Parents Q&A (Part 2)
Please see below for the link for the live Q&A on Saturday the 15th at 3pm Dublin time. I will respond to the below questions at this meeting. Please add any further questions in the comments section
I will respond to the following questions at the next Q&A, link at the bottom of this post.
1. Thank you for hosting these. Our 19 year old college son is socially trans. But only with friends and online community. Outside of our immediate family, he has not told grandparents, aunts, uncles or anyone else. He has not medicalized. But I think he would like to. Before he went to college, I contacted the college to make sure that they did not prescribe cross sex hormones. His college does not. Everything is set up for him to use the clinic on campus. Last fall, he began asking for information to see a doctor off campus. The only reason he would need this is for medicalization. I’ve managed to hold off, giving him the necessary information for him to make that appointment. At Christmas, my husband, and I both noticed positive changes with him. Such as he is monitoring his screen time more, Starting to read books just for fun, he’s making a point of getting out into nature and just seems to be enjoying life more. Not sure if this could be the start of desistance or just maturing. He was back the whole Christmas holiday without mentioning anything about the information he needed. He brought it up just as we were getting ready to leave to take him back to college. My husband and I managed to stall and tell him we would get him the information later. But I can only hold out so long. We’ve already had discussions about what I see as the negatives of hormones. Such as side effects, irreversible damage. I’m trying to think of ways to ask him what exactly he’s hoping to accomplish by this. What he thinks will be different. Etc. Any advice is welcome. Thank you.
2.Thanks, Stella, for your dedication to these Q&As--they continue to be so helpful. Our daughter is a couple months shy of 18 and will be heading off to college next year. She has been trans-ID'd for her whole high school, was a typical ROGD girl, and has been 'socially-transitioned' at school (name, pronouns, bathroom, PE). She's a very bright, successful girl, no psychiatric co-morbidities and has stated a few times in the last couple months that she does not want to medicalize. She knows that we will not fund college if she medicalizes but we have not directly had this conversation yet, and she came to this realization on her own. Two of her three sisters are pretty 'anti-trans' and 'anti-woke' (after being on the receiving end of posting up against a male in basketball), and her older sister is neutral ( in her words, 'live and let live'). She expresses a lot of distress about her physical body (although she is wearing a few more feminine pants and sweaters lately) and can barely talk about it with me. She doesn't have PCOS, has regular cycles, and doesn't wear a binder (she wears either no bra or a light sports bra). What are some ways to help her become more accepting of her body? She can state that she recognizes that she is a biological female but any more exploration crumbles into crying. She hasn't had any relationships, think she is interested, said she was bi before. Before she donned the 'trans-boy' aesthetic with the baggy clothes/hunch/scruffy short hair, she was a gorgeous ,almost 6ft tall, long blonde hair, model-type. I'm trying to start regular 30min chats with her to explore--we only have a few more months until she is out of our house. If you have any questions about our situation, i'll try to answer them in the chain. Thank you!!
We can have great discussions about philosophical ideas as long as I steer clear of ‘third rail’ politics. She can handle a bit of debate around issues that we may disagree on but she is more sensitive to taking disagreement as a personal affront than my other children. I can tip toe into gender related questions but have to keep it free of any judgmental jargon. Anytime I dive into physical body questions, she is teary and shuts down.
The big discussion I need to address with her is around rooming in college. We have always set a firm requirement that she rooms with biological females at summer camp and school trips in high school and we would like to continue that for college. I have been talking about the beauty of college as a time to meet a variety of people and avoid getting pigeon holed too early. I talked about my own regret before about picking a major too early and not exploring. We also want to encourage her to try on embracing her female reality. She can always return to living like a trans boy but she never gave her inner girl a chance to grow up.
3. Hi Stella. My daughter is 17, has identified as trans FtM for 5 years. We know it's a maladaptive coping mechanisms after years of self-hate a and media imput (neurodivergent, bullying, porn etc). Last year has been a nightmare. Her depression and anxiety got even worse, and she started drinking and vaping to selfmedicate, engaged in other risky and inappropriate behaviour. She has attachment issues, too. She is seeing a therapist and a psychiatrist because of evaluation for bipolar or sever depression, but she is not receptive for their input. She says she is just waiting to be 18, which is in 7 months, to be able to decide on her own, quit therapy, move out, transition. Other then that she is immature and doesn't know what to do in life. No meaningfull interests. I'm at my wits end. Thinking of giving up. I believe my daughter will destroy her life, and when she finally realises it, she will not have strength to try to get better. Any kind of intervention we have tried, makes her self-harm and threat with suicide or moving out to her boyfriend. What to do? We're trying some family councelling, too. Feels like no progress or very very slow.
4. Stella, obviously a cultural shift needs to take place but that will take time & won’t help any of us in the thick of it & especially the panic arising to get fixed quick before the rules change. I’m thinking in particular of the US & the new administration. I keep advocating for more voice for the detransitioners so that those ‘trapped’ can envision a way out. I see Genspect has launched a new resource Beyond Trans which is wonderful. But how can we make it ‘cool’ to detransition, to desist. How do we get more doctors, therapists to embrace this new ‘market’. How can we get everyone to be on the positive side of history, to be part of the solution? For kids to say ‘I was brave enough to say no, this is what I’m good at, not what I’m bad at’. It’s cool to be kind to my parents. I don’t view Reddit, instagram, discourse or anything so I don’t really know what I’m talking about, but can’t these chats be hacked into 😂 or other ones set up to dominate a happier narrative? Sorry….ranting here.
5. Dear Stella, thank you very much for all the effort and support you are giving to us parents, absolutely essential! My question is related to current change in the US brought by change of administration. How do we support our adult vulnerable young people when they have temper tantrums about the current political situation and feel that they are being attacked. It seems that my son got deeper into the trans rabbit hole as a result of this recent developments. As if the focus is back on being "trans" and showing off to the world (social media). Many thanks!
You can see the recording of Part 1 here:
Below is the Zoom link to attend Saturday’s meeting:
Stella O Malley is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: Parents' Q&A
Time: Feb 15, 2025 03:00 PM Dublin
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