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Topic : 10/29 Gender Confused Children

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Created on : Friday, October 24, 2008, 02:51:47 pm

Author : DrPhilBoard1

Dr. Phil tackles the sensitive topic of children who identify more with the opposite sex. What do you do if your son wants to wear dresses and play with dolls? Or if your daughter tells you she wants to be a boy? Should parents chock it up to being a phase that their children will grow out of, or should they intervene right away? Meet Melissa and Tim, whose 8-year-old son declared himself to be a girl when he was just 3 years old. Now, they allow their child to live as a girl and wonder if and when they should begin hormone therapy. Then, when Mary’s son was 8, he told her he felt like a girl, and Mary allowed him to experiment with dressing as a female. Now a teenager, her son is more comfortable living as a male -- but Mary wonders if she caused his confusion. Joining the discussion are experts with differing points of view: Dr. Dan Siegel, professor and clinical psychiatrist at UCLA School of Medicine, and Glenn Stanton, author and research fellow with the organization Focus on the Family. Is gender identity something we’re born with, or is it influenced by parents and environment? Don’t miss this heated discussion, then talk about the show here..

Find out what happened on the show.

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jennpdx

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October 30, 2008, 12:33 am PDT

God Does Not Make Mistakes... I agree

Quote From: dpwtchr

GOD DOES NOT MAKE MISTAKES! If God made mistakes, He wouldn't be much of a GOD now would He??? That just makes me mad that someone would say that!! Now listen, just because your child WANTS to wear nail polish doesn't mean you should let him. When I was a child I wanted to smoke cigarettes because I saw others doing it... mom and dad didn't run out and get me some, they knew what was best for me! I'm glad Dr. Phil had someone from Focus on The Family on, but Dr. Phil, it bothers me when you SAY you are a Christian and yet don't speak up when someone openly defies the GOD you say you believe in. Again, GOD DOES NOT make mistakes!

I agree with those who happen to believe in a Supreme Being when they state that God does not make mistakes. Despite what that young girl on Dr. Phil's show said today, she is not any kind of mistake. God (if there is one) made her EXACTLY the way she should be... and she is only asking for others to respect and recognize that fact.

For ANYONE to think they know what God's plan is for her, is the ultimate example of hubris and conceit.

This young girl is anything BUT confused. She has been consistent in her self-identity, shown remarkable courage in the face of an entire culture that wants to intimidate her into being what THEY want, rather than what is in her best interests. (This includes the "morality" vultures like Glenn Stanton and Focus On The Family). She seems to be a happy, well-adjusted and loved child...and yet, that isn't enough for some of the gender police busy-bodies out there.

To the family of this wonderful young lady, bravo! You are literally saving her life and by committing to a course of treatment that may include puberty blockers and cross-gender hormones, you are providing her a higher quality of life and self-esteem than many adult transgender people have been able to enjoy.

And one last thing.... there is entirely too much conversation here about sexual orientation. This show was NOT about sexual orientation.... gender identity is a COMPLETELY different issue and subject. I dare say you all had a sense of whether or not you were a BOY or a GIRL years before you had an idea of who you were romantically attracted to. Please stop conflating the two things.

If anyone would like more information on providing education and advocacy on behalf of their child or youth, please contact me. Our organization, TransActive is based in Portland, Oregon, though we serve families throughout the country.

Jenn Burleton

Executive Director

TransActive

transeducate@gmail.com

www.transactiveonline.org

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confused_too

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October 30, 2008, 12:47 am PDT

10/29 Gender Confused Children

Quote From: toolatemom

It is all confusing and I don't know that anyone has the answers. I do think you need to be careful with kids so young. Steer them the way they 'appear' to be lovingly and time will tell.

I can say that I had a son we suspected as being gay but we were ignorant, condemned such things in front of him. To make a long story short, he died at 36, having a great career, of a drug overdose. Found he lived two lives. The one for the person he really was and the other as a show of who he thought everyone thought he should be. The drugs were from the pain he lived with and his parents were the cause of most of it. We learned too late. Why would anyone choose to 'want' to be gay. I now understand and am active in a local PFLAG chapter.

I am so sorry for your loss.

I admit I have not read all the messages as there are just too many. Your caught my eye as you said " Why would anyone choose to 'want' to be gay". Sad truth is my son has. My son was a normal boy growing up all through high school same thing. He was very smart and I guess you could of called him a nerd. He is now 23 years old, has had the same girlfriend for 3 years. This girlfriend is the artsy type and is into theater. My son would go to a night club that has people dressed gothy almost anything goes, but his girlfriend never went. My son is about 5'11 and very skinny. He started to dye his hair and dress in unisex cloths. Two weeks ago he called me to say he was breaking up with his girlfriend and by the way I also want to be a girl, I am transgender. What??? In shock I asked him if he was gay? His reply was no. He went to a doctor and in one visit somehow convinced this doctor to give him pills that block testosterone (he says "he can't handle testosterone). He is also going to be put on estrogen this Friday. The kicker is he says he wants to be a girl but also date girls. He wants to be gay???? If you like girls then stay a boy.

I am at a loss here as he is legal age and does not want to listen, does not want help. He has somehow convinced a doctor he is transgender. He has a whole new set of friends (we have never met) he hangs out with (not one childhood friend). He has a new girlfriend who calls him "she" (I have never met her). My son does not seem to care what anyone thinks and seems to be loving the attention he gets when people look at him weird.

Do I understand any of this.........no

He's an adult and by law he can do as he wants and his family has no say. His father and sister know but no one else.

I am sorry to say but people who go through the sex change operation will never be male or female, they will be "its". They will always have to be on medication to keep them looking the sex they were not born as. They will never truely be the sex they were not born as.

I love my son, I only wish I could help him.

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fatbob08

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October 30, 2008, 1:07 am PDT

I was gender confused, but it's OK !

For as long as I can rember I have always wanted to be a boy. My mother told me that even as young as 3, I was always acted and dressed as if I was one.(That is when she would allow !) For obvious reasons there were deals to be made, such as I could wear my tennis shoes and baseball cap to church: (the parking lot !), and then put on my patton leather Sunday shoes, remove my cap, brush my hair and attend church. Tthat was the deal. Of course as soon as we got back in the car, I was allowed to don my shoes and cap again ! Now let me say that my Mother was a "girly girl" growing up. And even though she had adopted a "girl" @ 3 1/2 wks old... I was my fathers son !! I even traded chores with my older brother: (as I became physically able ! ) and spent my Saturdays with Daddy @ Sears in the tool dept.! I sat at the top of the driveway every day, just waiting for my Dad to come home to play whatever the season dictated. While my brother helped Mom in the house before dinner. Our Father of course spent time with us both, but it was me who really wanted to be his son. Now we are 47 & 50 yrs old. Neither of us are gay and both happily married. (myself for the past 20 yrs.) I guess what I am trying to say is let your children be who they are... truely deep down inside... it just might work out. My husband says that he's glad I'm not a "foo foo" girl

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tina_socal

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October 30, 2008, 1:58 am PDT

I would like to see Dr.Phil clarify his position

On today's show he made it clear that he was against HRT and other medical interventions for young kids who express gender incongruity...

but in the case of the intersex kids mentioned in passing during today's show who were born with ambiguous genitalia and chromosomes, they are routinely subjected to HRT and surgery to "correct" their natural born bodies even when there is no medical necessity to do so.

And what's worse is that it is religious types like Focus on the Family and churches that most adamantly promote this kind of treatment and insist that it is necessary for purely social reasons, even though they repeat the mantra over and over that "God doesn't make mistakes"...when they are talking about TG's.

The massive hypocrisy is that they only promote genital surgery and HRT when the person getting surgery and hormones is too young to give consent or express their inner sense of gender- when an older child or adult ASKS for help to align their body with their innate gender ID, these pharisees are suddenly against the exact same treatment as being some kind of affront to God's will....even in cases where a surgical birth "correction" was done and turns out that the male or female ID assigned to the kid was wrong.

The David Reimer case was mentioned today, and the protocols that the FOF guy decried were actually developed not in the treatment of TG kids, but in the treatment of IS kids. Reimer was neither, but the "knowledge" allegedly gained through the systematic butchering of IS kids to "normalize" them was used to justify forcing Reimer into a female gender role after a botched circumcision, which in case anyone has forgotten is the deliberate mutilation of normal, healthy male genitalia (where have I heard that before?).

It was a classic case of doctors playing God, and ignoring someone's desperate pleas to be allowed to live as his innate gender identity until he was driven to suicide (all because John Money didn't want to admit that his entire 'nurture only' gender ID hypothesis was wrong) .

So I would like to hear Dr. Phil's stand on the issue of HRT and surgery given to infants and prepubescent children with intersex conditions without their consent or even asking them whether they feel like a boy or a girl...seems to me that if he adamantly opposes it for transgender kids, to have any consistency he would have to oppose it for those IS kids who can live without it too.

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bethlove

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October 30, 2008, 1:59 am PDT

bible

Where in the bible does it say that transgender is wrong? Where does it say it's a sin? There is Deuteronomy 22:5 "A woman shall not wear anything that pertains to a man, nor shall a man put on a woman's garment; for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD your God." Ok how many people follow all this passage. Women wear jeans all the time. Do you put a rail around your roof so no one falls off, wear cloth combined of wool and linen? Sew tassels on four corners of clothes. Just to name a few. Would God hate/ disown someone for being intersexed. Go on with your hate and see how heaven treats you, or will you go to hell?

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tina_socal

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October 30, 2008, 2:31 am PDT

what you don't understand is this

Quote From: cindib63

I don't know weather a child really can decide these things at a young age, but what I do know, is that if this child continues to dress as a girl, when he is a boy, he will be teased and ridiculed all his young life. I believe, that even if it ends up that the young man still wants to be a woman when he is an adult, then whatever. But right now, he needs to be the "boy" that he was born as. Stand by him at home, let him know that he is wonderfull no matter what he feels inside, but, in public he needs to dress socially acceptable. I wanted to wear skimpy shorts and short shirts when I was young, but that was not allowed. It did not change that I wanted to, and sometimes wore them at home, but I sure didn't show up at school or church dressed like that....

I think it is totally rediculous tha a parent would knowingly support and promote a child to dress in a way that will end up humiliating and embarassing him or her.

When someone is trying to hide their inner sense of being a different gender than the one they are expected to act like based on their physical bodies, they still get ridiculed and harassed for being different, because one's internal sense of gender is so pervasive that it can't be hidden or overcome through sheer force of will.

Even if they manage to create a persona that they think "reads" as normal for their physical sex, it is often a crude caricature that is no more believable than that of an over the top drag queen...and it isn't just coincidence that so many MtoF transsexuals go into hypermasculine endeavors like military special forces, police work, athletics, etc...even so, people will always get a sense that the person is hiding something, and this wreaks havoc on their personal and professional lives and living that lie often drives them to suicide.

The humiliation and shame felt by TG and IS kids forced to live a role that doesn't fit who they are is no different than the shame and humiliation that would be felt by any "normal" boy forced to go to school in a dress and act like a girl, so it is a fallacy to think that "making" them act like their birth sex will prevent them from being harassed or ridiculed for who they are, it doesn't, even when they aren't "out" as TG- people will know that something is up..

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jewelsf

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October 30, 2008, 3:49 am PDT

OK, I see your point, yet..................

Quote From: havasumoma

I didn't disagree with what the person said and I didn't say it did not have value. The point I was making is that when you try to compare the experience of an adult and the experience of a child it gets confusing to those who don't understand these finer differences. Folks lump sexuality and gender indentity together and it confuses the discussion. The parents aren't to blame. No one said this person didn't have a right to post. I simply stated my opinion that the poster probably further confused folks who were already having difficulty understanding the topic. I work doing education on behalf of gender variant and transgender children and I am all too aware of how hard I have to work to help people understand the difference between sexual orientation and gender identity. People are afraid that this is about young children being sexual (that is why they think it is somehow immoral) so it is essential that this distinction is always made clear.

I read that post and had no trouble at all understanding the difference between an adult and a child. And for those who couldn't understand the difference, maybe they shouldn't be on this topic at all because it would be way over their head to begin with. All this person did was to explain what he went through "as a child" and to express that his parents were not to blame. It's that simple. Actually, I feel his post was beneficial to this topic.

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jewelsf

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October 30, 2008, 4:00 am PDT

No positive male role model?

Quote From: nohsp4u

Here is a simple thought, as a child i was raised in a household where my step father sexually abused me for several years, after my mom finally left him, i was left with a mom and two sisters to grow up around> Gender confused? no! it is called no positive male role model. My mom started me into the Big brothers/big sister program. I still have some female charactoristics, but i am all male and love being a male and i love women. Any parent that would foster an 8 year olds desire to cross dress etc, should be taken aside and have their heads checked. I think they left their brains at home.

Do you have any idea how many women raise children alone these days and their children are "not" gender confused? That is a ridiculous statement! My parents were married for 27 years, until the day when my father passed. They had 4 girls and only one boy.

My father was rarely home because he worked out of town, building golf courses. Sometimes he would be away for 3 months at a time. My mother essentially raised us. So here is my brother, surrounded by females, with his father away from home most of the time. Is he a woman or gender confused now? NO! He's all male, believe me, he's all male.

As a matter of fact, 3 of us girls were tomboys while we were growing up, riding dirt bikes and going target practicing (with guns). When my brother entered the Air Force he was so good that he automatically qualified as a sharp shooter and received a stripe for it. I, a female, was almost as good as he was. But I also had and still do have, my feminine side. All of us girls do.

So trying to blame this on having no positive role model just doesn't work and sends a false message out there to women who are raising children on their own.

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jewelsf

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October 30, 2008, 4:10 am PDT

Very well put!

Quote From: pch2008

OK, lets see here. I just watched the show. I check this site and :voila" a response to what I wrote earlier...."OH wow, why didnt I think of that! I can overcome this!" "Now why didnt I think of that before? I am 37 years old...surely if I keep trying to change for other people that dont focus on their OWN life, I can eventually be worthy enough! I had already tried to change for complete strangers for over two decades! But THIS time it is different! Nope, THIS time I can...nope, THIS time...Oh, shoot...now I am dead and I wasted my life trying to be someone I was not, all because of other people. As my therapist said years and years ago, I am transgender, as I already knew for decades, and this does not leave. It is something we cope with and others need to learn about.

What a sad waste of time judgmental, ignorant people are. I'm sure when THEY are at the Pearly Gates, God will surely tell them how "Christian" they were acting like this!

This response I got above on here is 1) condescending, 2) judgmental (assuming I would want to change this about me even if I COULD, which again, it is me, but it seems to go in your ears and out the other on everything I wrote, despite trying to be personal, factual and heartfelt professional even., and, of course, the always required 3) IGNORANT. Oh my gosh...since I am Christian myself (as I already said) it is amazing what a bad stereotype so many seem to be on here...do you realize you fit that stereotype to a "T"? All it does is turn off non-Christians to ever find that faith. All stubborn, judgmental, not listening (even if it was wrong, which again it is not) it is how God made me...

You insulted me 110% to equate who I am with being an alcoholic. You should really get some common sense and be ashamed of yourself. Do you even realize what you are writing? Or does your brain not interact with your typing fingers? Oh my...simply , simply amazing. I guess we all must listen to you because you sure sound like you think you know everything....even those things that you actuallly know NOTHING about.

Oh and to the even more amazing winner on this board that seemed to be alluding to me (unless there was somebody else on here that wrote about their parents not knowing about their son being TG), you take the insensitiviy prize, congratulations, I say that my father DIED this month, and all you can say is assume that we MUST have had a bad relationship with my father and mother. News flash to the ignorants to light a flashlight to your thinking....MY PARENTS WERE MARRIED OVER 50 YEARS BEFORE MY FATHER DIED THIS MONTH. There, happy? I guess not because your weak "proof" now holds no water. My family always has been amazingly close, went to church every Sunday back when I lived in their city, etc., it is only in the exception because of people just like YOU writing on here that they dont know about this one thing about me....they, too, were/are extremely religious....as in its practically the only channels and music they every listen to, etc.

Again, I love my God, too, and share the same faith with as my Mom and siblings (and my Dad, before he passed away)...but the way people are thinking like this on these boards is exactly why I thought that I couldn't possibly be a Christian if even I, growing up the way that I did, was like this. I was on the verge of SUICIDE thanks to people like you, congratulations. Is that what you want on your hands?

All of this "converting/conforming" talk TOTALLY reminds me of religious extremists in other countries that KILL people if they dont believe exactly as they do! And news flash...not everyone in the US is a Christian, so what would you say to a TG person that doesnt even have that faith? Crazy, crazy logic so many have on here.

Cant we all use the BRAIN that GOD gave us?! Sheesh, even if it was a sin, (since everyone loves to quote the Bible so much), there is also references that all sin is equal in the eyes of God (there, see? CHRISTIAN)., so I am no "worse" than you as far as sin. So get off of your high horse and "judge not lest ye be judged" (that one sure is appropriate on this board, sad to say).

I can't believe someone actually tried to compare this to alcoholism. How ludicrous can it get? I am also so tired of Bible thumpers trying to bring Satan into everything. I am a Christian also but I also believe that God knows what is in our hearts and who we really are. I am not a TG, but I have committed my fair share of sins. Not that I feel TG is a sin, don't get me wrong. But I deeply believe that God has forgiven me and that I don't have to be or act like some of the people on this board demand from all of us or we shall perish in hell forever.

What about that other saying? "Those in glass houses should not throw stones"? And the other one, "He without sin.....................

Everyone sins, it's impossible not too! Judging others is a sin in itself!

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jewelsf

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October 30, 2008, 4:15 am PDT

Are you kidding?

Quote From: plainjanedoe

Just another, although rather extreme, case of parents wanting their kids to get everything they want instead of teaching them that sometimes they don't get what they want. I can't believe that steroids are illegal for athletes (who feel and believe that they are the best of the best), and only allow them to realize that dream, but doctors can give hormones to kids to make them into something they are NOT physically. I wanted to be a boy when I was a child. I wanted it so bad because I was raised with the belief system that boys could grow up to be someone and do things and girls could grow up to get married and have children. I was not told that I was confused, nor was I. I simply wanted to be what I was not. I also wanted blue eyes and blonde hair, which is possible nowadays, but when I grew up I learned instead to accept what I am. So my hair remains dark and my eyes remain hazel, and I remain a female, although growing hair on my chin and lips.

If drugs can be given to people to enhance the qualities of a gender they are not physically, why can't drugs be given to them to enhance what they are physically. Wouldn't that straighten things out? (And save a lot of emotional distress for them (and their families/parents) in the long run?) Hormones are really potent chemicals; ask any menopausal woman. If they can make a boy feel/look more like a girl, then it would seem they could certainly make a boy feel/look more like a boy. What floors me is that someone would feel like a man with a constructed fake penis or a woman with a fake uterus. A penis does not a man make.

How is the desire or belief that a person is a gender other than what he/she is physically any different than other desires or beliefs that any child has? My daughter cried when she found out that she was going to be short. It prevented her from one of her lifelong dreams of becoming an Air Force Pilot. I did not go out and seek a doctor to have her legs lengthened (which is possible) in order to help her attain what she dreamed she would be since she was since a child. I did help her to see that there were other options in life.

If my kid wants to pull the wings off of flies because it is interesting, should I provide him/her with flies? If my kid wants to experiement with drugs or alcohol to attain highs (because if feels good), should I allow that? If my kid thinks he's Napoleon and it doesn't hurt anyone, should I encourage him/her in that belief? If my kid thinks he/she is Dr. Phil, should I shave his/her head and allow him/her to go around in a suit and a tie giving advice to people?

To my understanding, psychotherapy has as its goal--at least cognitive therapy--having a patient alter his thought patterns so that they are more positive in allowing that patient to live happily. Actions promoting transgender (a word that should be incomprehensible to 3 or 5 year olds, or even 8 year olds unless they have been exposed to a lot more than they should be) would seem to do the exact opposite unless the child lives in a bubble.

As far as nurture is concerned, perhaps part of the confusion is caused by parents who draw firm lines about what little girls and little boys "have" to do. The position: "If you are a little boy then you can't comb Barbie's hair" may lead to the conclusion in a little boy's brain: "If I comb Barbie's hair then I am a little girl." That is a logic error. If you are a little boy and you comb Barbie's hair, it may be a little wierd, but it doesn't make you a little girl.

As to the doctor with the theory that there is a brain imprint as to gender which is independent of the physical realtiy, how was that determined or measured? Does it show up in a scan? I get the impression that anecdotal "evidence" by laymen is just talk, but anecdotal "evidence" by psychiatrists becomes scientific proof. There are rules about conducting research. What research supports this theory?

Lord, grant me the serenity to recognize those things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

You don't know the difference between a doctor medically giving hormones and an athlete using steroids? Maybe you need to educate yourself!

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