A mum from Australia shares her story of how previously supportive medical professionals dismissed her concerns about her daughter’s newfound identity.
Transcript
Hi, I’m a mum from Australia.
Our daughter came out as transgender three years ago.
Three years prior to that, she had had very poor mental health, for the ages of 15, 16 and 17. And so we’d been on a mental health merry go round for three years prior to the transgender announcement. In that three years when I had a diagnoses of anxiety, depression, bipolar, possible borderline personality disorder and I’d taken her to over 70 medical appointments in a three year period. I’d never been treated badly by the medical profession in that three years. I’d been called a very supportive parent, because I tried to do so much for our daughter.
Then when, out of the blue, she declared that she was transgender, we were alarmed because there was no history, there was no signs. There was nothing prior to that, that had indicated any gender dysphoria or signs that she was uncomfortable being a female. So it was pretty strange, this sudden announcement. Yet, it was also like she had a script in her head, that she was reciting stuff to us that was just not like the person we knew. It was coming from somewhere else.
Yet, a hospital admission because she told the medical practitioner she was suicidal, resulted in immediate affirmation by medical professionals and an immediate referral to start testosterone at age 17. We didn’t want to do that, we said we wanted caution. We thought that was all too fast, too quick, not being considerate of her mental health history. However, we were undermined, we were dismissed. And we were treated appallingly by the medical profession here in Australia.
And from that point in time, our family pretty much fell apart.
Our daughter turned 18, she put herself on testosterone and became estranged from us some time later. She is now three years into this journey of transgender. She is on an invalid pension for mental health problems. She’s isolated herself from us.
I can tell you the grief our family has experienced is like nothing you would ever imagine. Her younger brother became anorexic through this time period. He couldn’t cope with what was happening to his older sister. Our family have been completely devastated. And I truly believe that our daughter has been caught up in a social contagion of transgender.
Just like so many other young people.