If you are new to the crazy world of gender, you’ve heard that trans is something you just know. So, if your kid comes out as “trans”, that’s who they are, who they’ve always been. You just somehow missed the obvious. And now that you are aware you have a trans kid, your job is to help them “become” the sex that they are inside through social changes (pronouns, clothing choices), drugs (hormones) to halt their development and develop alternate secondary sex characteristics to the extent possible, restrictive garments that hide their secondary sex characteristics (binders), and cosmetic surgeries.
This is the Myth of Permanence. Similar to the Suicide Myth (affirm your child’s trans identity or they will kill themselves), which says you must affirm a trans identified person or they will kill themselves, with the Myth of Permanence, you must instantly medicalize people who proclaim they are trans because if one says they are trans, it’s because it’s an irrefutable, immutable fact about you that cannot change. Along with the Suicide Myth, the Myth of Permanence is used to bully parents into actions they feel are against the best long term interests of their children.
If you believe in this ideological dogma, it is wrong to do anything except enable social and medical transition immediately and fully because, to do otherwise, would cause certain, immediate and extreme harm to the trans identified person. The Myth of Permanence has thrown a lot of good people into logical tailspins trying to do the correct thing, in the absence of physical/biological evidence that trans is an actual state of being, and not just a metaphysical or religious concept.
However, the Myth of Permanence has been clearly disproved both in long term studies, through parent experiences, and by detransitioners and desisters that felt certain they were “trans” and then later changed their minds.
If Trans-ness was permanent, none of this would be possible. But yet, it is.
While I agree that parents should never fall for the lie that you must affirm or your child will kill themself, if your child tells your they are suicidal, get them help. It doesn’t have to be hormones or affirmation of anything like that. I’ve struggled with dysphoria my whole life and while I never plan to transition, I have thought attempted suicide multiple times. Everytime I’ve gone for crisis treatment, I wasn’t given hormones. When I was a teen, a friend of mines parents refused to get her any help because they worried that any therapist might immediately put her on testosterone. They told her she was lying and manipulating them. She passed away a month later. Please please please get your kids some sort of help. Even if the therapist is like “yes you really are the opposite sex” that’s temporary damage that can be undone. Please please please help them. My friends parent’s didn’t and my parents won’t.
Do you have a link for those studies? Thx