Transgender Children??

I was watching the documentary "Becoming Chaz" last night with Sunny Bono and Cher's transgendered daughter (born a girl, transitioned to a male).

There was a part of the movie where the was a group of parents and YOUNG children who were "transgender." When say young I mean 3-4-5. They had expressed wanted to be the opposite gender, and these parents were actually medically intervening and planning to give them hormones before puberty to prevent then from becoming their actual gender.

What do you think about this? Would you do it?

IMO, I am fully supportive if a person chooses that for themselves, but the parents administering drugs and hormones to children to support the opposite gender is absurd to me. I know gays/lesbians/transgender people "know" from a young age. But knowing you are gay at that age is one thing, changing your body chemistry is something completely different and a person should not be able to make that decision until they are an adult.

wow that is a lot to swallow. as a parent you want your child(ren) to be happy but you are to also protect them. letting them transgender so young seems scary to me because of how cruel people, especially school age kids could be.

I'm not a parent of a transgendered child, however I am a parent to a child who's other parent is transgendered.

When I met Brandon is was a flaming drag queen named Katrina Dupree. Katrina won the Ms. Gay Utah pagent 1994/95.  We became friends and I suddenly realized that my biological clock was ticking and his DNA would make a beautiful daughter that I somehow thought I was destined to have.  One night, hanging out, getting a little drunk, I actually approached Brandon about it. Brandon was totally receptive to the idea. On one condition. I married him. He needed a tax write off and needed the social protection of being married for his job.  I agreed. We got married in September of 94 and by November I was pregnant.

When I was 5 months pregnant, Brandon became angry and sullen and verbally abusive to me. I almost left. We went to counseling and it was there that Brandon's secret came out. He always felt like he was in the wrong body. Brandon then switched to a therapist that specialized in transgenderism.  In June of 1995 I gave birth to our son. No daughter for me. Before my son turned 2, I had had enough. Brandon was so angry with the world, the fact that we lived in a small town in Utah and he felt trapped. He became more abusive to the point he beat me a few times. I left.

I got custody of our son, he got limited visitation. About a year later he moved to Salt Lake which is a bigger town and he could be who he wanted to be without fear of recrimination. He started more intense therapy - both for his anger and for gender issues.  He started making friends with other transgendered people and started researching his legal and surgical options.

When my son was 13, he wanted to actually go live with and spend time with his father. At that point Brandon was simply living as a gay man who did drag on weekends. Ironically the week before my son moved, Brandon decided to start living as  woman full time and move back to the small town we had lived in when first married. Brandon legally became Brooke. I wasn't sure how it was going to work. A transgendered parent of a hormonal middle school teenager in a small town. It lasted all of a year. My son couldn't take it anymore and moved back home. It's not that my son couldnt' deal with Brooke living as a woman, he couldn't take Brooke being a ***** all the time.  She started having an over inflated sense of entitilement that everyone and the world owed her for screwing up her life and when she couldn't find someone to actually be a sugar daddy and pay for her gender reassignment surgery, it got worst. She is legally a woman. Her therapy sessions for 10 years helped seal the deal.  She takes hormones. But she is stuck with a penis that doesn't work.  And that just adds to her anger.

The silver lining is that she did find someone who knew her when she was a gay man, he is/was a gay man himself. They started a relationship a few years ago. He has stood by her thru everything. He supports her living as a woman, and if they ever have the money, her choice to have surgery too. We (my son and I) love Gary. The man deserves a medal for dealing with all of it. And I have to admit, his influence in Brooke's life has been positive. She's still a drama queen but she can be put in her place. They live together and Gary introduces Brooke as his fiance. They are getting married in september.

I'm on the sidelines and watching this and I can't imagine how hard it is to be the parent. Brooke's parents are supportive. They just aren't going to pay for the surgery.

I would hope that parents who alloweing thier children transition are doing so with the guidance of both medical specialists both in the physiology and the mental departments.  It can't be easy for them.  But when you love your children, you find away to fix what you can. Those who are not the parents of said child have no room to judge. It's not thier cross to bear.

Holy cow what a story!!!!!  I am glad your ex is working on herself!

My wife and I both watched it last night too.  I found it to be a beautiful story.  Jill and I both know several transgendered people (mtf and ftm.)  As a lesbian woman, I personally did not "know" I was lesbian when I was a child, but many of my gay and lesbian and transgendered friends and family knew when they were young.  All have shared with me the pain and agony of trying to live a lie about either sexual identity or sexual orientation.  Almost 100% of the time, transgendered people knew when they were very young that they were in the wrong physical body.  I think those parents in Chaz' documentary who are supporting their transgendered children transition before/as they go through puberty is fantastic!  It absolutely involves medical and psychiatric support.  For those children, transitioning IS what is natural and right for them.  I think those parents who support that process are absolutely protecting their children from years of pain and agony of living in a body that is not truly theirs.

I totally admire Chaz for doing this all publicly, not like he had a choice being who his parents are. 

I know a lot of gays and lesbians, in fact Sage's godfather is gay and my cousin is a lesbian and her and her wife are ttc right now!  I have met 2 transgender people in my life, they are my cousins friends.  While I agree they both knew they were in the wrong body as a child, there is no way in hell I would prevent my daughter from getting breasts with hormones when she was 10 years old.  I mean there is NO way.  I would let her dress/do her hair/ date women but I would never subject my child to that. 

You saw the movie, those kids were young.  If Sage came to me at 13, I would take it more seriously, but kids want to be unicorns when they are 3, that does not mean I will be taking them to a plastic surgeon to get a horn surgically implanted in their head.  If they feel that was at 4, they will feel the same way at 18 and they can do it then, and I would be 110% supportive.

When I was 3 I would ALWAYS pretend to be a male hairdresser named Mr. Frankie.  My mom recollects I would demand to be called Mister Frankie and act like a male at home and in public.  It lasted for over a year.  But had my mother decided I REALLY wanted to be a man, at 3 (this is the age some of those kids were) I would be screwed right now.  I would have no breasts, no periods ect...

So while I do not fully understand how a transgender child feels, there is no way I could give my 9-10 year old drugs to stop them from being what they biologically are until they have experienced being a woman first.

****quietly tiptoes off this thread****

I saw the doc. (well, Oprah) too and I just honestly don't have an opinion either way. It is what it is and people are who they are. I mean, I see someone short, tall, fat, thin, black or white and I just think "there's someone just trying to be the best they can be with what they've got ..."

Again, I don't think we saw the same documentary (so if i'm sticking my foot in my  mouth by saying this somebody please correct me), but who exactly gets to determine when it's "ok" for parents to transition their **very** young child? 

Jeezus, we can't even have WLS until we've proven ourselves "worthy / responsible enough!" Just sayin' ..

LOL @ Chelle!

there is a book called the princess boy. interesting.

 I heard Chaz say that the hardest part for him, the part that messed him up most mentally was going though puberty in the wrong body. Feeling like he should be a man, but becoming this curvy woman instead, he said it was one of the hardest things he ever went though. So if my child came to me and told me they felt this way early in life, I would (with doctors and pyschiatrists) help them to delay the process of puberty while we helped them to figure out what they really wanted. Before surgery, the hormone replacement etc is reversable and I don't see the harm in delaying what could possibly be a mentally damaging thing until the child knew for sure exactly what they wanted in life (such as Chaz went though when he "became" a woman during puberty).