The battle over infants with cross-gender desires

The battle over infants with cross-gender desires: NPR Radio's All Things Considered just had an interesting feature on two six-year old boys who identify with and want to be girls.

[Ziggy on High]

First off, the title here is rather misleading. We're not talking about infants here, but 6 year old children.

Sometimes, we need to give the child the benefit of the doubt that they have some idea of what is going on in their body and mind. This requires a lot of discussion with the child to ensure that this is truly how they are and not a phase. Sometimes boys DO go through these phases, but many times it is not just a phase but a mismatch between the mind and body. As the article says, the stress and potential depression from growing up in the wrong body are what need treating. They CAN be happy, well adjusted, AND transgendered.

[My Opinion_El Paso_TX]

Ziggy on High wrote:

First off, the title here is rather misleading. We're not talking about infants here, but 6 year old children.
Sometimes, we need to give the child the benefit of the doubt that they have some idea of what is going on in their body and mind. This requires a lot of discussion with the child to ensure that this is truly how they are and not a phase. Sometimes boys DO go through these phases, but many times it is not just a phase but a mismatch between the mind and body. As the article says, the stress and potential depression from growing up in the wrong body are what need treating. They CAN be happy, well adjusted, AND transgendered.

Good points Ziggy. I believe that at age six, that this could be just the developmental stage that they may be going through. I doubt that at this age that they could really have a full understanding of what they're experiencing.

I would want to know more on what they have been subjected to and see how that may have influenced their thinking.

Most reported cases of transgendered individuals reports that in hind sight that they have always felt that way. But, for little children, they don't have that complete understanding.

This would in many ways be a good case for a longitudinal study for understanding the transgendered community, but it would have to be handled very delicatelly in order to ensure that these two boys were not dramtically influenced to any degree on either side of this life issue.