Friend's child. Is this worrying?

[namechange102938]

I'm probably opening a can of worms here but I would really like to hear from others on this.

The situation is this:

My lovely female friend is married to another woman. They had a DD. When DD was 3, they had a DS. DD had always been more interested in trucks than dolls. After DS was born, DD started saying that she was a boy too. The parents immediately switched to male pronouns and within the year they've changed the child's name to a boy name and even changed the birth certificate and the passport, erasing the child's birth identity. We're in a liberal US state.

I have trans friends, but they were all adults when they transitioned so I don't know what the healthy approach is for children. At 3 years old it seems to me that there's a possibility that being a boy was appealing since the only boy in the house (the new baby) was naturally getting a lot of attention. Also, a love of trucks and a dislike of dolls surely shouldn't matter.

I know my friends deeply love their children and think they're doing what's best for the child. I'm just concerned that perhaps the child isn't trans, but it would now be very difficult for him to change his mind. Changing the name and the birth certificate feels unnecessary at this stage. It seems to me that it send a message a child might interpret as 'they love me as DS more than they loved me as DD, so I can never be DD again no matter how I feel'.

Ironically, it seems very binary and limiting. They're already planning to use puberty blockers. The child takes part in trans events and has a whole identity based around this one part of him even though he's now just 7.

Do many very young trans children change their minds? Does this seem concerning or am I just out of touch?

Of course that's concerning. Making any decisions at a young age is detrimental

I agree with people who suggested the nudge approach. Particularly away from the medical side. Maybe with a positive slant if poss.

Eg oh I was reading something about a trans man who said they don't feel the need to change their body, they feel secure in their trans identity while being physically female (there are definitely examples out there!)

Or yes suggesting the non binary approach to keep their options open till they're older (I think non binary is nonsense, but if it doesn't involve medication and surgery then at least it's fairly harmless nonsense!)

I've tried mentioning that clinic in England that had so many issues, but it's like the shutters come down immediately. Now that I'm writing this, that defensive response makes me think maybe my friend has reservations. People are usually most defensive when they're unsure of their position.

I think I'll keep drip feeding information as casually as possible.

So true!
This is terrifying - they're totally playing with that child's life. I agree for me it'd be worth losing a friendship over - someone needs to stand up for that little girl. Could you drop feed them comments starting from very mild questions and building up to "I think you're at risk of ruining her life"? Maybe that would give it more chance for the message to sink in.
So disappointing from lesbians too. Surely of all people they can see how they'd have been at risk of being pushed down a trans route as children when they're now perfectly normal healthy lesbian women.

Exactly this. Makes my blood boil and all this simps that go along with it

Children live in their imagination, they just naturally role play and it’s pretty meaningless. transing a 3 year old child based on their play seems immoral and I would have many safeguarding worries. A child does not have the capacity to decide to take life altering drugs which will make him/her infertile.

Besides I really don’t understand how playing with trucks makes someone a boy, it seems a massive illogical leap. in the 80s as a kid I climbed trees, played with cars, played football, had short hair and was just a typical strong capable girl. I was just a Tom boy, with no pressure externally to be anything else but myself. I’m now a strong capable woman

That sounds like a truly horrendous, abusive and exploitative situation. The parents are using thye child to play out their own issues. The poor child is in for a life time of profound and major issues.

Frank Furedi in his book about boundaries talks about the erosion of boundaries between adulthood and childhood - and about how the key markers of transition, between one state and another, are disappearing in a culture which venerates boundarylessness and limitlessness.

Adults are abdicating their reponsibility by giving young children such choices. Choices they are not equipped to make or to handle. You see it in supermarkets and shops all of the time: parents asking their young children what they'd like for their dinner, or asking them to choose betwen one item and another.

The above examples are relatively trivial - but this giving up of adult responsibility in te name of 'child centred' everything has some darker and more disturbing implications.

Sounds like they see themselves as pioneeers and activists - and the child is being used to affirm their status with the community.

Remember Indigo children if a few years back? I met a ‘healer’ who earnestly told me that DS was an indigo child. I just thanked him and went off to look it up.

Sadly DS is not running the country, a leader of men (yet). Nor is he supernatural, although I have just mucked out his room and there was some pretty unearthly smells in there…

Sounds like the parents secretly wanted a boy, and/or are more comfortable with boys; they feel uncertain how to nurture a girl; maybe for fear of imposing gender streotypes around femininity - but ironically now doing that but in the guise of trans liberation).

I have often considered that a strong desire for a child of the opposite sex can infect the psychic/emotional atmosphere between parent and child - and the child then does its best to become what the parent wants.

There was a documentary film on Netflix 'Petite Fille' about a young french boy who had transitioned. His mother never hid the fact she had desperately wanted a girl when he was born

Is there a list of resources to give to parents who announce their kid is transitioning?

a summary of why blocked =bad and “you are probably doing conversion therapy on a little gay kid”?

So you've got a child who has limited understanding of these sorts of things and is in a situation where she's probably jealous of her baby sibling and misinterprets the reason the baby is getting more attention than her at the moment. As a result she makes what is (to a rational adult) an absurd claim - and her parents take it seriously! Of course it's worrying.

There was the case of 2 American lesbian mothers who transed their 2 sons, and then realised they'd made a mistake and de-transed them. I think one of the mothers talked about this on Mumsnet? Can't find it now, but could be useful for this mother. They were also caught up in a social circle where transing your child was deemed to be right-on.

It's here: https://pitt.substack.com/p/true-believer

I was going to mention referring to de-transitioners as another nudgy approach. It would enable you to focus on the child's well-being while staying within the framework of the parents' worldview, especially if you frame any such future change as an outlying possibility in much the same way you may quite naturally have a chat together about "if my child drops out of uni" etc. I also like the idea of referring to NB identities above, for the same reason.

This. Terrible, terrible parenting.
At seven she only has a few more years before she will be put on puberty blockers, and then cross sex hormones. That poor little girl, what on earth are they doing to her ? There is no such thing as a “trans” three year old.

There is nothing liberal about child abuse. Well maybe there is but it is not in the child's interest. I would be blunt about any medical intervention and probably not stay friends. It is a form of madness this belief that people can change sex.

Here are a couple of articles we were reading earlier this week. They make some very stark points about the effects of even social transition on children:

A childhood is not reversible - Transgender Trend

When a teenager says they're transgender - Transgender Trend

I think they're very well worth a read and they might spark some gentle questions you could ask if you get one of the parents in the right situation.

It's great that you care so much about this family and particularly this little girl. Even if you can't stop it, maybe you can help slow it down and give everyone involved something to reflect on.

I don't disagree with you on the wider point but allowing children some choices that they can understand within boundaries is generally considered to be good for them. E.g. do you want meatballs or macaroni cheese for dinner with broccoli or salad as a side is a choice that they can make. Allowing children to choose what they wear. These are choices they can understand without very long term consequences if they get it wrong - it's healthy to let children have control about less consequential decisions and make mistakes too as they get older e.g. allowing a teenager to go out without a coat and let them get cold, because it's a learning curve.

Of course you wouldn't let a child choose their dinner as a free choice EVERY NIGHT because they'd choose ice cream / chocolate every time and become diabetic (or at least my kids would). Ensuring they eat enough vegetables even though they don't like them - that's an adult responsibility.

Allowing children to feel a little more in control and giving them more choices as they get older is the right thing to do IMO.

However this should not be conflated with allowing children to make irreversible decisions they cannot understand. Children that have not gone through puberty cannot possibly understand loss of sexual function or reproductive potential. They just can't.

Children aren't adults and treating them as if they are is unhealthy and will harm them and there is definitely a push towards this in society. We don't allow children to drive, get married, get a job for a reason, but somehow they can "consent" (except they can't really) to sterility, life long medicalisation and loss of sexual function. It's insane.

I'm listening to Hannah Barnes' Time to Think book at the moment that meticulously documents the problems with GIDS Tavistock. She had interviewed some of the patients too. One of them still identifies as a boy, is still trans, but came off puberty blockers and felt they had been a terrible mistake that they had been sold as the solution. They had been on the drugs for 4 years (from 12-16 I think) and it had caused many medical problems - they've had 4 broken bones in a short time and their menstrual cycle didn't start until they were 18 and it is still irregular. They don't intend to go on cross sex hormones or have surgery and are happy dressing as a boy/man and having supportive family/friends. They felt the Tavistock didn't have a clue about other ways to be trans, and just pushed the medical model.

Seeing that not all "trans" people need to be on that medical conveyor belt might be helpful for your friend. She might be prepared to believe the medical care offered to "trans" children isn't safe/good enough more than she's prepared to countenance that her child isn't necessarily going to always be trans.

Kids can't consent to blockers and the people prescribing them are experimenting on kids who will have to live with the consequences for the rest of their lives. Broken bones as a teenager are one thing, but I hate to imagine how much worse it will get as they age.

The mother couldn't believe that noone was medically following up the effects on her child - being on them or coming off. Considering how experimental it all is, the lack of curiosity about gathering data or case reports to feed into future clinical decisions was mind boggling. They can't just say it's irreversible or safe if they don't actually record what happens to people when they take them or come off.

I hope that legal cases brought by detransitioners cause changes to the approach taken by insurance companies and healthcare in time for your friends's child. The malpractice and lack of safeguarding is horrendous.

So sorry you're in this situation OP. I would agree with pushing the non-binary idea, gently talking about side effects of pbs (which can be very serious) and also, if you can, the idea of 'transing away the gay'. Your friends are lesbians, surely they don't want to do this to their child? Far too soon to know about the child's sexuality but hopefully this will give them pause.

It is horrendous that they have taken the word of a 3 year old as gospel and set the child on an irreversible path as a result. What a shame the child didn't fixate on being a farmyard animal or literally anything else instead.

This thread is so useful. I have a friend just announce that they now have a daughter. Bible Belt of USA, he’s 12, very bright and socially isolated. I know that if I say anything it’ll be the end of our 30 years friendship which will be painful, but so will not saying anything. I might send her Hannah Barnes book and a card with “love you lots, don’t FFS put him on blockers or cut his cock off”. That bit might need some
editing.

Another key question is, I think, why do adult male transitioners not need to have surgery or take hormones but just be trans the way they are (something like 90% retain their penis) but children are pushed to a medical pathway? I think ALL parents should consider this. Some people are getting very rich from this.

Many adult transitioners do not have surgeries and of those that do, quite a few are vocal about how the outcome was not what they believe was promised, was experimental and has caused them harm e.g. Scott Newgent.

Even if you watch the Jazz Jennings tv show, you see the parents incredulous as the surgeons are clearly quite clueless, and just don't really know what's going to happen. Then the concern because Jazz has so many problems. The mother says at one point 'this isn't normal for someone this age' or something along those lines.

Trans surgeons like Marci Bowers - completely on board with gender ideology in general - are now raising concerns about the point at which pbs are used and have observed that using them at tanner stage 2 (I think?) results in 100% of cases of loss of sexual function.