We need to stop calling GnRH agonists 'puberty blockers'. They stop sex hormone production. They are chemical castration drugs. Of course, Avery felt worse after his natural testosterone levels were dropped to zero. Giving estrogen to his male body does not replace testosterone.
This is horrific. I was having dinner with three highly successful 50 something gay men this weekend. A doctor, hedge fund manager and a marketing director. All three said they fear they would have transitioned as children had this been available in the 80’s. They didn’t understand why they were different. They knew something was off before they knew they were gay. They didn’t want to be different and would have done anything to change that trajectory. Eventually, they grew up, accepted themselves, found love and fulfilling lives. None of that would have happened had they transitioned. Stop transing gay kids.
That would have been my trajectory, too. And of many friends. Just astounding how many gay men/lesbians are totally accepting to gender transition stuff.
Even if one believes that there is such a thing as “true trans” (despite the nonexistence of any objective evidence or plausible biological theory for it), there is no diagnostic for determining which kids are “true trans” and which kids will eventualy desist from their gender dysphoria.
Not only is there not a vetted diagnostic, with good estimates of its false positive and false negative rates, there is not even a proposed diagnostic. The mantra within the medical community has been affirm, affirm, affirm.
The result has been nothing less than a still ongoing crime against humanity.
The author of this book is considered to be the expert on factious disorders and Munchausen/Munchausrn by proxy. He had a case study specifically about a mother using gender identity on a child in this Munchausen context. I don't know what's going on with Avery's mother but I wonder if some parents get into this activism as a way to distract themselves from their own doubts and questions about whether or not they're doing the right thing. If you're being told that it's either do this or your child may die, and you have doubts and misgivings but feel like you don't have any way to safely express those doubts and misgivings and your only option is to convince yourself, I can see how you could get drawn into activism as a coping strategy. Then if it really seems like you've made the exact mistake you feared the most, I can understand how some really dysfunctional and self protective coping strategies could develop. I'm not saying that it's right or trying to defend her actions, but I think we have to make some attempt to understand what parents like this are thinking and not assume every parent is Munchhausen's.
Okay, now I've watched the videos on X and I'm feeling less generous toward her. She was leading the kid, leading the whole family. Yikes. Hard to watch.
Exactly. How many of us have the strength to walk away from our entire context twice in a lifetime. Her last statement might seem like stubborn pride, but let's give her the benefit of the doubt. Rejecting the notion that you have facilitated catastrophic harm to your child goes beyond pride - it's survival.
As a gay man in my late 60s who has been with my husband for 43 years and helped raise his daughters, I feel compelled to respond to this comment—because it misrepresents both gay people and the trajectory of gender ideology in ways that do real harm.
First, being gay is not a “gateway” to being trans. That’s a fundamental misunderstanding of sexual orientation versus gender identity—one rooted not in lived experience, but in confusion and cultural noise. I came out long before being out as a gay man was safe or celebrated, and I’ve seen the hard-earned gains of the gay and lesbian rights movement. The current surge in gender identity ideology is NOT a natural extension of that movement. In fact, many of us—especially gay elders—feel deeply alienated from the direction things have taken. The erasure of same-sex attraction in favor of subjective gender identity is not progress; it’s a reversal.
Second, your experience of your mother’s activism may be valid, but generalizing from that to assert that gay and lesbians are collectively defined by “dark sides” like drug abuse and infighting is both stigmatizing and reductive. Every human group has its dysfunctions—families included. But pathologizing gay and trans people as uniquely diseased or violent plays into decades-old stereotypes that many of us fought hard to dispel.
If you’re concerned about the conflation of gay and trans identities—so am I. But the way forward is not to collapse into reactionary caricatures. It’s to be clear-eyed about the distinctions, demand scientific and ethical rigor in youth medicalization, and resist ideologies that treat identity as a trend or a performance.
Finally, if your mother’s activism made you uncomfortable, that’s your story. But it’s not evidence that being gay is inherently unstable or damaging. I’ve lived a quiet, committed, and constructive life as a gay man. Many others have too. We are not defined by the loudest voices or the most dysfunctional examples. We are not a pathology. We are simply people.
I say all this not to defend a “community,” but to defend truth, clarity, and the dignity of gay people whose stories and struggles deserve better than this kind of rhetoric.
Estrogen is depressogenic even in women so hard even to fathom what a wallop it packs in a puberty-blocked male with all these socio-emotional relational challenges. They medically induced psychiatric illness.
Puberty initiates the final decade of brain re-wiring. This completes in one’s mid-twenties. Block puberty, you block development of an adult brain and thinking capacity. It’s seriously ignorant to believe blocking puberty is only about hormones.
The entire issue is basic, fundamental insanity. Celebrating - or even allowing it - is crazy.
to me this childhood seems rife with abuse, by the mom and by the medical establishment. "Avery" was a child and in no position to understand her body, physiological and emotional development and maturation, sex, sexuality, orgasm, or pro-creation. All of this is absolutely 100% beyond the comprehension of a child. Avery was abused by those who were supposed to give love and nurturing care.
Wow. I keep saying it: individual stories like this one are the only thing that will turn this train around. People can hear and see the harm done here - no academic words, no fights about vocabularies, no need to quote stats. Your restraint in reporting only the facts and letting the characters speak for themselves (and not - equally conspicuous) makes it all the more powerful. Thank you.
I maintain that children who transition at very young ages—such as Avery Jackson at four— generally have adults in their lives who do their utmost to ensure the child’s cross-gender identity is consistent, insistent, and persistent over time. The popular mantra that a child must exhibit those traits to warrant transition ignores the powerful role of adult influence. Young children are developmentally suggestible and highly attuned to adult cues. What’s framed as a child-led identity is often shaped—consciously or not—by adult reinforcement, praise, and the interpretation of gender-nonconforming behavior through a trans-affirming lens.
There is no scientific consensus that a preschooler can reliably identify as transgender in a way that predicts adult outcomes. In fact, longitudinal studies suggest that most children with early gender dysphoria desist, often growing up to be gay or lesbian. Social transition at a young age may entrench an identity that otherwise would have evolved naturally.
Adults—whether parents, clinicians, or cultural influencers—create the context in which gender identity is understood, expressed, and affirmed. They set the terms. And when affirmation becomes the only acceptable outcome, any possibility of exploration or desistance is quietly foreclosed. The claim that “the child is leading” often serves to mask the extent to which the adult is scripting the child’s path.
The mother hopped on the trans train--and took her child with her.
There is no way to know what was really happening with young Avery. Was he a natural GNC young boy? Would he possibly be gay as an adult, or would the gender non-conformance be a normal phase that passes?
What was happening in the home?
Did the mother want a daughter? Did the mother want a "special child"?
What role models was Avery exposed to?
Most family members are instructed to clam up, to follow the script of the trans promoter.
Thank you for covering this. I’ve seen several Substackers comment on Avery’s “regret” recently, and I can’t shake the feeling that his words are being taken out of context, without citations, which makes me doubt the credibility of the writers on this very important topic. I fear that people who want to, will dismiss the whole story. I appreciate you only reporting on the parts of the story that are verifiable at this moment.
Did anyone consider at any point that Avery might be on the autism spectrum? As a clinician who works with trans identifying adolescents and young adults I can attest that my MTF patients are all on the spectrum, all of them high functioning, most of them superbly intelligent and having niche interests (would have fit an Asperger’s profile in previous iterations of DSM) and many diagnosed as young children but not given adequate support.
This young man had surgeries too? I'm so sad to hear that. Even on the cover of Natn'l Geo, he didn't look natural, happy or contented. He seemed to know he was being used. I'd like to know the results of bone scans and whether cognitive development appears to be slowed or altered for a normal middle class individual with every educational advantage. I've seen quotes where he said it "ruined" his life. The doctors saw Avery as great advertising, whereas they should have cautioned his parents against the publicity stunts. We already have the examples of the child actors and their unsuccessful adult lives. I know from my female ideating ex-husband that all of them are public advocates in some way or other.
My ex didn't want to "out" himself (though he didn't pass--if you know the tells, none of them do) so his public acts involved a webpage on his tech company website (which otherwise had nothing to do with children) re: pronouns. Now that he's retired and scrubbed from the Gallery Systems webpages, the pronouns nonsense is gone, as are the anime portraits of the entire executive suite.
The help all individuals will benefit from when they have the psychiatric malady of identity-based obsessive-compulsive disorder, is quality talk therapy to iron out trauma/abuse/bullying experiences, time exercising out in nature and body work such as Feldenkrais physical therapy or Alexander work, to bring the mind/body connections back. Along with minimal time online and minimal time with influencer friends, and of course, zero time watching pornography.
hip/shoulder ratio: women have wider hips, men wider shoulders
head size--larger in men
hands and feet--too small in heavy, short "man" who is a woman on T, to big for XY
voice--they all get tinny voices from wrong sex hormones. My ex sounded like he'd been a pack a day Camel smoker from throwing his voice too high
gestures--exaggerated whole body moves for women claiming to be men, exaggerated hand gestures for men claiming to be women
asking for "affirmation" -- name and pronouns tags, accessories flaunted
furtiveness--sideways glances, looking for affirmation, hoping they go "stealth"
gait--men who ideate a female persona often swing their hips too much and still take long steps, due to their longer legs and what's called Q angle, the angles of the legs going down from the hips. Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies explains this in her book.
too heavy and theatrical make up in men claiming to be women: ie Eddie Izzard
teeth and mouth--much bigger in biological males
Brow and chin sizes--can't be hidden in make up
False fingernails and overly long fingernails--men think it makes hands "smaller"
Adams apple--a male feature
oversized shirts--females claiming male persona often hide under
scents--overuse of perfume by males ideating a female persona
This all reflects the obsessive-compulsive nature of the psychological disorder
Thank you. I saw one video on how to pass made by a trans woman who really looked female to me, even knowing, saying 5 most important things were (I may not have the order right) use mascara (use a little makeup but not too much), hide 5 o'clock shadow, clip nose hair, use perfume (to hide male smells), wear clothes (or do whatever) to make hips look wider.
Reading this makes me sick. Avery is no doubt sterile and will never have normal, or possibly any, sexual function. I don't know what to think of his mother, Debi — the clinicians can be so confident and assuring, and clearly this was a child in severe distress, but it seems like at a certain point, affirming parents of gender-derailed kids lose their protective instincts and can be too-easily convinced to consent to fairly horrific medical interventions. I do not envy her. It must take a tremendous amount of work — which will only get harder — to convince herself that she didn't harm her child. Pity the mother, but prosecute the doctors to the fullest degree of the law.
The movie "Run" is very interesting on the topic of maternal Munchausen syndrome (though not in the context of trans). I don't want to give away any spoilers, but if you're interested, check it out.
The photo, with Avery's hand positioning, is sick. Was it taken by a pedophile? I agree, it's not clear if Avery thinks that transition ruined his life or his mom's activism but even this picture alone is enough to ruin a child. Shame on National Geographic. Shame on parents.
We need to stop calling GnRH agonists 'puberty blockers'. They stop sex hormone production. They are chemical castration drugs. Of course, Avery felt worse after his natural testosterone levels were dropped to zero. Giving estrogen to his male body does not replace testosterone.
Good point!
This idea that we humans are like Mr. Potatohead and can swap out hormones needs to be debunked.
This is horrific. I was having dinner with three highly successful 50 something gay men this weekend. A doctor, hedge fund manager and a marketing director. All three said they fear they would have transitioned as children had this been available in the 80’s. They didn’t understand why they were different. They knew something was off before they knew they were gay. They didn’t want to be different and would have done anything to change that trajectory. Eventually, they grew up, accepted themselves, found love and fulfilling lives. None of that would have happened had they transitioned. Stop transing gay kids.
That would have been my trajectory, too. And of many friends. Just astounding how many gay men/lesbians are totally accepting to gender transition stuff.
Stop transing all kids.
Even if one believes that there is such a thing as “true trans” (despite the nonexistence of any objective evidence or plausible biological theory for it), there is no diagnostic for determining which kids are “true trans” and which kids will eventualy desist from their gender dysphoria.
Not only is there not a vetted diagnostic, with good estimates of its false positive and false negative rates, there is not even a proposed diagnostic. The mantra within the medical community has been affirm, affirm, affirm.
The result has been nothing less than a still ongoing crime against humanity.
The author of this book is considered to be the expert on factious disorders and Munchausen/Munchausrn by proxy. He had a case study specifically about a mother using gender identity on a child in this Munchausen context. I don't know what's going on with Avery's mother but I wonder if some parents get into this activism as a way to distract themselves from their own doubts and questions about whether or not they're doing the right thing. If you're being told that it's either do this or your child may die, and you have doubts and misgivings but feel like you don't have any way to safely express those doubts and misgivings and your only option is to convince yourself, I can see how you could get drawn into activism as a coping strategy. Then if it really seems like you've made the exact mistake you feared the most, I can understand how some really dysfunctional and self protective coping strategies could develop. I'm not saying that it's right or trying to defend her actions, but I think we have to make some attempt to understand what parents like this are thinking and not assume every parent is Munchhausen's.
https://a.co/d/aP5DVDO
I like this compassionate take. I agree—Munchausen is overused. More likely it's self-justification, as Carol Tavris discusses.
Okay, now I've watched the videos on X and I'm feeling less generous toward her. She was leading the kid, leading the whole family. Yikes. Hard to watch.
Exactly. How many of us have the strength to walk away from our entire context twice in a lifetime. Her last statement might seem like stubborn pride, but let's give her the benefit of the doubt. Rejecting the notion that you have facilitated catastrophic harm to your child goes beyond pride - it's survival.
Agree that not every case of a disordered mom seeking attention, significance and community through transing their kid is Munchhausen’s.
As a gay man in my late 60s who has been with my husband for 43 years and helped raise his daughters, I feel compelled to respond to this comment—because it misrepresents both gay people and the trajectory of gender ideology in ways that do real harm.
First, being gay is not a “gateway” to being trans. That’s a fundamental misunderstanding of sexual orientation versus gender identity—one rooted not in lived experience, but in confusion and cultural noise. I came out long before being out as a gay man was safe or celebrated, and I’ve seen the hard-earned gains of the gay and lesbian rights movement. The current surge in gender identity ideology is NOT a natural extension of that movement. In fact, many of us—especially gay elders—feel deeply alienated from the direction things have taken. The erasure of same-sex attraction in favor of subjective gender identity is not progress; it’s a reversal.
Second, your experience of your mother’s activism may be valid, but generalizing from that to assert that gay and lesbians are collectively defined by “dark sides” like drug abuse and infighting is both stigmatizing and reductive. Every human group has its dysfunctions—families included. But pathologizing gay and trans people as uniquely diseased or violent plays into decades-old stereotypes that many of us fought hard to dispel.
If you’re concerned about the conflation of gay and trans identities—so am I. But the way forward is not to collapse into reactionary caricatures. It’s to be clear-eyed about the distinctions, demand scientific and ethical rigor in youth medicalization, and resist ideologies that treat identity as a trend or a performance.
Finally, if your mother’s activism made you uncomfortable, that’s your story. But it’s not evidence that being gay is inherently unstable or damaging. I’ve lived a quiet, committed, and constructive life as a gay man. Many others have too. We are not defined by the loudest voices or the most dysfunctional examples. We are not a pathology. We are simply people.
I say all this not to defend a “community,” but to defend truth, clarity, and the dignity of gay people whose stories and struggles deserve better than this kind of rhetoric.
Estrogen is depressogenic even in women so hard even to fathom what a wallop it packs in a puberty-blocked male with all these socio-emotional relational challenges. They medically induced psychiatric illness.
Puberty initiates the final decade of brain re-wiring. This completes in one’s mid-twenties. Block puberty, you block development of an adult brain and thinking capacity. It’s seriously ignorant to believe blocking puberty is only about hormones.
The entire issue is basic, fundamental insanity. Celebrating - or even allowing it - is crazy.
to me this childhood seems rife with abuse, by the mom and by the medical establishment. "Avery" was a child and in no position to understand her body, physiological and emotional development and maturation, sex, sexuality, orgasm, or pro-creation. All of this is absolutely 100% beyond the comprehension of a child. Avery was abused by those who were supposed to give love and nurturing care.
Wow. I keep saying it: individual stories like this one are the only thing that will turn this train around. People can hear and see the harm done here - no academic words, no fights about vocabularies, no need to quote stats. Your restraint in reporting only the facts and letting the characters speak for themselves (and not - equally conspicuous) makes it all the more powerful. Thank you.
I maintain that children who transition at very young ages—such as Avery Jackson at four— generally have adults in their lives who do their utmost to ensure the child’s cross-gender identity is consistent, insistent, and persistent over time. The popular mantra that a child must exhibit those traits to warrant transition ignores the powerful role of adult influence. Young children are developmentally suggestible and highly attuned to adult cues. What’s framed as a child-led identity is often shaped—consciously or not—by adult reinforcement, praise, and the interpretation of gender-nonconforming behavior through a trans-affirming lens.
There is no scientific consensus that a preschooler can reliably identify as transgender in a way that predicts adult outcomes. In fact, longitudinal studies suggest that most children with early gender dysphoria desist, often growing up to be gay or lesbian. Social transition at a young age may entrench an identity that otherwise would have evolved naturally.
Adults—whether parents, clinicians, or cultural influencers—create the context in which gender identity is understood, expressed, and affirmed. They set the terms. And when affirmation becomes the only acceptable outcome, any possibility of exploration or desistance is quietly foreclosed. The claim that “the child is leading” often serves to mask the extent to which the adult is scripting the child’s path.
The mother hopped on the trans train--and took her child with her.
There is no way to know what was really happening with young Avery. Was he a natural GNC young boy? Would he possibly be gay as an adult, or would the gender non-conformance be a normal phase that passes?
What was happening in the home?
Did the mother want a daughter? Did the mother want a "special child"?
What role models was Avery exposed to?
Most family members are instructed to clam up, to follow the script of the trans promoter.
We will never know.
Thank you for covering this. I’ve seen several Substackers comment on Avery’s “regret” recently, and I can’t shake the feeling that his words are being taken out of context, without citations, which makes me doubt the credibility of the writers on this very important topic. I fear that people who want to, will dismiss the whole story. I appreciate you only reporting on the parts of the story that are verifiable at this moment.
Did anyone consider at any point that Avery might be on the autism spectrum? As a clinician who works with trans identifying adolescents and young adults I can attest that my MTF patients are all on the spectrum, all of them high functioning, most of them superbly intelligent and having niche interests (would have fit an Asperger’s profile in previous iterations of DSM) and many diagnosed as young children but not given adequate support.
This young man had surgeries too? I'm so sad to hear that. Even on the cover of Natn'l Geo, he didn't look natural, happy or contented. He seemed to know he was being used. I'd like to know the results of bone scans and whether cognitive development appears to be slowed or altered for a normal middle class individual with every educational advantage. I've seen quotes where he said it "ruined" his life. The doctors saw Avery as great advertising, whereas they should have cautioned his parents against the publicity stunts. We already have the examples of the child actors and their unsuccessful adult lives. I know from my female ideating ex-husband that all of them are public advocates in some way or other.
My ex didn't want to "out" himself (though he didn't pass--if you know the tells, none of them do) so his public acts involved a webpage on his tech company website (which otherwise had nothing to do with children) re: pronouns. Now that he's retired and scrubbed from the Gallery Systems webpages, the pronouns nonsense is gone, as are the anime portraits of the entire executive suite.
The help all individuals will benefit from when they have the psychiatric malady of identity-based obsessive-compulsive disorder, is quality talk therapy to iron out trauma/abuse/bullying experiences, time exercising out in nature and body work such as Feldenkrais physical therapy or Alexander work, to bring the mind/body connections back. Along with minimal time online and minimal time with influencer friends, and of course, zero time watching pornography.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5uC7xX9Lxo&list=PLOFlPPQm71IiX8NjEVo6jSIwL6IYAtey0&index=11
child actors...interesting comparison! This is similar to "trans" adult turned influencer --
doctor assisted push into the limelight, not a good look for "professionals"
"he didn't pass--if you know the tells, none of them do)
How can I detect those tells? I tried to look it up on the internet, and got "You shouldn't want to know" articles.
hip/shoulder ratio: women have wider hips, men wider shoulders
head size--larger in men
hands and feet--too small in heavy, short "man" who is a woman on T, to big for XY
voice--they all get tinny voices from wrong sex hormones. My ex sounded like he'd been a pack a day Camel smoker from throwing his voice too high
gestures--exaggerated whole body moves for women claiming to be men, exaggerated hand gestures for men claiming to be women
asking for "affirmation" -- name and pronouns tags, accessories flaunted
furtiveness--sideways glances, looking for affirmation, hoping they go "stealth"
gait--men who ideate a female persona often swing their hips too much and still take long steps, due to their longer legs and what's called Q angle, the angles of the legs going down from the hips. Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies explains this in her book.
too heavy and theatrical make up in men claiming to be women: ie Eddie Izzard
teeth and mouth--much bigger in biological males
Brow and chin sizes--can't be hidden in make up
False fingernails and overly long fingernails--men think it makes hands "smaller"
Adams apple--a male feature
oversized shirts--females claiming male persona often hide under
scents--overuse of perfume by males ideating a female persona
This all reflects the obsessive-compulsive nature of the psychological disorder
I hope this is useful.
Thank you. I saw one video on how to pass made by a trans woman who really looked female to me, even knowing, saying 5 most important things were (I may not have the order right) use mascara (use a little makeup but not too much), hide 5 o'clock shadow, clip nose hair, use perfume (to hide male smells), wear clothes (or do whatever) to make hips look wider.
Reading this makes me sick. Avery is no doubt sterile and will never have normal, or possibly any, sexual function. I don't know what to think of his mother, Debi — the clinicians can be so confident and assuring, and clearly this was a child in severe distress, but it seems like at a certain point, affirming parents of gender-derailed kids lose their protective instincts and can be too-easily convinced to consent to fairly horrific medical interventions. I do not envy her. It must take a tremendous amount of work — which will only get harder — to convince herself that she didn't harm her child. Pity the mother, but prosecute the doctors to the fullest degree of the law.
The movie "Run" is very interesting on the topic of maternal Munchausen syndrome (though not in the context of trans). I don't want to give away any spoilers, but if you're interested, check it out.
The photo, with Avery's hand positioning, is sick. Was it taken by a pedophile? I agree, it's not clear if Avery thinks that transition ruined his life or his mom's activism but even this picture alone is enough to ruin a child. Shame on National Geographic. Shame on parents.
Eloquent, thoughtful essay, Lisa. Thank you. I hope this will be widely read and shared.