library on the subject.

I don't know if anybody is looking into it but they have tried many 'cures' down the years but, up until now none appear to work as well as the current pathway.

This method of treating children who are unhappy about their sex is very new. I think it is too early to say that it works well.

Yes, still it can be very difficult to find a therapist, plus the cost of private therapy is not within the means of many families.

So you have all these children who are not getting any sort of holistic treatment or advice bar what organisations like Mermaids give

And anecdotally (therapist in the family) therapists that would explore background issues (ie do proper therapy) are starting to get nervous around taking on young trans clients. They don't want to be struck off now for not affirming or sued in 10 years for the opposite.

You're right I'm biased, it's not overly pleasant being generalized by the commonality of a medical condition with a sex offender.

Why take it personally though? Transwomen can be sex offenders, it's a fact. What was wrong with the reporting about the Karen White case specifically? Would it have been better to simply refer to KW as 'woman'?