My teenage aspie daughter says she is transgender

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What I don't understand is what her being an Aspie has to do with any of this, or why you would even include "Aspie" in the thread's title, unless you believe that being on the spectrum makes her less qualified to make her own personal life decisions.

Note on things that have always been here, but hidden:

I spend a lot of time with people who are very homophobic - more so in the modern age, I think, because they see homosexuality as part and parcel of Western cultural imperialism. I try to make them see life from a gay person's point of view, without being too holy about it.

But when you talk to old people, they'll tell you that of course they knew a couple of 'friends' who lived together and minded their own business. There used to be much more of a live-and-let-live attitude about these questions. People knew to some extent.

In the past, there was less one could do about these things. That does not mean that some people were not horribly unhappy, and mistreated due to outsider status.

Also, to the OP, the parents' forum is perhaps the place to meet other parents if that is what you wish. But it's perhaps good to hear from actual transgender people too. You are in pain now, and they have a world of pain inside, so communication can get a bit hairy at times - but I think this is an important and valuable discussion.

Also, isn't it reasonable for a parent to go to WP and ask autistics whether wanting to change gender can have something to do with autism? Considering the identity flip-floping? Because identity troubles is a thing for some autistic girls - just not for all.

Why does it have to mean that...maybe they want more aspergers specific advice than advice with an nt teen in mind.

That was my experience and my parents experience. I am not talking about kids and teens who viciously bullied anybody that was different because they assumed they were "homo". The working world culture was radically different. Your boss and co workers gossiped a bit but the bottom line was the bottom line. If you were productive it did not matter what you did on the weekend or what shape you came in on Monday morning. They had no technology to keep track of what you did once you left the office. The down side was if you were LGBT you had to be fully "in the closet". If you slipped up and somehow it became public knowledge you were fired and blackballed.

You made the claim so you provide the evidence. No-one can prove a negative.

The OP's follow-up post certain seemed to support my view of things quite well so maybe it's not a load of crap after all.

This depends on the hormone. For male to female transexuals, the hormone therapy (estrogen) causes fat redistribution which fills out their face, softens their skin, and can cause some breast growth. The first two things are reversible to some degree by stopping the hormones. The breast growth may be reversible to some degree.

But female to male transexuals take testosterone, and most of the effects of testosterone, like change in voice, masculinzation of facial features, male pattern baldness, and facial/body hair growth are not reversible by stopping the hormones. A female to male transexual who wishes to detransition and regain a female phenotype would have to go through similar procedures as a male to female transexual. For example, facial feminization surgery, voice training or voice surgery, laser hair removal, and if they have had their breasts removed, then breast implants.

Yeah the part about it potentially being a phase she is going through, but if it is she would have to see a doctor and be evaluated and all that to actually start the transition, so I am sure they could determine that before staring hormone treatment and such. But its possible she really is transgender to...the part that was B.S was that transitioning/sex changes don't help transgender people and that the O.P should just automatically assume its a phase, which would be damaging if it is for real.

Evidence shows that it doesn't. It's like plastic surgery. Have you seen those shows\women who think that a nose job is going to make their life perfect and solve all their problems? Only it doesn't, but a boob job will. Only it doesn't so lip filler will and so on. These women have psychological issues yet doctors are just treating the systems and they're happy to do so as it makes them multi-millionaires, but the real problem remains unaddressed. Transgender is turning into the same thing, so many people willing to sell you "cures" for the symptom but the actual problem is still there and the surgery rarely fixes things for them. It's simply the latest quack science to make doctors rich, doctors that have signed a Hippocratic oath, and unlike plastic surgery that has the subjects stigmatised and vilified as "vain", transgender people have the full support of the newly sprung and very vocal SJW army.

Or pretended to want to be a princess so she wouldn't be disowned and blackballed by her own mother.

At the terrible risk of being personally attacked and called things like "ignorant", "pathetic", and a "nitwit" by certain individuals just for having an opinion on my own, you should love your daughter unconditionally and accept her no matter what major decisions she makes in life. Some people are born the wrong gender, the same way some people are born with one too many fingers or toes, and I really don't understand why this the big screaming deal that it is.

This is something that lot of transgender don't understand about cis folks. It's not that simple to understand. Many people are born with a female brain and a female body or the other but unfortunately some are born with one each and many people think gender is defined by what is between your legs. That is something taught in early childhood because if you notice you will notice that someone is a girl because they don't have a penis and this is something small children are told and it's also implied. So we basically learn gender is defined by our body. Then we see someone "claiming" to be another gender so we think they are just pretending or just role playing or think they want to change their gender because of the gender roles society places on us or because they hate their penis or hate having their period or hate their breasts. It took me a while to understand that gender is defined in your brain, not your body so imagine if I was forced to get a sex change and would have to take male hormones, I would hate it so I imagine that is probably how transgender people feel. Or let's say one day I was told I couldn't wear any of my clothes anymore and I now had to wear men clothes, I would hate that too because I couldn't wear the clothes I liked so I imagine that is how transgender people probably feel. I feel weird having to wear clothes that are made for adults and don't look immature enough for me and if I had to wear that all the time I would probably hate it but yet I am fine with wearing them sometimes for certain occasions. That is probably how transgender people feel.

Plus there have been stories out there about people being forced to do a sex change in Islam countries like in Iran to cure homosexuality and honestly those people are unhappy when it happens to them to be forced to live another gender so that is proof right there about gender is defined by the brain and also there was a case when a child had a botched circumcision so a doctor told his parents to have him live as a girl so he grew up as a girl (I forget what his name was but that case was pretty famous) and he never felt right about "her" gender and then when "she" was nine, "she was told she was born a boy and she lost her penis during getting circumsized so they were told to have her live as a girl and at age 15 she decided to go back to living as a boy and changed her name into a male name. That is also proof right there gender is defined by the brain and honestly it's not that hard to understand anymore if people are open minded so they take their time to actually read about it and read about these cases.

I still don't understand what it means to feel male or female because I have always felt myself so I didn't know there was a female and a male feeling inside and I was a tomboy so I didn't follow gender roles really and I still don't wear make up or do fashion and my husband considers me a tomboy but yet I still identify as female because that is what I was born as. Yes I am sure there are kids out there who do want to be another gender because of gender roles parents try to place on them so the kid feels if they were a boy, things would be easier for them. I remember wished I were a boy because I thought penises were cool so I thought for a while that is why some people were transgender because they wanted women privileges or guy privileges because of the stupid gender roles in society. Like it's more cute for women to like childish things and be immature but for guys it's deemed creepy. Many cis people think that is why people are transgender. They are basically projecting their selves into the transgender person. You can say this is where many people also lack theory of mind.

[Moderating]

The mods have been looking at this and similar threads and come to the consensus view that it is not appropriate to question the validity of trans identities in threads about individuals with trans identities.

If you want to debate trans identities, please do so in the Politics, Philosophy and Religion board, bearing in mind that this is a sensitive topic and one should avoid being derogatory when discussing it

--Adamantium.

Thank you for the explanation, I did not know that. As I say, I have come from the other side and am obviously less knowledgable than I thought.

MODS - why are people allowed to post blatantly transphobic things in these topics on WP, spreading hate and misinformation around, and the topics are allowed to continue without being locked?
Honestly with this crap, I don't even want to read here anymore.