Transgender Video. Please download the file and then run on your PC video application.
We have found this video really beneficial as we have journeyed with our transgender child. We hope it is of value for you as well. Sorry we are unable to put it on YouTube currently.
Transgender Video. Please download the file and then run on your PC video application.
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It has been a tremendous time supporting parents of #LGBTQ children, and being supported ourselves, over the past 14 months. Yesterday was our second group meeting where we had the opportunity to chat about our different, but surprisingly very similar, journeys with our children. Contrary to the statistics suggesting that the vast minority of those who identify as #LGBTQ are transgender, only approximately 1 in 10,000 identify as transgender, the vast majority of our parents have transgender children! Regardless of the reasons for this we are here to unconditionally support them all. Although through information on the website, and via telephone calls and emails, we can aid the process of journeying with our children, we value extremely highly the personal contact: that initial meeting with the parents, one-to-one, to show that this is a group that truly cares about every member of the family. Hence we also greatly appreciate the opportunity to meet up together - it is all about 'connections'. We want to connect up people from all across our great county so that they can help each other. We chose our venue for the meeting so it is central to all who could attend, and so this may alter as we develop further. Uncle Henry's supported us magnificently!
The parents wanted to also express their concern for all within the #LGBTQ community and took the picture (seen at the top of the blog) to show solidarity and to show their love. It is difficult to summarise just what a wonderful time was had meeting up with all of the parents (although some were ill and couldn't attend - we delivered cake to those we could!) we felt that we should leave you with this quote from a parent: "I think today, as parents, we felt hope. Today we saw that there is acceptance too and the world for our child is not as as scary as we maybe thought" says it all really....
If you'd like to join please contact us via the website contact page. If you have a question email us here. We'd be glad to help! Otherwise if you'd like to leave us a message here on the blog we would love to hear from you! How wonderful to be invited to join such an array of notable speakers at the LGBT History Month session at the Chester Police Headquarters. The session was organised so well and brought together representatives from Liverpool Open Table Kieran Bohan; the Equality & Diversity representative from 5 Boroughs NHS Partnership Tara Hewitt; Rose Neelam discussing LGBT and being a Muslim; and Khakan Qureshi from Finding a Voice in Birmingham: all of this, more than ably organised and led by Kat Stock, a PCSO and the LGBT chair of Cheshire Police Network (CCLGBTNetwork) group. The session was introduced by the Cheshire Police and Crime Commissioner, John Dwyer. It was notable that all speakers of differing faiths were in agreement... about LGBT! Here's a picture of them all (Kieran was hiding it would seem!): All the speakers, bringing together the different faiths of Christianity (Anglican & Roman Catholicism) and Islam mentioned their journey, of particular struggles when confronting their own faith with respect to LGBT but, contrary to many perceptions, winning people over with love. As they engaged with people, as others understood what it meant to be LGBT or how coming out enabled that person to be the person that God truly made them to be, others saw the deeper meaning and came to a greater understanding and empathy. All felt that winning a personal battle was one thing but they were committed to putting their head in the firing line and give a voice to the many who were unable to speak out.... or come out. And they encouraged all of us to do the same: to stand up for others within the LGBT community. It was such a encouraging afternoon of reassurance and positivity. Our short talk focussed upon the Clobber verses, those 6 verses out of the 31000+ verses in the Bible which are used to criticise others because of their homosexuality but which can be interpreted very differently when particular words are examined in context. Remember that the word 'homosexuality' was only introduced into the language in 1869, and then to describe what they perceived to be a disease. Of further interest the Revised Standard Version of the Bible was the first Bible to include the word and that in 1946 - rather recent really. So what were they interpreting this to be prior to 1946? Our own personal journey was also given but is one that is heard and not put on line. Here are our slides:
LGBTLincs attended an NHS conference "Everybody Equal" on Thursday 11th February at the wonderful Showrooms facility on Tritton Road in LIncoln: a wonderfully positive day with lots of straight allies and members of the LGBT community within the NHS or like us providing support for parents. The opening speeches were so positive and encouraging. Yes we had a lot of delegates present (110) and the atmosphere was one of moving forward but Paul Devlin, Chair of the NHS Lincolnshire Foundation Trust, reiterated that we still need to do far more with actively preventing homo-, bi-, and trans-phobia. Professor Rachel Munton, Managing Director of the East Mids Academic Health Science Network, gave an illuminating, frank and humorous talk about her life and being who she really is; moreover, she discussed the battles she had faced with her colleagues not being able to understand and come to terms with Rachel as a lesbian. She asked 'How could we help people to come to terms with them being LGBT?' There was always a tension with not wishing to offend but 'why should we declare our relationships? as unhelpful disclosure can also be damaging. Would a heterosexual director arrive in a meeting and announce that they are in a straight relationship? What we did need was sincere authentic personal narratives and others being respectful towards our working colleagues of all positions. She said it may be fine to accept the Managing Director but would we react the same to the cleaner? We hope so. if in doubt when wondering how to help #LGBTQ individuals just ask them... because Stonewall UK's Nick Corrigan, a young looking Director of Personal and Professional Development Programme, introduced the current programme from the organisation called 'Driving Change'. He too agreed with the previous speakers that we needed to step up, reach out and help others with the transition to full acceptance, without exception. With 15% of Doctors feeling that they did not have all the necessary skills to support LGB patients and with this figure rising alarmingly to 25% for transgender patients he had the evidence to support his claims. He asked us all to Empower individuals; transform institutions; Change hearts; Here is the Transgender Check List of Questions which were kindly provided by Paul Fitzgerald from EMAS The main thing that came out of the day was that there is an awful lot of good will and desire to improve the services for the LGBT community but an awareness that it is not happening. As with all things these days they need the numbers to crunch and feedback to those holding the purse-strings so that budgets can be allocated to local groups, GP's etc for specific support. If anyone would like to feedback to the relevant people your experiences of any part of the NHS that has not met your needs, or indeed if you have met providers who ARE getting it right, then the people in suits need to know. Every GP's practice should now have Patient Participation Groups (PPG's) which you can join to help influence policies at the surgery. There are also opportunities to speak to Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) who are the people who influence budgets. They love their acronyms we discovered!! For us, lots of networking was done & as well as being in contact with more parents of LGBT children, we are hoping to launch a Teens LBGT group in the Sleaford area but more of that later. Premier Christian published a blog entitled 'Can we be born into the Wrong Sex?' written by Andrew Hamilton Thomas. It is available here .. http://www.premier.org.uk/Topics/Can-We-Be-Born-Into-The-Wrong-Sex It is an article which attempts to engage the readers of the blog with the topic of being Transgender and then continually persistently shows a blatant lack of respect by mis-gendering Caitlyn Jenner - the subject of this article. Firstly after finding out that gender may not all be as we initially thought it to be, we look at being 'transgender' and conflating it with being Intersex. According to the American Psychological Association, there is strong The article makes this quote (above) and given that we are talking about the whole human population it can be difficult to disagree with it. What it loses in the margins is that we are talking about a small proportion of this total population, possibly 1 in 10,000. When children are assigned to a particular gender at birth the medical profession have to make a decision based upon some observable criteria: the presence or absence of what they consider to be a penis. However, as the author has already highlighted sex and gender may be different. Yes the sex of the child can be assessed as either male or female but gender is a complex abstract formed in the brain. The author then looks to link intersex and transgender (I know not why). Let's help by describing transgender and then intersex. Transgender People who identify as transgender are usually people who are born with typical male or female anatomies but feel as though they’ve been born into the “wrong body.” For example, a person who identifies as transgender may have typical female anatomy but feel like a male and seek to become male by taking hormones or electing to have sex reassignment surgeries. Intersex People who have intersex conditions have anatomy that is not considered typically male or female. Most people with intersex conditions come to medical attention because doctors or parents notice something unusual about their bodies. In contrast, people who are transgendered have an internal experience of gender identity that is different from most people. Many people confuse transgender and transsexual people with people with intersex conditions because they see two groups of people who would like to choose their own gender identity and sometimes those choices require hormonal treatments and/or surgery. These are similarities. It’s also true, albeit rare, that some people who have intersex conditions also decide to change genders at some point in their life, so some people with intersex conditions might also identify themselves as transgender or transsexual. In spite of these similarities, these two groups should not be and cannot be thought of as one. In the author's argument he uses the term deformity. He is correct in that many decades ago we may have used such terminology but now, with the use of DSM-5 we no longer do so. With transgender people the medical profession now use the term gender dysphoria as "dysphoria, in the diagnostic label is not only more appropriate and consistent with familiar clinical sexology terminology, it also removes the connotation that the patient is “disordered.” We are informed that according to the: The Law of Moses in Deuteronomy 22:5 it specifically states that it is an abomination before God for a woman to wear men’s clothing and vice versa. It is always difficult when you take one verse and use it to bolster your argument when you need to look at the context of the original remark. This was the Law of Moses, given in Leviticus to the priests during the Exile.
These are the laws of the times, the law that God gave Moses. Yet, how many of us put railings around the roof of our houses? But it's the Law ... God's Law. Also, we plant all sorts of various seeds in our gardens, whether it be a vegetable or flower garden. This also is against the law of God. According to the laws in the Old Testament, we are breaking the law to plant corn and beans in the same garden. What about the clothes we wear that are made of many different blends of natural and synthetic fibers? How many of us go around with tassels hanging from the four corners of our jackets and coats? Yet, this was God's law. But transgender individuals are not wearing the clothes of the 'other sex' for their gender is not as initially assigned. You are not wearing the clothing of the opposite sex. In John 1:17 it reads: For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ and further on in Galatians 3: 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither Male nor Female: For ye are all one in Christ Jesus. What this article lacks is love. We are not called to judge but to love one another. Focussed upon the total inerrancy of the Scripture (written in English) without any use of reasoning and experience can cause a strange view of the Gospels as written to set us free. We just wanted to relate the pressures parents of LGBTQ children are under. We are NOT saying that they have it easier than those in the LGBTQ community - by no means - just want to say how the parents often feel.
As founders of the support group for parents of LGBTQ children in Lincolnshire we get many a call, email or message via the website seeking help. Occasionally from people outside of the county boundary, as neither Facebook nor Twitter seem to respect Geography. It does not matter to us as we will try to support people come what may. We are happy to accommodate all who contact us as they try to seek out pertinent information and find that support they need. We certainly don't have a set plan of action as it wholly depends upon them. We try to support people in a very bespoke manner - it's an individualised support package if you like. Often we'll talk on the phone as they tell of their concerns. This can take a long time but then again the time not being able to talk about this has been much longer. These calls can often be very emotional as, possibly for the first time, they can relate how they are feeling, how they have not been able to tell their relations and/or fellow workmates. We can refer those people who are 'out of the county' to neighbouring LGBT Foundations if possible - but we don't cut those now established links with us - unless they want to do so. If parents are happy we'll meet them in a neutral venue, as they direct, where, over coffee, we can listen to their journey. That's all - no magic - listen and empower through respect for their story. Generally they are very emotional; that anguish, which has been weighing them down for some considerable time with the news that their child is gay or trans*, now starts to be unloaded. Often they will suggest that it is 'their fault'. I know - I said it as well. Often it is the fathers who feel the most guilt, especially when young lads are involved. Mums question whether their baby, now a teemager, was ever normal? They discuss that it has been difficult to speak of their concerns to others but by doing so now you can see their shoulders rise, the weight which has been bearing down for so long is now slowly starting to lift. We provide links to the information on the website to help answer their questions - too many to answer over a coffee. They are just relieved that their questions do have answers! To hear that science is confirming that their child is normal, that it is not their fault, brings a smile to their face; something that this issue has denied them that opportunity for a long time. For some parents they are now content and do not seek any further support - we don't chase them for, if the support provided is all that is necessary then, they know where we are, and other groups we have signposted, if they want further information. For many they now want to meet up with other parents from across the county. Our bi-monthly meetings now offer that time to share, to chat and to foster bonds of friendship over related LGBTQ matters. Over more coffee and cakes, we can together encourage, enthuse and equip parents to move on, in love and affirming their wonderful children. We are starting to investigate a youth support group for LGBTQ teenagers: for example, having a clothes exchange system so trans* teemagers can get a start on their new wardrobe. It is an exciting time as we watch parents come to an understanding that, after initially feeling that they were failing as parents, they are really supporting, loving, their child totally. Long may this continue. |
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May 2016
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