Medicalization. Surgery. Pronouns. Name and sex marker changes. Influencers at school. We parents navigate through these troubled waters where our kids are suddenly “trans”… and will do something—ANYTHING—to slow our children down from medicalizing their identities. We rightfully place a good deal of blame on the process, and on the medical personnel and clinicians advocating and prescribing these permanently life-altering hormone treatments and mutilating surgeries, just as
I fell for all of this. While reading this article I stopped and removed my kid from the paper hug program. I am so ashamed that I supported any of this. This has all seemed wrong from the beginning.
My liberal daughter is a "mama bear" and has 3 children. age 14, 16 and 18, whom I have been very close to since they were born. I love my daughter and grandchildren very much, but due to my political affiliation, over the past 18 months, my daughter has distanced herself from me. I'm a Christian, she's an atheist. In the past year, I have posted many comments (not hateful or nasty) about my concerns with the progression of LGBTQAI+, pride month, boys in girls sports, transvestites reading to toddlers in libraries, men in female bathrooms, men in women's beauty pageants, and particularly the Biden Administration's appointment of Rachael Levine. In doing so, my daughter unfriended me on Facebook and showed her children everything I said (they weren't on facebook) and alienated them from me. She says I'm hateful and bigoted. Come to find out, the 2 girls (16 & 18) are "identifying" as gay (even though they've never expressed these tendencies) and the 14 year old boy is identifying as a transgender named Diana. What are the chances that all 3 children would be "gay" or transgender??? Social media and Hollywood encourage the practice of bisexual or same sex relationship to a fault. None of them will speak with me which is difficult because I would spend a week with them every other month and every holiday while they were growing up as normal kids. I'm so depressed I don't know what to do. What I do know is that there are many people who think like me and that brings me comfort. Thank you for letting me vent and thank you, PITT, for reaching out with your truthful dialog.....
Oh Linda that’s heartbreaking. Truly. Grandparents are are whole other group being impacted with this ideology. I pray things go better. Showing young kids Facebook posts between two adults and posts that your daughter feels puts HER in the right and a loving grandma in the wrong is IMO another example of using these ideologies to promote oneself. I’m so sorry.
If you have to ask, then your idea of traditional family values are different than mine. I do not have a problem with gay people. I have a gay sister whom I love. However, I will not bow down to whose who want to put me in a phobia category. Homosexuality is not the normal relationship that my Christian upbringing embraces. I know there are people who are truly not happy in a traditional relationship. However, gayness is now being pedaled as normal and is glorified to the extreme in our society. Many young people are indoctrinated into jumping on this train as a means to dismiss the concept of man/woman. Men are emasculated and women are emboldened to reject men. Sex and promiscuity are encouraged as well. How does humanity survive with this mentality? I am 72 years old and live in a world I no longer recognize.
If my use of the word 'abnormal" offends you, that's your phobia. As a journalist, I'm sure you have a plethora of synonyms. I'll try "unusual" or "extraordinary" just for you.
You are speaking out based upon your own life experiences and are being very judgmental in my opinion. You have no idea as to the dynamics of my relationship with my grandchildren. I welcome debates and am willing to do so. My comment about gayness refers to the fact that it is being pedaled through social media and movies as normal for confused, heterosexual children. Social media is not restricted in my daughter's home and the focus on how the world embraces, celebrates, and favors homosexuality over heterosexuality is powerfully tauted. Young children are groomed in school to embrace their sexuality by any means.
It is so important to try to understand all that we can about every aspect of what is going on. Thank you so much for reporting back from the front lines where most of us cannot go. You have not harmed those mothers or their kids, you have just described phenomena and reported facts. I am not sure why judging something good or bad according to basic values is now judged to be bad behavior.
I'm struggling with the tone of this. Until I became a mother, I didn't realize it was the judgiest space out there. And I'm guilty, myself. I still can't imagine a mother not questioning experimental treatment of a healthy body. That said, I can't help but think this is another indicator of where we've arrived as a culture. I completely agree that this is an ideology, a new world view. A child with a trans ID likely offers a meaningful experience where before there was a vacuum. I think, as humans, we are wired for meaning that we use to bind us together in social groups. We organize around a mythology, and these moms have found theirs. Also, once in, it's really hard to change course--especially if you've greenlighted procedures that may have harmed your kid. Can you imagine?! Most would have to double-down to protect their own psyche--it takes tremendous courage, courage few in our modern culture have, to acknowledge and take responsibility for such a mistake. I have not followed these groups, and I haven't fostered relationships with any affirming mothers to have real conversations. The ideology continues to sicken me. AND I would encourage curiosity and compassion. We can only make assumptions as to what's really in their hearts and minds. Let's be careful.
My wife is an affirming mom to our biological daughter who she refers to with their new desired name and pronouns. She had us all visit with a gender pathways counselor and I sat in on the discussion and put my foot down on any medical or surgical interventions. They immediately tried pushing puberty blockers. I’ve told my wife our daughter cannot remove their breasts until they are 18 if that is their decision and my wife has said she agrees with this. My wife is a liberal feminist but is all on board with the trans affirming train. I wanted to see a non-affirming counselor for our daughter but in the meantime we are seeing a Christian couples/family counselor. The counselor just basically says we may have to agree to disagree because I don’t know I can change her mind.
Make sure to clearly explain that insurance coverage from 18-26 is not automatic. If they do not have insurance coverage, this can be very costly. Who provides the insurance? If it is you, you can make the decision to remove her from your plan. This might wreck your marriage, so this is not a step to be taken lightly. But it is a point of leverage.
Not much leverage , unfortunately, since many states "help" with the cost. The colleges certainly do. That is if you are in US. I don't know about other countries.
Maybe there is a chance this craziness burns out. I want to remain someone optimistic. Otherwise this is the new normal. My wife believes transgenders are the new homosexual.
I think there are too many vested interests/profiteers for it to just burn out on it's own. Too many Gifters are making a buck as speakers and in plastic surgery, etc - protected by those who claim this is a "civil rights" movement. I think it will end. It has to end. But, I think it will require push back coming in many forms - and then it needs to be kept down with a GI museum so that it never happens again.
Your wife is a Believer. Cults do pass but generally not on their own. And, this one is really entrenched in all of our institutions. Pharma like Johnson & Johnson make $$ on it - it works for the Democrat party and the Republicans mostly don't seem to think pushing back on it is a priority. Non-believers are afraid to speak out as they are called names and they lose their jobs. I have high hopes for the Elon Musk buyout of Twitter being of some help. Then, there need to be lawsuits. Lots of lawsuits.
Even with insurance the gender pathways meeting was over $700 and my wife said she had no idea it was going to be that expensive. She was the one that signed up for it and when I found out I told her exactly what they were going to do and sure they did those exact things. You are exactly right, there is too much money being made, this is big billion dollar business, these people are a money grubby con artists who pretend to care. I’m not sure if it’s women though that get conned into this more often than not. Like my wife takes a handful of pharmaceutical drugs and has no push back because drs prescribe it to her and she seems to have no intention to getting off of it. Now the experts say you must affirm your child with drugs and surgeries or they may suicide themselves. I don’t want to typecast all women, but my experience with my wife is she’s no skeptical at all. Same with the Covid vaccines, she said she didn’t believe in any government conspiracy.
Sad but true. I know several of these affirming moms personally. One even decided that she herself was nonbinary, after her daughter "transitioned." It's an ideology, no doubt about it. I wonder how many of them will blame themselves ten or fifteen years from now?
Reading the comments from the affirming moms made my stomach hurt. How did we get so far from the ideal of teaching our kids to love themselves just as they are almost overnight? How have we redefined "true self" to mean the infertile, scarred person you are become after hormones and surgery? And how can anyone who has ever been a 14-year-old girl think that an elective mastectomy is a choice children of that age are ready to make? I think about my 14-year-old self, and she was barely ready to pick out her own clothes.
This is going to seem like such a sad, bizarre chapter in history when it passes. I can only hope it passes soon.
This article is spot on. I follow a group on Facebook where the comments she posted are exactly like that . The glee with which the moms post about the drastic physical changes ( binding, top surgery, hormones) their children are going through is to me astounding and very scary. How a mother (or father, but that is apparently rarer) can support their own healthy child’s physical mutilation in rapid and sudden onset is incredible to me. In such groups any questioning is shut down. It seems they live in an alternate reality and what when the child later wakes up to the fact that they will never be of the other sex? It’s all a charade /fantasy . This is heartwrenching actually.
Thanks for posting this. I don't feel "worthy" to comment, as I'm not personally going this this crisis, but empathize deeply with those who are and wanted to share an adverse event that spills over beyond the family unit. I met what tuned out to be a very dear friend 20 years ago. We were both single parents, her by choice, myself by divorce. We managed to maintain a close relationship even as she left the city we met in, married, and adopted her second child. 11 years later, she announced her adopted daughter was a boy in a Christmas news letter. I didn't think much about it, assuming it was a fad, the child was always a "girly"girl. The child, who had long had social/compliance issues but eluded diagnosis, took an abrupt turn for the worse, cutting, verbally & physically abusive, and refusing school. I recall delays at gender clinic to get testosterone, which she and child desperately wanted to "stop his period." As far as I'm aware, despite the insistence on testosterone, it wasn't administered because child was too oppositional to get the blood work required. It was clear all mom's knowledge was coming from Internet support groups. The following two years went downhill terribly. The child was asked to leave special needs school after school. "He" refused to go. Was spending hours in his room on interest. The school district was informed and frustrated. Multiple suicide attempts, multiple hospitalizations. Normally reasonable/sensible mom refused to hear anything other than affirming this child, now 15, and newly diagnosed with autism, despite having none of the traditional systems, unschooled since 5th grade. We tacitly agreed not to speak of it. Wanting to help, I would "babysit" child so my friend and her husband could go on vacation. After one of these trips, my friend called me transphobic in a rare discussion on the topic, when I commented I wouldn't be comfortable showering with a biological male next to me in a gym. I was in shock - we were close friends, her position was irrational, and regardless of my beliefs - I was the only friend she had that was willing to look after this child and helping reduce tension in her marriage. Granted, my friend was at the end of her rope, her child was hospitalized some weeks later, but for me, it was the end. Six months later, I cut off all contact with her. Avoiding the topic wasn't enough for her, and the thought of seeing the child, who acts out terribly, was more than I could bear. I truly thought we'd be close friends for life - but the "addiction" - and I believe it's a type of addiction - that one must be 1000% in agreement all the time that there's no such thing as sex - was more powerful. The term "TERF" is meaningless for me from strangers, but being called transphobic by a close friend I helped in very tangible ways with her child was unbearable.
I know you had to be hurt terribly by this, both for the effects this is having on the family and for the loss of your friendship. It is difficult, if not impossible to understand how so many people, particularly those we think we know, can take such leave of their senses, but I believe underneath it all is fear, but of what, being insensitive and not inclusive of others, that their child will commit suicide if all conditions of transitioning aren't met (this is heavily stressed by staunch advocates), fear that they will be seen as a bad parent if they don't go along with every part of it, no matter how drastic the procedures or that their child will hate them? Also, we must not ignore what likely is a deep-seated unrecognized homophobia that tells them it is less acceptable for the young person to be gay or lesbian than trans which more closely presents as the heterosexual model. I may be overthinking in trying to understand it, but they are questions I've considered.
TYSM. She is a caring, competent, and very responsible person who I never imagined would behave this way. Having it "reframed" as a cult was actually very helpful to me. Once you've joined a cult, you lose your identity.
I'm so sorry to hear that. I wonder if I was wrong in just accepting the child's new name, etc., doing my best to just "get on." No regrets, I tried, but again, never thought this very important friendship could ever be destroyed. It shows the power and pathology of the trans community.
Who can say what the right thing to do is? I won't use someone pronouns, but I don't say that to their face - I just don't use pronouns with that person. Is that cowardly of me? Probably. At my UU church, there is a strong Woke push, and we try to be polite and non-confrontational. So, I just don't use pronouns. In your case, I guess you could say "your child" and avoid the name entirely.
Trans is a cult. The cult depends on belief, and if people stop believing this cult glamour, the glamour collapses, and we are left seeing the truth of mutilated children. That is why those who will not affirm are cancelled. In "The Emperor's new clothes", when the little girl said "But the Emperor is naked", everyone suddenly realized that the "fabulous clothing" were complete fictions. Same here. No one is allowed to doubt. The validation of the lie is done by getting more and more people to buy into the cult.
This is why CLEAR STATEMENTS of the fact that trans is a lie are important. I have tried to do that, and have now been perma-banned from Reddit due to this clarity.
I'm in a FB group of affirming parents and there are more and more really young kids! It is incredibly alarming and sickening when a mom of a FOUR year old asks for advice, saying that her biological son has reverted to wanting to be a boy, after a year of "being a girl" and the mom is "not sure" what to do....She is asking whether she should start referring to her child as a boy...
Well, I would guess that a mom of a 4 year old is likely a millenial. She may easily be in her twenties herself and part of the "woke" generation. In general I wonder if most of the affirming parents are younger and came of age believing this crap. Even a mom of a 14 y.o. can be in her mid 30s. I am not saying that as an excuse, I am just trying to understand
I'm older and when this happened to our daughter at high school 4 years ago I could not even believe it was a thing - and that 20 something year old teachers would call my daughter "he" and a crazy name - and that they would not stop when we said "no". Of course, they were more hip/with it/understanding/informed - and we parents were dinosaurs. It's really terrible.
I’m an older millennial (and the mom of a 15 year old) and do not agree with this whole woke mentality nor do many people that I know that are around my age, which is 35. While I agree that there are many people in my generation and ones below mine that are part of this “movement,” it is not fair to make this generalization. As an older millennial, I was not exposed to woke mentality during my teenage years. I grew up in a rural Midwest area, maybe it’s a matter of demographics and belief systems.
Something that stuck out to me was the post by a Mom about having a grandchild. Her son was able to father a child despite 5 years of HRT, and the Mom recognizes how lucky her son was that there was a "supply chain issue" that prevented him from getting the HRT for some period of time, which is how he was able to become a father. One would think this miracle, this joy, FATHERHOOD and her becoming a grandmother, would remind her how precious our natural bodies are, and that messing with your body and risking (and in many cases, depending on when this all starts and what interventions occur - such as castration, assuring) sterility is a terrible thing to do to a young person. If a fully grown, mature adult without mental health issues who has been fully informed of all the risks and is not relying on lies (like that they "really are the opposite sex" or "this will surely make you your authentic true self" or "it's perfectly safe") wants to have these medical interventions, then that person can do this to their body and take those risks so that they can APPEAR more like the opposite sex and perhaps live as if they are the opposite sex. That is their choice and good luck to them. It's nothing to applaud, but I wouldn't condemn them either. But encouraging children to do this is simply unforgiveable. I cannot believe that Mom's miracle grandchild did not wake her up to what she is pushing onto her son. This phenomenon continues to shock me. If I didn't have to stay informed for the sake of my confused daughter, I would probably bury my head in the sand because this is all too upsetting.
Author: What I found fascinating with that post is that these FtM girls are extremely dysphoric to even be in possession of breasts, yet becoming pregnant and GIVING BIRTH for God's sake causes no issues. As with so much in our society whatever benefits me at the moment is what is important and ok.
I have had the same thought. This whole idea that we can’t speak of “pregnant women” as it may offend a “pregnant person” is absurd. If you are bothered by a word - “woman” - yet not bothered by being pregnant, you are simply creating a problem out of nothing. Woman means you are biologically female and only biological females can get pregnant - and, yes, not all biological women can get pregnant, but that matters naught. It’s the square and rectangle not all rectangles are squares, but all squares are rectangles.
I never saw myself as some old crotchety get off my lawn type but is it wrong for me to be furious that someone decided that I'm now cis gender and my physician saw my vagina and assigned me a girl but he/she may have been mistaken?
As I posted above, the trans "my way or the highway" belief system destroyed a close and trusted friendship with an incredibly good woman, who was reasonable in all matters except this one.
This is indeed, tragic. I sometimes read posts in one of those groups and I get physically ill. I stay so that I can, sometimes, post a neutrally worded advice that might open someone's eyes at some point. If I were to say something even 0.1% "critical" I'd be kicked out of the group. The censorship there is unbelievable.
Could someone go in as pro affirmation, play that part and then slowly start little by little saying they were rethinking the whole thing. I wonder? And then that they had changed their mind and thank goodness because their kid changed her mind. ?
Author- I often consider DM some of the moms who appear to be questioning the rapidness with their child. I think sometime in the future I will be doing so. Hoping against hope that I can help these questioning moms slow down. I definitely do not misrepresent myself - I just don't post at all. But I did feel the public needs to know with breadth and depth of this...esp as the members of the group are rallying support to contact government, councils, etc to change the laws and make this easier.
is it possible that these "proud moms" are under some sort of mass formation hypnosis and banning together in a social media group radically reinforces this? is it possible that they fetishize the idea of their child being special and therefore they themselves are special? is it possible that they never bother to ask if their child may be gay OR having other issues that convince them that they should cut off body parts? there are those who insist that this is NOT a new phenomenon but Instead a cultural shift that previously rejected trans individuals but now welcomes with open arms and people line up to jump on the bandwagon? if someone has their breasts surgically removed because of cancer it's called a mastectomy but if a young person decides they don't want to be female it's called top surgery. when I think back to the growing pains I myself experienced going from a child to adult it is a lot for even one person to deal with. but does this mean it requires medical intervention other than Clearasil or tampons??? why are we doing this???? I do not believe history will be kind.
The head of Seattle Public schools (Juneau) apparently tried and tried to talk her DD into trans but her ex-husband, who said "NO!" as well as her father, both suggest its so that Mom can have a special/victim/underrepresented kid to make up for being a middle-aged white woman. Its a horrible thing to say about anyone...but...I can't say it would never happen. And yes, Seattle is good with it
Yes, it is a mastectomy and when my child mentions too surgery , I use the correct medical term. They do t like that term as it does not connote what they wish to convey. The term mastectomy tells you how rough , seriously dangerous and painful it actually is.
Even "mastectomy" is a euphemism. Use "breast removal". Does your daughter understand that NO ONE will prefer her as a partner once she has been mutilated?
I think most believe that the outcome will be flawless and beautiful. They should all see what a mutilated chest looks like and hear from those who have gone through it.
Do you know about Ellen Page who goes under the name of Elliot. She had a mastectomy, and now has many barechested pics of her "masculine" chest. Of course, since she is 5'2", she is kind of like a midget lumberjack, or like James Bond, if James Bond was a 14 YO guy without much muscle development.
Absolutely some of that. Trans is a cult. When you are in the glamour of the cult, you seek out those who help you continue the glamour. It's like the old stories of fairy-fruit, where if you eat it you can eat nothing else, and you pass from this world into the world of the fairy slavemasters (in many traditions, fairies are NOT good).
Breaking someone away from the glamour of the cult is not easy.
when I was. a kid the only people who got tattoos were bikers and rough types. the average middle class person would NEVER consider this. then at some point this became very fashionable trendy and extremely socially acceptable Now it's weird if you don't have one. someone I met told me their child was non binary. I made the tragic and worst social faux pas imaginable and said well it's trendy. this person nearly ripped my fing head off. do I think their gender is ambiguous? yes. do I think that society is trying very hard to destigmatize this? yes. is that a good thing? yes of course. but do I think the majority of the population should now all go out and get tattoos? no.
You are right. Its trendy and kids do trendy things. They shouldn't be stuck in that trend for life though and shame on mama for not thinking like an adult. I remember a fight in our area when it was suggested uniforms might be a good thing for public schools. All the rage over "my kid needs to be an individual" "there are no uniform kids!" and I wanted to say, "Um. your kid is choosing to dress JUST like every other kid their age. Its a trend. its not individual specialness that they are doing. Its a chosen by every middle schooler outfit that may as well be a uniform."
I fell for all of this. While reading this article I stopped and removed my kid from the paper hug program. I am so ashamed that I supported any of this. This has all seemed wrong from the beginning.
My liberal daughter is a "mama bear" and has 3 children. age 14, 16 and 18, whom I have been very close to since they were born. I love my daughter and grandchildren very much, but due to my political affiliation, over the past 18 months, my daughter has distanced herself from me. I'm a Christian, she's an atheist. In the past year, I have posted many comments (not hateful or nasty) about my concerns with the progression of LGBTQAI+, pride month, boys in girls sports, transvestites reading to toddlers in libraries, men in female bathrooms, men in women's beauty pageants, and particularly the Biden Administration's appointment of Rachael Levine. In doing so, my daughter unfriended me on Facebook and showed her children everything I said (they weren't on facebook) and alienated them from me. She says I'm hateful and bigoted. Come to find out, the 2 girls (16 & 18) are "identifying" as gay (even though they've never expressed these tendencies) and the 14 year old boy is identifying as a transgender named Diana. What are the chances that all 3 children would be "gay" or transgender??? Social media and Hollywood encourage the practice of bisexual or same sex relationship to a fault. None of them will speak with me which is difficult because I would spend a week with them every other month and every holiday while they were growing up as normal kids. I'm so depressed I don't know what to do. What I do know is that there are many people who think like me and that brings me comfort. Thank you for letting me vent and thank you, PITT, for reaching out with your truthful dialog.....
Oh Linda that’s heartbreaking. Truly. Grandparents are are whole other group being impacted with this ideology. I pray things go better. Showing young kids Facebook posts between two adults and posts that your daughter feels puts HER in the right and a loving grandma in the wrong is IMO another example of using these ideologies to promote oneself. I’m so sorry.
If you have to ask, then your idea of traditional family values are different than mine. I do not have a problem with gay people. I have a gay sister whom I love. However, I will not bow down to whose who want to put me in a phobia category. Homosexuality is not the normal relationship that my Christian upbringing embraces. I know there are people who are truly not happy in a traditional relationship. However, gayness is now being pedaled as normal and is glorified to the extreme in our society. Many young people are indoctrinated into jumping on this train as a means to dismiss the concept of man/woman. Men are emasculated and women are emboldened to reject men. Sex and promiscuity are encouraged as well. How does humanity survive with this mentality? I am 72 years old and live in a world I no longer recognize.
If my use of the word 'abnormal" offends you, that's your phobia. As a journalist, I'm sure you have a plethora of synonyms. I'll try "unusual" or "extraordinary" just for you.
You are speaking out based upon your own life experiences and are being very judgmental in my opinion. You have no idea as to the dynamics of my relationship with my grandchildren. I welcome debates and am willing to do so. My comment about gayness refers to the fact that it is being pedaled through social media and movies as normal for confused, heterosexual children. Social media is not restricted in my daughter's home and the focus on how the world embraces, celebrates, and favors homosexuality over heterosexuality is powerfully tauted. Young children are groomed in school to embrace their sexuality by any means.
It is so important to try to understand all that we can about every aspect of what is going on. Thank you so much for reporting back from the front lines where most of us cannot go. You have not harmed those mothers or their kids, you have just described phenomena and reported facts. I am not sure why judging something good or bad according to basic values is now judged to be bad behavior.
I'm struggling with the tone of this. Until I became a mother, I didn't realize it was the judgiest space out there. And I'm guilty, myself. I still can't imagine a mother not questioning experimental treatment of a healthy body. That said, I can't help but think this is another indicator of where we've arrived as a culture. I completely agree that this is an ideology, a new world view. A child with a trans ID likely offers a meaningful experience where before there was a vacuum. I think, as humans, we are wired for meaning that we use to bind us together in social groups. We organize around a mythology, and these moms have found theirs. Also, once in, it's really hard to change course--especially if you've greenlighted procedures that may have harmed your kid. Can you imagine?! Most would have to double-down to protect their own psyche--it takes tremendous courage, courage few in our modern culture have, to acknowledge and take responsibility for such a mistake. I have not followed these groups, and I haven't fostered relationships with any affirming mothers to have real conversations. The ideology continues to sicken me. AND I would encourage curiosity and compassion. We can only make assumptions as to what's really in their hearts and minds. Let's be careful.
Oh wow. Thanks for writing this. It is so sick. Harming their kids for internet clout. 😞
My wife is an affirming mom to our biological daughter who she refers to with their new desired name and pronouns. She had us all visit with a gender pathways counselor and I sat in on the discussion and put my foot down on any medical or surgical interventions. They immediately tried pushing puberty blockers. I’ve told my wife our daughter cannot remove their breasts until they are 18 if that is their decision and my wife has said she agrees with this. My wife is a liberal feminist but is all on board with the trans affirming train. I wanted to see a non-affirming counselor for our daughter but in the meantime we are seeing a Christian couples/family counselor. The counselor just basically says we may have to agree to disagree because I don’t know I can change her mind.
Maybe supply data about how the mind does not mature until mid twenties?
Make sure to clearly explain that insurance coverage from 18-26 is not automatic. If they do not have insurance coverage, this can be very costly. Who provides the insurance? If it is you, you can make the decision to remove her from your plan. This might wreck your marriage, so this is not a step to be taken lightly. But it is a point of leverage.
Not much leverage , unfortunately, since many states "help" with the cost. The colleges certainly do. That is if you are in US. I don't know about other countries.
Yes, be careful where you send her to college and maybe decline the college insurance?
Maybe there is a chance this craziness burns out. I want to remain someone optimistic. Otherwise this is the new normal. My wife believes transgenders are the new homosexual.
I think there are too many vested interests/profiteers for it to just burn out on it's own. Too many Gifters are making a buck as speakers and in plastic surgery, etc - protected by those who claim this is a "civil rights" movement. I think it will end. It has to end. But, I think it will require push back coming in many forms - and then it needs to be kept down with a GI museum so that it never happens again.
Your wife is a Believer. Cults do pass but generally not on their own. And, this one is really entrenched in all of our institutions. Pharma like Johnson & Johnson make $$ on it - it works for the Democrat party and the Republicans mostly don't seem to think pushing back on it is a priority. Non-believers are afraid to speak out as they are called names and they lose their jobs. I have high hopes for the Elon Musk buyout of Twitter being of some help. Then, there need to be lawsuits. Lots of lawsuits.
Even with insurance the gender pathways meeting was over $700 and my wife said she had no idea it was going to be that expensive. She was the one that signed up for it and when I found out I told her exactly what they were going to do and sure they did those exact things. You are exactly right, there is too much money being made, this is big billion dollar business, these people are a money grubby con artists who pretend to care. I’m not sure if it’s women though that get conned into this more often than not. Like my wife takes a handful of pharmaceutical drugs and has no push back because drs prescribe it to her and she seems to have no intention to getting off of it. Now the experts say you must affirm your child with drugs and surgeries or they may suicide themselves. I don’t want to typecast all women, but my experience with my wife is she’s no skeptical at all. Same with the Covid vaccines, she said she didn’t believe in any government conspiracy.
Sad but true. I know several of these affirming moms personally. One even decided that she herself was nonbinary, after her daughter "transitioned." It's an ideology, no doubt about it. I wonder how many of them will blame themselves ten or fifteen years from now?
It's a cult.
Reading the comments from the affirming moms made my stomach hurt. How did we get so far from the ideal of teaching our kids to love themselves just as they are almost overnight? How have we redefined "true self" to mean the infertile, scarred person you are become after hormones and surgery? And how can anyone who has ever been a 14-year-old girl think that an elective mastectomy is a choice children of that age are ready to make? I think about my 14-year-old self, and she was barely ready to pick out her own clothes.
This is going to seem like such a sad, bizarre chapter in history when it passes. I can only hope it passes soon.
So well said.
This article is spot on. I follow a group on Facebook where the comments she posted are exactly like that . The glee with which the moms post about the drastic physical changes ( binding, top surgery, hormones) their children are going through is to me astounding and very scary. How a mother (or father, but that is apparently rarer) can support their own healthy child’s physical mutilation in rapid and sudden onset is incredible to me. In such groups any questioning is shut down. It seems they live in an alternate reality and what when the child later wakes up to the fact that they will never be of the other sex? It’s all a charade /fantasy . This is heartwrenching actually.
It is like munchausen by proxy. They love the attention it brings them. It is truly sick.
Lesbian Mom below called it Transhausens.
That's a good one!
Thanks for posting this. I don't feel "worthy" to comment, as I'm not personally going this this crisis, but empathize deeply with those who are and wanted to share an adverse event that spills over beyond the family unit. I met what tuned out to be a very dear friend 20 years ago. We were both single parents, her by choice, myself by divorce. We managed to maintain a close relationship even as she left the city we met in, married, and adopted her second child. 11 years later, she announced her adopted daughter was a boy in a Christmas news letter. I didn't think much about it, assuming it was a fad, the child was always a "girly"girl. The child, who had long had social/compliance issues but eluded diagnosis, took an abrupt turn for the worse, cutting, verbally & physically abusive, and refusing school. I recall delays at gender clinic to get testosterone, which she and child desperately wanted to "stop his period." As far as I'm aware, despite the insistence on testosterone, it wasn't administered because child was too oppositional to get the blood work required. It was clear all mom's knowledge was coming from Internet support groups. The following two years went downhill terribly. The child was asked to leave special needs school after school. "He" refused to go. Was spending hours in his room on interest. The school district was informed and frustrated. Multiple suicide attempts, multiple hospitalizations. Normally reasonable/sensible mom refused to hear anything other than affirming this child, now 15, and newly diagnosed with autism, despite having none of the traditional systems, unschooled since 5th grade. We tacitly agreed not to speak of it. Wanting to help, I would "babysit" child so my friend and her husband could go on vacation. After one of these trips, my friend called me transphobic in a rare discussion on the topic, when I commented I wouldn't be comfortable showering with a biological male next to me in a gym. I was in shock - we were close friends, her position was irrational, and regardless of my beliefs - I was the only friend she had that was willing to look after this child and helping reduce tension in her marriage. Granted, my friend was at the end of her rope, her child was hospitalized some weeks later, but for me, it was the end. Six months later, I cut off all contact with her. Avoiding the topic wasn't enough for her, and the thought of seeing the child, who acts out terribly, was more than I could bear. I truly thought we'd be close friends for life - but the "addiction" - and I believe it's a type of addiction - that one must be 1000% in agreement all the time that there's no such thing as sex - was more powerful. The term "TERF" is meaningless for me from strangers, but being called transphobic by a close friend I helped in very tangible ways with her child was unbearable.
I know you had to be hurt terribly by this, both for the effects this is having on the family and for the loss of your friendship. It is difficult, if not impossible to understand how so many people, particularly those we think we know, can take such leave of their senses, but I believe underneath it all is fear, but of what, being insensitive and not inclusive of others, that their child will commit suicide if all conditions of transitioning aren't met (this is heavily stressed by staunch advocates), fear that they will be seen as a bad parent if they don't go along with every part of it, no matter how drastic the procedures or that their child will hate them? Also, we must not ignore what likely is a deep-seated unrecognized homophobia that tells them it is less acceptable for the young person to be gay or lesbian than trans which more closely presents as the heterosexual model. I may be overthinking in trying to understand it, but they are questions I've considered.
Wow, I'm sorry that you loat your friendship. This ideology is so destructive. To everything.
TYSM. She is a caring, competent, and very responsible person who I never imagined would behave this way. Having it "reframed" as a cult was actually very helpful to me. Once you've joined a cult, you lose your identity.
I got unfriended by a friend of 20 years as I would not affirm her son (natal male).
I'm so sorry to hear that. I wonder if I was wrong in just accepting the child's new name, etc., doing my best to just "get on." No regrets, I tried, but again, never thought this very important friendship could ever be destroyed. It shows the power and pathology of the trans community.
Who can say what the right thing to do is? I won't use someone pronouns, but I don't say that to their face - I just don't use pronouns with that person. Is that cowardly of me? Probably. At my UU church, there is a strong Woke push, and we try to be polite and non-confrontational. So, I just don't use pronouns. In your case, I guess you could say "your child" and avoid the name entirely.
Trans is a cult. The cult depends on belief, and if people stop believing this cult glamour, the glamour collapses, and we are left seeing the truth of mutilated children. That is why those who will not affirm are cancelled. In "The Emperor's new clothes", when the little girl said "But the Emperor is naked", everyone suddenly realized that the "fabulous clothing" were complete fictions. Same here. No one is allowed to doubt. The validation of the lie is done by getting more and more people to buy into the cult.
This is why CLEAR STATEMENTS of the fact that trans is a lie are important. I have tried to do that, and have now been perma-banned from Reddit due to this clarity.
I'm in a FB group of affirming parents and there are more and more really young kids! It is incredibly alarming and sickening when a mom of a FOUR year old asks for advice, saying that her biological son has reverted to wanting to be a boy, after a year of "being a girl" and the mom is "not sure" what to do....She is asking whether she should start referring to her child as a boy...
Omg, these ppl. 😞
Well, I would guess that a mom of a 4 year old is likely a millenial. She may easily be in her twenties herself and part of the "woke" generation. In general I wonder if most of the affirming parents are younger and came of age believing this crap. Even a mom of a 14 y.o. can be in her mid 30s. I am not saying that as an excuse, I am just trying to understand
I'm older and when this happened to our daughter at high school 4 years ago I could not even believe it was a thing - and that 20 something year old teachers would call my daughter "he" and a crazy name - and that they would not stop when we said "no". Of course, they were more hip/with it/understanding/informed - and we parents were dinosaurs. It's really terrible.
I’m an older millennial (and the mom of a 15 year old) and do not agree with this whole woke mentality nor do many people that I know that are around my age, which is 35. While I agree that there are many people in my generation and ones below mine that are part of this “movement,” it is not fair to make this generalization. As an older millennial, I was not exposed to woke mentality during my teenage years. I grew up in a rural Midwest area, maybe it’s a matter of demographics and belief systems.
Something that stuck out to me was the post by a Mom about having a grandchild. Her son was able to father a child despite 5 years of HRT, and the Mom recognizes how lucky her son was that there was a "supply chain issue" that prevented him from getting the HRT for some period of time, which is how he was able to become a father. One would think this miracle, this joy, FATHERHOOD and her becoming a grandmother, would remind her how precious our natural bodies are, and that messing with your body and risking (and in many cases, depending on when this all starts and what interventions occur - such as castration, assuring) sterility is a terrible thing to do to a young person. If a fully grown, mature adult without mental health issues who has been fully informed of all the risks and is not relying on lies (like that they "really are the opposite sex" or "this will surely make you your authentic true self" or "it's perfectly safe") wants to have these medical interventions, then that person can do this to their body and take those risks so that they can APPEAR more like the opposite sex and perhaps live as if they are the opposite sex. That is their choice and good luck to them. It's nothing to applaud, but I wouldn't condemn them either. But encouraging children to do this is simply unforgiveable. I cannot believe that Mom's miracle grandchild did not wake her up to what she is pushing onto her son. This phenomenon continues to shock me. If I didn't have to stay informed for the sake of my confused daughter, I would probably bury my head in the sand because this is all too upsetting.
Author: What I found fascinating with that post is that these FtM girls are extremely dysphoric to even be in possession of breasts, yet becoming pregnant and GIVING BIRTH for God's sake causes no issues. As with so much in our society whatever benefits me at the moment is what is important and ok.
I have had the same thought. This whole idea that we can’t speak of “pregnant women” as it may offend a “pregnant person” is absurd. If you are bothered by a word - “woman” - yet not bothered by being pregnant, you are simply creating a problem out of nothing. Woman means you are biologically female and only biological females can get pregnant - and, yes, not all biological women can get pregnant, but that matters naught. It’s the square and rectangle not all rectangles are squares, but all squares are rectangles.
I never saw myself as some old crotchety get off my lawn type but is it wrong for me to be furious that someone decided that I'm now cis gender and my physician saw my vagina and assigned me a girl but he/she may have been mistaken?
And some times the influencer is in your own home and family.
I wish someone could infiltrate these groups and somehow expose this to the lawmakers or I don’t know who!!! This is a tragedy….
As I posted above, the trans "my way or the highway" belief system destroyed a close and trusted friendship with an incredibly good woman, who was reasonable in all matters except this one.
This is indeed, tragic. I sometimes read posts in one of those groups and I get physically ill. I stay so that I can, sometimes, post a neutrally worded advice that might open someone's eyes at some point. If I were to say something even 0.1% "critical" I'd be kicked out of the group. The censorship there is unbelievable.
Yes, same here. It’s a very very fine line.
Could someone go in as pro affirmation, play that part and then slowly start little by little saying they were rethinking the whole thing. I wonder? And then that they had changed their mind and thank goodness because their kid changed her mind. ?
Author- I often consider DM some of the moms who appear to be questioning the rapidness with their child. I think sometime in the future I will be doing so. Hoping against hope that I can help these questioning moms slow down. I definitely do not misrepresent myself - I just don't post at all. But I did feel the public needs to know with breadth and depth of this...esp as the members of the group are rallying support to contact government, councils, etc to change the laws and make this easier.
is it possible that these "proud moms" are under some sort of mass formation hypnosis and banning together in a social media group radically reinforces this? is it possible that they fetishize the idea of their child being special and therefore they themselves are special? is it possible that they never bother to ask if their child may be gay OR having other issues that convince them that they should cut off body parts? there are those who insist that this is NOT a new phenomenon but Instead a cultural shift that previously rejected trans individuals but now welcomes with open arms and people line up to jump on the bandwagon? if someone has their breasts surgically removed because of cancer it's called a mastectomy but if a young person decides they don't want to be female it's called top surgery. when I think back to the growing pains I myself experienced going from a child to adult it is a lot for even one person to deal with. but does this mean it requires medical intervention other than Clearasil or tampons??? why are we doing this???? I do not believe history will be kind.
The head of Seattle Public schools (Juneau) apparently tried and tried to talk her DD into trans but her ex-husband, who said "NO!" as well as her father, both suggest its so that Mom can have a special/victim/underrepresented kid to make up for being a middle-aged white woman. Its a horrible thing to say about anyone...but...I can't say it would never happen. And yes, Seattle is good with it
yes, we are living in an epidemic of Munchausen's syndrome.
Yes, it is a mastectomy and when my child mentions too surgery , I use the correct medical term. They do t like that term as it does not connote what they wish to convey. The term mastectomy tells you how rough , seriously dangerous and painful it actually is.
Even "mastectomy" is a euphemism. Use "breast removal". Does your daughter understand that NO ONE will prefer her as a partner once she has been mutilated?
I think most believe that the outcome will be flawless and beautiful. They should all see what a mutilated chest looks like and hear from those who have gone through it.
Do you know about Ellen Page who goes under the name of Elliot. She had a mastectomy, and now has many barechested pics of her "masculine" chest. Of course, since she is 5'2", she is kind of like a midget lumberjack, or like James Bond, if James Bond was a 14 YO guy without much muscle development.
Absolutely some of that. Trans is a cult. When you are in the glamour of the cult, you seek out those who help you continue the glamour. It's like the old stories of fairy-fruit, where if you eat it you can eat nothing else, and you pass from this world into the world of the fairy slavemasters (in many traditions, fairies are NOT good).
Breaking someone away from the glamour of the cult is not easy.
well when you make something cool I suppose everyone wants to be a part of whatever that is. lucky for me when I was young it was guess jeans
when I was. a kid the only people who got tattoos were bikers and rough types. the average middle class person would NEVER consider this. then at some point this became very fashionable trendy and extremely socially acceptable Now it's weird if you don't have one. someone I met told me their child was non binary. I made the tragic and worst social faux pas imaginable and said well it's trendy. this person nearly ripped my fing head off. do I think their gender is ambiguous? yes. do I think that society is trying very hard to destigmatize this? yes. is that a good thing? yes of course. but do I think the majority of the population should now all go out and get tattoos? no.
You are right. Its trendy and kids do trendy things. They shouldn't be stuck in that trend for life though and shame on mama for not thinking like an adult. I remember a fight in our area when it was suggested uniforms might be a good thing for public schools. All the rage over "my kid needs to be an individual" "there are no uniform kids!" and I wanted to say, "Um. your kid is choosing to dress JUST like every other kid their age. Its a trend. its not individual specialness that they are doing. Its a chosen by every middle schooler outfit that may as well be a uniform."
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