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Trans Kids and Chemical Castration: Embracing the Journey Conference. Session#2

Staff Writer

For part 1 of our exposé, click here

The conference began with a worship song and a welcoming word by Greg and Lynn McDonald, who also played some videos introducing themselves and the event’s purpose. Notably, one video featured Hanne Larson, a ministry leader with Embracing the Journey who explained that she suspected her child was transgender at three years old. After the introductions, Debbie Causey took the stage for the first message.

Causey is the gay-affirming pastor and Director of North Point’s Care Network. She’s a board member of Renovus, the LGBTQ-affirming activist group formed by North Point pastors and leaders designed to normalize homosexuality within the church. She also recommends that struggling LGBTQ kids attend the Christian Closet for counseling, an organization whose schtick is that all their counselors and therapists are themselves LGBTQA in some way or another. Her session was titled ‘A Winter of the Soul,’ and she outlined some of the most painful times she’s experienced as a mother to a gay son, pulling from private memories and personal vignettes.

Breakout Session Two: The Transgender Journey: Parent Panel Discussion.

This session featured a panel of a half-dozen parents with transgender children sharing their experiences raising kids who believe they are the opposite sex. It was an emotional time that frequently saw the men and women in tears as they lent their wisdom, experiences, and beliefs, giving insight into everything they did right and wrong along their journey.

But these are not ordinary panelist parents. Instead, nearly all of them are members of Embracing the Journey’s coaching, counseling, and group leader teams. These men and women host and lead small groups for this craven ministry, with North Point Community Church helping to direct desperate parents to them. They’re also all gay-affirming, and everything about the answers reflected that.

During introductions, one panelist proudly proclaimed, “I am the father of a transgender daughter.” Another explained that his son initially came out as gay but has since morphed into a “non-binary trans human.” Another shared, “Five years ago (my daughter) came out as transgender masculine,” and a long-time staff member of North Point revealed that his son came out as transgender two years ago but has yet to transition or change his pronouns.

The panelists spoke about the fear, denial, and bargaining they experienced when their children first came out, along with the intense guilt and sense that theyt did something that caused it. One panelist described her response to having her child come out as transgender as “shock, followed by intense fear for my child’s safety and what is the future going to bring.”

The host turned their attention to the “unique challenges and considerations” transgender kids are facing, and one panelist divulged that the medical aspect of it is always at the forefront of their minds. She insisted that a child’s decision to take hormones is “very misunderstood” in the world right now:

For many of us and for our kids who take hormones to feel like themselves, this is medically necessary. This is life-saving. And so many in the culture treat it like it’s some flippant thing.”

She further insisted that people need to “come to grips” with the reality that “medical intervention is necessary for a person’s well-being and healing” and that gender-affirming care “is a treatment for gender dysphoria.” Then her voice began to quiver:

“This is life-changing; this is permanently altering someone’s body. (As a parent) the hardest piece is how do we know this is real? There’s not a test that can be taken. There isn’t a mark that can prove they’re transgender.”

She says she’s spent years watching her daughter get hairy legs due to the hormones and listening to her voice change, which has been hard but worth it because “I want my child alive, alive, alive, alive.”

One panelist, a medical doctor, shared that her daughter is on testosterone and had top surgery. She explained that “it’s critical for transgender people to have good counseling” because they have a “really high incidence of depression and anxiety and other psychiatric diagnoses,” including being on the autism spectrum. For this reason, she says it’s crucial that parents “optimize those factors in the process of figuring out what to do about hormones and surgery.”

A major session theme was how the parents could gain influence and build a stronger relationship. One panelist said that using their child’s new personal pronouns helped them gain a foothold in their life, while another said it was as simple as “really loving them for who they are” without trying to convert them with therapy or just preaching at them.

One panelist told the story of forcing her daughter in 8th grade to wear a dress to graduation even though she wanted to dress like a boy. Looking back, she said she deeply regrets making her daughter do it, but years later, she has been given a second chance. Now, when she goes shopping with her transgender son, she reveals how excited she is to run to the men’s sections and recommend outfits to her. She says, “Supporting my child is truly celebrating who my child is now and being grateful for this beautiful kid that I have.”

Lastly, as it pertains how having a transgender child has shaped them spiritually, one panelist shared that they initially wrestled with this situation, but after reading several gay-affirming books like Matthew Vine’s God and the Gay Christian, his theology developed and evolved, “I just feel like it’s opened up so much of God and the world to me.”