Why aren’t parents worried about the effects of hormones on their children.

The blindness to side effects and lack of risk/benefit alanysis is impossible to understand. Contrast to that with the response to possible emerging side effects of Covid vaccines. I'm not saying that is wrong just why are the two responses so different.

Parents of teenagers know what a challenge it is to maintain a good relationship while allowing them to seek independence. The fact that adults in schools / random adults on the internet can interfere in family life, enabling children to transition while positioning parents as bigots is unethical and dangerous.
Those of us with children not going through this can support by challenging schools who have unthinkingly bought into the lobby groups with their anti safeguarding policies.

On detransitioners awareness day (last week?) I read a few accounts from people who had detransitioned. They were all supporting that for many people transition is a positive pathway, however in their case the medical opinion was the only path offered. I think typically you wait for a referral (often a long wait with no support or treatment/investigation of any other issues that maybe going on so the family is left in crisis) and then you will have a few consultantions. If you choose not no go on PB I don't think there is another treatment plan?

That must be awful for parents. It seems like an utter failing in our NHS. I had an eating disorder as a teen but the help available was woefully inadequate. Unless you were very underweight and needed in patient care there was pretty much nothing. It almost encouraged you to get more ill to fit into the right box to get help.

I don't know much about other mental health conditions but I think many teens with depression are just offered medication (which is life saving for many but much more effective when offered with therapy). I think the wider issue is the lack of investment in supporting good mental health for children and young people and accessing help quickly when it's needed.

As a PP said, hormones are in no way a validates therapy for suicidal thoughts!

We really need a sceptical narrative in the public domain to enable parents to question and resist ridiculous medicalisation. Schools also have a job of work to do as well!

This whole misrepresentation of suicide rates is so concerning. This script that says hormones save lives is based on nothing.

I truly don't believe people have an understanding of the impacts of not going through puberty and then having a lifetime of hormone treatment. How could they when there is so little research?

Hormones aren't well understood within the general population. I guess they might have something like the contraceptive pill in mind and see it as an equivalent.

I also think some people think it “pauses” puberty and will be reversible by just stopping taking the tablets

I know parents who are very opposed, like me.

Generally we have subsequently had breakdowns of the family - the child telling us that their online ‘friends’ know more than us.

I stand my ground, the drugs are bad for you, especially when bought on the internet without medical support. I can not change my son, I can change my response to him. I don’t believe he can become a woman. I will not go along with that lie.

I am still a mother of 3 children, one however only contacts me when they want money, like a drug addict or alcoholic.

Fear that their child will kill themselves otherwise. Lack of awareness that there are other approaches (talk therapy if you have the money and can find a private therapist who will take a neutral approach). Getting sucked into the world of Mermaids which sells “easy” solutions. Trusting the NHS when they diagnose GD and say this is what is needed.

There are the transhausen parents as well. I hope their numbers appear larger than they actually are, that it is just down to their vocalness.

It’s incredibly difficult to fight when your child is surrounded by a world of affirmation, where everyone celebrates it and you are the only voice of caution, where their school, their peer group, peer group’s parents, social media etc all push affirmation, and you are the bad guy and described as “emotionally abusive”. Very difficult.

My daughter’s school reported us to social services for not affirming her. That’s pretty difficult for any family to go through (and yes, a school who chooses to actively undermine the advice of professionals who have assessed my daughter, referred us to social services for following said advice) and parents know the threat is there just bubbling under the surface.

I think the biggest problem is that medicalisation is sold as “life saving” and so I think it then becomes “life saving” for many purely because they truly believe it is the only option. If other paths and ways to manage GD were promoted, I think the numbers demanding medicalisation would quickly drop.

Following up on what @thinkingaboutLangCleg said, if you dare to point out that this is social contagion
... Could you do just that? Reply to their b**y Facebook post, pointing out that it is just social contagion & that all hormone treatments should wait until after puberty because most cases of ROGD resolve themselves by then?
And include some useful links?

I know that I don't know the full circumstances etc etc, but I hate to think of us mumsnetters walking past on the other side (as it were) whilst this abuse of children goes on.

Good luck

I’m generally amazed by how willing parents are to accept medical advice with zero questioning.

To be fair it would seem a reasonable thing to do- until you realise many medical personnel are incredibly clever but don’t think outside the box.

I understand that the suicide thing is scary, but it never made sense to me as an - ironically - binary choice. Hormones vs suicide. To me, I just thought, well, let's get some help (psychotherapy) for the suicidality.

Maybe parents need better info on how to treat co-morbid health conditions, like depression and anxiety.

@thinkingaboutLangCleg Oh yes. Would never voice that to my colleagues. Apart from one pupil however, whenever we write reports for the others we use their biological sex pronouns and names as their parents do not know.

As a parent of a trans identifying child I have made it absolutely clear that we won’t support medical transition while they are under 18....child had bought pills online and that’s how we found out.

The problem is, older TRA’s (most of whom do not transition, interestingly) bang on about “literally killing us” and “trans kids being driven to suicide”.

I do wonder if parents are terrified of losing their DC to suicide if they don’t go along with this nonsense.

Also, I wonder how many parents think their DC might be gay and would rather believe they are trans? I read somewhere a parent -on learning their DC was trans - saying, “Oh thank God! I thought they were just gay.”

Been a teacher for 20 years. Up until 3 years ago had never taught a transiting pupil, that year taught 1. 2 years ago we had 5 pupils across the school who were transitioning. This year there are 20.

But if you dare to point out this is social contagion, a teenage fad, you get abused.

Most parents probably are worried but it's not really acceptable to publicly voice those worries. Parents are constantly told they have to just support, accept and celebrate, otherwise they're transphobic, a bad parent and their child will commit suicide. Any concern is shut down with, "well it's better than a dead child".

Then there are the parents who are themselves fully immersed in trans ideology and genuinely don't question it.

I don't know which I pity more.

The effects of the drugs are awful but I think this is why the suicide stats are continuously presented as (impossibly) high, to outweigh the risks.

Parents are led to believe that their child will literally die if they don't get the drugs and they are encouraged to become full believers for fear that they will alienate their child if they do not.

Whereas, if they were continuously told that the vast, vast majority of kids with gender identity issues would just grow out of it by simply going through the painful (but natural) process of puberty, they might be more prepared to not medicate the process.

I think many parents are torn, but don't feel they can be open about their concerns. I don't know why that is. Well, I know there

When we went through ROGD in our family, impact of treatment was in the forefront of my mind. I made it clear to treating psychs that cross-sex hormones were a decision to be taken by adults, not teens. And my kids knew that was the deal. No hormones or surgery before they reached adulthood.

I don't know why more parents don't speak up in the same way.

I think some are worried the child will harm themselves if not given the hormones etc.

Not one is going, all this might fuck my children for life, make them infertile, leave them with a catalogue of issues decades down the line.

I'm sure many are. Just they are doing so quietly. Maybe they are quietly getting on with supporting their child and keeping them safe until they have worked through this phase, because the parents know the backlash they will suffer if they announce their terfiness on SM. Or maybe they are simply not over-sharing attention-seekers, and they also just get on with supporting their child and keeping them safe.

The sensible majority have been silenced - most people believe that this is wrong but have been shut down for fear of being called a biggot. These are children they are growing up and they need protecting