​​The very existence of our children demonstrates the falsehood that once a young person declares a transgender identity, that identity is innate and stable and in need of affirmation. Our kids are proof that, contrary to what some activists say, kids do not know who they are, certainly not in the way that would justify disrupting their still developing endocrine systems and amputating their healthy body parts.

 

Some might claim that our children’s desistance is a sign that they were never transgender to begin with. We reject this claim. Our children met the criteria for gender dysphoria laid out in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). They were “insistent, consistent, and persistent” in the rejection of their bodies. They were affirmed as transgender by allies in their social environment, who also pressured some of us to go along with our children’s declared gender identity.

 

Our children were transgender, until they weren’t.

 

We have no idea how many desisters there are. No one is counting. Two of the largest surveys ever done on the U.S. transgender and gender diverse population explicitly excluded respondents if they desisted. Few researchers or clinicians are asking to hear the voices of our children, or to understand what made them want to escape their bodies, and later accept those bodies and even learn to love them. 

 

Even if someone did care enough to track the data and collate these experiences, many of our desisted kids don’t want to be public about their experience. Trying to escape their bodies was part of a broader mental health struggle they don’t want to relive. Some are embarrassed by what they went through, by the cultish mindset that consumed them for a few turbulent years, or by the demands they placed on their families and friends.

 

Our kids just want to quietly get on with their lives, and we don’t blame them. Frankly, we do too.

 

One of the most common and distressing experiences we’ve had is the loss of trust in medical, mental health, and education professionals. These professionals are fully committed to a worldview in which they believe they’re heroically saving trans kids, while being utterly uninterested in exploring the true cause of our children’s distress. They willfully ignore the deluge of systematic reviews of evidence from abroad finding that gender-affirming care lacks any credible evidence and that one European country after another is walking back the practice. We know there are reasonable and compassionate professionals who work with gender questioning youth; some of us have benefitted from their guidance. But they are the exception, not the norm. 

 

School counselors, principals, and teachers took it upon themselves to implement the serious psychological intervention of socially transitioning our kids, often behind our backs, and encouraged them to lie about it at home. The recently published Cass Review, the most comprehensive report on youth gender medicine to date, found that the evidence for social transition is extremely weak. It emphasizes that social transition is an active intervention and that parents should be involved in these decisions. 

 

The threat of suicide is used to coerce parents into accepting radical and unproven medical interventions for our children. We have been admonished to deny reality and accept our children as the opposite sex, and threatened that if we don’t, our children will estrange themselves from us or even kill themselves. This narrative has been proven false and harmful. Some of us were asked, in front of our children, “Would you rather have a live son or a dead daughter?”

 

We know that every suicide is tragic, but being threatened with the suicide of our children is emotional blackmail, and it has to stop. 

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The breach of trust between us and professionals means we must reclaim our full authority as the experts on our own children. For too long we’ve listened to ideologues who insist they know and care about our children more than we do.

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Most gut-wrenching of all is when our own family and friends frame us as hateful and bigoted for simply asking questions or expressing concerns about our child’s self-declared identity and the serious, lifelong risk that comes with medical intervention.

 

​We believe it is our duty as parents to protect our children’s right to an open future.  

 

There is no such thing as being born in the wrong body. There is no right or wrong way to be a boy or a girl. It is not kind to lie to children by telling them their actual bodies are meaningless and that they can start afresh and become the opposite sex. 

 

Many of our children have poor mental health. We know this is related to comorbid conditions they have, including ADD/ADHD, autism, sexual abuse and other trauma, anxiety and depression, difficulty fitting in socially, and internalized homophobia. Their transgender identity was a coping mechanism.

 

Gender transition did not alleviate their distress. 

 

Parents know their children best. We don’t think there is a one-size-fits-all solution to gender dysphoria. There are many pathways into a transgender identity and many pathways out. Creating strong bonds with our children is what helped us see them through and what kept our families together.

 

We want all parents of trans-identified children to know that it is never too late. If you have supported social or medical transition you can still help your child accept the reality of his or her sex.

 

Our experiences show that desistance is possible. 

 

We are eager to hear from parents, and from medical, mental health, and school professionals who want to help us safeguard children and support them in living healthy lives in healthy bodies. Please join us in supporting the truth that every child is born in the right body! ​

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