Safe space for parents of LGBT adults

[Name5]

As the title says really. If anyone wants to ask a question re their adolescent/adult DC.
I have been in this position for 8 years and the issues are very different for adult people versus children.

Hmm I clicked on this thread and I’m a little confused now. I have posted a little on the FWR thread hoping for a reasoned debate (I hadn’t been on there before!) and was shocked at what I felt were unkind and offensive views towards trans people, and towards my child and me.

i think I used to fit with a gender critical perspective but since my child (born female) has socially transitioned I’ve found myself shifting my views. My child is no longer suicidal and self harming, is accepted by uni friends as a (very handsome) man and is generally much happier . They were very focused on hormones at one point but at 21 have stopped talking about that - I’m
not sure what the next step is and to be honest I’m afraid to rock the boat and ask.

I guess I’m somewhat torn because I understand the views expressed about trans identity being damaging and not real, and yet my reality is it’s made my child able to live their life. So, how can I be against that? But if I let myself think about it I have a lot of buried sadness about no longer having a daughter, and a lot of fear about how their life will pan out. For example, being attacked as a trans person. I’m also very sad to see the backlash against trans people on here and in real life since the Supreme Court ruling.

I’m not sure if these are the kinds of views youre looking for?

@marthasmum hello. Sorry to have missed your post. I'm a lark.
FWR is not trans friendly. There is a group of six or so vipers who will shout you down whatever you say. It feels like they would like to round up all trans people and put them in a secure facility. Everyone is a pervert or mentally ill.
My born female DD is 22 and at uni too. She uses a different name there. It's not unusual. I have been on a big journey with my DD. She wanted surgery and drugs but I refused to support it. She is doing a science based degree so we argue facts and it isn't on the agenda anymore.
I don't care about her clothes or name it's just the irreversible stuff.
I've been accused of being a TRA on mumsnet and a TERF. I'm neither.
What these women don't understand is it's a form of grief when your daughter becomes a different persona.
I know there are a few with direct experience but the majority know wider family members. It's not the same. Your natural instinct is to protect your child not abandon them. The hate is all about 'protecting our kids.'
I m not sure if you saw the thread about the non binary teacher? It was a pile on as usual and we were back to toilets!
Fwiw my dds uni has mixed single cubicles.
I get that some men have used TW identities to push male privelage but to tar everyone the same is bigotry. To be trans is not illegal and has its own legal protections. Sadly some mumsnet posters would like that point of law removed.

Thank you for your kind reply name. It sounds like we’re quite aligned and our DDs are similar (even down to the science degree!) I am glad to hear you have a good relationship where you can debate it and it sounds like she is doing well. I agree with you, it is a form of grief - although I feel that less than I used to do as it’s been a couple of years since she transitioned socially and I guess we’ve all got used to the new persona. That’s complicated as well though isn’t it - I feel I shouldn’t grieve as my child hasn’t died - plus why would I grieve when she’s happier? But when I see little blond toddler girls that remind me of her at that age it literally takes my breath away.

Also, my DD has identified as a boy since a very young age (though she did revert to dressing as a girl in teenage years). So, that’s different to a lot of kids who come to this identity in teenage years and seemingly out of the blue. I can understand parents in that situation feeling that trans isn’t the ‘real’ issue, but I do feel it’s pretty real for my DD.

I absolutely agree with your last point about being trans not being illegal. My DP who is a man of few words and not in any way ‘woke’ (but very supportive of our child) said recently that people just need to get their heads round the fact that it’s not wrong to be trans. That’s my bottom line and I think if you start from that point then you do have to begin to move your understanding of gender and identity.

thank you for your support - I don’t talk about this much in real life and I was quite shocked by the anti-trans feeling on here tbh.

Just to add too to your last point - I think the debate around trans men and trans women is very different. And even then there are trans women quietly getting on with their lives wanting to harm no one, even if there are the odd few who are toxic. I just don’t get why people think it’s so personally offensive to them for others to identify as trans. I think it’s another form of homophobia.

I couldn't agree more.
Stonewall have a lot to answer for with their trans umbrella. They've made this mess in my opinion and people going about their business get dragged into it.
I've employed two mtf in my time. One lovely the other not so much. It wouldn't put me off doing it again.
My DD has a great group of friends. Straight and LGBT. They all seem to mix ok
The online USA lot were the problem. Very militant and controlling. From suggesting suicide threats to bullying over cosmetics. My DD spoke to me once about this set of rules from an online TW and I quickly made her release that was bullying and coersive control. She rarely engages with these people now. She has been to the LGBT club at uni and they are all sorts and seem good at their studies. They threw a party after their exams and I took her. Tbh most of the bio females are NB.
My DD is a big music fan and has been asking lots of questions about glam rock. We never took any notice when we were kids and I loved boy George. Sadly the people pushing for rainbows were just after further income streams. After gay marriage was legalised there was nothing to shout about so they started to look for other targets. Kids got caught in the crossfire
My BFF is bisexual and I work in an industry with a high proportion of LGBT people. My colleagues have been very supportive.
My DH like yours is a man of few words but he won't have bigotry. He suffered enough as child in the 60/70s.
He once bought a mug with her chosen name on it. That was his way of supporting her.
My DD is odd that she pretty much answers to any name these days. I call her by her birth name and I don't get the anger I had directed at my when she was a teenager.
This week at her pt job I have no idea what they called her.
Will my DD stay in her male person? I couldn't say. She wants to be married to a man and have children. She has a poltonic boyfriend.
As long as these young adults are happy I'm OK with it.

Sounds like you have arrived at a good place with it, that’s really good. I think you are right that as with other things, some of this may look very different to them in their 20s than their teens. I’m hopeful that my DD is thinking differently about hormones but perhaps doesn’t want the climb down of admitting this publicly…but it may still all be going on. She keeps things very deep so I need to prod again and see.

Thank God for supportive partners. I have friends who are finding themselves at loggerheads with partners over how to manage a trans child and that must be awful for all concerned.

@tennishellbow so sorry to have missed your post. Welcome.

Living with trans young adults can be like walking on eggshells.
We were all honky dory then the supreme Court ruling came up. I was a bigot again. JKR was a personal friend (she's not). All off the trans activists on the Internet.
I am coming to see when there's trouble for trans people it starts with the rights of TW. I hardly ever see a TM in these often violent protests.
I can only advise honesty. I don't use the male pronoun. I occasionally use a joky take on my dds chosen name. I insist she's a women. And I absolutely insist she doesn't use any confusing ideology in a medical setting (she has gynecological issues). NHS staff have enough to do.

I have never been directed to a case where a post full surgery transgender person has been charged with indecency or sexual assault.
I "think" there have been quite a lot actually (but as per with my brain when I actually need the info...... I cant remember the details required!) Maybe try the hashtag "It never happens" which I think brings up various such cases (although being old <ahem> I dont really get hashtags or twitter etc)

My son (early 20s) has been pretending to be a woman for a couple of years now which has been heartbreaking for me and the rest of our family. He seems to generally agree with me re most of the Terfy stuff I say and yet....... hes still not accepting of the fact he is male.
Which totally doesnt make sense. Ive totally refused to endorse or encourage it in anyway at all. Still always refer to him as him and by his birth name.
Thankfully hes been very willing to listen to me as much as Ive listened to him and we are still just as close as ever despite it all. Im hoping that in a year or so he will switch back and settle down a bit (less alcohol, steady job etc)

I dont know what percentage (if any) of these are "full surgery trans women" but tbh I dont think it makes any difference at all. Not a bit. A man who has chopped all his bits off is still a man.
This Never Happens - by A Predecessor - The Glinner Update

Good morning @Okiedokie123 thank you for the link.

I wonder if these perps have the surgery whilst they're bailed?
No rape can take place without a penis.
If they are having the surgery that quickly they're going private.

I'm sorry for your heartbreak, I feel the same. I thought I had a very feminine daughter who I could play shopping and clothes with. Not a chance after 14.
High numbers do detransition but it's hard to admit things have changed if you've been turning your life upside down for years. It difficult to say I don't believe or feel like another gender anymore.
Things have changed for my daughter but there are too many neferus people pulling her strings including a vicar! I'm hoping next year when she moves university she'll have a chance to re evaluate everything.

@Okiedokie123 good God I've read the link.
I'm shocked tbh. No wonder why there is such hatred of trans people.
I'm a former prison visitor and all prisons I have been in segregate sex offenders and trans people. They do not share cells (England).

I’m shocked too. I mean for one thing it’s shocking to read some many horrendous crimes against women and young girls in one sitting, whoever’s committed them. Reading this I can understand more about why the anti-trans lobby feel the way they do. BUT I also think there is a world of difference between the offenders here and my kid feeling like a boy. They’re clearly not informed by the same things as far as I can see. I think probably f-m trans and m-f trans have somewhat different motivators, because of how male and female identities are socially presented. I think there is much more nuance to it all than we’re aware of yet. But just because some people choose to hijack trans identity, that doesn’t make it ‘not real’ does it? I find the anti trans lobby to be quite hysterical.

im trying to be honest with myself and think, if I didn’t have a trans child and didn’t know much about it, would I too be gender critical? Probably would be to be honest.

Same. This. X

@marthasmum the named bio men are sex offenders and paedophiles. They change gender when caught.
I have never come across such a person in the prisons I visited.
My understanding was there were 143 transgender TW in prison. This could be wrong of course.

The trans people I have met tend to have felt different from their bio sex from an early age. However that wasn't the case fot my daughter.

It is truly frightening but of course the law allows the smoke and mirrors of name change. And criminals of course play a long game. They can wait three years to build a profile (phone contracts, banking etc) and then you can't trace them. Hence the vigilantes and rightly so in these cases.
These disgusting people do not represent our often gentle DC. Shame on people for thinking it does.

Yes of course name that’s what I was meaning. And you’re right, I can’t understand why people can’t make a distinction. There is a thread going at the moment about hair colour indicating your views on gender ffs!!

on another note your career as a prison visitor must have taught you a lot.

I was also thinking how lucky all the kids on this thread are to have parents who are standing by them and working this out with them. My DD often tells me she is grateful for me as she knows of trans kids disowned by their families etc.

There was a thread I found very insightful a while back - an AMA with someone who was f-m trans and had identified as such from being a toddler. He was a medic and reflected very carefully on the implications of this eg was it ok for him to treat men who believed him to be a cis man, and might not have wanted care if they’d known he was trans? It was marked by respect on all sides and everyone posting commented on that.

I remember the AMA, it was insightful.

My DD is a medic of sorts but has chosen to work with the police or academia.
She has been working doing some research into SEN. She has been into a school but with full DBS. She actually doesn't disagree with Cass.

How does one ‘feel different to their bio sex’? As a woman in my 60s, I have no idea what any other woman feels like with regard to their sex. Being female isn’t a feeling, it’s a state of being. I could be unhappy about being female, just like I can be unhappy about having short legs!

@Soontobe60 i have no idea how it feels to be different to ones born bio sex. I'm not transgender but this what I frequently hear.
It could be imagery of what each young people should look like or just feeling of not belonging.
I can only comment on what my DD and her friends tell me.
I don't confirm professionally to female norms but in my youth looked like Barbie!
Feeling female may not matter that much to you. Why do you ask? Do you have a trans DC?

The way I understand it is that you, and me for that matter, don’t understand ‘not feeling female’ because we have absolutely no issue with it. I’m comfortable in my body, happy to be female and have no wish to be male. I don’t need to think about feeling female because I just do (and I’m not particularly ‘feminine’ either). But trans people presumably feel profoundly ‘wrong’ in their bodies such that they start to question gender identity.

And whether this is ‘right’ or not - but one of the reasons I find it easier to accept in my DD is she passes very effectively as a man. She has androgynous looks (think Cillian Murphy-type) and if she goes clubbing she’ll have young gay men coming on to her because they don’t realise she’s not a cis man. She’ll have (presumably) straight young women walking past her workplace and commenting on her looks. This isn’t a boast, just to say that something about it looking ‘right’ makes me wonder if there is some kind of neurological, biological basis to it too? Personally I think we will find out more going forwards about chromosomal/ neurological differences in trans and cis people especially given the links with autism.

Going with the thread title, rather than contributing to the discussion so far, if that’s okay?
Was just hoping for some advice. I don’t think I need signposting to ‘support’ as such, I don’t really have any issues. Just would find the experience of your lesbian adult daughters helpful as my daughter has just in the last week told me she is a lesbian. There is no surprise or concern about this on my part and she had no worries about telling me.
I suppose I am wondering if I should start more conversations about this with her - I don’t want her to think I’m not interested, but nor do I want to be intrusive! I should just ask her what she wants I guess. I don’t want to get it wrong!
I asked her when she told me if her friends know (yes) and if she’s told her dad (no ‘just awkward’). She doesn’t have a girlfriend and hasn’t had one. She hasn’t experienced any direct homophobia although we’ve been discussing the indirect homophobia and misogyny in her school for years.
We have some gay (male) friends and relations and have always (hopefully) been actively anti-homophobic (is that a word?).
Can anyone let me know what helped in navigating this part of life in your family?

@parrotonmyshoulder i don't have much experience of lesbianism but a little as my best friend is bi sexual. I've known her since I was 23. She told her parents when she was in school and it didn't go down well particularly with her mother. However that was forty years ago. My friend has since married a man then a woman.
Im sure your husband knows but men can be unsure what to say. They don't want to grill their child or dismiss with jokes (my cousin is thought gay but my family can push the jokes too far).
All we want for our children is a happy life.

@marthasmum ive been reading the hair thread, hilarious!
I'm thinking of dying mine tomorrow in solidarity.

Let me start with apologies as I am using this as a place to just put down my thoughts rather than reply to some of the other posts. So my dd has taken some more steps towards becoming trans, more or less dressing male and has gotten rid of a lot of her 'female' clothes, has discussed wanting top surgery although not for a while. Less keen on hormones and not changed pronouns yet. I am being supportive although occasionally questioning. This all comes on top of her wanting to make a huge career change and also wondering about autism. In my heart I am beyond gutted, I feel like I have a limbo child, she's a different person yet exactly the same if you know what I mean. And this has happened so quickly, all within a month. She is an adult so I am trying to respect her choices but I am completely overwhelmed and out of my depth. I have had a huge discussion with her about finding a support group to discuss these matters, as she's leaning heavily on me and I don't think I have the resources to be that person. She needs people who are on the same path or have been on that path.

Saying all that, I have more acceptance of her choice than I did when I first posted and I plan to keep all my doubts to myself and my DH.

@tennishellbow is your DD 25 yet?
, I ask because many surgeons will not operate on anyone under this age.
When my DD was at her most millitant I offered a reduction (she's big busted as I'm I) but not until her brain was fully formed. She knows what that means as she's a trainee clinican.
My daughter has a vest thing now but only wears it for a couple of hours if she's out with certain friends. She then switches to a normal wired bra.
We have breast cancer in our family so she knows how I feel about unnessassry surgery. As I've said before I can live with the masculine clothes and name but I will be vocal on permennt changes.
My DD is lazy. I've told her it's much easier to bf when you're a tired new mum (she wants children). I keep my gob shut on things I get change.