Our personal experience seems to be common; ROGD daughter poisoned by internet contagion?

I am so thankful for finding you, it really helps a lot - to find the resources that help me to understand what's going on and to see the broader picture, to learn from experiences of parents in similar situation, and last but not least - to realize that I am not a crazy, narrow-minded, selfish mother, but exactly the opposite.

When my daughter told me, 3 months ago, that she was transgender, that she hates her body and wants mastectomy, my whole world crashed down. I had a nervous breakdown and it's my husband, who remain stable and long-term optimistic, saved me. After that, I have started my "research" - I was on internet 20 hours a day, and what I have learned saved my mind and helped me not to go mad, I swear. I understood that it was not like homosexuality: if someone says he/she likes the same sex, that’s it! - but something completely different. So, it helped me to separate LGB from T, and to understand what and how is trans lobby doing to us.

What happened to us is so similar to your stories. June was a healthy, feminine, girly - but only by her choice, we didn't push it at all! Gosh, how much many we gave for the dolls! When she was 14, and puberty started, she started to change her style - wearing black, gothic, shorter hair, a bit EMO style, but still quite feminine, with make up and jewellery. With 15 she gave it up and started wearing hoodies, neglecting her appearance, and once she asked if we would allow her to buy binder or sport bra, because she is ashamed of her breasts. We understood that as an expression of being shy, typical teenage development...and we refused because of health risks.

Three months ago I found tight sport bra that she bought (I don’t know exactly how long she is wearing it), and everything exploded. With fight...crying... me going through sadness (crying over my "dead daughter"), aggression, guilt, hope, sorrow, depression... I lost energy, will to work, or do anything except reading about it, I have neglected myself...

I am sure the social and cultural context did play an extremely important role! We live in a country where  there are two opposing tendencies, with devastating results. On one hand, image of girls and women here is awful - primitive, vulgar... even young girls should look like a cheap sex objects, and the social pressure is extremely strong. The society is traditional and patriarchal, but at the same time (typical for post-communist countries) – there are no many career chances for girls and women, at least not for those that don’t fit into the sex-object role. No positive female models, but strong rivalry in the school – who looks more sexy, who has bigger breasts... The other tendency is that we accept here everything what comes from "West" as positive and progressive, so people who are not nationalistic, fanatic, radical – but consider themselves as open-minded, progressive, intellectual – they support the politically correct, uncritical “all-inclusive” approach. And that was the trap for my clever, shy, confused daughter. We never had serious family problems, she was loved and protected (too much, I see it now...), supported (too much, again, because it was too much pressure for her – to achieve something, to find her way, to become adult – mature, stable...), she never had any mental problems (this was confirmed today after series of diagnostic test – a bit depressive, not too social, but normal and clever... How I blame myself for not noticing what was going on, adding the pressure, not recognizing the symptoms... You know the feeling... But I didn’t know anything about transgender, and I’ve heard about ROGD just a months ago, so how could I recognise it...

When she told us, my first reactions was awful - I wasn't loving and supportive (as she expected, because I was the open-minded one, and my husband more conservative), I have brutally reacted, rejected, and painted her future exclusively negative. There was no space for love and acceptance, I have instinctively refused any idea that she might go for HRT, any idea with using the male name – I was angry, aggressive, crying... Next day, I had the nervous breakdown... Screaming and shouting and punching the furniture, then crying for hours...and days... and weeks...  I am taking antidepressant now, otherwise I don’t think I could manage...

But very soon, she showed a cooperative approach! – she accepted to go to the psychotherapist, and to “give herself two years or so”, to explore, to find out about herself, to develop as a person, and then to decide... She is now kind and gentle (even more than she used to be), but I think: she just wants to win the time, hoping that we will accept one day...

She is seeing a therapist now. An advantage is that our doctors do not have to apply affirmative approach, they are free to decide. On the other hand, they don’t know much about transgender and I am not sure if the usual therapeutic methods work well in this case. But at least we got the time...

Next week my husband and I will start with the systematic parental counselling and it looks like they are fully on our side. I hope they will help us to develop a good strategy. The warned us to be very cautious, to be loving and supporting (to June, but not to her trans-ideas), in order to prevent her from falling into the “supportive hug” of the trans community. We were also told not to forbid, push, “discipline”. But I am puzzled – how to prevent her from spending countless hours on internet, how to make her start with the sport or any physical activity (she is a couch-potato and she said she will do something about it, but she is too lazy, and addicted to internet), how to make her participate in the real world, meet real girls and boys (if there are some left), make real experience... She never had a relationship, have never ever kissed anyone (boy or girl), she is simply afraid of her sexuality.

You have noticed that I have mentioned internet – but I should have put it at the very beginning, since June is really addicted. I would strongly support the research finding about the social contagion and the influence of internet and social media. We need more research evidences (like those by Lisa Littman) in order to be able to do something more about it. So, the 'affirmative' pages, YouTube videos, quasi-science promoted by serious looking people, the whole trans-ideology disguised as the human right – it’s poisoning the teenagers.

There is one more phenomenon that shocked me: June was, as many ROGD girls (as I just realised) a big fan of anime and manga. She is into Japanese culture for years and we didn’t see anything wrong about it, and we supported her activities related to that (happy that she is doing anything!!). But recently I checked some details in her room: it is full of anime/manga posters and books. But most of them are about: 1. trans-personalities (it seems to be very typical for anime/manga), and 2. about gay love!!

Also some other popular teenage books that she reads – either trans or homosexual. well, researches did show that many ROGD girls grow out of it and become normal lesbian. But strange thing about it: in Junes case it is something different – guy, not lesbian love!!!

A new phenomena of girls obsessed with gay MALE love, deciding one day to become one of them! Anime and manga are the main source, cosplay seems to be connected. As far as I could see, this is newly observed phenomena, a psychologist are still looking for an explanation, but they obviously offer unrealistic image of sex, gender, roles, relationship, life... And teenager are not able to cope with it.