My “Transphobic” Beliefs
Today I googled myself in the process of working with an incredible branding & designer expert I am so excited to have chosen for my upcoming podcast. I discovered that someone who doesn’t personally know me, and certainly isn’t a former client, went to the trouble of leaving me a 1-star rating on healthgrades.com and sharecare.com (which are basically the same site). They didn’t write a review, but they pressed buttons. And they didn’t know what they were doing. The sites asked some questions about my practice that they got incorrectly. They answered yes that I specialize in working with children and seniors, and offer evening and weekend appointments. A simple visit to my website would have allowed this troll to answer correctly.
They also answered incorrectly in deeming that I don’t work with the LGBTQ population. I do. I have since the start of my career. In fact I grew up amongst LGBTQ friends. But I appreciated that by making this remark, Mx. Mystery Grudge confirmed my suspicion that the rating wasn’t left by a client; it was left by a stranger on the internet with an axe to grind about my “transphobia.” I don’t expect that I can, oh, I don’t know, breathe, without having labels like these slapped on me — this is 2021 — so I don’t waste energy trying to avoid it. Haters gonna hate. And I’m not worried about their efforts to dissuade prospective clients from seeing me. I have to turn people away all the time.
But I am going to take a moment to explain what actually happened.
What I actually said, in an online group for therapists, was that I believe rapid onset gender dysphoria is a thing that exists, and that parents of ROGD youth need help finding therapists who will take the time to listen to them. That’s what I got mobbed for. I stopped checking my notifications. I didn’t have the energy to deal with the dogpile, nor did I have reason to feel encouraged that anyone would listen to a reasonable response.
I stand by what I said. The hubris of many therapists amazes me. They argue that there is no such thing as ROGD and that therefore, any parents who question their offsprings’ sudden assertion of being trans must be ignorant or hateful transphobic threats their children need protected from. Have any of these therapists ever had children of their own? How would they feel about another adult meeting their 14-year-old once and then being certain that the kid is right and the parent is wrong?
Rapid onset gender dysphoria is absolutely a thing.
Teenage social contagion is absolutely a thing. Perverse incentives are a thing. Permanent physiological damage from hormones and surgeries, including infertility, inability to orgasm, and increased risk of all kinds of diseases, are painfully real things. Soon, massive class action lawsuits for medical malpractice will also be painfully real things.
And let’s talk about real people.
Detransitioners who feel traumatized by having been allowed at a young age to make rash life-altering decisions are real people who deserve to be heard.
Nurturing parents with reasonable, loving concerns about their offsprings’ mental health and about the risks of making life-altering medical decisions at an early age are real people who deserve to be heard.
Personality disordered parents who seek attention via Munchausen syndrome by proxy inflicted onto naive children are real people who need to be seen for what they are and whose children need protection from them. Personality disordered young adults who seek attention by claiming every “victim” minority status within reach do exist, often perpetrate more harm than they are victim to, and their claims shouldn’t always be taken at face value.
Intersex people exist, deserve to have their stories heard if they want to share them, and deserve privacy if they’d prefer that. They deserve access to caring, educated healthcare providers who will help them decide which medical treatments, if any, are right for them.
Gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth, many of whom present in gender-atypical manners, are real people who deserve thoughtful, considerate, open-minded therapists and an open space to explore delicate questions, without jumping to conclusions or being pushed into medical interventions when they may just need to find themselves like most people do in adolescence and young adulthood.
Youth who experienced sexual trauma, or were exposed to destructive messaging that made them feel unsafe in a given body shape or social image, and have been led to hope that changing their gender identity will fix that, deserve therapists who will take their time helping these kids explore what happened, how it affected them, and what the most empowering steps and outcomes for them might be.
Youth who are lonely, outcasts, perhaps odd, perhaps victims of bullying, perhaps neurologically atypical, perhaps neglected; who feel estranged from others, and want the feelings of acceptance, belonging, approval, and protection that we all desire as human beings; are real people, who deserve support getting these needs met, and shouldn’t be presented with a vision of the world that leads them to believe the only way to do so is to change their names, pronouns, and physiology.
Youth who are growing up in a racially charged era in which it has become socially acceptable to openly express hatred toward white people, and feel like they have targets on their back for belonging to “privileged” groups, are real people, who shouldn’t feel like the only way to gain compassion and acceptance from others is to adopt a minority status that they are not sure in their heart of hearts is really them.
Woke therapists can serve the clients who want to see them. And they can all agree that these experiences and human beings are completely made up. But outside of their self-aggrandizing bubble, there are plenty more reasonable people who also need to be understood. I’ll be one of the therapists who is here for them.
