Heellp my 14 year old daughter says she wants to socially transition

[Pleasegotobed]

It is literally my worst nightmare.

She has a significant history of trauma as her dad is / was abusive. It’s been 3 years of hell. He is also a TRA and all over social media posting about resources for “queer children”.

she’s apparently been going to the lgbt club at school with her friendship group and now all of them have said they want to transition to using male names and pronouns. The teacher who runs the club has trans flags all over his wall. The head of year called me this morning to essentially ask for my consent to implement this at school. I raised my concerns about her history of exposure to dv (non mol in place), the social contagion aspect and that she’s also simultaneously self diagnosing herself as autistic and with adhd and is showing significant signs of anxiety.

What do I do and how do I handle this?

Can school and her dad consent to the social transition even if I say no? Her hoy seemed to have no idea what to do as I hadn’t consented and said he would speak to the head and DSL about where they would go from here. Which I assume means they may do it anyway?!

I would also reiterate if you can in any way reach out to the parents of the other girls who this has affected you may find some allies and can present a united front with the school.

Obviously go carefully as some of them might be full on TRAs but I bet some of them feel exactly as you do. Most normal people are not caught up in the insanity and just want to protect their children from harm.

I think the point that PPs have made about social transitioning setting children on a path (that it's very difficult to deviate from) to medical transition is an important one.

if they don’t have a councillor already to help with the abuse then now might certainly be the time.

it might be a teen rebellion or it might be them but for now look after your DC and make sure they feel enough and loved just as they are.

also do some personal research remember a mothers love should far outweigh any fear/distrust of trans people should it come to that. Use this as an opportunity to learn and grow with your child and let them know it’s interesting to explore gender but no decisions have to be made now

Do you mean counsellor? A councillor is a democratically elected member of the council.

Although, if it comes to it, if the school abdicate their safeguarding responsibilities, involving your MP if they are sensible and understand reality, may be an option further down the line if needed. Very much depends on the MP as to whether they'll be at all useful. This is for a later stage though.

If you find a counsellor to support your daughter you need to make sure you find one who has also read the Cass review and is committed to adopting the approach laid out by Cass. I.e. not affirmation only, not ignoring other issues.

Some great advice from dougal

Unfortunately the school is the "bouncer on the night club door" when it comes to all of this i.e. they hold the cards on how the events will unfold and whether it remains collaborative or takes a different direction. Hopefully they have your daughter's best interests and safeguarding front and centre in how they choose to conduct themselves but unfortunately we've all seen some of the many examples where this isn't the case.

There are also examples where the school has seemed collaborative but has clearly been behaving very differently behind the scenes. If you search posts from rogdmum you'll see some examples of this 😬 One thing that's changed for the better since she was navigating this stuff is that there is more public awareness of the harms that are linked to it all. Obviously it's still not universal but I can't imagine how difficult it must have been for her when there was much greater public ignorance and (most likely, from the receipts she's shared) activism within the leadership.

I can't remember if I said it up-thread but my approach has always been to assume that I'll bump into a blocking person somewhere, even if I'm not directly liaising with them and even if they are coming from a (mis)placed sense of kindness and/or ignorance. So having my MP involved from relatively early on has been beneficial for both the school and me IME.

As far as counselling or CAMHS is concerned, I would take a very cautious approach and make sure that the pathway is clear of affirmation on an individual person basis. My own experience with CAMHS has been difficult but we're making good progress now.

One other thing I'd say is, don't let them chip away at your confidence. You clearly love your child; you love her more and know her better than any teacher at that school. You're her parent, you have parental responsibility, they cannot take that away.

There's a reason children aren't allowed to drive, drink, get tattoos, get married or make permanent decisions until they're adults. As I said before, the school won't just say 'oh you have an inner deep identity of 'not coming to school' and 'not needing gcses' well that's fine then, see you if you ever decide to pop in'. And yet, on gender they're letting children lead the decision making. I know plenty of children who deeply, deeply don't want to be in school and strongly, strongly believe that gcses are pointless. And not doing gcses is something you can do later and doesn't involve lifelong medication. It's literally insane that safeguarding is just abandoned when it comes to gender ideology and it's so logically inconsistent as to make any rational adult weep.

Yes someone to support the child’s issues surrounding DV and abuse ect. An
unhappy teen with unresolved issues might try out different identities if their friends are as the OP said even tho it’s not truly them at their core.

one thing I would suggest with teens is don’t go to battle stations against this unless you want to make it seem seriously cool and rebellious. A calm measured approach will allow true feelings to come to the surface.

also remember if they truly are trans and that’s the worst case scenario for you would you loose your child over their pronouns and lifestyle? If not then just be a parent and give love 🧡

I would caution your threat of legal action until you are confident it won't result in her moving out and you having little access. She is 14 so a court will listen to her or her dad is accepting her decision.

Going against the school if she sees them as accepting is also likely to go against you with her.

I think you need to approach this in the smaller steps suggested above

also remember if they truly are trans and that’s the worst case scenario for you would you loose your child over their pronouns and lifestyle? If not then just be a parent and give love 🧡

To be "truly trans" requires:
a) an unwavering belief in the idea that everyone has a gender identity
b) a significant enough level of distress, linked to this belief, that someone is willing to put their trust in doctors who also hold the same belief, where there is no proven empirical evidence base. It's essentially "faith based" consent, rather than informed consent.

Speaking as a non-believer, I would hope that no child or vulnerable young person finds themselves on a pathway where a belief in gender identity leads them to make decisions that are irreversible and bring huge risk to their endochrine system and overall physical health. It's heartbreaking that this is happening on a huge scale in the UK and other countries.

Yes, I would agree with you that "just being a parent and giving love" is all we can ultimately do as our children grow older and make decisions for themselves. But I can't imagine many parents would just rollover and accept their child falling in to this mess if they don't believe in gender identity themselves. Bringing the concept of "true trans" on to this thread is unhelpful unless you know you're speaking to a fellow believer.

Talk to your daughter. Truly understand what she meant and why. Then hopefully you have the answer and take it from there.

Yes.. my fear is that the school are gatekeepers and they will wave it on through… their incorrect definition of sex on the website isn’t exactly filling me with hope. Still waiting on them coming back to me…

HOW can this legally be the case?! My child’s school can potentially give them a sex change without my consent or even some medical oversight?! It’s beyond belief.

I’ve been in touch with Bayswater who seem great. I agree she needs psychological support for all the other stuff but she has declined it - I’ve tried.

I am extremely concerned about her just moving in with her dad - it was the first thing that crossed my mind. He is extremely manipulative. But I don’t think parenting decisions should be taken out of fear.. so my feeling is that I will love and support her and be compassionate but still fight for what I think is best for her. He does very very little actual parenting. She realises that on some level too.

Unfortunately my future MP is a 5* TWAW Lib Dem whacko.

There will be zero support there!

Is your DD's school part of an academy chain or run by the local authority. If it's the LA could you contact the councillor responsible for education?

I’d be asking the school what clinical qualifications the person who started the Club has. Children shouldn’t be led towards social transition and clubs should be interest-based not affirming what should be a clinical diagnosis with absolutely no qualifications to do so (I presume).

As for your DD, I think it’s really important to listen to her. Act and speak in a neutral and calm way. Ask her questions and allow her to speak. You can’t lead her to the right answer. She has to find it herself, by exploring her thoughts (preferably with you) and by asking and answering questions. My first question to her would be, “Why?” Why does she want to socially transition? Change her name?

What are your plans for the summer?
If her dad is one of these "useless until it impacts on my control" dads then he won't be interested in doing anything with her, just in having control; Erin Friday has spoken about taking her daughter away off grid for weeks or months to get her away from the toxic friendship group. Any chance you could do something like that?

I'm sorry you're in this position. I had to negotiate a similar situation with a clueless, be kind school. There's some great advice on this thread I'd add one small point. I ended up making a complaint about the first meeting I'd had with school when I tried to raise a safeguarding issue as my DD one of about 10 girls in her year group affected. Naïvely I thought pointing out the social contagion aspect would change school's approach but it didn't. When I ended up meeting HT and safeguarding lead, I was more measured, had way more evidence at my fingertips and didn't assume they knew or understood anything. I acknowledged that for every parent like me there was probably one trying to get school to go further and faster with transitioning their kid and that I didn't envy them. Sorry I'm going the scenic route here to make my point.

Which is, I acknowledged school was in a difficult position but they only had any responsibility for my child till she's 18 while we're her parents for life, no one knows her or loves her more and that my nightmare scenario was her asking me when she's 25 with a fully grown brain, " why didn't you stop me". The HT followed up with an ex pupil who had transitioned at school to see how they were doing (not well) and I really think that was the moment that they started listening to everything else I was saying.

It was back in 2021 so no Cass or KCSIS updates then and I've been feeding info to school ever since. They've definitely changed tack. My DD in a much better place. Not fully out of it but in s place we can be hopeful.

Good luck. As others have said, you're not alone (or crazy). Fight like you've never fought before

It’s a single academy trust. I don’t really know a lot about how that works structurally?

I had a call from school to organise a meeting with the head next week “in response to my email”. I guess that will be re my informal complaint about the lgbt club which I sent to him, rather than dd since I addressed the email about her to her head of year.
Do you think it’s okay to meet in person instead of in writing? I don’t really have anyone who can go with me to take notes. I will summarise via email afterwards.

sadly her dad will have her for nearly half the summer - but we are travelling in Europe for 2.5 weeks so will be pretty off grid then and she’s at a music camp for another week. I’ve organised a diving thing that she wants for her birthday too which will take a couple of days up!! Next week is work experience so she won’t be there at all - and then there’s only a fortnight left of school… 🍷

This is an incredibly insightful book. Irreversible Damage: Teenage Girls and the Transgender Craze amzn.eu/d/0ckiUIXx

I'm a in awe of your calmness, if this was one of my grandaughters I would be making Rambo look chilled!

Be assured that must just be how I’m coming across- in real life I’m trying not to have a breakdown while being very calm to school and dd 🤣

I think the best way to go into the meeting is to be prepared. Write down all your questions and concerns. Over the next few days every time you think of something jot it down and nearer the time put it together into some sort of coherent plan on what you want to discuss. I can only imagine you probably feel that it’s all out of your control, so try and take some of it back. I hope that everything goes better than you anticipate and so sorry that you are having to go through this.

💐💐💐

If it helps to hear it, things are far from "sorted" in my conversations. I keep having to pivot between the approach of the school as a whole and my daughter's own EHCP. I still don't know if she'll remain at this school (reasons not connected to gender stuff) so it's imperative that everything goes in there to protect her as this will be the legal document that moves with her. There is still more to do on the EHCP, following a submission this year from CAMHS and last year's submission from the initial paediatrician. There has been a change in the staff at the LA and it's clearly being blocked there... somewhere. That'll be one of my next "battlegrounds".

Remaining calm on the outside while more angry and scared than I've ever felt about anything is a skillset I never knew I needed.

You're getting some great advice on here. @Cantunseeit it sounds like you did a great job and are continuing to do so. And a million yeses to this:

Good luck. As others have said, you're not alone (or crazy). Fight like you've never fought before 💪

@Justme56 has good advice and I also think that your idea of a post-meeting email to share with the participants and confirm that you have correctly summarized what was discussed/decided. Good luck, OP, you’re advocating so well for your DD. 💐

So I just wanted to do a quick update in case there’s anything I’ve missed:

had the meeting with the school and it went as well as it could have I think.
they had clearly not considered the lgbt club as being an issue and have very little oversight. They were open to the idea of changing it to a broader “equalities club” but pushed back when I tried to bring up my concerns about its current format. He’s going to take my questions to the trustees meeting in September though.

they have agreed not to transition dd without clinical oversight / advice. They feel they’re in a mess with no guidance and potential legal challenges whatever they do but say they really want to get it right. They’ve offered her mh support which she refused but they’re going to suggest gp for camhs referral and bring up support again with her. They want me to talk to her over the summer and we will check in again in September to see where we are.
I am about to email them to summarise this in case I need it in the future!

dds friends mum contacted me about them going to a summer camp together so dd is signed up for that and very excited- which I think will be great as all outside activities and no phones allowed! A week less with her dad too…
talking of whom - he has ordered a “trans celebration pack” which I happened to see! Many flags, badges and hats etc. nothing seems to have happened with it yet but I am not sure at all how to handle it if / when it does.

You're doing an incredible job under incredibly difficult circumstances 💪💐

@Pleasegotobed Well done! It sounds as if it's gone as well as possible at this stage. It is brilliant they've agreed not to transition your DD without clinical oversight - that is in line with Cass and needs to be front and centre in your email summary! Make sure you reference Cass too.

The summer camp honestly sounds like the most positive and beneficial thing you could do at this point and the school holidays have come at a good time.

In terms of her Dad this sounds very, very familiar He does very very little actual parenting. She realises that on some level too.

Your DD will realise who is there helping her, supporting her and organising fun activities for her and who ISN'T more and more as she gets older. Have you seen the transwidows threads? It's eye opening the commonalities in behaviour that - to put it mildly - does NOT centre child wellbeing.

Bringing your complaint about the LGBT club to trustees in September is a little pushing it into the long grass. Governors can be expected to have extra meetings and / or for the chair of governors to deal with issues outside of regular meetings. Did you mention you believed it could be a safeguarding issue due to the clear social contagion happening?

However, it's definitely worth ignoring their obvious attempt to sidestep this for the time being in favour of prioritising what is best for your child. You have shown them that you are aware of a potential safeguarding failure, it sounds as if they've admitted they have little oversight about what is taught / goes on in that club (make sure you get that in any email summary) and that you are willing to use the complaints procedure. This shows you're not a pushover and you understand their responsibilities.

I would also include, if you can the information about the number of girls wishing to transition after attending the club. It sounds extremely obviously of concern - when the information gets to them any governor worth their salt would be wanting to know why SLT don't have oversight of that club and raising safeguarding concerns.

That sounds like a positive step from the school, OP. Very well done.