Sorry if this is long. A very good friend of mine has an only-child - a lovely and intelligent daughter in Y8. Since she was very young she’s always said she thinks she’s a boy. She’s also significantly on the autism spectrum. Since Y6 she’s been identifying as a boy and most of her classmates think she is one. My friend is now facing the very difficult time of what to do next as she will very soon start menstruating. A good friend of hers has an older daughter who’s recently transitioned to being male and I’m expecting this is what my friend will choose. I’ve never questioned it, as it's her life and her choice and I don’t know a lot about it.
I was having lunch with friends yesterday though and the conversation turned to this. I mentioned my friend’s situation and
one of them, an academic I don’t know well, got quite heated and said a parent doing this to their child is akin to child abuse and that most of these teenagers are just autistic and gay and their autism makes them want to completely reinvent themselves, and to guide them down the trans route is a death sentence.
She said that the drugs cause a lower IQ, early baldness and osteoporosis by the time they’re 30, and that phallioplasty involves constructing a penis from skin taken from the lower arm, which leaves horrible disfigurement and usually fails, causing incontinence. She also said that there are many suicides after ten years when people massively regret what they’ve done. She gave the example of one of Angelina Jolie’s children, who was like a boy for years but is now very feminine.
She implored me to advise my friend and I’m not sure how to do it without really upsetting her. She’s a lovely person and just trying to do the right thing for her daughter, but aren’t they all.