A judge in Cincinnati has granted legal custody of a 17-year-old transgender boy to his grandparents, paving the way for the teen to potentially undergo hormone therapy, reports the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Judge Sylvia Hendon determined that the teen’s maternal grandparents, who accept their grandson’s gender identity, were better suited to make decisions for the teen, who experienced depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation after his parents refused to acknowledge his feelings of gender dysphoria.
The boy’s parents had previously taken him to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in November 2016 to seek psychiatric help for feelings of anxiety and depression. But they were shocked when the hospital diagnosed their child with gender dysphoria, and tried to seek out “Christian-based” treatment rather than gender-affirming counseling and therapies offered by the hospital.
When the teen began backsliding and expressing suicidal thoughts, hospital staff contacted Hamilton County Job and Family Services, which eventually placed the teen with his grandparents.
The boy’s parents partially relented, allowing him to receive traditional therapy and psychiatric counseling at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.
Reportedly, the teen has been excelling both academically and musically since receiving that therapy. But his parents continued to fight the hospital’s diagnosis of gender dysphoria and attempted to block the hospital from offering hormone therapy to aid their son’s transition.
The son’s attorney argued in court that his client felt unsafe in the home, and had accused his parents of attempting to subject him to forms of conversion therapy, including being forced to sit in a room and listen to Bible scriptures for more than six hours at a time.
The teen’s parents had previously noted that they wanted their child to continue living with his grandparents even if they were granted decision-making power. But Hendon eventually decided that that power was best left to the grandparents.
However, Hendon has set forth several conditions before the boy can receive hormone therapy. One of those conditions is that the teen must be evaluated by an independent psychologist not affiliated with Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. That evaluation, Hendon said, should look at “the issue of consistency in the child’s gender presentation and feelings of nonconformity.”
Hendon also expressed alarm — and a degree of skepticism — around a statement by the director of the hospital’s Transgender Health Clinic, who had told the court that 100 percent of patients seen by the clinic are considered “appropriate candidates for continued gender treatment.” As such, she sympathized with the teen’s parents, who, she noted, were surprised and confused over the hospital’s diagnosis.
Hendon called on Ohio state lawmakers to craft legislation that would allow juvenile courts to evaluate whether a juvenile should have the right to consent to transition-related therapy, noting that similar family disputes are likely to arise in the future.
Living with Change, a local pro-transgender organization in the Cincinnati area, praised Hendon’s decision “to put the safety and medical care of the child first.”
“Forty-one percent of transgender youth attempt suicide in their lifetime, making access to medically necessary care an incredibly important part of living a healthy and complete life,” the organization said in a statement.
Poised to juggle her past and present, her fears and joys, in the one-woman autobiographical show Circus of the Self, Lucy Eden will also be juggling her two favorite props.
"I'm using balls and knives," Eden says, grinning. "And there's also some unicycling, some balance elements. I like to balance things on my face. It's one of my favorite elements of juggling."
So is comedy, which the performer blends with poetry and first-person narrative to relate her own origin story -- someone who is trans and grew up in rural south Georgia, before relocating to the Bay Area.
In another swipe at the transgender community, the national monument honoring what is widely seen as the seminal event of the modern LGBTQ rights movement has erased all mention of transgender and queer people.
Each June, the Stonewall National Monument in New York City typically decorates the fence surrounding Christopher Park -- the small park adjacent to the historic Stonewall Inn and part of the official monument -- with various Pride flags.
In past years, the display has featured a mix of flags -- the familiar six-stripe rainbow Pride flag, the blue, pink, and white transgender Pride flag, and the "Progress" flag, which adds stripes for Black and brown communities and a chevron design incorporating transgender and intersex Pride colors.
U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) is the latest high-profile Democrat to come out in opposition to transgender athletes competing on female-designated sports teams.
In an interview with the right-wing news outlet The Dispatch, Gallego echoed President Donald Trump and a host of Republican lawmakers who have been vocal in their opposition to transgender participation in female-designated sports.
"As a parent of a daughter, I think it's legitimate that parents are worried about the safety of their daughters, and I think it's legitimate for us to be worried also about fair competition," he said.
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