When Abbott’s teenage daughter befriended a transgender peer, he did not foresee the tidal wave of online content about transgender issues she would encounter. Within a few months, his daughter was in the throes of gender confusion.
After persistent and thoughtful efforts that Abbott compares to a game of chess, he and his wife were able to guide their daughter away from a disastrous path.
Sharing his harrowing journey with The Epoch Times, Abbott aims to raise awareness about the pressures of cancel culture and the dangers of transgender ideology. His message: don’t assume your family is safe from a force he calls “a witch’s brew that is almost unstoppable in its power to catch kids.”
Nonetheless, despite “an unbelievably bad situation,” he believes there is hope.
Abbott (a pseudonym, as are all the family names in this story) lives with his family on the West Coast. He is a high-level executive; his wife, Allie, stays at home to raise their children.
Because their children were schooled at home, the two assumed that they were in the safe harbor of a learning environment free from the ideologies that have swept the public school system.
However, when 14-year-old Hannah struck up a friendship with the transgender sibling of a homeschooling friend, the relationship propelled her into an extensive exploration of gender identity.
Her consumption of online material skyrocketed as she delved into literally thousands of transgender-themed videos.
“We found out that, in one day, she had clicked on over 700 videos about gender. It’s just unbelievable how much media these kids can consume about this stuff in a very short amount of time,” Abbott said.
When they made the discovery, Abbott and Allie immediately curtailed Hannah’s internet access. Hannah responded by attempting suicide.
Life-saving medical intervention pulled Hannah back from the brink. She was admitted to a psychiatric facility for a short time following the suicide attempt.
When she returned home, Abbott and Allie came face to face with the issue that was tormenting their daughter. She was transgender, she told them, and identified as a boy.
Hannah’s revelation sent shockwaves through her parents, who were aware of such situations but had never anticipated it would affect their family directly.
The couple embarked on a quest for solutions. They observed that obsession with gender transition was spreading like a “social contagion.” As they saw in their daughter’s case, it was usually fueled by online activities and pressure from transgender acquaintances or friends.
Social contagion is the rapid spread of behaviors or emotions among peer groups, particularly prevalent among teenagers and more so among girls. Psychiatry records many such phenomena, including trends in suicide, self-harm, and eating disorders.
Child and adolescent psychiatrist Dr. Miriam Grossman has noted that it’s not unusual to see whole clusters of girls, influenced by school or online connections, visiting facilities like Planned Parenthood or gender clinics for testosterone treatments.
However, Dr. Grossman—who has publicly sounded the alarm about transgender ideology for years—expresses that with therapy and a determined approach that takes into account the “huge, complex tapestry” of each child’s life, there is hope.
“Some even step off. They can accept, even enjoy their bodies. It’s far from guaranteed and not always an easy road, but it’s possible.”
Strategic Moves
Abbott and Allie approached their daughter’s situation strategically, addressing each concern individually.Faced with Hannah’s suicidal tendencies, they took immediate action. Stabilizing her mood with antidepressant medication was a top priority.
Further, they decided to take her out of the homeschooling group where she had met her transgender friend, to distance her from the troubling influence.
A shift to a private Christian school—one that did not endorse transgender ideologies—provided Hannah with a fresh start.
The new environment proved beneficial.
“Things really improved a lot. Her mental health got a lot better. She was a lot happier [and] meeting friends,” Abbott recounted, his voice tinged with gratitude.
They remained proactive, engaging with Hannah’s teachers to ensure her given name and pronouns were retained, and reinforcing her original gender identity.
Breaking the Obsessive Hold
Abbott and Allie redoubled their efforts to communicate with Hannah, immersing her in various activities in an effort to help her break the obsessive hold of her gender quest.“We got an archery set so we could do archery. We bought ducks so she could take care of the ducks,” Abbott said.
They found a job for Hannah, which afforded her not only structure but also the means to contribute towards a much-anticipated family vacation.
Finding Trustworthy Psychological Support
The journey to deter a child from transitioning can be isolating, Abbott observed, given the prevailing societal attitudes and medical practices. The pressure toward social transition—changing one’s attire, pronouns, and given name—is extreme and goes hand in hand with the push toward medical intervention.Abbott lamented that the health care landscape is dominated by gender-affirmation, with psychologists often guiding minors toward gender clinics. The overwhelming direction within therapeutic training is to validate a client’s transgender identification without question.
Hannah’s parents navigated the search for a suitable therapist with the utmost caution. “Almost every therapist we looked up was like LGBTQ friendly ... you know, gender-affirming model of care ... rainbow flags on their website,” Abbott recounted.
Among the many practitioners who openly support LGBT causes, as evidenced by the rainbow flags on their websites, Abbott and Allie finally found one who maintained a discreet online presence.
An absence of declaration can speak volumes about a therapist’s methodologies. “It was not spelled out explicitly because therapists are very scared about losing their licenses,” Abbott said.
“The therapy community has essentially been captured by the ideology. So when therapists get trained, they are taught that if somebody comes in saying that they have questions about gender, the best thing you can do is just affirm their gender, affirm their pronouns, [and] don’t question it. And it’s only going to help them if they feel like they need to transition.”
Nurturing Intellectual Curiosity
Recently, Hannah’s disposition has shown marked improvement; her depressive episodes have diminished, and her zest for life has been rekindled with a newfound focus on creative outlets like art.As her psychological state stabilized, Abbott introduced her to literature to broaden her perspectives. They delved into historical contexts, drawing parallels with contemporary gender discourse.
“We gave her a book about the eugenics program in the United States. In the 40s to the 60s, there’s a lot of parallels between that eugenics program and what’s happening right now with kids getting sterilized,” he said.
“[Giving] her historical touch points so that we can start tying those pieces together with the gender ideology. [And] hopefully, at some point, she can draw her own conclusion and see how screwed up this thinking is.”
Abbott is candid about the ongoing nature of Hannah’s journey, noting that she occasionally still adopts a masculine presentation. However, Abbott and Allie’s commitment is unwavering.
The Emotional Toll
The family’s ordeal has exacted a profound emotional toll on Abbott and his wife. Their burden is heavy, laden with anxiety, melancholy, frustration, and isolation.To maintain his emotional equilibrium, Abbott embraced daily meditation.
“One of the biggest tools I use is meditation, mindfulness practice. Helping a kid who is stuck in the gender ideology and is headed toward a potential medical situation is extremely stressful and extremely scary for a parent,” Abbott confided. “It [can] cause a lot of anxiety, depression ... anger.”
To safeguard his professional standing, he has consciously chosen to keep his family’s tribulations private, particularly from social media platforms. Despite Abbott’s extensive knowledge of gender issues, he refrains from public commentary online, aware of potential repercussions to his job.
“I’m not financially secure enough to come out publicly and say I don’t care if I lose my job, and I don’t care if I can’t ever work again because I have millions of dollars in the bank and you can’t touch me,” Abbott said.
“That’s not my situation. I have kids that I have to raise and put through school and help get on their way in life.”
Abbott’s caution extends to job prospects, as he is acutely aware of the scrutiny applied to one’s online persona.
“Let’s say I have to change jobs. I go to a new company, and they’re going to look at my social media. Have I been ranting about gender ideology? If I have, they’re going to be a lot less likely to hire me no matter how good my skill set is because I’m going to get labeled a bigot, a transphobe.”
Recommendations for Parents
Reflecting upon his family’s trials, Abbott offered some advice for parents navigating similar situations.First, he stressed that affirming a child’s transgender identity may lessen the possibility that they will detransition. When it comes to “picking your battles,” the battle over pronouns is non-negotiable, he said.
“We’ve talked with psychologists, and the best thing that we can do is to keep her birth pronouns and keep her birth name,” he remarked. Abbott and his wife made a conscious decision to consistently use Hannah’s given name and female pronouns.
Abbott advises parents to talk with their child’s teachers and school—but not necessarily about transgender ideology. Keeping the conversation on an individual level may be the most productive approach, he said.
The conversation might go like this, he said: “Look, my child is going through this transgender thing because they’ve experienced trauma, and we’ve talked with the psychologists and the best thing to do is to keep her birth pronouns and keep her birth name; that’s what we’re asking you guys to do.”
In this way, Abbott said, “You’re not trying to tell the school what’s wrong with transgender ideology; you are trying to make an individual plan for your son or daughter.” Given the pervasive nature of transgender ideology, he feels that this non-confrontational approach may be the most successful.
He urged vigilance against the cultural wave of gender transition advocacy. “Don’t assume your kid is not vulnerable. It doesn’t take much to get them interested in transgender ideology [and] going down that road.”
“If your kid is already identifying as trans or is already taking in trans material or hanging out with trans kids ... and this is a hard thing to say; the best thing that you can do is remove the sources of information as quickly and as deeply as possible. Cut them off from the internet [and] get them away from their trans friends. Take them out of their public school, isolate them from the ‘contagion.’”
Like other parents of gender-confused children, Abbott likened transgender ideology to a cult. When dealing with a cult, the first step is to physically remove the brainwashed individual from the cult.
Abbott noted that it took mere months for Hannah to be ensnared by certain ideologies online, yet the journey to reverse the harm could be lengthy. The imbalance is stark and alarming, he noted.
He advises parents not to overestimate their children’s resilience and recommends promptly curtailing internet access, steering clear of transgender influencers, and shielding them from what he considers harmful ideologies.
Abbott pointed to the particular vulnerability of adolescents, noting Hannah’s susceptibility to influence during a turbulent period in her life. Past trauma led to a body discomfort that was exacerbated by peer and online influences, which suggested transitioning as a panacea. Abbott conjectured that it was likely a confluence of these factors that set Hannah on the path toward transitioning.
The combination of a teenager’s struggle to establish their own identity, possible past trauma, and today’s overwhelming societal influence towards transgender ideology combine to form a “witch’s brew” of seductive power.
Creating a supportive environment and addressing the underlying social and personal difficulties faced by adolescents is crucial, he insisted.
“So much of the solution is not about just countering the ideology and getting them to think differently,” he said. A teenager most likely doesn’t have the “intellectual capacity or critical thinking skills or philosophical tools to possibly understand that conversation.” Instead, the goal is “helping to heal the root trauma,” that is causing them to cling to a transgender identity.
He warned parents to be discerning in their choice of therapists and to challenge the prevailing professional consensus.
His frustration with the status quo was palpable. “It is very hard to find therapists, psychologists who are going to help. And your kid is on a conveyor belt to medicalization, where they will have lifelong challenges.
“[The medical establishment] will take a perfectly healthy teenage body, sterilize it and cut off reproductive organs, breasts, give hormone injections that will have lifelong consequences. And there is nobody that will stop them.”
Despite the difficulties, Abbott said he sees hope on the horizon. “The bright spot is that there are people who are starting to speak out. There are parents that are coming together to try to save their kids.”
He concluded with a personal reflection on his daughter’s future. “I love my daughter. And I think that she has the potential to grow into a truly amazing woman with a lot of insight and wisdom,” he mused.
Abbott compared his strategy during his family’s painful journey to the movie “Finding Dory.” Memory-challenged Dory finds a seashell that triggers a recollection, then follows a trail of shells to her parents—who have never stopped searching for her. “We’re trying to put these little sea shells out in every direction possible so that we reconnect.”
