Seven Years On

And Where Are We?

Seven years on and I still feel just as disgusted with the societal scandal and medical scam that is “trans.” I am just as angry with the adults who self-aggrandize at the expense of vulnerable youth. I am just as annoyed every time I see another politician or entertainer or journalist or Facebook post lying about a fictional class of people born with the necessity to be lied to about their sex and the necessity to be chemically and/or surgically altered to appear as the opposite sex in order to have any semblance of happiness, and how stunning and brave these special people are for meeting their needs despite the alleged negative judgment they face while doing so.

I am just as outraged when I hear another story about a woman attacked by a man in prison who pretends at being a woman; at another female athlete deprived of her rightful place on a podium because a male athlete was put in her place; at another woman fired from her job for complaining about men in the women’s changing room; or, and this is what really gets my goat (I looked it up, and nobody really knows where that expression comes from, although popular theories include stealing the goat that’s used to calm down a race horse), another law aimed at making it easier to chemically castrate children, causing, among other things, symptoms of menopause in pre-teens!

But all of that has little to do with my day-to-day life with a 20-year-old daughter attending a local college, working part-time, hanging out with her friends, lying to the world about her body, rejecting and chemically assaulting that body on a daily basis with synthetic testosterone. (She’s been doing this for two years now.) Nowadays, “trans” is just the way things are in my home, with my daughter.

On a daily basis, I just accept that my daughter has much hairier legs than her older brother or her father, a deepened voice, acne that never seems to go away (and that didn’t come until she started on “T”), and some features that are neither male nor female. I just accept that she pretends to be male to most people she already knows, and every new person she meets. I just accept that her breasts are suffering severe atrophy to the point that she can wear a thin t-shirt and there is no hint of the breasts that naturally grew during puberty. I just accept that, after two years, there is serious likelihood of damage to her sex organs, and legitimate concern about the blood tests that show things like high cholesterol in a slim, active young person, with legitimate fear for what else may be going haywire.

I realized the other day that this is my life now. It’s like being the parent of a child with drug addiction. At some point, you can’t keep hoping it will go away. Instead, you hope for your child to have the best life possible despite the addiction, not instead of it. Likewise, I am at the point where I just hope for my daughter to have the best life possible despite her belief in “trans,” and her concomitant choice to lie to herself and the world constantly and harm her body more and more each day.

Sure, I occasionally indulge in the momentary fantasy of my daughter as a detransitioner, someone who came to her senses, and realized the whole attempt to play-act at being male is, at best, pointless folly, and, at worst, Guantanamo Bay level psychological and physical torture. But I don’t dwell in that place.

Besides, even thinking of my daughter as a detransitioner is still acknowledging that she’ll never not be someone touched by “trans,” just as an addict is always an addict. She’ll always be touched by trans - trans or detrans. I can no longer hope for my daughter to get out of this unscathed and just move on as if it never happened.

Instead, the fantasy available to me now is to have a daughter who learned from her mistakes, gathered wisdom and strength, and moved on with her life, acknowledging the harms caused by her choices, and learning to live with the physical consequences thereof. And my daily task is to accept that this fantasy may never come true. My daughter may hold onto the “trans” belief forever, living a lie for the rest of her life. She may continue to take the toxic steroids that will inevitably sterilize her and may cause a laundry list of other medical issues. She may move on to have surgeries to remove healthy body parts (although they may be less healthy as a result of the testosterone), or to create faux body parts and stitch them to her body. This could be her life.

Regardless, I will still love her, still cheer her on every time she says or writes something clever and creative, still tell her how proud I am when she takes on new challenges. I will still share a laugh, a meal, a bubble tea or ice cream cone, a TV show or movie, especially all the holiday movies we love so much in December. I will celebrate milestones like graduations, to the extent she is comfortable with her “transphobic” parents being involved. And I will hope she has joy and meaning in her life, a relatively healthy and pain-free existence, and a long and productive life.

I’ll never give up the fantasy of detransition, but I will accept that my daughter has chosen to believe and live the lie of “trans,” and that this is now a part of our collective reality. Our daily existence is forever impacted by “trans.” Seven years on, that’s where I am.

How about all of you? Have you accepted that this is reality? Have you come to terms with it? Did your child desist or detransition? Are you still devastated on a daily basis? Are you just over the whole thing? And what about those of you who are not parents in this? How are you dealing with this issue today? Have you lost interest, given up on it, or moved on, or are you just as horrified as before, or more so, ready to speak out, even just to a few close friends or family? Let me know in the comments.

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