Multiple five-year-old children accepted as patients to Belfast Trust's transgender service

[IwantToRetire]

Children as young as five have been accepted as patients of Northern Ireland's specialist transgender health service, the News Letter can reveal.
The news comes after it was revealed last week that health minister Mike Nesbitt has committed extra funding for trans patients.

The figures were obtained via a Freedom of Information request to the Belfast health trust, which runs the Province’s trans services.

Article continues https://www.newsletter.co.uk/health/multiple-five-year-old-children-accepted-as-patients-to-belfast-trusts-transgender-service-5243998

Also

Five-year-old transgender patients 'down to parents and doctors' says academic critic of trans movement Kathleen Stock
https://www.newsletter.co.uk/health/five-year-old-transgender-patients-down-to-parents-and-doctors-says-academic-critic-of-trans-movement-kathleen-stock-5245621

This should count as child abuse and the parents should be referred to social services. Let 5 year olds be 5 year olds.

The parents need investigating - age five?!

Thanks for sharing this article. It's utterly appalling that a parent would even think of a young child in such a way.

i thought i was a pirate at age 5, most of these young kids are probably just gay, the parents and doctors doing this should be reported to social services

This is complete madness and agree with PP it’s child abuse

how on earth can a child of 5 be trans? Are we talking little girls who prefer cars and action heroes? Little boys who want a play kitchen? This is actually worse than when people would say kids would ‘end up gay’ playing with toys aimed at the opposite sex. I can’t even articulate properly how fucked up it is.

when I was in school there was a girl who insisted she was a horse, it’s a good job her parents weren’t nuts, they’d have had her in the 13.40 at Kempton

It's worth remembering that we don't know what the doctors have told them. I know a 4yo who went to Scotland's gender clinic and the parents were actually told the child had no concept of gender, the medics tried to calm the situation down but were still criticised in the press after a similar FOI request. Because of patient confidentiality they can't answer back.

Obviously the family just stropped off to mermaids and told people how biased the NHS was against them. I don't think I'd have found my way here if not for them and how crazy this seemed (I thought the NHS had given them good news).

I honestly can't imagine what sort of distress a five-year old would be having for the parents/guardians to think they need a gender clinic to sort it out. They're only just realising what yesterday and tomorrow mean let alone what gender is. It's ludicrous.

Child abuse
Parents need referring to SS

Imagine if we as a society affirmed all the passing whims of a five year old: you don’t want to go to school? OK. You would like a can of beer? Sure, why not. You fancy getting a tattoo? No problem! You want to go for a walk across the motorway? Crack on! You want to sleep in a tent on your own in the park? Great idea!

Etc etc

My nephew by marriage (was niece but didn’t know then then) as young as preschool told teachers that when they grow up they wanted to be a man, refused to wear school dresses etc. Over 20 years ago so long before the current fad started and before mainstream social media. They tried ignoring, they tried insisting on proper school uniform and all kids of other measure but at 16 they changed name and pronouns. No “treatment” until over 18 but trans kids do exist, rare but exist

I'm sorry but as a parent you've got to be some sort of wrogun to be saying your child is not the sex they were born and to be going to clinics. its a case of Munchhausen's by proxy. just let kids be kids dont have to label them

The treatment would be better getting them to accept and live in the sex they are. No one can change sex but we are all free to subvert gender stereotypes and present however we like. It’s free, easy and requires no medication! And no coercing other people into colluding with a falsehood.

I suspect many such parents have an overwhelming desire for a child of the opposite sex to the one they have. Children live in the shadow of their parents psychic life and are shaped by that.

What you are describing is a child who doesn not want to be restricted by gender stereotyping and the messges they receive about what it means to be a girl or boy. This is a perfectly normal response. It does not make the child 'trans' whatever that is supposed to mean. It simply means that the child does not want conform to what is expected of them.

Your neice is most likely same sex attracted...as in a lesbian. Many nascent gay and lesbian children experience this.

Your niece sounds like me as a kid. I'm so glad I was left alone to not fit into a gender stereotype of the adults' making. Of YOUR making.

Sterilising kids is NOT ok.

I find it extremely disturbing to find that gender stereotypes are so ingrained in people that they consider someone who hates wearing skirts as a bloke?! I haven't worn a skirt since I was forced to at school - decades ago!

She might not even lesbian. I wouldn't add labels like that either. Tomboys/tomgirls often grow up to be straight too.

I’m a Social Worker in NI, and I would be very interested in completing an assessment on a family like this. Suppose to see what the dynamics are, family history or concerns.

Absolutely!

No child should be referred to these clinics until they can demonstrate that they fully understand the concepts of sex and gender and the difference between them will vary but certainly not before 7/8 - more likely 11/12

Yes, they might get a sensible HCP who understands child development and tells the parent to leave their child alone/get them off internet/social media OR they might get a captured HCP who believes in 'affirmation' and pushes that very young child to somewhere the child cannot return from - even if they want to.

It should never get to these specialist clinics at this age - they should have to go through health visitors/school nurses/pediatricians/teachers, especially early years teachers- people who understand children and who can help the parent understand that there are many ways to be a boy and a girl and that their behaviour, what they choose to wear and play with, who they choose to play with, has absolutely no relevance to their sex.

Many years ago you would occasionally hear of mothers who wanted a daughter so dressed their baby / toddler / pre schooler boy as a girl and grew their hair long.
Never heard of fathers doing any such dressing up (probably because they wouldn’t actually be arsed in physically caring for their child themselves) but certainly letting their daughters know they were a poor second to the son they actually wanted and giving feminine versions of the male name they had intended to use.
They were rightly criticised but these days it is celebrated.

But when it was over 25 years ago had this child been protected from the insidious cultural sexism that male is better than female, that the primary purpose, value and power of a woman is her beauty/sexual attractiveness and usefulness to men, and that all the greatest achievements and leaders and doers in the world are men, with occasional token women added in as an afterthought. I know the answer is no and anyone who says yes is lying, because I was there at the time too and I also wanted to be a man until I was mature enough to realise that what I really wanted was to be free and valued as a fully valid human being, and that's a privilege that culture grants so much more readily to men than to women that it's very easy to conflate the concepts in the mind of anyone under about 35.

Petition begins to revoke fresh funding for Northern Ireland transgender NHS services
https://www.newsletter.co.uk/health/petition-begins-to-revoke-fresh-funding-for-northern-ireland-transgender-nhs-services-5248991

Never mind the parents, why are the professionals who are referring and the professionals who are being referred to and accept the referral should be imprisoned.

Its child abuse. Pure and simple.

And its actualy depressing that people have commented on this thread about the parents, but no one has commented on the professionals and the degree to which they have bought into this on all levels ESPECIALLY since over the week or so we've seen the extent of the rot within the NHS.

There's no such thing as a vegan cat.

There should be an autism assessment first and foremost in all of these childhood gender confusion cases.

I don’t actually think it’s a bad thing. There was an interview with a psychiatrist on the Nolan show a while back, he was a whistleblower for the Tavistock clinic. He said rather than medical affirmation children should be told that it’s understandable that they feel that way but it’s important to understand why they feel that way.

Then therapy to help break it down. At five this is a parent led situation. I think a clinical programme thst consists of therapy for the child ( and their caregivers) and watchful waiting till 18 will help. I think people left to their own devices start self diagnosing and ordering drugs off internet.