(Cw suicide) As someone who was a suicidal 9 year old, yeah that age tracks.
It really sucks but yeah it can happen that young. Puberty can start anywhere from 8 to 14 and puberty is rough enough without the gender dysphoria.
Intersex kids are allowed to have genital surgeries without their consent, 17 year olds can enlist in the military w parent permission, and in some states minors can still get married to an adults with parent permission. So why can't trans youth make medical decisions, esp when parents (1/2)
are helping them understand risks and benefits and giving their consent for gender affirming care? If youth 19 and under can't make these decisions, no one under 19 should be married or in the military. Intersex youth regret surgeries forced on them every day, but no one stands up for them. (2/2)
I'm a cis lady of a certain age who lived with decades of suicidal ideation starting at 12. Whenever I talk to skeptics about gender affirming care, I tell them that it comes down to one thing: Do you want children to kill themselves? If the answer is no, treat them.
I have a patient who's been out since he was 6. He's 13 now and after years and all the required Dr's visits he's finally able to start hrt and he is so. Fucking. Happy. When I first met him he was anxious and withdrawn and now he's such a chill and confident little dude. I'll fight anyone about it
"They're deciding they won't have children at age 40" I wish these people would actually look into these things before they yapped cuz plenty of trans adults have biological children later in life. Also Jesus dude not everything is about reproducing.
This is why gender affirming care for kids is important. We have to trust in the experts here and not to mention the kids themselves and take them seriously. No kids should feel like there's only one way out.
Also, my kingdom for ANYONE doing these pieces to talk to a single trans adult and ask us about our regret at not having any of this care available to us when we were children.
This is what I've been shouting from the rooftops. Kids need time to explore their identity and mature enough in order to make decisions that have irreversible effects. Blockers just let them live long enough to get to that point.
Puberty blockers are in fact the compromise that was already made to placate the people who think kids don’t know what they are. Which goes to show the worth of compromising with these people.
relieved this interview is apparently from 2012 and not 20 years ago, just from an "omg am i that old" perspective. also i wish i could find the whole interview but the only clip i could find is in embedded in a tweet from a substack ghoul u_u
I mean, 13 isn't that far off from 20! But yeah, fair - I couldn't remember exactly when I'd seen it, only that it was while I was living in a specific place.
Starting at around 7, I prayed almost every day for God to let me die so I didn't have to suffer anymore. I stopped when puberty hit and I finally stopped believeing in a god.
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It really sucks but yeah it can happen that young. Puberty can start anywhere from 8 to 14 and puberty is rough enough without the gender dysphoria.
I was witness in the 1990s to someone talking about their late sibling and the note they found and...that was a trans kid who saw no hope.
People might not understand it...
...but DAMN I wish they wouldn't minimize it.