Parents of transitioning adolescents struggle, too.
Even the ones who are supportive.
Supportive or not, they will still need to grieve the loss of the son or the daughter they were raising, in order to fully accept their “new” son or daughter.
Our society is so binary, that the first question many people ask a pregnant woman and her partner is,
“Do you want a girl or a boy?”
Or even,
“Is it going to be a girl or a boy?”
In recent years, gender reveal parties became a big deal, getting more and more elaborate. From the Jumbotron at a Bulls game, to pink-colored water from a firehose, to an alligator chomping on a watermelon filled with blue dye, expecting parents have put creativity and — let’s be honest — insanity, into gender reveals. All in the effort to celebrate not just birth, but gender.
But what if the baby is born intersex? What if years later, after investing in pink or blue bedrooms, girl or boy toys, gender-related activities, and non-neutral clothing, your child tells you they are transgender? What happens then?
My own mother was deeply committed to making us girlie-girls. And we were, as long as she had a say. We ranged from okay to happy with our cis-gender lives. All three of us grew up to hate ruffles and ribbons, though. The middle sister hated them then, and she and mom were often in loud disputes. I don’t think mom could have handled one of us transitioning.
I’m now a therapist who’s worked with transitioning adolescents and their parents. The struggle is real for both.
Transitioning adolescents have often grappled internally with their gender dysmorphia for years before telling anyone. It can be devastatingly difficult to share those thoughts and feelings with a parent or caregiver whose approval and continued care they need.
If the parent is open, available, and supportive, providing a safe space for the child’s or adolescent’s feelings, the experience is obviously better. When the parent isn’t open or supportive, of course the experience of opening up can be traumatic.
In either case, it can be as difficult for the child to understand the parents’ feelings as it is for the parents to understand and accept those of the child.
As you’d expect of any adolescent, they are caught up in their own feelings, fears and hopes. They often don’t anticipate or understand their parents’ or caregivers reactions to the reality of an offspring’s transition.
It’s right that we, parents and caregivers, the larger community and medical professionals, including therapists, fully support transitioning adolescents when they do come out to us. It’s also right, and important, that the parents be allowed to grieve.
This approach, of allowing both adolescents and their parents/caregivers to have and express their real feelings in a safe place, shouldn’t be revolutionary, but in our all-or-nothing world, it can be considered a radical approach. Some factions consider parents’ feelings that aren’t completely and immediately supportive to be sabotage. As a therapist, I know there should be nuances.
Even the most supportive parents have to grieve.
One client told me he heard his mother crying in her room. He felt guilty and worried. I worked with him, and later with the two of them together, to help him understand that she still loves him. It was important for him to have empathy for the stress and grief she was experiencing during his transition, without feeling guilty.
She was not only grieving the daughter she thought she was raising, she was also dealing with animosity toward her from her ex-husband and other family members, as she fully supported her child’s transition.
Parents’ and caregivers’ feelings are often mixed. They may be grieving, but also feeling proud of their child for their courage. They could be dealing with the disapproval of family and friends, and from those in their surrounding community.
It’s okay for both parent and child to have all the feelings.
All emotions should be brought forth, acknowledged, validated, and resolved. Grief has its own trajectory, and is dealt with in its own time.
Joint therapy sessions can help adolescents with gender dysphoria and their parents establish goals and aid in understanding each other. As in any joint counseling, tensions and feelings may rise and discourse can get rocky. The therapeutic environment should be a safe space for the these emotions to emerge.
Finding therapists who provide that safe space is equally important. Look for one able to be unbiased, supportive of transitioning, while also aware and willing to work with the feelings of parents and caregivers. One able to help them all have compassion for one another.
If you are the parent or caregiver of an adolescent who want to transition, consider therapy for yourself as well as joint counseling. Communication and expressions of love and validation can go both ways, making the paths ahead easier to traverse. For everybody involved.
Carol Lennox is a writer and psychotherapist in private practice for over twenty years. After many years working with children and adolescents, she currently works only with adults. Incongruently, she writes a lot of humor. Subscribe to her email list below to experience the intersectionality of her writing.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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