When “No” Is Only the Beginning

TL;DR Declining to affirm a child’s transgender identification is not the end of the parenting challenge. It is the beginning of a much larger one. Boundaries create the opportunity for development to resume, but they do not produce development by themselves. Epistemic parenting asks a deeper question: “What kind of environment teaches children to know reality well enough that psychologically seductive explanations lose their grip?”Parents cannot eliminate every cultural influence. They can cultivate homes so rich in love, competence, curiosity, responsibility, and embodied experience that identity-based explanations become less necessary because life itself has become more meaningful.

“Healthy children are not protected because they never encounter compelling ideas. They are protected because they have learned how to evaluate them.”

Parents often imagine that the most difficult part of refusing to affirm a child’s transgender identification is saying “no.”

Continue reading this post for free, courtesy of Dwight Panozzo, PhD, LCSW.