I am the mother of a trans child ...AMA

[DoryNow]

But no bun fights please, I am not a trans activist.

I can't speak for your son obviously but I guess the face of this issue does seem to be very stereotyped people on both sides. It kind of makes me want to say that being a woman is more than wearing glamorous clothes. As a real woman I simply don't believe a teenage boy could really understand what it's like to be a woman, not sure I could comment on the other way.

Did your child have any male role models or men they admired growing up?

How do they feel they compare to men their age?

"he had always been inherently male just with the wrong bits on the outside"

Please explain this for those of us with more literal minds.

Your child was female. There is no such thing as "inherently male" AFAIK. What do you mean by this?

Your child had female organs on the inside as well as outside. Unless you signed on a hysterectomy, your child still has female organs on the inside.

Do you really believe that hormones have made your child male, that is Of the sex that can make sperm as the word is defined in any dictionary?

Oh here we go- all the usual suspects who have beaten me up mentally & theologically before.

This is what a trans parent has to put up with folks, a civilised chat with genuine questions railroaded by trans haters who have no bloody idea of what it is to go through this with a child but insist I am wrong because of their own extreme views.

I’m offline for a bit now -real life & all that- so back later to answer anyone with a genuine question about my situation as opposed to feminist theory. ( which I hasten to add I’m all for in the appropriate time & forum)

SlowlyShrinking the whole lesson in medical ethics is that you should listen to patients when they speak. Intersex people are not treated with irreversible procedures at birth anymore because at that time they don’t have a voice in the choice. They tell us who they are later. The same goes for trans people. If a person tells you they are in pain you can stomp your foot and shout ‘you look fine to me’ all you want but that doesn’t make their pain go away. If a person tells you they are male you can stomp your foot and shout ‘you look female to me’ all you want but that doesn’t make how they feel go away.

Who has given you the right to tell people who they are?

I hope you are not talking about me

I just asked what you meant by a few sentences that I found confusing.

Sorry for hijacking your thread OP, but I feel that if people keep purposefully derailing it they should not go unchallenged. I will stop posting immediately if you want me to though.

This is what a trans parent has to put up with folks, a civilised chat with genuine questions railroaded by trans haters who have no bloody idea of what it is to go through this with a child but insist I am wrong because of their own extreme views.

All I can see is someone doing an AMA in the hopes of pushing an agenda (social transition as early as possible, puberty blockers are all fine and dandy, there can be such a thing as a female who actually is a male 'inside'...) without having to deal with pesky questions from people familiar with the ideology/movement and the actual facts.

back later to answer anyone with a genuine question about my situation as opposed to feminist theory

Since when is the question 'in what way is a female actually a male inside?' more a matter of feminist theory than, I don't know, material reality? Or irrelevant to your personal situation, for that matter? It relates to your claim about the situation...

Lol booboobstwo it’s hardly stamping my foot to say that a Male is a male and a female a female. It’s easily checked by a medical person anyway (genitals or chromosomes). Why should someone who is clearly male or clearly female be believed when they say they are the opp sex, anymore than we would believe an anorexic who says they are fat, or a delusional person who says they’re Jesus? That doesn’t mean we can’t be kind, does it?
And of course we should believe someone if they say they’re in pain, although it would be harder to believe if, for example, the person was dancing a jig while complaining of leg pain
Also, giving someone analgesia is likely to cause significantly less long term harm than giving them hormones and booking them in for surgery (some more medical ethical dilemmas for you!)

Do you see changing sex as different to changing race, and if so why is this? If your son were to say he identifies as black even though he was born white (or vice versa) is that something you would accept?

(I'm not sure if you'd see this as outside of the questions you're willing to answer OK, and if that's the case feel free to ignore - I'm not here to start an argument, it's just something I'm curious about as I don't feel I fully understand it).

I don't see why you've posted an ask me anything when you get upset when people do just that.

[flowers]@Booboostwo [flowers]@Dorynow

As this is AMA I have a trans child can ask ask the other posters their experience of having a trans child?

Perhaps your own more relevant AMA might be more appropriate. I for one am interested in hearing from the OP on her own terms. The showboating belongs elsewhere, or are we only allowed to hear one side of the argument now.

SlowlyShrinking why should a woman be believed when she says she enjoys sex with multiple partners? Why should a person be believed if they say they are sexually attracted to people of the same sex? They are clearly delusional.

Here’s a third repetition: the medical profession has realised that there is no easy check for determining someone’s sex, you are still optimistic, or delusional that you can take your pick.

You speak as if you know nothing about complex medical cases. What is the easy test to determine what is happening when someone feels that their leg is not their own. You look at them and say clearly it is your leg and that is the end of the matter, but patients have panic attacks in the middle of the night when they find a stranger in bed with them and when they push the stranger out of the bed they find themselves on the floor. These people perform self amputations in desperation. Is this complex neurochemical condition just a delusion as far as you are concerned?

We do not understand the complex conditions that have been collectively grouped under body dysmorphia, we don’t understand their causes or what they mean for the people who have them, but we do owe these people dignity and not to call them delusional based on false biological claims.

You cannot define harm in the abstract or in general. A patient with severe, chronic and debilitating pain may prefer the risk of opioid addiction to the pain. A patient with cancer may refuse chemo. It is not up to you to decide who wants to take on the risks and benefits of hormone treatment, it is up to them to make an informed decision. In the case of children it is up to them, their families and their medical teams, once again it’s nothing to do with you.

If someone said they enjoyed sex with multiple partners, but they were a virgin, I’d say they were lying or delusional. It hardly matters though does it? There’s no danger that the person will be given synthetic hormones, which could have very severe side effects, as a result of their delusion. However a person who says they are really the opposite sex could be subject to quite a few heavy-duty medical interventions. Surely you can see the difference?

Yy an informed decision. However I, and others, have doubts about whether there is actually enough information given to these patients and their families, or whether quite a lot of information is being left out or glossed over. Surely you wouldn’t support this? Or informed consent is rendered meaningless!

Op, has your son been affected by anti trans sentiment? How does he deal with the knowledge that there is a section of society that believes he is mentally ill?

Hi OP
Thank you for carrying on the thread I am sure some of these are difficult questions to consider.

You said that the psychological and emotional support that you felt your son (and you) needed was either not there or was cut short or generally not made easy enough to access. You said that the NHS medical care was good.

Do you feel that the balance is right between what is accessible around emotional support and what is accessible medically?

This is not an AMA. It's a thinly veiled propaganda piece where the OP and others are allowed to argue bad science and bad research and anyone who questions her approach is a trans hater.

FWIW (as I suspect I'm in that box), I have trans friends. I don't hate transpeople at all. I am just questioning why so many of our young people are suddenly coming out as trans. Social media and social contagion has a huge part to play in that. I am curious as to you haven't answered that question

How can they be a man if they have a female reproductive system?

Here’s a third repetition: the medical profession has realised that there is no easy check for determining someone’s sex

Christ. That's news to me. At what point in med school do they let people know about this? Did they send out a worldwide memo to all currently practising doctors?

OP if your child has come out earlier would you have allowed them to have puberty blockers given there is conflicting information about long term effects? I realise you would have had a chance to research this so sorry to spring it on you! And again, had they been younger, what transitioning (medical or social) would you have allowed?

I realise it's a slightly different situation but you're closer that in ever likely to be. I worry that as the rate of detrasitioning is so high allowing even non medical transition makes it harder for someone to say if they feel they were wrong, kind of coming out for a second time (and sadly there are a lot of TRAs who are very vocal when someone realised they are not trans and groups who drop supporting individuals when they are no longer a cool trans person).

Do you really think that 18 is old and experienced enough to decide on sterilising themselves? I find it shocking that the NHS would so this, they won’t give a woman a hysterectomy at that age as it’s just too young to know if you want to have children in 10 or 20 years time.

I also find your statement that you think it was unfortunate that he couldn’t have puberty blockers very concerning. That can be nothing unfortunate about not be able to give your child’s untested medication with very serious side effects.

Finally, you think women who don’t want transwomen (who almost certainly won’t have have genital surgery) in the loo next to them ‘unfair’? Seriously??

DoryNow, you say if you are referring to blockers they merely pause the onset of puberty while allowing the child to socially transition.

If this is your understanding, you have been gravely misled.

The side effects of the drugs, some being used off licence without research having been done, that trans people are being given can be extremely serious, even deadly. Puberty blockers reduce IQ by 8-10 points, and prevent the brain maturation that accompanies puberty. They also prevent or reduce genital maturation. A boy given blockers will have a child's penis and both sexes will have little or no sexual function.

Here's a long scientific article about Lupron, a supposedly harmless puberty blocker. Here's an easier to read article about Lupron's use in children with precocious puberty, who would obviously be taking the drug for a shorter period than a child being medically transitioned.

Puberty blockers are specifically not approved for any child with MH issues. Given that they are being given to children with gender dysphoria and that their vulnerability is the argument given for their use these drugs are being used against all the research evidence.

The cocktail of drugs given to transmen is so cytotoxic that they're advised to have hysterectomies after a few years. The effects are permanent after a couple of years, so if a woman detransitions she'll still have male pattern baldness, male body hair and a deep voice. Considering how young these detransioners typically are, this is tragic.

This a post made by @BowlofBabelfish on another thread:

My area of expertise is human developmental genetics (and allied fields.)

Humans cannot change sex. To tell a child they can change sex is incorrect. To give a healthy child drugs that are off label, unmonitored and actively contraindicated in anyone with mental health issues is irresponsible, unethical and abhorrent. Parents and patients are not being given impartial full information on these drugs. Children are being sterilised and undergoing risky and painful surgery.

I’m employed in a field that has a LOT to do with medical ethics, drug development, directly working with patients, patient facing materials, clinical trial design, paediatric trial populations etc.

Affirmative treatment, blockers and surgery are GROSSLY unethical.

If I exposed patients and their families to the kind of biased information and clinical risk that dosing with blockers does, never mind sterilising children, not only would I be fired, I’d be facing criminal charges with serious time attached.

I cannot believe this is happening. I condemn it in the strongest possible terms. This is going to be a huge scandal.

Like @DixieFlatline I see OP as doing an AMA in the hopes of pushing an agenda (social transition as early as possible, puberty blockers are all fine and dandy, there can be such a thing as a female who actually is a male 'inside'...) without having to deal with pesky questions from people familiar with the ideology/movement and the actual facts.

I really hope for the OP and her child, that her (very young) adult child continues to be unwavering in their views about sex and gender.

I've certainly changed my ideas and beliefs a lot since I was a teenager.

I also hope your child wasn't influenced at all by the sort of online, cultish, porn and forums/ message boards which sent my STBXH spiralling from a breakdown, into a solution where transitioning from the person he was, into a new personality and gender role, seemed like the best solution to his huge and unaddressed underlying problems.

I'm really sad that the solution for my STBXHs gender dysphoria is to change how he presents, rather than to challenge how he feels about who he is, and his place in this world.

I really hope your child wasn't influenced by him or his online pals, because they lie and lie.

It's useful to him to have children transition, because it takes the conversation away from middle aged men who, like him, dress for the humiliation fetish, the sexual thrill and the power.

I hope you are in good faith OP, and not one of his pals. Or acting as an unwitting enabler for his sexual fetish.

Regarding Mermaids, a couple of years ago regulars on Feminism Chat spent time supporting a mother of a gender dysphoric child. Her account of Mermaids was very different from that offered here. She told us that the other parents spent meetings sharing tips about private doctors and websites where puberty blockers and hormones could be obtained against NHS advice. She found it both unhealthy and unhelpful.

She left Mermaids but was pursued by members warning that without their support her child would kill themselves and that it would be her fault.

She said she found the support she received from FWR regulars life changing for both her and her child.

Me , push an agenda ?!?!

I have just got from work m’dears & can hardly push a cuppa to my mouth.

I am just the mum of a trans boy who thought she would share her experiences as other AMA’s have done. The majority of posters have been courteous and reasonable intheir questions& it as been good to chat.

However this barrage of demands that I answer questions that will be then used against feels very much like gaslighting & not in the spirit of MN.

I am going to read through a few posts now & catch-up.