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Healthy Transitions for Girls's avatar

Thank you for sharing the plain truth. I am angry too. I am a therapist who sees what you see. I live in Idaho and worked hard to pass a bill that would protect my personally held beliefs so that I could offer therapy that is based upon real science for gender-confused kids. We could not pass a bill that protects the personally held beliefs of therapists, a most basic constitutional right. Idaho Medicaid follows the mandates of the counseling professions which require me to use gender-affirming care, to embrace and promote the transgender agenda, and to tell parents who don't agree that they are oppressing and discriminating against their child. I am making a career change and have lost income because I refuse to comply with this evil. I am fighting with you. You are not alone.

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Shar Ron's avatar

We should take back the vocabulary. Gender affirming care needs to be defined as birth gender affirming care. Take back words

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Mars's avatar

Thank you for fighting. As a teacher, I have also had to change career directions because of the pressure to go along.

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gaynor harding's avatar

When my wonderful psychoanalyst asked me why i didn’t think that cross sex identifying people ought to have the right to self identify just like homosexuals do, I fired her . She had finally swallowed the koolaid. I have been trying to get help for the ptsd from my brother having a sex change in 1975. I have cycled through several therapists but not one was empathetic or informed. I am the sole caregiver for my brother/sister who has been paralyzed for 37 years after cardiac complications from HRT. Completely paralyzed. The conflicting emotions I experienced are at times intense. I find gallows humour helpful. Good luck and much love. You are not crazy, not alone. Enjoy life. It is worth it.

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Person's avatar

Caring for a paralysed person is very tough. You have extra reasons to be angry. Stay strong. Best wishes for some happiness in 2024.

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BowWow's avatar

There is such a need for non-affirming therapists, even if just for parents. Can a non-affirming therapist continue to practice if they are just private pay? You would have no shortage of clients.

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Healthy Transitions for Girls's avatar

I'm getting a coaching certification. Haven't decided if I will keep my license but therapists who object to what is happening in the system need to be looking for other options. It won't get better in the short term.

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Student of Rhythm's avatar

We might start seeing a proliferation of ex-therapist life coaches for this reason. I've been skeptical of life coaches, but I'd be interested if I found one who quit being a therapist over this point of conscience.

Recently I read M. Scott Peck's _People of the Lie_ and he has a whole chapter about one problem patient who kept pushing him to "affirm" her. "She wanted to be loved for herself, neurosis and all." It's horrifying to contemplate the profession of therapy getting taken over by people who enable and even encourage that.

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Karen Lynch's avatar

One of my favorite books. I hadn’t thought to put that together with gender “affirmation”

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Hecate's Daughter's avatar

We need to affirm the best of the person and the physical reality, not the gender.

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