Another article in The Times this morning

[busyboysmum]

Schools rushing ‘on whisper’ to label pupils as transgender

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/schools-rushing-on-whisper-to-label-pupils-as-transgender-0d8zm53qs?shareToken=634da1c5f56d3d1cac7267d907f1e6d7

Children as young as 11 are being offered medical treatments that could leave some infertile, according to a psychologist at the only NHS clinic in England and Wales for children seeking to change their gender.

It's a very good article - they are focusing on schools 'rushing' to accept a child's transition rather than 'watchful waiting'.
She is very brave to speak out!

I hope some principals and libfemmy teachers feel a pang of guilt at reading it.

IMHO the Tavi’s GIDS do a great job. They quietly get on with supporting young people and take an ethical stance.
I often feel uncomfortable when reading posts on this board where people argue that lobbying should include a focus on interfering with medical intervention.
The medics should lead on this and the government and translobby should back off. I think the gender critical ‘lobby’ and engaging in this talk because others have made it political.
It is fine to question the decision making of GIDS and to question what they are doing, but to take the stance that should or shouldn’t provide certain interventions grossly under estimates the knowledge and expertise of the team. Over 80% of the children who enter the clinic leave feeling aligned with their natal sex.

Yes but that's at the moment. Have a look at what's happening in Canada to see where we could end up if we're not careful.

I think you would see an exodus of psychologists working in GID services/ willing to work in such services if they felt ethically compromised.

Doctors aren't infallible. Seriously. They aren't. Lots of awful things have been done in the name of medicine and the patient doesn't always come first.

I also think it's wrong to tell gender critical people not to question it. TAs are online telling kids how to get hormones/blockers from online sources, and coaching them in what to say to counsellors etc. Their parents. Advising them to say they are suicidal if they hit blocks to getting what they want.

Many young people who have had treatment are realising that yes, you are infertile. Saying that they were so young they didn't really realise the full implications of what was going on. Plenty of, especially female, detransitioners whose bodies have been permanently altered.

TAs desire is for anyone including children to have any and all treatments that they need no questions asked. Asking questions is deemed conversion therapy. They are actively fighting to remove therapy / barriers to treatment.

The consequences for children is - well I was incredibly affected by the Jazz Jennings situation that someone mentioned. Jazz is 17 I think (I don't follow it) and due to treatment is in a sort of permanent pre-pubescent state. Has never had an orgasm, has no sexual desire really. Jazz's body has not grown so the organs are not developed enough to create a pseudo-vagina, Jazz was misled about what would be possible when making the decisions, and of course when they made the decisions they were a child. I was genuinely really upset, it's just clear that stopping development like this, the brain development that happens at puberty that is very significant, it's not been properly researched. And of course the drugs for stopping puberty are very strong and have a host of serious side effects I think loss of bone density for females who take it is a big consequence.

All in all I don't think it's a good idea to shut up and not question. Medical people are not infallible, and the drug companies are very powerful.

I think it is incredibly important that the medical profession are questioned and held to account. This means posing questions and demanding evidence based practice (where the evidence is critically appraised).
I read quite a bit on here about campaigning to stop hormone/ surgical intervention for children. I am not convinced that people saying as much have a good understanding of the needs of those children. I apologise if they have, if they haven’t I think asking questions and finding out more about treatment pathways is important

A lot of the gender critical people questioning this do have non-conforming children and are experiencing the strong tide that is taking their child straight into the treatment route, without sufficient questioning. SilverLady's comment is very accurate about the reasons for this.

The medical profession must also be under constant pressure from the pressure groups involved in this. They do need space to get on with their work, and good solid reliable evidence to work from, which they are being denied.

I don't think that children should be having surgical intervention for this either if I'm honest.

The removal of healthy organs in a child just feels very wrong.

Surgery is not a small deal, there are always risks.

Body dysphoria is common in teens, especially teen girls, and gender dysphoria is the only one where there is a push to put them under the knife while they're still children.

I think you would see an exodus of psychologists working in GID services/ willing to work in such services if they felt ethically compromised.

How many psychologists do work in GIDS services do you know MrsBeaujangles?

There are people who have had legs / arms removed due to dysphoria, they were adults though. There was also a woman whose psychologist helped blind her.

I think people struggle to understand this, it's very difficult to get it done, if possible at all, however the dysphoria people feel is real. Society has a natural knee-jerk response of no to this, even with adults.

But with children with gender dysphoria it's fine?

In the UK they only do surgery when they are 18 I think, and before that it's puberty blockers. So this question is a bit moot at the moment, although 18 is still very young really, and especially if you've been on blockers and so your brain hasn't been through puberty either with all the changes that entails (growing up, basically).

However there are pushes in the UK to reduce age for surgery to 16, and of course some people take their kids abroad for it.

It seems to me that there's a lot more research needed looking objectively at all sorts of things. Off the top of my head:

• the characteristics of gender questioning children/teens and their families, so for example we could see if it is still the case that the majority of the young people are gay, and I'd like to know if I'm correct in my hunch that transition rates are higher in socially conservative/deeply religious families (medicalising the issue and getting a 'cure' for 'being born in the wrong body' being more acceptable than having a gay child)

• the incidence of mental health and developmental problems in gender questioning young people (i.e. whether they have pre-existing conditions like autism, depression, anxiety, history of abuse, eating disorders before they first start talking about being unhappy as a girl/boy )

• how it affects children not to go through puberty at the normal time

• how it affects them when they do go through it later on (either normal puberty for their biological sex or puberty brought on by taking cross hormones)

• how the cross hormones affect children later in life

(there is data on all of this from children who have had to take puberty blockers and cross hormones for medical conditions and my impression is that it shows there are long-term problems, but of course doses might be different and it must be difficult to separate out problems arising from these drugs and other medical problems)

• evaluation of the mental and physical health of people who have transitioned

• what the true rate of detransitioning is, and if it's different between young men/women

• how people who have detransitioned feel now and what the long-term effects are of having transitioned

I don't think much of this is known at present. There are so many more children and young people coming forward with gender identity issues and it's all accelerating so fast that I don't think there's been time to do any good quality research yet.

And then of course there's the fact that universities are backing off researching these hot topics because if they come up with an unwelcome finding they face very negative publicity, personal attacks etc etc from TRAs - like the James Caspian case.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/schools-rushing-on-whisper-to-label-pupils-as-transgender-0d8zm53qs?shareToken=315f17227c1c052cb0287315f3d589a4

clicky link

Thanks terrylene

I hope this post answers the questions I have been asked. I am posting on both threads about The Times article as I can’t recall which questions came from which.

There are around 40 staff working with the GIDS service (across the London and Leeds clinics). Not all of them are full time. Recently, the service has increased with over 30 new members of staff. Prior to this the team was relatively small. NHS England funded the increase in staffing because waiting times were well over the 18 weeks requirement. The increase in referrals has been huge and the waiting time, even after expansion of the team, is well over 6 months.

The children that get referred to GIDS have complex needs, they are not simply GNC. Many have autism and co-morbid mental health issues and many experience suicide ideation or have attempted suicide. The service does not try and intervene or change patients’ gender identity (as being GNC is not a mental health issue in itself) and focus is on the all aspects of the child and their lives, not just gender identity. The goal of intervention is to help the young people referred feel comfortable and content in themselves.

The team are gatekeepers to physical intervention and do come across a lot of pressure to ‘deliver’ these. However, there is a multi disciplinary approach and therapists work together to ensure considered decisions are made. Even when physical interventions are given there is a staged approach. Hypothalamic blockers are considered after onset of puberty and cross-sex hormones only after 16. Surgery is only available from adult services (post-18) only. Tavi staff have published a number of articles about the challenges associated with the gatekeeping role and the pressure they come under. I don't think anyone is failing to 'speak out' because the team are getting on with supporting young people and holding the multiple boundaries they need to hold.

The conference discussed in the article is open to a range of professionals (the cost to attend is only £40) and its purpose is to discuss how academics, health practitioners, youth workers and charities can work together to better support trans young people. I expect the range of advice currently circulating in schools will be discussed and critiqued.

I have no doubt that the vast majority of staff would resign if they felt ethically compromised by the way in which they were required to work. Work is not hard to come by as the qualifications and experience are transferable to all aspects of child and adolescent mental health and so I don’t think fear of being out of work would be a factor.

A reference for the 80% desistance rate can be found in an article written by Helen Hingley-Jones, Sarah Davidson and Claire Gregor (Understanding the Experience of Parents of Pre-pubescent Children with Gender Identity Issues, Child and Adolescent Social Work, Child and Adolescent Social Work, June 2015, Volume 32, Issue 3, pp 237–246).