But I think in the back of my mind, you know, I'm noticing all the things that now we talk about in the sex realist space. I'm noticing the autistic traits, the sexual trauma, the same sex attraction and the parental neglect in some cases. But it's like, what do you see with your own eyes? Like you're telling me there has not been an exponential rise in the number of adolescents presenting with some kind of gender identity issue in the last decade, like, how can you possibly dispute that? It's the therapists and the doctors and the school system, blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah blah. And I'm like, yeah, but what made your kid susceptible to this? And what made your kid uniquely vulnerable? Is this a form of protest against something happening at home? They try to silence dissent and then say that there's unanimous agreement. Right? Hello and welcome to awake at the wheel. So today we are joined by our guest, Stephanie Winn. Stephanie is a licensed marriage and family therapist in Oregon with a master's in counseling psychology and a background in treating complex mental health issues. After years of working group practice, she grew concerned regarding gender affirming care and shifted her focus to working with detransition ers. Rapid onset gender dysphoria parents, as well as others, impacted by gender ideology. She is the founder of Real Talk Therapy. Host of the podcast You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist, So hi, Stephanie. Welcome. Thanks for being with us today. Thanks so much for having me. So I'm wondering if you can start out by telling our listeners a little bit more about, what inspired you or what motivated you, in your clinical work to move into the work that you're doing now? More focus on advocacy, podcasting, and so on? Yeah, honestly, it was just kind of one step at a time. I did not know where I was going. It was just a lot was shifting for me. And the cultural climate of 2020, and it caused me to reexamine some of my most deeply held beliefs about right and wrong. And through that process, I felt a need for intellectual community and reached a point where I wanted to do things like blog and tweet and, you know, start planning a podcast and things like that just to have other, as they're sometimes called heterodox thinkers to exchange ideas with. And I think it was just compelled by that desire for conversation outside of a clinical context, because most of the conversations I was having in a given week were with my patients. And, that is not an appropriate outlet for my own thought process. That's that's for their thought process. So I started looking for that community and one thing led to another. I did not know what I was wading into. And the moment I started, posting, you know, as, as we could say, gender critical or as people are increasingly referring to it these days, sex realist ideas online. And as I started to express skepticism about the whole model of so-called gender affirming care, you know, trans rights activists came after me, blew up my life. There was a bit of Streisand effect there. I don't know if that's the right application of that term. But, you know, I developed the fame and infamy of being under attack and and so then that that just kind of changed my career process. And, and I just kind of figured it out one step at a time. You know, I started podcasting and my podcasts became increasingly niche, not because I necessarily wanted to zoom in on the gender issue, but partly because there's so much going on there. And when you wade into those waters, everyone else doesn't want to touch you with a ten foot pole. So those those are the only people who would come on my show. So it just, you know, reached a point where, okay, now I'm being asked to appear in documentaries because it's incredibly hard to find therapists willing to say anything about this. And okay, now I'm representing a documentary and, you know, and now I have parents reaching out to me from all over the world asking me for help. What do I do? And that's when I figured out how to coach them, how to essentially take, you know, Psychoeducation in which we do in a limited context within therapy and kind of make it my whole career helping these parents, not as my patients, but as people looking for understanding into this issue. So I want to go back to your earlier clinical work. When you're working in a group practice setting, with gender affirming care, what was the tipping point for you where you're like, I don't know if this is quite the right direction to be taking with these patients. Honestly, I was that frog in the metaphorical, slowly boiling point. And looking back with that 2020 vision, you can see all of these moments that should have been more shocking. The first one was very early in my career. It was 2013 or 14 when I was working in a residential treatment facility for 18 to 24 year olds with very severe mental illness. We're talking, you know, post acute hospitalization. Most of them have some kind of psychotic disorder like schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder. A lot of them come from trauma, and poverty. And in that setting, we had an actively psychotic, you know, hallucinating, very physically intimidating, young man with nothing feminine about him claiming to be female. And we didn't know where to draw the lines between that and any other delusional belief that he held. And, there was a debate amongst the staff as to what kind of room to put him in, because all the rooms were shared and he was put in a female room. And, one of the females in that room had a history that would make her ultra susceptible to feeling vulnerable in that situation, any female should and would have every right to feel vulnerable in that situation. But her background especially, and she ran away well. And so that looking back was one of those moments of like, I should have realized then that this was going to be increasingly a conflict of interest issue in society, that you can't just give one group all the things that they demand of rights without potentially infringing on the rights of other people. But it didn't occur to me then because it was so strange at the time. And then I just started seeing more and more of these, you know, youth with different gender identities. And I went to a training that the company I worked for put on, where we were taught to affirm this, and I tried. I was kind of like an early adopter and an early abandonment of this approach. Like I tried to do what I thought was the right thing by adopting all this new language. I mean, I even remember when the company sent us a form we were supposed to use with the identity stuff I like, corrected their language and sent it back to them. I'm like, no, it's like sex assigned at birth. And, you know, I was really trying. But I think in the back of my mind, you know, I'm noticing all the things that now we talk about in the sex realist space. I'm noticing the autistic traits, the sexual trauma, the same sex attraction and the parental neglect in some cases. You know, I'm noticing all these contributing factors and feeling like this gender identity created this kind of elephant in the room where or this sacred cow. I'm not sure what the right metaphor is, but like, we can't touch that. We can't explore that. And then I would I would have patients post transition with all these mysterious medical issues. And again, it felt like we couldn't figure out where that was coming from. And there was just these things we couldn't talk about. And I witnessed, you know, girls with nothing masculine about them but a significant sexual trauma. History is suddenly deciding they felt safer as boys. I started seeing all these things, and then I would see again on the other side, post transition patients obsessed with the question of do I pass? Do I pass, do I pass? And it feels really neurotic and unproductive. So, you know, I'm noticing all of these things right? But it wasn't until a combination of factors in 2024, when I had to leave that job because I was too concerned with, being, I don't know, perceived as professional at work. I guess I had to leave that job, get out of that environment, and even go through some of the social isolation of the pandemic to really start thinking a little bit more independently, combined with actually being with the patient through the process. Because I'd been with patients before and after the medicalization process, but being with a patient who I'd known for years through the process and it setting into me how real this was, you know, like, okay, surgery scheduled. Wait, is that really is this really happening? Is this really necessary? Is this really going to make her life better? You know, and then feeling the weight on my shoulders of, this person's making a life altering decision, and I've been a significant part of their life. And am I doing the right thing? I really started to question that. And it was right around the same time that I heard of Detransition is for the first time, which is really a shame. Like, how did I make it that far? How did anyone make it that far without ever hearing that anybody ever regretted this, that anybody ever had, you know, whether that's physical or psychological and and regret isn't a good even measure of harm, because there are plenty of people who psychologically are not consciously in touch with the the feeling of regret. That doesn't mean that they haven't been harmed. So is all that, you know, once I heard that there were people being harmed by this, I was like, okay, I have to find out everything I can about this. And I went down the rabbit hole of trans stories. And what I was shocked me was that, that that's not the response of any therapist. Like, why wouldn't you want to know everything you could? I mean, especially if you you know, if you're coming from a place of liberal values like, you know, caring for minorities, okay, here's an oppressed minority. Here's here's a victim class, right? Detransition is like, why? Why would you not want to understand that? Yeah. And or and I have spoken about this on this podcast before and even professionally, we've discussed the fact that when it comes to any other issue, we wouldn't be instructed in our profession to do this. But when it comes to the issue of gender affirming care, gender ideology and so on, it's almost like we are told to turn off our clinical brain and turn off our clinical judgment. So I don't want to put words in your mouth, but when I'm hearing you share your journey, it almost sounds like enough was enough. When it came to that request to shut off that clinical judgment. Absolutely. So why do you think? Because, you know, cognitive dissonance reduction has such a powerful force, and nobody wants I think they've been complicit, you know, in causing such harm. Yeah. What do you think? Can I ask this to a number of people? What do you think allowed you to be able to overcome that and see reality? I always go back to this moment when, because everything was changing in 2020, and it was this moment that, you know, you talk about cognitive dissonance. And I actually teach people in my course to look for signs of cognitive dissonance and others to be able to pick up on, you know, because sometimes you can feel when someone is speaking from an authentic place and that and that knowledge or sentiment is grounded in their body and experience, versus when someone's saying something that they don't even fully themselves believe. And I had a moment in a conversation with a friend in 2020 where I was in the latter category. I was saying something that if you were very perceptive, you would have noticed I didn't actually fully believe what I was saying. I was parroting something I had internalized from the culture. And it was something, something right side of history, that phrase. Right. And my friend just it was, you know, the phrase knocked me over with the feather like it was a feather. It was how do you know what's the right side of history? And I was like, I don't, because that cognitive dissonance was there, right? All I needed was that little bit of crack. A good question, I don't know, are you saying I have the freedom to question? Because I think I felt the social pressure of all these ideologues surrounding me who are so incredibly confident that they knew what the right side of history was. And I just needed one person who I trusted as a good person, and who trusted me as a good person, to give me permission to question that. Well, okay. I mean, the sad thing is, I think many people have had that that experience where they've had good people, credible people, you know, people's best intentions, people who've worked in the field who would have said the same kind of, you know, thing that kind of spurred you on. Yet the person hearing it doesn't have that same moment as you had. So do you think there's something else about you, your history or psychological functioning that enabled you to overcome that? You know, cognitive dissonance reduction. Personality wise I'm really high openness and I think, my career as a therapist made me more open in some ways. Like I recognized a need for cultural competency, as you might say. And so, for example, there were other moments along the way. Like most of my life, I'd been in very, liberal urban settings. And so I thought of cultural competency as, you know, having to deal with people from all walks of life. Right. But the one group that I overlooked in my understanding of the need for cultural competency was your kind of normie, middle American, working class, white, conservative Christians. That was like the one group that I didn't have any cultural competency with, and I didn't think I needed to until I had a job that placed me in a setting where I was dealing with normie, working class, white, conservative, Middle American Christians. And and I had a moment of like, checking my bias. And speaking of checking my bias, I think there was a seed planted early in college. I remember I had this incredible anthropology teacher, and, she was just this, like, wild woman in her 60s with long, flowing white hair. And she just she had lived such a rich life and she had, you know, traveled to the Amazon and like. And she shared a story about checking her biases, which is that early in her teaching career, a student came up to her and said, I know a group you should study. And she said, oh, what is it? And he said, the police and, Maloney, you know, speaking to the fact that you work with first responders, she had a moment of, oh, and then she caught herself and she's going, wow, I really have some preconceived notions about this group, don't I? And thus began a 20 year study into the Los Angeles Police Department as a, I forgot what they call it in cultural anthropology. Like there's a word for a technical word for it, but basically the the formal study of a group through a cultural anthropology lens. And, and she ended up marrying a police officer. And so I, I loved that story from when I was in college. And I think that that planted a seed for me and that when I would have these moments in my career, like noticing my biases about the the Middle American that I just described, I would I would take it as like a oops. Well, you know, just as a humbling moment. And, and I had several of those in that job where I would have a preconceived notion about a colleague, for instance, I would project on to a colleague that I like her. So therefore she must share the same cultural perspective as me. And then I would have moments of realizing, oh, we don't come from the same cultural background, okay. You know, so it was all these little things along the way that I guess just increased my openness and, and I think being in the role of a therapist, you kind of have to be ready for having some of your biases tested. And, and I just don't know how there are people in our field who are so ideological that they can be in that role and not feel like they have a duty to understand where the person in front of them is coming from. Yeah, that's you know, I don't know what factors have led to that, but that is clearly that that lack of, you know, of self-awareness, of openness. You know, I would call ethics, you know, good ethics. I don't know how it has happened. Okay. But I do know that more and more, I mean, that's the that's why we have the title awake at the wheel, because more and more people in that position of authority where they should have been teaching that to be, you know, kind of imbuing people, you know, their students with that thought of you have to have the perspective that you just described. Right? They've been asleep at the wheel. And, you know, we have a whole field that has really it seems that ideology truly has trumped good practice, best practices, evidence based practice. So, again, anytime we speak to somebody who, as you said, has heterodox thinking, I always want to understand, you know, what sets us apart from the average person? And it's not even the average person, the average professional, because these are people who should be trained to have better critical thinking skills. But they're not demonstrating that. And, you know, I have one more thing to add to that that's coming to mind, too, in terms of kind of learning moments in my career, there were many moments that I would notice. Wow, I have a lot of people, patients coming to me saying, I wish so-and-so would understand, blah, blah, blah, or I wish that so-and-so would basically let me open their eyes to the truth of what I see because I'm right and they're wrong. And if only they would be open to learning, I would see so much of that. But what I never saw was the flip side of I'm open to learning. I want so-and-so to open my eyes. I want to learn a lesson. Maybe I'm wrong, you know? And so I would notice I was like, wow, okay, half of my clients desperately want someone else to change, desperately want someone else to realize they're wrong and have their eyes opened and be open to learning because they're sure that they're correct and the other person's wrong. Well, is that ever going to happen if no one in the population is? Cultivate a willingness to recognize that maybe they would be wrong. And so I realized there was kind of a give and take to it. And every now and then, if the rapport was right and the moment was right, I would maybe challenge a client like, well, sounds like you're really wanting this kind of level of openness, on their end. And I'm wondering if you feel like you're bringing that to your interactions, you know, are there times that you're putting that in that you're open to maybe you being wrong and them enlightening you? Because I'm not sure how you can, you know, want to, receive but not give. Right. So it sounds like based on what you're saying, that you are were a passionate therapist, but it's my understanding that you don't see patients any longer, although you are still licensed. Can you talk a bit more about your decision to do that? Yeah. So I've experienced some fame and infamy over the last few years, and I, I didn't necessarily think through or plan anything that's happened. It's all just kind of unfolded. And I didn't realize when I started putting myself out there on the internet, exchanging ideas and the intellectual marketplace, so to speak. I don't think I fully realized what that would entail for my therapy career. But you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube, so to speak. And, you know, I don't believe that a therapist should have to be a blank slate, per se. But I do feel like at this point, I put too much of myself out there, too many of my opinions on too many things. So that's part of it. Another part is that I was juggling a lot of roles because first I was, you know, sticking to the role of therapists. And so when parents of the youth would come to me asking for help or guidance, I would turn them away. I'm not a therapist licensed in your state. People are reaching out to me from all around the country, then all around the world. And eventually I was like, okay, let me just see what they want. Maybe they're not looking for therapy. Maybe they just feel like I have some valuable guidance to offer. So I started opening coaching and consulting, and sure enough, they found my guidance valuable in that context. So I developed a different set of forms and sort of informed consent process for what that would look like and started more kind of honing that offering. So I was doing that alongside therapy, alongside podcasting and presenting this film and all the different things I was doing, and meanwhile had family, had chronic illness. I had, you know, it was too much. And so early 2024, at a low point, with my health feeling overextended, I decided I have to pull back on something. What's it going to be? And I decided to really narrow my focus to this parent work because it's just it's it's rarer what I'm doing with the parents. There are maybe a dozen people in the world of, of which I know half who are doing the type of work or anything comparable to the type of work I'm doing with parents. So I thought, okay, this is really kind of my niche. And also as a therapist, I may not be able to offer my patients given how unstable my health was at that point. I'm like, I never know when I'm going to need to cancel on someone. And you know, so I had to pull back. I limited it to the coaching, but along the way there were there were transference issues, you know, for one, there was what if a patient finds my work and it changes their opinion of me and they don't necessarily have the maturity or the rapport, the understanding of the therapeutic process to bring that to me and work it out in the relational, psychodynamic way that I would idealize. But, you know, the patient has to choose that, right? And they might not choose it. So what if the patient ends up feeling harmed? Right. Because in their mind, they're putting this trust in someone who they project. Onto that. That's a good person, right? And in their worldview, all good people believe acts and don't believe why. Right. And then they find out I believe why and not acts because they find my podcast or blog and now they feel harmed. They feel almost like it's a repetition of, wow, I put my trust in this authority figure and now they're not who I thought they were. So I recognize the potential of this dynamic to activate core traumas for patients who may not be willing to bring that back to me and work through it in a mature way that results in maybe an expanded worldview, which would be the ideal. Right? That, oh, now I actually can see that a person can have good motives and believe something that I previously thought only bad people believed. Well, that's not necessarily going to be the outcome here. And so that was a transference issue. And another transference issue was that, you know, sometimes I would have patients select me because of my public work, because they're looking for a gender critical therapist, but then they're still bringing a certain set of expectations into therapy. There's still a transference dynamic there. And maybe, maybe in that, in their mind, because of all the things I do in the public eye, I should agree with them on everything. And then when I don't, you know, collude with their narrative about who's wronging them or, you know, then now I'm the bad guy, and the fact that I'm a public figure makes that more intense. So I just I saw some major kind of transference issues that I wasn't sure I could navigate, you know, being a therapist and a public figure at the same time. And I just thought, okay, I really need to narrow it to people who, yes, are choosing me because they know what I have to say. So there's never the danger that they're going to discover what I have to say and be disturbed by it. But also we have to kind of take the therapeutic part out of it. We have to focus like, I'm here to provide education at this point. I'm here to use my therapy background and my understanding of psychology to help people who are really struggling with understanding what's going on in the mind of a loved one. And at the risk of sounding like I'm pandering, which I'm not, that's so responsible of you as a therapist to take that approach and reflect the way that you did of, you know, it wouldn't be best for clients because of all the things that you just mentioned. So I think that's probably was difficult, but also so responsible. But nonetheless, I want to go back to something you said before that there's only a small handful of about 12 people in the world that you know of who are doing this niche work that you are. So I guess two questions surrounding that. Why are there so few and what is that? Where can you, like, talk a little bit more specifically about it? But before you do, because I don't know, you said rogue parents. I'm not sure if at the very beginning, if we spelled out the rogue, just in case people are wondering, no, not everyone might know. You know what, Stefanie? Focus on. So do you want to just, you know, explain that and just give a brief history. Megan. Lisa, that means worked is very, very brief. If you know, I'm. Sure it's it's a shorthand that a lot of people who've been in this space for a while now, it's rapid onset gender dysphoria, the term coined in 2018, in a paper by Doctor Lisa Littman, who had noticed, rapid rise in her community of, people with, mostly teenage daughters who were suddenly declaring a trans, nonbinary or some other kind of gender identity. And she studied this and made this paper that was considered very controversial. It was considered debunked, which is again, it feels like this, what's the, fable that I'm looking for, the Emperor's new clothes. Like, you know, it's like it's like that if you Google it, it's like this has been discredited, right? But it's like, what do you see with your own eyes? Like you're telling me there has not been an exponential rise in the number of adolescents presenting with some kind of gender identity issue in the last decade, like, how can you possibly dispute that? So anyway, ROG is sort of shorthand and it gets thrown around. It's not a DSM diagnose this, obviously. And for some people in this community, it's maybe not been so rapid. You know, I have met parents who started affirming at an early age and then regretted it, but it's sort of the colloquial term that we all use at this point. Okay. Sorry. And then Melanie had your question. I forgot I interrupted the question. So, So the question was, surrounding the small handful of individuals who do the type of work that you do. And if you can talk more specifically about what that work is. Okay. So, I mean, I don't know anyone doing exactly what I do, but, there are a handful of people in the world of which I know, a smaller handful who do any kind of parent coaching regarding communicating with trans identified youth. And out of those, there's an even smaller proportion of those who are willing to work with parents of adults. So a lot of the parent coaching that does exist is for parents of younger teens. And I think there's a few reasons. There's, you know, fear of cancellation. There's overwhelm and not trusting that people have any answers for this. So out of the people in this work, there are a small number of therapists standing grounded in their clinical experience. And I think that's where we get some of the strongest examples, like Sasha ad you know, her niche is a little different than mine because she works directly with the teenagers and provides resources directly for the teenagers, which is amazing. She has this new project called the metaphor of gender on YouTube, where she's talking to the teens. And she also does parent coaching based on her experience there. So I would say, like in terms of overlap, there's overlap there, right? Because she's also a therapist. And then in, in the world of people who aren't therapists, who are trying to offer parent resources, there are parents who are peers and who are trying to draw from their experiences and what I've seen, I would maybe say there are a couple different categories there. So there are parents who worked very hard to help their own children out of this, and then feel that that equips them to give guidance to other families. And I've seen that get sort of taken beyond its reach in a sense, where I've seen parents kind of come and go from the sex realist field where they'll be like, I got my kid out and you can get yours out, too. And then they think that they have the tools to help every family, and I think they quickly become overwhelmed and humbled by that, because, yes, you had the tools to get your child out because you know your child and you were willing to move hell and high water for them. That doesn't mean that you have a, you know, necessarily a broad enough perspective on the psychology aspect in the family systems aspects of, you know, what could be going on in all these other families that your guidance is, you know, what worked for you isn't going to necessarily work for them. So I think there are some sort of parent activists who have gotten a little ahead of themselves and then been humbled and burned out. I think there are also parents who have a much more cautious and thoughtful approach and are hesitant to give advice because they don't want to get in trouble. They don't want to be accused of operating outside of their scope of practice or, you know, practicing therapy without a license or, you know, they they understand what's at stake and they're being respectfully cautious. And I think in some of the, like, parent advocacy groups and things like that, you know, they have to treat this issue very seriously because of the risk of literally life and limb. That's at stake here. And so I think people are kind of hesitant to say that they have any real solutions because of that. And I think that's wise. Right? They're staying humble. But I think what I have that makes me unique, and this is totally going to sound like two to my own horn, but I think I have a combination of humility and hubris. I think I have like, I respect how incredibly tricky this is and the complexity of these situations. I have respect for that. But I'm also kind of ballsy, like I have a certain degree of courage that I'm like, if no one else is going to step up, I'm going to take a chance on using everything I know about psychology to to try to actually give some solutions here. And we're going to be very cautious with those solutions, and we're going to think five steps down the line of what could go wrong. And you know, what's our contingency plan. But I started doing that a few years ago. And it's just been trial and error. And I got so much valuable feedback. I've really developed a very profound trust in my pattern recognition abilities. So when a parent comes to me very early on in the process, I'm starting to sort of map the family patterns, the relational patterns, cause and effect and things like that. And a lot of what I do, it's a very logical process where we're figuring out if you do this, then they will do that. Is that the result you're going for? No. Okay. So what is the result we're going for? What is a reasonable goal that you can aspire towards in terms of moving the needle in a positive direction? And how do we plan backwards from that outcome. So I apply a lot of logic, and I think I'm able to be so gutsy because we are going one step at a time and testing out everything we do. And it's all based on, you know, actual patterns unfolding. So you said pattern recognition in that reminds me of, the AI tool they've created. So I'm wondering, is there a connection between you being able to utilize what's helped parents and identifying that pattern, recognition and so on and so forth, and putting that into a more accessible version of the assistance that you've been giving people one on one. Yeah. So I have essentially three tools. Right. So there's a one on one coaching and then there's my program for parents ready repair. So that is a self-paced online course and community for parents who want the psychology concepts and communication tools that will be valuable to them in navigating, this very tricky situation of raising an ideologically captured youth or potentially, you know, loving them from afar if they're a young adult. So I launched RG Repair in August 2024. And when you talk about pattern recognition, it was basically spring and summer 2024 that I was working on the course, and it was all about mapping those patterns that I and the common threads that I was finding through all the different families that were coming to me and articulating them. Kind of one concept at a time. Like, here's something that applies to three families I met with this week, so it might apply to a fourth, you know? And I started putting those into lessons. So that course has been around for a year now. I've been, you know, had, I think like 80 lessons when I released it. Now it's up to something like 120. So I'm continuing to add more lessons when I have time. So RG repair is what I recommend to any parent that wants help with this. And then I recognized a need to use AI, which is very controversial. There's a huge debate in our field right now about, AI therapy. And again, that's I drew the line a year and a half ago saying I can't be a therapist right now and do everything I'm doing. So I don't consider that I developed an AI therapist. I'm happy to wade into a conversation at some point with someone about, like, this whole, like, AI therapy thing. But this is more about tools and strategies and understanding and having a sounding board and having help with the homework that I give an ready repair. Because I in RG repair, I have, the advice I give parents going through the course is basically, you know, listen to all the modules and then choose the ones that really stand out to you as, oh, this is my kid, or this is my family, and do the homework exercises from those lessons, because it'll give you questions to reflect on it, to personalize that information. So I'm sorry that so that's kind of the the base is ready repair. And where I recognized a need for AI was that in my coaching work I've worked with parents who are working really hard on changing their patterns. They are engaging very earnestly in the process of going through my program, working on coaching, where identifying sort of bespoke, customized solutions that work with this particular kid and what this issue might be about for them in the context of this family. And I have parents who are working so hard at this, but the work can't necessarily happen fast enough because they're changing deep seated patterns in their communication. And there's so much at stake. These relationships feel incredibly tenuous. These parents feel like they're walking on eggshells sometimes there's a surgery scheduled, you know, sometimes the kid is actively using life altering drugs. So it feels like there's a lot on the line. And I often recognize, like, wouldn't it be helpful if they could have gotten some guidance in the moment?

00 pm when they were responding to that text from their kid? If they could have gotten some help right then and there, because I do trust that they're working with me on understanding what they should be doing differently. But that doesn't mean that it's intuitive. Yes. So that's where the I came in, right when I understood that we have the technology now where I can essentially make an AI clone of myself, I can take my own material and upload it and train a bot to think like me. So I went ahead and took a chance, and I built that bot and I call it Repair Bot. It's through a service called Delfi, so it's called my Delfi. Stephanie Winds Delfi. But I call it repair bot. It's an AI trained on the entire RG repair curriculum and every episode of my podcast, as well as some medical information. And it's it's going really well. So, it's, it's now a chat box that's embedded in all of my websites. Plus it has its own website at RG repair Dot.com. And, what a lot of people who've experimented with don't realize yet is you can actually call it it's trained on my voice. It's it's like slightly creepy, but I'm actually finding it more cool than creepy. I actually just interviewed Repair Bot for my podcast. I called it up at it in front of this mic right here to have a conversation with it, and I was really impressed with how it handled things well. Okay, so that's amazing. And so I, I maybe a very difficult question to ask, but let's say the parents are dealing with someone who they've it's been years that person has identified as trans for quite some time. You know, whether they have use hormones or not or having surgery. And they you know, obviously all they want is their child back, right? That's all they want. And it's almost a totally different person. It's a person is so far gone. But let's just say they are functioning reasonably well. They're not having mental health crises per se, you know. But they are in their new identity. They're doing okay. What is kind of the hardest sort of accepting what is there, you know, have you had to tell so many parents that, you know what, you just kind of have to accept that this is what they become? Or is it constantly trying to slowly, you know, strategically pull them back into the reality that the parents want them to be back into. While that person you knew and loved is never coming back the way you knew them before? There are pieces of them that are going to be consistent throughout their lives, and those pieces are the foundations of the character that will actually last them. So I think about personality is like a ship that needs to be able to sail across a sea. And sometimes youth build these sort of fictitious identities, and they're basically like this rickety raft that can't really take them anywhere. It is not going to last. It doesn't have a personality, it doesn't have what it needs to make it through life. But, you know, when it comes to forming an actual character and that's why this matters so much, right? It's not just about health, it's also about character formation. When it comes to forming an actual character, building that ship, there are elements of the child that you knew and loved and raised that are always going to be there, some, some temperamental qualities. But a lot of the child has been left behind. And if parents, are trying to get that kid to just be a kid again, it's like you're forgetting that adolescents and young adulthood is is almost a violent, chaotic process of dissolution and reconstruction of the self. So there is a morning involved. Now, do I ever tell people to give up? I mean, I'm kind of distorting what you're saying a little bit here, but I will give an example of the most extreme end of what I've seen, where I do tell the parents that there's very little they can do. So I'm always telling people, I will help you look under every stone, okay? If we are in a barren landscape, then we're just turning over a little like dry pebbles in the desert to see if there's anything under there. Okay? And we might be in a more lush landscape than that. I will always help you turn over every stone. If there's a shred of hope that the situation could be improved in any way, even if it's just harm reduction, because harm is already taking place. But, I would say like right after a youth has had their genitals removed, that would be the most extreme case when you really need to keep your expectations in check. So I have worked with a family where, you know, they had like a couple of meetings with me before they found out that, their son had already been castrated. And after the castration, obviously there's a complex grief process there, but they kept wanting to figure out how they could turn around the situation, how they could sort of get him to see the light, so to speak. And what I found myself repeatedly explaining is. He's going to be, you know, unless he's one of those cases. And we do see this, we hear this testimony amongst Detransition or some have the experience where they wake up on the operating table and they're immediately like, oh God, what have I done? And then maybe it takes a year or two to fully, consciously grapple with that regret. But some do have that experience. However, I think a more common experience is once you've just done something so incredibly permanently life altering, every single part of you is going to be working overtime to justify that decision. So in this situation, based on everything I was hearing about where the kid was at and what he'd done, I needed to repeatedly explain to these parents, now is not the time. I'm sorry I you you're not going to be able to get through to him right now, because every single part of him is working so hard to convince himself that this is the right decision. So you're going to try to stop him from having something, you know, comparatively minor. The next step would be facial feminization surgery. Like, that's a really big deal, but not after castration. It's not as big of a deal as castration. You know, you're trying to stop him from having facial feminization surgery. Now with the narrative that, you know, that he should just slow down. A lot of what I do is I explain to parents how their kids are thinking, like, I put on my trans pair of glasses and I look through that lens and I say, here's how it looks from his perspective. Right from his perspective, he's being patient and reasonable. You don't see him that way, but he sees himself as patient and reasonable and he suffered so long and hard, and he waited so long to have the surgery, this lifesaving surgery that he really needed. And he's had to suffer so long looking in the mirror, seeing this masculine face and the least you could do is understand how much pain and distress it causes him to see that face, and that he has wanted this facial feminization surgery for so long. You're asking him to slow it down because you think he's rushing well, you're not appealing to his self-concept. You are not speaking his language right now. And a lot of how I work with parents in the course and my coaching is I teach them, you have to be able to look through your kid's eyes and appeal to their self-concept and their worldview. And if what you're saying clashes with their self-concept in their worldview, they're going to fight you to protect their self-concept and worldview because that's about their pride, their dignity and their autonomy. Right? And in their own eyes, also their very existence by they're like, they're exactly. Yeah. I've. Yeah, that really resonates. I've had to give the same message to numerous parents because they have this logical if I would just tell them this, or I convey that you'll be able to. It's like, no, you have to see where he's coming from. I so I and the idea of seeing it from their perspective is so critical. But then and also I mean with, with parents, we use the term side of saying acceptance. Okay. Or you know, resigning yourself to that is too negative. So we come to, you know, we come somewhere in the middle of coming to terms with like even when they're using that with their kids to youth or adults trying to say to them, look, this is a lot to come to terms with, because if they say accept, they feel like they're betraying themselves, their own values. The parents are right because they can't accept it. They won't. That just it goes against, you know, again, wanting to preserve the child that they knew or philosophically speaking, you know, like logically speaking, knowing that what how the child sees himself is just not in line with reality. Right? So I think a lot of people have the language is so critical things that we use, a for themselves. So they feel they're not betraying themselves, but be so that they can communicate with a child in a way that's not going to feel so damning to them and offensive, and then just push them away. So I assume that that's a big part of your education. A lot of these parents struggle with control and autonomy, and I call the idea of trans. Sometimes I call it the trans potty. It can take any shape, it can fill any void. And so I like to look at what shape does it take in a given person's life, because that tells us a lot about what feels missing for them. And so for some, the trans party takes the form of individuation. This is their adolescent rebellion. This is their way of saying no. And some parents say, oh, you never gave us any problems. I hear that a lot. He never gave us any problems before. That's well welcome, because at some point your teenager or young adult has to give you problems because he's a separate person from you. And this might be the first and only way that he's experiencing that. So you actually need you might need to create more conflict in your life. You might need to give him more experiences of pushing back on you in other ways. So you can't control your way out of this. You know, I saw this brilliant clip on social media the other day. I don't know what podcast this was or who was talking, but it was a dad talking about how he's never had any conflict with his kids. And then he described an example. He said, and I'm going to use his words. He said at one point, his ten year old was behaving like an asshole. So and he sat down and have had a conversation with him about the choices he was making. Any frame this as well? You know, these are some interesting choices that you're making. And if you continue making these choices, here's what that will create in your life. Or there's this other path where you could choose this instead. And here's what that would create in your life. And he really gave his ten year old. And that's a young age. But he gave his ten year old choice and autonomy. And I thought it was such a good example of the type of shift that some of these parents need, because ultimately it is your kid's life. And I encourage parents at every opportunity to say, you're right. Whenever your kid says something that's right, even if you only agree with 10% of what they're saying, it's very important for you to acknowledge that 10%, right? If they say it's my life, you're right. It is your life. It's my body. You're right. It is your body. And right then how do we create the space for the other reality that we're also trying to bring in, which connects to some other principles in the course, like cognitive dissonance, parts work? I encourage a lot of kind of both and thinking and thinking out loud and saying, part of me wants this. Part of me thinks that because we need to model that kind of ability to hold complexity that adolescents don't don't have yet, so that they can eventually internalize their own, dilemmas. Right? As not just this is what it is, and I'm cutting off and rendering unconscious any part of me that doubts it instead of that it's part of me really wants to move forward with this transition and imagines a life like this and that in the other. And there's another part of me that's scared of the medical part. We want them to be able to hold that complexity, but we don't do it by coming in hot and heavy with our own doubts, because that causes them to push away. They don't want to be controlled. They need to feel themselves. Right. So. So I teach parents to create that space for your kids own ambivalence about this to arise. That's the most important piece. I'm really big on autonomy here, and partly because I work with so many parents of adults. But even when they're younger, it's like, you know, they're going to be an adult one day. And and if you're just operating from a place of control, that's going to create resentment and resentment fuels entitlement, and then they're going to feel entitled to use your resources, your love and support and lie to you and do whatever the heck they want with their life in their body. Because you made this into a power struggle over autonomy, right? And I love your approach. And you're you're a clinician through and through, obviously with your background. But I like the approach that you're taking where you're empowering parents to understand and rather than be, a dictatorship of, you know, you know, this isn't what you're doing. And I imagine that there's probably people who misinterpret the work that you're doing with parents of, and I'm familiar with your work, so I of course, don't think this, but I assume there's people who think that you're telling parents what to do and how to make this not happen. Are there misunderstandings like that that people have? Well, so, I have been hounded by a couple of parental rights activists who are in the gender critical space, but not the therapy world. I actually one who is in the therapy world, but in my opinion, not very good at it. I'm not going to name names. Okay. But, I've, I've been hounded by parents rights activists who really want to view this through the lens of parental rights only. And I, I support parental rights. I don't think it should be legal to do this to children. I don't think that this should be taught in schools. I'm I'm on board, you know, politically, philosophically with what parental rights activists are trying to do. However, the sphere that I operate in is the world we live in currently, not the world that the activists are fighting for. And what I advise is very tactical. So, for example, you don't want to pick a fight with your kid's school unless a you know who you're dealing with and or b you are ready to pull them out of that school and potentially move across the country, putting all your cards on the table saying I'm a gender critical sex realist, blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Putting yourself out there when you don't know who you're dealing with and you're not ready to follow through on whatever you have to do is putting a target on your child's back. It is bringing attention to your family from that woke school counselor who's going to view everything through the lens of the drama triangle. And you are the perpetrator, and your child is the victim, and they are the rescuer. And guess who's going to be spending a lot of time with your kid now? Okay, so I warn people about these things. So, you know, the parents rights activists, they're approaching this from a legal standpoint, and they often view themselves as the victims and the righteous rescuers, or they view the kids as the victims or the perpetrators. I mean, they're coming at it from this really drama based perspective. And then I come in and I'm like, here's what you can do differently. And they don't like that because they're like, we are an aggrieved people. We have been wronged. The system is against us. It's the therapists and the doctors and the school system, blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah blah. And I'm like, yeah, but what made your kid susceptible to this? And what made your kid uniquely vulnerable? Is this a form of protest against something happening at home? Because if it is, that's where you should be doing something and you're not doing it. And that's a problem, because if If if your kid is in this and you have not gotten them safely to shore yet, if they are still at risk of medicalization and you're spending your time being an activist, you have preemptively given up on your kid and you don't have your priorities straight. Be an activist. After you've gotten your kid safely to shore. As long as your kid is at sea, you have no business putting your name and face out there as an activist because you are making yourself your kid's enemy. You are joining the class of people that they see as bigoted and transphobic and blah blah blah blah blah. And you are not your kid isn't your priority here. Your own sense of victimization and righteousness is perhaps your priority here. So I don't recommend being an activist. I'm grateful for activists doing that work, but I hope all of them have taken care of their family first before they start doing that work. And so, yeah, I tell parents what they can do differently. I look in any situation and I have many clients who work wonderfully with that. Like just to give one tiny example, I could give many examples, but I have a dad right now I am cracking down on and I'm like, sir, you are paying me good money to tell you what to do differently. And I'm going to tell you you need to chill out. You need to stop being a dictator at home. You need to stop making comments on what your daughters are eating. You know you need to do this, that, and the other differently, including taking the activist stickers off your car. And I'm saying that I owe that to him, and he's paying me good money to hear it, because I'm looking at the family dynamics and I'm looking at, okay, practically, strategically, what do we need to do to get your kid to stop feeling like this is their source of identity and autonomy? Right. And, you know, to that point, this might resonate with some people. The fascinating thing about I was going to sound like a tangent, but it's actually related interpersonal psychotherapy for bulimia is that within the whole course of therapy, never once is eating ever talked about. It's not about the food. It's not about the eating. It's about the family dynamic. It's about the control. It's about everything you just mentioned. So they're saying, as you say, like male trans putty. This is just this is the way we know a lot of eating disorders, you know, are a manifestation, you know, of a child's lack of agency and control. And they're trying to, you know, actualize that way. Yeah. I mean, a lot of what I do is honestly just taking what you said, like how we would approach family therapy for eating disorders. But putting that in the context of I am not doing therapy, I'm coaching and I'm coaching exclusively the parents. So I'm just figuring out what they need to do differently without ever talking to the kids. Yeah, yeah. And and I don't know if you can break this down. I'm going to frame it in the way that I think the therapist, and it's not going to put you so much on the spot. Okay. Based on your professional experience, your anecdotal experience, and then your readings of the research, if someone said to you and I get I know there's no good answer, but I want to, you know, see if I can give a range because there's a lot of misinformation here. If someone said, okay, what is the true rate of regret, of trans regret? Okay, what would you pay for it? And I know it's a loaded question because there's different types of people are logged. That's a whole other category of people. Then, you know, then years ago there was those being research. So, you know, let's just say, either for the, you know, the more contemporary families or the, you know, the people, the individuals or, you know, the broader any idea what you would say would be, you know, the regret rates. I thought you said you weren't going to put me on the spot. I said, okay, give me a range. You can say from 0 to 100, take your pick. I mean, look. I just think regret is so subjective, like we have so many ways of defending ourselves against regret. Like, okay, take me. Okay, I'm relatively healthy. I mean, I got some chronic health issues, okay? And I'm, you know, financially doing okay. I have a loving family. I'm doing all right in life. But I made a lot of really stupid decisions in my past. And I could theoretically speaking, in a parallel universe where I'd made smarter decisions in my youth, I could be doing a lot better than I am today. But I look at the world I have, and I'm lucky to be married to the person I am. I'm. I'm lucky to have the career I have, you know? And so take me. I'm relatively successful. Am I going to look back with regret at the, you know, stupid choices I made? Because I could have been a millionaire today. I could have married ten years younger. If I made right choices, I could have had half the health problems. I'm okay. So. And that's that's coming from a place of relative success, right? And no, I don't think about regrets a lot because I think when you lead in regret, it's like such a it has this weird ripple effect because it you start questioning everything in your life. And really we have a lot of mechanisms in place to prevent us from doing that to, you know, justify the choices that we've made and keep moving on productively. And so I think, you know, we could look at like, the emotion of regret and how that even works. But what we do know is that there's harm and there is there's direct physical harm to the body involved. Now, there's harm to identity and relationships and life satisfaction. You know, are people going to consciously realize, I wish I hadn't done that? I mean, there's going to be a huge defense against letting in this devastating feeling that your whole life has been a lie. Your whole life has been a waste. And if you'd only zigged when you had zagged, then you you could be so much happier in so many ways. I think we have so many ways of protecting ourselves against that. But when you look at the harm, okay, so-called gender affirming care harms the body, is shortens the lifespan, it increases all cause mortality, it increases deaths by suicide, it increases depression and anxiety and psychiatric drug use. It increases cancer, heart disease, diabetes, addiction. I mean, it it it's it's problematic across the board. And it decreases relationship satisfaction. And it removes, suicide protective factors like having children, for instance. That's a huge protective factor. Takes that away. Right. It takes away fertility. So is regret the right measure? I right. Yeah. I thought it was funny because I'm being a hypocrite because I spend so much of my time with patients getting them not to regret choices, to accepting and moving forward and having a realistic outlook. So I thought it would be because I know there's a problem with a detransition like I could have just gone straight to that. What do you think the actual detransition rates are? But then, you know, it's the same idea of someone may not detransition, but they're still living with regret, so I don't know what the best. I don't know what the best word would be to capture, you know, the the ill effects of gender or gender affirming care. It's not. It's harmful. And that's just a fact, right? I mean, testosterone withers the female reproductive system, estrogen withers a male reproductive system and call causes testicular cancer. Testosterone makes a hysterectomy medically necessary. After a few years. Just like if a man takes enough estrogen, he's going to have testicular cancer, so he might as well get castrated and be reliant on exogenous hormones for the rest of his life. I mean, these are just a few little snippets, you know, it's going to weaken your bones. It's going to inflame your body. It's good. It's it's just going to screw up your life in every possible way. All right. So so now if I want to ask one other question. Yeah. Okay. So your non-answer was actually a really comprehensive answer. Like it really help people kind of get an idea that you can, you know, look at numbers to fully understand, you know, what is really happening in all of this. So, what I was going to ask you again, put you on the spot because this is one of the most common questions. And, I mean, I know the answer. I believe, but when people say everything you're saying goes against all the literature out there, that shows that it is life saving, his life affirming, it's, you know, it's it's a panacea for all these problems. Right? The the research is there. Jack Turbin will tell you so and so on. What do you say to someone who, you know, that's their mindset. And let's say they're not too ideologically driven. They just they've heard it. So they're not in any campaign on it. But that's that's what they, they've come across, you know, how do you debunk that. Yeah. I mean there's so much corruption in academia in our mental health field, in the medical field, you know, they they want the activists want to manufacture this appearance of consensus that, you know, all the major medical organizations agree and all mental health professionals, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But part of how they do that is by, you know, a case in point, what happened to me as soon as I put myself out there as a licensed mental health professional saying, this is wrong, they tried to take my license away. They failed, but that's what they do. They try to silence dissent and then say that there's a, unanimous agreement. Right? And then you actually look at the quality of the evidence that they cite. It's all been graded as very low quality, but the actual guy, what is it, doctor guide? Yeah, yeah. Like the actual guy who came up with the official grading system for rating the quality of scientific evidence. He got pressured and coerced into going along with the narrative. You know, he came up with the system by which we can look at that so-called evidence and assess that it's all very poor quality. And then his own system was, you know, used in, I don't know, the case review and the path files. Right. Maybe I'm getting stories mixed up here, but then he comes out and says, because he's being pressured by these trans rights activists, and then we have so many cowards in this world and so many people, I don't know, maybe being blackmailed. Sometimes I wonder, like, is there blackmail going on? You know, and and he comes out and says, well, patient autonomy is more important. Right? It's like blink twice if you need help. Right? Like. Right. Anyone who is not aware of the story they should follow if they go on X, either the writings of Ben Ryan or Jesse. Single both. You know, just a single. An actual interview with Guyette. And he made it pretty clear, you know, the, the he bent the knee. And again, when even someone like him, who's again, as you say, the creator of the system that's supposed to be for evidence based care, if even he bends the knee, to this pressure, you know, like, again, what what chance do, let's say up and coming new therapists or researchers have to be able to show again the other side, as you say, they're silencing dissent. So it is very compelling for those of us who know about it. I just don't know how to break through to the average person to get them to care enough to say, no, no, this really is happening. This is not a conspiracy theory. It's a conspiracy fact. So I don't know what to do. If you have any good, advice for how to get people to, again, to kind of get themselves out of that space and see reality. Who are you trying to get through to? I think the people who will one day or who are already in positions of power, whether it's in school, whether it's in the medical field, the legal field, politicians, people who have the ability to make the kinds of changes, good or bad in the system that, you know, that is either allowing or prohibiting these types of, remedies, quote unquote. Children are being butchered and sterilized and vulnerable young adults. I mean, I'm not one of these people who believes that 18 is this magic age whereby, like, everything is okay. And I don't think that, you know, even if someone's brain has reached maturation according to developmental timelines, I don't think that that means that they're in their right mind to be making those kind of decisions. I just I think it's not about it's not about patient autonomy to me, it's about what doctors should be allowed to do to people. Right. And so if I can just steel-man on the other side for a second, and I do know people from self-report, all I can say is self-report. Okay. But there do seem to be some people and you were talking about earlier about that distinction between someone who really authentically has internalized something and believes it versus parroting something, or trying to convince themselves that they haven't made a terrible mistake. But there do seem to be there is a tiny percentage of people who seem that, you know, that the transitioning medically even was the best thing for them, that you know, that it really was like, I've seen cases. I think there's a small handful. I mean, are some. Are you a true trans believer? I believe that for some people, I mean, it's the same as with electroshock therapy. I, I've said like, you know, it's, you know, it's it's nothing I would ever recommend as a first line of, you know, of help. But if nothing else, you know, if I were depressed and nothing else was working, and someone says, you know what? There's this, you know, this intervention that might give you a chance, I can say, you know what? I could see if I would take it, if nothing else worked. So in this case, I've seen some people where they do seem to be leading relatively, you know, relatively better lives than they were before, so I do I have seen a few of those, I think, again, self-report, you know, I can't read their minds, but, you know, so I, I do believe that space opened for a small percentage. So obviously you don't leave for any like it's okay. Humans can't change sex and so-called gender affirming care harms people. It shortens their lives. It's medically dangerous. And I guess I just I am a big believer in neuroplasticity and, you know, like that people can change. It is easier to change your brain than your body. And the question I always ask true trans believers is when you say that you think that these life shortening medical procedures are right for a small handful of people. My question is, do you think that we know how to identify those people? And I've always said that we don't. That's the that's the issue. We really don't. So I guess my first line of defense, but if they've already gone and they yeah, I see I know I know what you're saying. I see it. And that they would say though, you know, quality of life, can I do I lead a longer life or I'm totally miserable or do I lead a life where I have, you know, a better quality life even is shorter again, we can argue what is quality of life if you have so subjective. Yeah, I know, I understand that. So again, you I guess you answered the question. I don't even know what my question was in the beginning. I think I was asking whether there you leave open this possibility for some people it might be, you know, like the only resort like Can I, can I use a metaphor so or an analogy. So, you know, there are also people we can look at suicide risk factors. Right. And and one of them is poverty okay. So there are people who have ended their lives due to financial stress. And maybe in their suicide notes, they said, you know, $1 million would have solved my problem. Does that mean that we should start a, you know, some kind of campaign to ensure that anyone who's impoverished and suicidal should be granted $1 million? Right. Okay. But that's what I'm saying. I'm not saying as a campaign, what's the right word here? Like I said, I'm not endorsing it. I'm just I was just it was a more of a hypothetical question, thinking whether you thought that, you know, that there is a possibility that for a few people, it really did improve their lives. That's really what I'm getting at. So obviously, your answer is no. I mean, there's no way there's no AB test for that, right? We don't have a time machine where we can like, try their lives on on both lines. I just think we have to be really careful about endorsing cynical narratives. If someone has the belief that, you know, this is what I need in order to survive, we don't know that that's factually true. And I just I think it sounds cynical because it it sounds as if we don't have any hope for that person achieving acceptance and integration with their birth sucks. And to me, that's a cynical perspective. Okay. Well again it was more of a hypothetical that I want to be very clear here. I'm not endorsing that as a I've never I've been speaking out against the on the unhealthy narrative, the harmful narrative of this, you know like would you rather have a trans daughter than a, you know, a dead son, right? Or wouldn't you rather have it right? So again, I've never endorsed that at all. I was asking as a hypothetical and, again, so. Well, I'm glad we can model this debate. Right. Because you and I are representing kind of two voices that you're not the only one who's ever said that position. And I'm not the only one who's ever said this position. Right. But we can come together as, mental health professionals representing both voices and sort of let that debate be heard. And I'll chime in here, too, because I'm uncharacteristically quiet as I'm listening to the two of you, because I'm somewhere in the middle, because I just don't think I personally have enough information to pick a side, so to speak. So I'm I'm fascinated by what each of you are saying. And it's helping inform, you know, as a clinician what direction I would go. But I think long story short, I don't know if we as a profession have enough information to know which is which. And I guess that's kind of what you're saying. Stephanie. There's no AB test for it at the at the moment. Right. Yeah. We don't have the time machine. When I asked you, I was taking a very philosophical stance, which was grounded in what I have seen with my own eyes, potentially. Again, I'm not reading the person's mind. I don't know how much. You know, they're trying to convince themselves that they're happy or whatever, but they seem to be relatively well adjusted, etc., etc.. But it was more of almost a thought experiment. And I, you know, I want to be careful here because, like, again, what I'm talking I'm talking to you as someone who's a professional and posing this thought experiment. Whereas if I'm working with a person who's in a situation, you know, thought experiments are very different from an actual course of action. I want and I want to distinguish between the two. So, you know, and I don't want to and I don't want to, I don't want anyone who, you know, is going through this experience thinking, oh, how is this guy who's not trans? Why would he be, you know, even philosophizing, you know about this? Like, I am not someone to be, speculated about. I am a real human being. I don't want people to to see that. But I just was curious whether, you know, again, hypothetically speaking, whether you thought there is a chance. So that really was more of a, again, a hypothetical than guidance. It's it's tough to do what you're doing, you know, to have a podcast where you're outspoken about cultural issues and to be a therapist at the same time, I, I, I couldn't do it like, I, I reached a point where I couldn't hold both of those roles. So I understand where you're coming from there. And if I can just add one little thing, you know, sometimes in my work with parents, I work with parents kind of all over the spectrum in terms of where they feel about these issues. And sometimes I meet parents who are referring to their, let's say, their daughter as they because that's some kind of compromise they worked out. It's a habit that they've gotten into. And so I'm sitting here, let's say, listening to a mom tell me about her daughter, and she keeps using Bay and and there's a pretty consistent pattern where when I inquire as to how it feels to use, they and I invite her to use she or I use she or I use the daughter's given name. There's all of this vulnerable emotion locked up underneath the surface for, let's say, this hypothetical mom. And it could be a dad and it could be a he, you know, but there is this way that the names and pronouns are used as a defense mechanism to protect some part of the self that feels vulnerable, or ashamed. And there's a way that we collude with that when we use that. And, you know, for me, it was a pretty powerful shift to think about the trans identifying people who I had affirmed in my role as a therapist. But just to really see that young woman, you know, that young woman who was balding with a beard and a deep voice to see that young woman and really just through and through, see her as a woman who has done this to herself because doctors allowed for it, and because of a complex web of factors. It would take hours to explain. But to really see her as nothing but a woman underneath all of that, there's so much vulnerability and sorrow and tenderness and so much feeling that we are avoiding, and we are colluding with avoidance when we use those names and pronouns. And I think I just feel a responsibility, a duty, if you will, to the the parts of these people that are being abandoned and forgotten. Yeah. So I think that's part of where I'm coming from in this stance. Okay. Okay. And maybe it's because no one else well, you know, maybe it's because like when I talked to Katie, Katie Foust of, then before us, she has what some people would perceive as an incredibly radical stance on children's rights issues. For example, she doesn't believe in stepparents. I'm a step parent, okay? She believes in my own step. Kids would be better off if their mom and dad were still married. She stands on philosophical grounds, but she does it for a very principled reason, and because no one else will. Because she there needs to be someone in this world who's really coming from principle of what is actually best for children. How do we start there and stay there, even in the face of pressures to make someone feel good about their personal family situation? You know, and I think that I'm sort of taking after that in a way by saying, well, somebody has to stand on this principle that there is a woman in there, you know, who's been harmed by these drugs and who's lost a life as a woman and who is rationalizing that this is a better path for her. But I guess I just feel some allegiance to to the parts of the people that are being cut off here. And one other thing, that I wanted distinguishes what I was asking the question. Because you work with, you are working with youth like younger people, right? I work with, you know, primarily adults and families. And so when I was asked the question, I always think of people who have already undergone, I think, as adults. And I know you said that even at any age, you don't think the transition is right. But I'm talking about people who've already gone through the transition. They've lived this way for many years. And so my question was, again, hypothetically, whether you thought any of them who claimed to be well-adjusted and happy could actually maybe potentially be that way. But again, I want to really distinguish between after the fact living with a decision versus when somebody is young. Do we say again, and I take fully to heart what you're saying, because I never would promulgate that message of if you don't do it, there's a risk of suicide, right? Like, you know, those are very different. It's one is, you know, again, pre preemptively versus it's after the fact many years after the fact and the questioning whether they could lead, you know, a healthy, well-adjusted life after the fact. So that was the hypothetical question as well. Yeah. And I mean and I don't want to create some kind of purity spiral that sends the message that we can only live satisfying, fulfilling lives if for if we've never been broken in some way, like I've been broken in so many ways, like I, I've barely skimmed the surface on my podcasts or in any public works of what has actually gone on in my life that I could, you know, allow to make me feel broken. You know, I'm I'm friends with people like Corey Cohn, who has had life altering procedures and Corey, he's never getting his testicles back, you know, and he chooses to stay on estrogen because the human body needs hormones and there's some really sensitive information here that I don't need to get into here. I got into it with my interview with him on my podcast. But, there are there are new problems that it would create for him to go on testosterone at this point. And, you know, he has to make decisions now based on what's right for him in the body he has today. Not the body he would have if he could go back in time 20 years. Right. So absolutely, like I, I support people's, you know, dignity no matter what they've been through. And, and the people are in this complex no man's land medically after this sort of thing. So Stephanie, we like to end this podcast by giving our listeners, a summary or something they can take away that is actionable. And I'm no, I'm asking you to summarize a decade plus of work. But if there's a parent listening or, you know, I imagine that parents come to you with similar concerns early on in their child's journey. What is it appropriate or useful or actionable first step a parent can take if they're finding that they're not sure what to do about their child, who is experiencing some sort of gender dysphoria or gender identity issues, or whatever the case may be. Do my course. I know you're looking for a like advice, but I mean, it depends on where they're at. Like, do they need the message? It's a marathon, not a sprint, you know, hold on to your hats. Do they need to be more assertive and get in touch with what's at stake here, or do they need to calm their jet so they don't push their kid away? It really depends on their parenting style. So my program addresses all of that. I would say to join RTD repair. Okay. And you mentioned a promo code. Yes, I have a code for your listeners. So code awake for awake at the wheel. You can take 50% off your first month at rogdrepair.com. And where can our listeners find all of your content? So my podcast, You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist is on all platforms. I'm on X @sometherapist. My podcast website is sometherapist.com I'm also at stephaniewinn.com and basically everywhere. And we put all that in the description. Thank you so much. Really appreciate the conversation. On that note, until next time, keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel.