Do “trans kids” exist?

[Siameasy]

Following on from yesterday discussion:

With it becoming increasingly clear that we cannot define “trans”, genuine sufferers of Gender Dysphoria aside, how can there be such a thing as a trans kid?

Reading the “new rules” from Mermaids how would I know if my kid is trans?

Can babies be trans?

Can I ask who introduced your son to the concept of trans Takemeaway?

Takemeaway it sounds very hard to navigate, and fwiw I think you're right to be wary of the therapeutic options currently on offer.

There's a lot in your post about how you haven't pushed stereotypes and have actively fought against them, and this still hasn't worked - with respect, you are crediting yourself with too much influence here. Your child has not been raised in a vacuum. You're only one person, and he's getting the stereotype messaging from everywhere else. One person alone can't mitigate it all.

And you really can't know whether it will turn out to have been a sexuality thing or not - he's seven!

A relative was desperate to be a boy. From year dot she wore boys clothes, hair, toys, had boy friends etc. I think she noticed boys were allowed to be louder, funnier, more confident, more direct, more active and she wanted that as much as anything.

If she could have taken a magic potion to change into a 6ft professional footballer she would have but that’s not what we are able to offer. The medical pathway is gruelling and the result would have been a relatively short normal bloke with slightly feminine features that would probably pass if you didn’t look too close.

We definitely have intensely gender non conforming kids that are interested in changing or don’t understand LGB feelings. I’m worried we’re not giving them enough of a reality check currently. Surely part of this is growing up and accepting who you are and finding a way to work with it.

@TyroBurningDownTheCloset

One thing that concerns me is trans self identification as a result of CSA.

So much this.

This is probably one of those areas which suffers as a result of very few people having the requisite insider knowledge. We CSA survivors don't tend to shout about it much, as a rule, and when we do it's very hard to speak honestly and openly.

It's bloody frustrating, the no debate angle, because it robs me of the possibility of talking to women and girls who share my experiences (because mine are 'transphobic' apparently) and robs them of the chance to learn that there are other ways of coping - nurturing a dissociative disorder is really not the healthiest way of dealing with the long-term psychological impact of sexualised abuse on the developing mind!

Tyro, I'm so sorry that happened to you. The disassociation aspect is honestly what worries me most. I may be wrong but I seem to recall anxorexia/bulimia/overeating having similar links. How terrible it would be if these victims were also told that affirming their mental illness was the only 'ethical' pathway.

@Siameasy

I'm still waiting for someone to answer how, when eveeyone elses toddlers are being yanked out thr cat food bowl, sleeping in dog baskets , and eating sudecrem how these toddlers are so articulate as to ask when God will bring them.a vagina and express their inner feelings so well.

Well, indeed. At one point my then-toddler was trying to eat the cat. So what’s the magic age when they can say I’m trans (cos, according to Mermaids “they’ll tell you”) and it’s to be taken seriously?!

Oh well if they tell you then my 4yo girl is definitely a boy. I know this because mid trantrum about god knows what, she told her that she wanted to be a boy like her brother.

Guess I'd better take her off for beta blockers right now eh?!

Take your child is seven, they will have been bathing in the water of gender stereotypes for years, despite your best efforts.
My daughter is not yet six; we tried to be as “gender neutral” as we could but she “believes” in gender (by that I mean she believes boys can’t have long hair and all that associated nonsense). As soon as she went to nursery, gender was there.
It could be that your son also “believes” in gender but because he likes the things of the feminine gender he thinks he is female and because gender is so pervasive in society (more than ever) this belief has taken hold.

Crossed post not in reply to anyone but Op. I type slow

I've a lot more to say about the dissociation aspect but I'm not sure the general FWR consensus is quite ready for some of it.

Suffice to say, on a psychosexual level, it fucks you right over.

One major problem is: How do you work out your sexuality when you don't want to have sex with your own genitals because doing so is triggering?

When my young daughters compete or fight one will shout "GIRLS " and the other will shout "BOYS "!! (We don't encourage this btw) even if her favourite colour is blue I don't think at this age they even understand what they're talking about.
I would ignore any "signs" until at least 7/8 years old.

One major problem is: How do you work out your sexuality when you don't want to have sex with your own genitals because doing so is triggering?

I know no one is thinking about that with children as they are children but eventually they will grow up and yes I think the relationship aspects are very troubling.

I mean lesbians are attracted to other women obviously. And naturally that rules out feminine presenting males. And im not sure who would want to be in a relationship with someone who hates the idea of male or female so much they tried to get out of being one. How would you deal with something like that as the other person in the relationship.

And the same with gay men. Would they want a relationship ship with someone who tries to look like a woman. Its a different level to just an effeminate man surely.

Doesn't this leave the dating pool somewhat sparse?

I do worry what kind of partner these kids will eventually end up with. Especially if they end up medicated and their sexual function as adults is affected. Its just not bound to be a healthy relationship surely?

I hope Spuddddd can find some great Gender Non Confirming role models for her teen.
The video posted here recently of the Tavistock worker explaining the GIDS model (to the Irish equivalent of CAMHS?) gave an example where a small boy was being teased for playing with dolls, and good steps were 1) find a good man 2) get him to play with the dolls with the child. That’s it.
Good steps were not “pretending that the child could change sex“, “changing schools and pretending to be a girl at the new school”, or “giving radical medication”.

There used to be places where you could find those GNC role models, but it is getting harder?

I mean lesbians are attracted to other women, obviously.

Yes, but I'm talking about before a female understands herself to be a lesbian.

As an aside, I wish we could leave the feminine-presenting males out of this. They just cloud the issue. They're not lesbians and they need to piss off with their claims about girldick.

What I was more getting at is: if you can't reconcile with being female, you can understand yourself as female-attracted but can't so easily understand yourself as a same-sex attracted female; and if you don't want to have sex using your own female genitals then you can't understand yourself as being the sort of person who wants same-genitals sex.

This ties in with the autoandrophilia of females who identify as gay men. Attracted to males, don't want there to be a female body involved, because the female body is the site of trauma.

The moral of this tale is: CSA can make it very difficult to figure out where you fit in, because the 'rules' weren't developed with these psychological fuckups in mind.

I guess I have to think about what I see it as meaning for an adult. Which is, I don't really see it as a mental state or a type of person in any essentialist way. I see it as describing someone who has taken a certain approach to dealing with some kind of underlying problem of situation, like sex dysphoria.

As I see it, while some kids may have some similar underlying issues, their significance is much different in children, to some extent they are even developmentally normal. And the solution of adopting an opposite sex identity is one that should not be used on children even when there is a real problem.

No all I can say of course is that we don't have gender stereotypes here.

I always thought of him as a creative type and that when he came to terms with just being his own type of boy he might just end up being into art or something taking account of his interests.

I got the David Bowie book (is it little people big dreams, the kids series) last year, I thought it might help because at the beginning of it it talks about how when he was younger he felt like a girl and wanted to be a girl but realised he was a boy, just a different type of boy to the ones people usually think of, he liked other things. Can't remember the exact wording but I tried to explain it to boost his confidence that you can like whatever you want and be who you want to be regardless of anatomy but it's still not helped.
The strange thing is that he's actually really bright and quite confidently understands that gender stereotypes are silly, and the things I've told him about all boys being different and allowed to like/act/dress however. We're open minded and accepting of whatever he wants to chat about but he's still adamant he needs to actually be a girl. When we ask him why he points to his chest and says it feels like me inside.

I'm not saying all these things for the sake of it, it's just an insight into the fact that it can go on for years. Sometimes parents try their absolute best but still don't understand it. Picking him up from school is hard because I'm sure there are lots of parents and possibly even staff who think I'm getting it wrong or it's my own views put on him. But it's really not that way and I don't understand it.

He goes to a great school and pupils seem to all be lovely with him.
It was after he told school about it that he had found some books in the library about it and from reading the book that he discovered the term trans and identifies with it.

he's still adamant he needs to actually be a girl

The thing is, he can’t actually be a girl. I wanted to actually be a boy when I was that age, and it was a sad time when I realised I couldn’t become a boy or a man, but it was the best thing for me to accept that, rather than spending my life pretending to be something I am not. That’s my opinion, formed from my personal experience

Kids that age believe things they read in books. The fact is that he has no idea what a girl feels like inside, but he likely isn't yet able to understand why that is so because of his age and mental stage. So he's repeating words he's read or heard but doesn't really understand.

What’s the difference between me saying I wanted to be a boy in the early 80s, and your son saying he wants to be a girl in 2020?

I'm not saying there are any differences between your experiences. I'm not saying this means he is trans. I can only explain my experience and his. It's something that's been going on since he was 3. He's now 7 and it just seems to be getting stronger despite him knowing he can't actually be a girl and understanding the way I've dealt with it, he still very strongly believes he is infact a girl inside.

It's just a very strange experience to go through and not knowing if it's just a phase or gender dysmorphia or something else.

I can only explain my lived experience. I won't pretend to understand but I don't know where those ideas could come from at 3. Am I dealing with it wrong?

My nephew, born in 1992 when my sister was 41, grew up in a calm, non-sweary, adult home surrounded by women — his mum, his sisters and his gran, who all adored him. He was a sweet, happy child who went to school aged 5 and came back insisting he was a girl. My sister and the rest of the family played along, unbothered. It turned out that his class was dominated by a couple of shouty, sweary boys who expected him to get involved in fighting games. He didn't like it. He saw the girls behaving better and he decided to be a girl so that he could hang out with them. It was as simple as that. Thank goodness that there were no woke teachers to start telling him he was trans. He's now a happy hetero male in his late 20s.

Sorry, TakeMe, I hadn't seen your earlier posts and it's taken me about 20 minutes to write mine, in between phone calls. My comment isn't commenting on or related to yours in any way.

I think him reading that trans book at school has given him the idea that he could actually be a girl inside, whereas those ideas were not about when I was a child. If they had been I would definitely have believed I was really a boy or a boy inside. As it is, I’m a heterosexual woman, who has my sexual function and fertility intact and isn’t a lifelong medical patient reliant on hormones. So imo that’s a good outcome.
I think if it was my child, I’d be gently telling him that the book he read was wrong.

I'm sure if I'd read a book at that age which said "trans" and that I could actually be the boy I so desperately wanted to be then I'd have insisted that I was a boy.

So I think these books are lying to kids and telling them they can change sex. And a 7 year old is going to read this book that is classed as non fiction and believe that can change sex and they feel it inside.

That actually makes me really angry.

@CaptainInsensible

I think him reading that trans book at school has given him the idea that he could actually be a girl inside, whereas those ideas were not about when I was a child. If they had been I would definitely have believed I was really a boy or a boy inside. As it is, I’m a heterosexual woman, who has my sexual function and fertility intact and isn’t a lifelong medical patient reliant on hormones. So imo that’s a good outcome. I think if it was my child, I’d be gently telling him that the book he read was wrong.

Just to make it clear, I wasn’t adding a value judgement to being heterosexual! If I’d been a lesbian with sexual function, fertility etc, I’d be just as relieved that trans wasn’t a thing when I was a child

What do I do about the name he wants to be called, wanting to wear a skirt to school ect?

Where is your son getting the idea that his name is wrong? Can't his name just be his name? It's pretty sad that names are so gendered, to be honest. He can wear what he wants and play with girls. That doesn't make him a girl, though.