FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 8, 2010
Contact: Jenn Burleton, Executive Director
Phone: 503-927-7052
Email: jenn@transactiveonline.org
Website: www.transactiveonline.org
A Proactive Process
TransActive’s executive director on the "youngest members of the GLBT community"
By Amanda Schurr
Oliver’s story may seem like a rare one, but statistics on transgenderism and gender non-conforming identity in youth suggest otherwise. A 2007 University of Michigan study by Professors Femke Olyslager and Lynn Conway reports that 1 in 250 children is significantly gender non-conforming, and additional statistical analysis by Conway indicates that 1 in 500 is transgender.
This is nearly 100 times the number published by the American Psychiatric Association in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual IV.
It should be noted that prevalence statistics for female-bodied/male-identified children like Oliver are less well known than male-bodied/female-identified individuals. One of the reasons for this may be due to the greater leeway and acceptance female-bodied children are given with regards to their gender expression (for example, "tomboy" is not considered a put-down). This is not to minimize the credibility of gender non-conformity and trans identity in younger, female-bodied/ male-identified children.
Yet stigma and stereotyping persist, as does the need to educate others in turn on transgenderism and gender non-conforming identity, for both youth and adults. For every
Oprah Winfrey show casting a positive spotlight on individual journeys, there’s an episode of Dr. Phil giving credence to the expertise of a "reparative therapist" like Dr. Joseph Nicolosi, founder of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH). For every milestone like the appointment of senior technical advisor for the Department of Commerce Amanda Simpson, there’s a thoughtless crack by a comedian (the Late Show with David Letterman broadcast the same day news broke of Simpson’s appointment).Education is the mission of Portland nonprofit TransActive, and founder and Executive Director Jenn Burleton. Since 2006, Burleton—who herself transitioned as a teenager—and her team have provided necessary support to improve the quality of life of transgender and gender non-conforming children, youth and their families through various services, advocacy and research.
And though TransActive is not associated with Oliver’s transition, the organization is at present working with 15 families in the Portland Metro area alone—what Burleton describes as a "proactive" process, versus the "reactive" one facing older transitioning individuals. By heading off much of the cultural, medical, social, and psychological conditioning, Burleton says they can "minimize the damage" wrought by not recognizing and allowing transgender and gender non-conforming children to express their identity when they are younger.
"The whole purpose of transition is so that individuals can immerse themselves in what they believe is the experience of their true identity and to see if that works," Burleton explains. "Where this impacts the work that we do with children and youth is that it gets significantly more difficult to transition the later in life you do so because you’ve accumulated all this baggage from trying to live a life that you were kind of forced into living."
According to Burleton, the average timeline for transitioning youth depends on the support or resistance received from parents and family, upon whom the child relies to facilitate the process. "Kids transition as soon as parents will tolerate it," Burleton says, adding that the vast majority of children her organization has worked with are under the age of ten. "The kid’s preference is to do it as soon as they possible can: ‘Mommy, this is who I am. Can I be this person?’"
By the time puberty looms, variables such as bodies not matching with gender identity factor into the transitioning process, as do the repercussions—suicide and drug abuse, among them. More than half of transgender children/youth ideate suicide, according to a study by Thomas P. Cody, Ph.D. at the University of New Hampshire Counseling Center. The percentage is greatly reduced when youth are supported and accepted by their families, as in Oliver’s case.
Over the past 30 years of study, the American Academy of Pediatrics and other mainstream health organizations have concluded that children have a firmly entrenched sense of gender identity by the age of four. "They know who they are by the same age, whether or not or their body matches," Burleton says. In a cisgender normative culture, it’s this commonly held medical and scientific belief that makes TransActive’s purpose a critical one—for families like Oliver’s and others.
"We need more exposure," Burleton emphasizes, "because we know, looking at the statistics, the number of families that are out there all think that they are the only ones like this."
For more information and resources for transgender and gender non-conforming children, youth and their families, visit www.transactiveonline.org
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TransActive educates the public on subjects useful to the individual and beneficial to the community. We provide necessary support to improve the quality of life of transgender and gender non-conforming children, youth and their families through education, services, advocacy and research.