How do I handle this?!

[PyongyangKipperbang]

Full disclosure, had a couple of wines.

Out for a drink with eldest DD and DD3, who had more than a couple. She decided, whilst obviously drunk, to have an all out "I am not a woman, I am a man, my pronouns are he him, does that mean you wont love me anymore?" She is 20. Eldest DD (27) tried to rein it in, as did I because its not a good time to have that kind of conversation.

I said that I would always love her but I said that I would probably forget her new chosen name and will almost certainly call her by her birth name, but thats not out of disrespect but from habit. She was fine with that, but then went on a rant about JK. She said "I know you love JK and you have to choose her or me" I said "I dont love JK but I believe in science". Then she said "Do you believe in my choice or JK?!!!" and I said "I respect your choice. But you know I believe in womens rights". She started saying "Then you dont love me" and I said (I was calm, took a lot of effort) "I am not being emotionally blackmailed" and left.

What do I do now?

ETA that I realised that I said "I believe in womens rights" and that when she lost it

Firstly, @PyongyangKipperbang, though she may not know it right now, your DD has an amazing, thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate mum. And in the long run, that will stand her in good stead.

The course leader sounds great. I think that, even if communication between the two of you is strained right now, hopefully the conversation can still carry on between the CL and DD, and that can only be a good thing.

Otherwise, I don’t have anything more to offer other than hugs and good wishes and a shoulder should you need it xxx

I think this is, essentially, how we navigated this (see my overly verbose comment above). For a while it felt like the elephant in the room as I refused to discuss it, but I have made it clear that I love her with every atom of her being, am proud of her and what she has achieved recently - the hard work and dedication that she needed to put into it, not the ‘achievement’ itself - and that while this issue is something we won’t see eye to eye on ever, it cannot define our relationship. I’ve made clear I and her dad will always be there for her - will come and get her in a crisis wherever she is in the world - and she will always have a home with us. I hope she is never foolish enough to start hormones or consider surgery (she faints for vaccinations, and was hysterical before going into have her tonsils out at 14, so am fairly confident she won’t…) but if she did, I would still look after her, just as I would for any other illness. I think she gets that as she is still here at 20.

I’d say that the issue you have OP is that she is begging for your approval. It’s taken the form of wanting approval for the trans identity - do you communicate your pride, love and approval of her in other ways? I am sure you do, but sometimes they develop selective blindness. I wonder whether it is worth sending her a summer card/gift to celebrate finishing another year of uni/tell her how proud you are of her in those other areas of life where you do agree (her degree, her career or life plans). I’d keep reaffirming your love and pride in those areas, ad nauseam if necessary, so that her internal monologue of ‘mum doesn’t accept my trans id’ is, if not overwritten then at least heavily overlaid with, ‘despite our differences my mum adores me and is proud of me’. It becomes difficult for them to maintain the cognitive dissonance of these two positions if you keep highlighting the latter.

Sorry I can’t offer anything more concrete, but I DO think the fact that she reached out at silly o’clock is a sign that she wants connection. Try not to discount this - if she didn’t love you, if she didn’t recognise that you love her on some level, she would have gone no contact. It’s a shaky foundation, but it’s one you can build upon nonetheless.

Defintely. Reading Judith Butler is like wading through treacle. Funny how being socialist now equates with finding women's rights transphobic.
I hope your DD comes to realise this eventually meanwhile, 💐

What a lovely wise post.

And this from @Igmum:
"The best advice I ever got was to focus on our relationship and the non-trans stuff. You say when you’ve seen her outside this she’s not as bad. Would she do nice social stuff with you? With her sisters? At least she’s still with family."

Transactivism seems to turn young people in on themselves with a narcissistic take on their life - hence her attempts to control you in relation to her. In reality young people should be forming views and growing in confidence in themselves in relation to the outside world - as a family member, student, adult, employee, friend, member of a club/sport/hobby etc. So everything that encourages her back into the real world away from all this benefits her in the long run - and hopefully your relationship long term.

Just sending some , @PyongyangKipperbang. This all sounds so very hard.

I was listening to Julie in Gender land podcast and one of the last episodeswas interesting. She spoke to a young woman ((think about 17) who explained how basically she had been pushed by her female partner to think she must be a man in the wrong body because it seems the girlfriend couldn't handle being a lesbian. It's a view point I hadn't heard before. I had heard of internalised homophobia but not pressure from a romantic partner cos they couldn't cope.

You might find the podcast helpful. She talks to parents, experts and one or two of the children. You get a sense of the culture young people are in. It might help you navigate.

Agree with everyone who says you are handling this very well.

That sounds very interesting thank you. I suspect that may have happened to a girl I know.

From a trans person's perspective, this is the approach. Putting ideology over family relationships is just all kinds of terrible. Also when people come out as any flavour of queer, they more often than not feel most vulnerable and are oftentimes expecting rejection, particularly if they know very well that the person they want to tell has a huge problem with queer people.

As Cautious suggests, focus away from all that and express your love and pride anyway.

particularly if they know very well that the person they want to tell has a huge problem with queer people.

You are prejudiced and judgmental.

Being protective of your child from irreversable experimental healthcare which has known horrendous side effects and telling lies that can not be true is not 'having a problem with queer people'.

I don't hate gay people. I don't hate trans people.

You are now making quite serious personal attacks which are dishonest and untrue.

I suggest you retract them.

The problem is OP, parental alienation is baked into trans ideology - I'm sure that's reflected in some of your daughter's comments.
Cynical trans adults and groups deliberately frame families as "bigoted". It's an appalling thing to do as anyone with any knowledge of what happens to young people alienated from their parents knows that they do dreadfully in all life chances that can be measured - poor mental health, lower academic achievement, homelessness, increased risks of drug use etc. We know this in society - all our data shows it.
Yet transactivists - the majority of who are not parents - run around warning children of hostile reactions. It's abusive. Responsible parents safeguard their children and always encourage questioning and self reflection. Being LGB is completely different to being trans - it comes with no drugs, surgery or denial of reality.
A child who thinks they're the wrong sex needs love, compassion and care from their family and community with activists being kept well away from them.

@BeeSouriante, your comments and accusations to RedToothBrush are completely unacceptable. I'm sorry you've been abused in the past but RTB saying things you don't agree with does not mean you can accuse her of hating gay and trans people.

Get a bloody grip. And - if you were a fraction of a decent person - apologise to RTB.

The irony is I'm actually helping a gay friend with some stuff for a pride event next month. He's a really lovely guy and really passionate about it all and tbh I'm not going to be a killjoy to someone with that much positive energy to push the subject in a healthy way. I had no idea how he felt about militant trans activism, it's really not come up in conversation at all. It's not something I was ever going to approach. Nor did I actually feel it was my business to ask.

A mutual friend got talking to him about it and was surprised at his reservations about the militants saying that he thinks he'd have been transed away if he were younger and thinks there's a problem with homophobia and a total lack of safeguarding for young gays and lesbians when they start to come out and says what a confusion of feelings it is at that age.

Mutual friend knows my concerns in this area and has mentioned the conversation. Gay friend is absolutely fabulous and brilliant and just himself. I'm glad he had the time and space without the pressures of militant activism to work it out for himself. The fact that we no longer can have tom boys or effeminate men without people around them jumping on it and saying you must be trans or you are bigoted for even questioning is definitely an issue no one wants to talk about.

And one that members within the gay community are awake too. They know it's a concern and threat.

There are massive elements of homophobia to this, and this is what the Cass Report picked up on. Hannah Barnes also talks about how there was effectively an attitude of complete disregard for anyone who might latter detransition by the Tavistock and how affirm only approaches were harming very troubled young people. And that's what the context of this thread is about. A young person who lost and acting in a way constant with cultlike influence around her.

So I find it actually laughable that I'm being painted as someone who spits at gay people and trans people. It really couldn't be further from the truth. I'm concerned that young people are being sacrificed on the altar of this to legitimise the decisions and life choices of older males.

And tbh I was hoping that the above message attacking me had been left to stand - it's enlightening. I didn't report it. But thank you to those of you who did anyway.