The effect of lockdown on transitioning teen girls

[Thegenderbreadperson]

I mentioned this on another thread, but as a worker in a high school we have found out during weekly phone calls home that since lockdown that most of our FtM students have de transitioned, perhaps as there is no longer the group peer pressure or affirmation from teachers? I was interested to see if there are any more examples - the other thread was started about Dr Haddock, and I felt this was worthy of its own thread.

In our school there were nine girls out of a approx 160 student year 9 cohort who identified as boys. Seven have now de transitioned since lockdown and one is considering it. Out of those nine I would have said three of them weren’t as committed as the others and had said they were “thinking about being non binary”, but were keen to remain part of that friendship group. It really is infectious.

This is really interesting OP. I have wondered this myself - away from peer pressure and spending more time with parents will these girls simply drop the idea? I'm sure this must be a wider phenomenon.

My teenage dd, who has Aspergers and has certainly been presenting as non binary for the last 2 years, has been really happy whilst off school. She's taken up exercising, lost a bit of weight, stopped wearing so many baggy clothes, and yesterday happily purchased clothes from the female section. Her short hair has obviously grown a lot recently but she doesn't seem to be in a hurry to get it cut again. So I am very interested to see this is a bit of a "thing".

That’s really interesting, Coke sending best wishes to you and your DD.

One thing I have observed amongst detransitioners/reidentified women is that they see each other and think they have finally found their ‘tribe’ - a kind of ‘where have you BEEN all my life’ feeling. It’s a beautiful phenomenon to observe (from the viewpoint of a woman twice their age).

Perhaps the younger desisters (those who never made it as far as medical intervention) will feel similarly about each other too? I hope so.

More needs to be done about peer pressure in schools. It is overwhelming in the age of internet and social media.

I know teachers and staff in schools are very aware and do all they can to mitigate but when I see so much money spent on delivery of the so-called anti-bullying lgbtq++ message (or RSE - it is truly one-size fits all curriculums) which boils down to slick presentation of cheap indentikit under-researched stuff with unicorns and jelly babies, I despair. They need properly researched resources to help them.

DuDuDu I’m so pleased to read that!

My DD has been much more relaxed and happy during lockdown but I don’t see her desisting once back at school. I think she feels she needs the “protection” she feels “being seen as a boy” gives her from her peers.

She’s been giving hints at home about wanting to back out of this, but I don’t think she sees a path to do so which would also not leave her feeling vulnerable at school. She does, however, now describe the Year Head who formally transitioned her behind our back as “really creepy” so we hope that means she will distance herself from him when they do return to school in August.

Peer pressure and trying out new sparkly things at school is something I clocked when I was in primary 5 and we had a dentist visit our class for a talk. He suggested eating carrots at playtime.

Next day all the other girls turned up with carrots for their play piece. I had a bar of toffee (as usual).

@rogdmum

DuDuDu I’m so pleased to read that!

My DD has been much more relaxed and happy during lockdown but I don’t see her desisting once back at school. I think she feels she needs the “protection” she feels “being seen as a boy” gives her from her peers.

She’s been giving hints at home about wanting to back out of this, but I don’t think she sees a path to do so which would also not leave her feeling vulnerable at school. She does, however, now describe the Year Head who formally transitioned her behind our back as “really creepy” so we hope that means she will distance herself from him when they do return to school in August.

Is a different school an option at all? Fresh start and all that?

I completely understand the boy identity as a protective talisman, it’s the current-day equivalent of telling creepy men you have a boyfriend to make them back off, or wearing a ring on your wedding finger.

Instead of inventing an imaginary boyfriend, a generation of adolescent girls are trying become the imaginary boyfriend.

It’s almost poetic really, if only it didn’t come with side orders of misery and unnecessary medical intervention.

@SerenityNowwwww

Peer pressure and trying out new sparkly things at school is something I clocked when I was in primary 5 and we had a dentist visit our class for a talk. He suggested eating carrots at playtime.

Next day all the other girls turned up with carrots for their play piece. I had a bar of toffee (as usual).

My stepdaughter went through similar way before the trans thing, back in primary school.

A young, female Olympian came to give a talk on healthy eating and DsD internalised it so hard she became afraid of eating anything other than fruit or veg.
Her parents had to speak to the school and it took a lot of work to get her through it (this was before her dad and I met).

Kids can be SO suggestible, it‘a downright scandalous that teachers, who intrinsically know this, seem to throw all common sense out of the window when certain diversity buzz words are mentioned.

Like, can we get back to basics on child development, please? Age appropriate doesn’t just mean avoiding adult themes, it means appropriate for developmental stage too.

I have noticed a huge difference in my teen dd with ASD, since lockdown. She's become massively more independent and wants to try new things. Her self care has come on in leaps and bounds and her attitude to the on line school work is hugely improved, she'd avoid it at all costs at the beginning, tears and meltdowns. She has started taking an interest in her appearance and clothes etc. I have wondered if without the pressure of school to process she is now able to think about other things and not have to shut down to let her mind deal with that. It's as though there is room for other things to be thought about, more head space. I'm in no rush for schools to go back tbh.

Oh and dd is at an all girls school no not even having to deal with boys at all but still seems happier.

DuDuDu My initial knee jerk reaction was that we should pull her but DD really doesn’t want to change schools because she finally has a little group of girls she’s friends with. The school no longer affirms her as a boy and if she were to change, we’d be starting all over with the fight to not affirm at the new school (they are very pro affirmation here). It’s all such a mess with the schools.

My point was that maybe without the constant onslaught of school and peer pressure these girls feel able to relax and not "perform" for their class mates and friendship groups. I think I'd be looking at home education if my dd was going down the transitioning route and I found she had desisted during lockdown.

I suspect court cases are the only thing that will halt it, sadly.

Ygritte I was actually really disappointed when in Scotland the First Minister announced that instead of blended learning, schools will go back full time in August. Nothing to do with Corona for me, just wishing DD could ease back into school a bit more.

@vivariumvivariumsvivaria

I've been wondering this about older trans women too.

It's that old question "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it - does it make a sound? "

If a person has a gender difference and there is no one to observe their clothes, mannerisms, hair and interests - are they less upset?

I said that on a GC group too! (Hope that worked, first time trying the quote button)

So much of it is performance, getting their kick out of being affirmed, that can’t happen so much in lockdown, nobody to stare at you in the street, nobody to be uncomfortable when you use the ladies loos and changing rooms. So what’s the point, right?

I have noticed a lot more affirmation-seeking on FB though - someone briefly added me to a dress manufacturer customer group (fuck knows why as I don’t wear or post about dresses!) and in the time I was on there I kept seeing so much sucking up to men posting about their latest purchases. The comments were far, far more cloying than on women’s photos. About how envious they were of their legs etc. I honestly could have worked out which posts were from which sex without looking at the photos.

Maybe lockdown doesn’t affect adult men so much because they can get their kicks that way online.

(Sorry if derailing, I’ve not finished reading the thread yet)

@OvaHere

I've also found lockdown has been beneficial to my DS2 who has a diagnosed ASD.

Obviously this is only tangentially related to what the OP is saying as he has no identity issues going on but I think the pressure release of no school has been good for some kids.

Yes, a relative of mine who is about 12 has moderate/severe autism and has come off her meds since she's been home, in fact I think her parents have decided to homeschool for the foreseeable future. Her doctor told her mum that quite a lot of kids had been coming off their meds since leaving school.

I worry for some kids and the idea of remote education isn't really workable for most people, but I think it really does point to the fact that schools have become quite inappropriate environments for kids all round. There needs to be a real rethinking of the whole set-up.

Not to be too nit-picky but I think it's important to be accurate in these troubled times. Caspian was refused ethics approval. He wasn't asking for funding. Even a small scale research project can cost quite a lot of money and it's really really hard to get funding for anything except Covid-19 and economics at present (has been hard to get funding for a long time). And it would be specially hard to get funding for this I think, though it really needs researching.

Honest to god if I ever win the Euromillions I’m setting up a foundation that will fund research into this sort of thing, y’know the “boring” stuff that only affects women/children.

It’s just like Caroline Criado-Perez’s book says about the lack of research around how certain drugs affect women differently, they just don’t want to put the time and effort in so go with “male = default human”.

This is interesting. Aside from the school influence, I wonder if these girls are also enjoying another unexpected lockdown benefit - namely it's now socially acceptable to cross the road and actively avoid people when out on the streets. No more having to walk through groups of men fearing the inevitable "cheer up love" or worse.

Hi I'm a Brazilian journalist but I write for two publications in English and I'm interested in writing a piece about it. If approved, it could be published either on 4w.pub or Uncommon Ground Media. Thanks!

@YgritteSnow

I have noticed a huge difference in my teen dd with ASD, since lockdown. She's become massively more independent and wants to try new things. Her self care has come on in leaps and bounds and her attitude to the on line school work is hugely improved, she'd avoid it at all costs at the beginning, tears and meltdowns. She has started taking an interest in her appearance and clothes etc. I have wondered if without the pressure of school to process she is now able to think about other things and not have to shut down to let her mind deal with that. It's as though there is room for other things to be thought about, more head space. I'm in no rush for schools to go back tbh.

Ygritte,I've seen the same. My dd has been showering more often, sharing clothes websites with friends, cooking a lot - including lots of veg!!! And where we live, when lockdown reduced her and her friend went out to buy sushi. After years of really fussy eating, I was quite impressed.

S'funny, I'm still non-binary despite being very isolated through lockdown with a large majority of essential worker friends.

@LokiOdinson
Worker friends? So you are not a transitioning teenage girl in high school then? Hardly comparable.

It’s just like Caroline Criado-Perez’s book says about the lack of research around how certain drugs affect women differently, they just don’t want to put the time and effort in so go with “male = default human”.

Apparently women’s menstrual cycles with complicated and varying amounts of hormones throughout the month make us more difficult to study needing larger sample sizes and longer trial periods and expense.

That drafted biology again. Funny how it keeps popping up.

@AndreiaNobre

Hi I'm a Brazilian journalist but I write for two publications in English and I'm interested in writing a piece about it. If approved, it could be published either on 4w.pub or Uncommon Ground Media. Thanks!

Hi Andreia

I follow you on twitter ( I assume you're the same one).

Sometimes people here are iffy about journalistic requests but I just want to reassure that your work is great. This would make a good article.