More funding for better services for confused young people.

[ImConfusedDotComHelp]

I think mental health services are poorly funded anyway.

Young people who hate their bodies and feel 'wrong' need counselling and help to see they are not 'wrong' they don't need to change themselves. No need to bind breasts, take hormones, hate themselves. Stop with the ridiculous extreme stereotyping of what girls should look or behave like and if they don't fit that silly idea opt of what they are. Pretend they can change sex. I feel sad for them. More sad for the detransitioners. No need for social contagion to feel OK, they are ok.

Build self esteem, love themselves as they are biologically.

This is my worry. Poor kids.

That’s not conversion therapy, @Tricho. Maybe you should do some proper reading about psychological therapy rather than just believing gender stuff off the internet?

Did you try therapy first? Have you read the cass report? I

Is it straight to, yes you have a problem, your body is the wrong one, let's change that awful body. Pretend you are the opposite sex, that will help. Tell lies and get everyone to.join the lie. Shout at anyone who won't join the lie. Just wow.

So much shouting and abuse at people who just want reality to be recognised.

Thank you.

Surely do least damage as first option. Many teens are confused.

Conversion therapy is largely a myth in this country. It originally described (often Christianised) therapy in the US which tried to “convert” people who were unhappy with being gay to being straight. It was outlawed here by all the professional therapy organisations in the 80s. Now, I’m sure these things probably still go on in Bible Belt states in the US, but it hasn’t been any part of reputable trained psychotherapy here for decades, and anyone experiencing gay conversion therapy in this country must be having something very very amateur and irregular done secretly by some kind of unregulated church or similar.

It used to be that people who were old school “transsexuals” actually had a lot of supportive and careful therapy exploring all sorts of aspects of their mental health before and during a traditional “sex change”. But some years ago trans activists decided that any open-minded therapy, and in fact any therapy at all that wasn’t immediately affirming, was akin to gay “conversion” therapy and started terming it as such. This put activist pressure on mental health services to not offer any more the kind of exploratory therapy which used to be standard and in fact would be standard for any similar mental health condition, eg. body dysmorphia. Now, activists call any standard therapy that isn’t immediately “affirming” a version of “conversion therapy” — which it simply isn’t.

Therapy for body dysmorphia doesn’t immediately affirm that yes, the patient needs a nose job to feel better. Nor does therapy for phobias, trauma or eating disorders “affirm” the condition: instead good therapy explores the roots of the condition in a careful, non-judgmental manner. This is what should be standard for gender issues, too. The reports into the Tavistock’s gender clinic for children found that many children were presenting with complex histories of trauma, sexual abuse, family dysfunction and lots of co-morbidities, but that these were all ignored in the rush to “affirm” gender “treatment”. That’s not good. Exploratory therapy should aim at first finding out what is causing the distress, and whether it can be alleviated in ways that as the OP says, do no additional harm.

It’s a real scandal that the non-evidenced activist scaremongering about “conversion therapy” has stopped proper therapy from happening, especially for children. When asked, none of the activist organisations scaremongering about “conversion therapy” ever have any actual evidence — apart from a few unscientific survey responses — that any so-called “conversion therapy” has actually been going on!