# Transgendered 6 Year Old Wins Rights Case **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 24, 2013, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831 "2013-06-24T23:14:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2013, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831/101 "2013-07-06T23:09:10Z")
True, but that is why the child should be evaluated by professionals, as opposed to random people on internet message boards, or busy-body neighbors. ---
**Author:** ![lorene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/65b543/32.png) [@lorene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lorene)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2013, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831/102 "2013-07-07T00:20:03Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > True, but that is why the child should be evaluated by professionals, as opposed to random people on internet message boards, or busy-body neighbors. Absolutely. My point was just that it does happen that a child who isn’t as skilled at articulating feelings may conflate one thing (in my daughter’s case: I want to play with the boys but they’re excluding me) with another (I hate being a girl and I would do anything to be a boy). Either way, as a parent, it’s absolutely gut-wrenching to watch and listen to your child be so unhappy. I would guess that no parent in any of these stories acted without first doing a lot of soul-searching and internal struggling. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2013, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831/103 "2013-07-07T04:19:16Z")
> [@lorene](#): > > Ok, but…in defense of the people saying, “What if she changes her mind?” I offer a (useless?) personal anecdote. But with respect, one could just as easily question without knowing any personal, medical, and professional details anyone’s problems. “What if you’re not really cured by Zoloft, and your depression returns?” “What if taking statin X for cholesterol makes you sicker?” They’re sort of silly questions, because the decision to transition isn’t done flippantly and not without scads of documentation and professional evaluation. If by age 11-13 Coy still isn’t sure, or the doctors aren’t sure, or her parents aren’t sure, then the option exists for puberty blockers, to allow an extra couple of years to see if the gender issues resolve. Almost always they will, as their peers all go through puberty around them, it will often serve as a “wake up call” for the (very few) who change their minds. There are no stats on the exact number of transkids who establish a gender identity early on, but revert to their body gender at puberty. The psychologists and psychiatrists I know claim it’s “exceedingly rare.” However, that shouldn’t be mistaken for a cite. > [@](#): > > It’s not unreasonable to point out that there may be other things going on. Absolutely. But the question is, how far did you pursue your daughter’s desire to be a boy? Did she threaten suicide if she couldn’t be a boy? Did she try to hurt herself, to change her body? Did she lock herself in her room and cry every morning, too worried she would be forced to go to the wrong bathroom at school? Was she then evaluated by psychologists, mental health professionals, and others, multiple times in a clinical setting? Was she administered testing for gender identity? Did they even try some antidepressants and other mood modifiers to see if perhaps her GID was really a side effect of an underlying mental condition? Not putting words in your mouth, but I would imagine that the answer is “no” to all of those. Whereas with the case of transkids who transition, it’s almost always “yes.” ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831/104 "2013-07-11T18:28:02Z")
> [@lorene](#): > > Ok, but…in defense of the people saying, “What if she changes her mind?” I offer a (useless?) personal anecdote. > > When my daughter was in Kindergarten, she wanted to be a boy. She repeatedly cried about how much she hated being a girl. She wore only boy’s clothes, including her brother’s underwear when she could. She told me she wishes there was a pill that the doctor could give her to make her a boy. This went on for far longer than 12 weeks. I assure you there were no bearings from peers or attempts by my husband or I to change her mind. Well, I did make her stop wearing her brother’s underwear and bought her her own boxer shorts. > > Fast forward 5 years to today. She is still an incredible tomboy. Still wears boxers. Wears swim trunks and a boy’s swim shirt. Shops in the boy’s section for all clothes. Hasn’t owned a dress in 5 years. But if you ask her, she is 100% adamant that she is a girl. For her it really was about being excluded by boys when she wanted to do the things they do, wear the (more comfortable) things they wear, and just hang out with them. She has a lot of male and a few female friends now and is happy as a clam, but 5 years ago, things looked a lot different. > > It’s not unreasonable to point out that there may be other things going on. I think the key here is that your daughter \*wanted \*to be a boy. She \*wanted \*the doctors to change her into a boy. She \*wanted \*the social benefits of being a boy - playing with the other boys - which right there disqualifies her from a diagnosis under current guidelines. Coy doesn’t \*want \*to be a girl. Coy \*is \*a girl. That’s the difference - your daughter _wanted_ to be other than what she knows she is; Coy knows what she is. The rest of us just needed Coy to tell us that, because the usual marker we look for (genitals) is mismarked in her case. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transgendered-6-year-old-wins-rights-case/661831.md?page=5)