Joey/Josie Romero has weird parents
December 20, 2009 · By Charles Anthony
As far as I am concerned, an adult who can look at what a 6-year old boy does as a manifestation of sexual identity is weird.
The 8-year-old’s favorite color is aqua. Her favorite toy: American Girl Dolls. And right now she’s reading a Junie B. Jones book that made her giggle when she talked about the plot.
Pink and aqua barrettes held her shoulder-length layered hair out of her face, while she drew chalk pictures of clouds on the pavement.
When her mother announced that the child would be allowed to pierce her ears next week, the girl screeched and had a huge smile on her face.
“You’ve waited long enough to live as a girl,” the mother said.
The mother is on a mission to educate the community and encourage churches to open a dialog about diversity and acceptance of all people.
She recently waged an e-mail campaign to urge her church members to place an empty envelope in the collection basket on Mother’s Day weekend. She said she wanted to send a message to the church that church members can have a voice and that they shouldn’t just blindly follow the flock.
The boy’s mother sounds like a nut.
I am sure there is a lot more to this story but anybody with half of a brain, an ounce of honesty and any experience minding children knows that children thrive on being copy-cats. I am willing to bet that the preponderance of what we do not hear in this Romero story is that the child is doing what every normal child does: please his parents. I do not believe them when they say:
“As she started to talk, she’d say, ‘I’m a girl’. We used to correct her and say, ‘No you’re a boy’.
“By the time she was four she was insisting, ‘No, I really am a girl’.”
Her father Joseph, an engineer in the United States Air Force, said: “I had mourned the loss of my son. When I came to terms with it, I knew I had gained a daughter.”
Joey Romero is following his parents’ orders. Where are the anti-circumcision advocates when we need them?
Now, a couple of disclaimers:
1) My government approved certification as a sex-therapist is in my back pocket and my Ph.D. in gender re-assignment is in my jeans.
2) Both of my sons wore hand-me-down girl’s clothing and my oldest son once said he really liked the color pink.
The plight of genuinely transgendered people is trivialized by such a case. I wouldn’t be surprised if the son was simply picking up on his mother’s deep desire for a daughter.
If this kid grows up as a girl, and realizes he’s really a man inside a man’s body, he’s going to have some serious problems to deal with.
Umm… ok, since you asked, I wouldn’t support routine circumcision for a boy who feels like a girl – or for a girl who feels like a girl or a girl who feels like a boy.
Being familiar with the standards regarding gender identity disorder, before a child is given hormone blockers the child MUST be under the care of qualified medical personnel. And the child must be evaluated by psychiatrists who determine if the child “really is” male or female. I believe that someone would have “blown the whistle” if this was a case of the mother forcing the child.
Wouldn’t you actually need to witness the case and observe the child for a period of time to have a objective opinion?
I guess what I’m asking Charles is:
Do you believe that transgender cases exist?
Thanks.
RD,
I am not offering an objective opinion. Rather, I am taking a gamble. Your second question does not follow your first. Regardless, yes, I believe that transgender cases exist but that is irrelevent because sexuality means different things to different people. It certainly is more profound than favorite colors, toys and clothing or any other stuff that are only supplied by parents.
I do not believe Joey’s parents. I believe that his parents are warped perverts who happen to manifest their mental illness by oppressing their son to the point where his only safe coping mechanism is to do his mother’s bidding and act like he consents. He would not be the first child-abuse victim that has to lie to himself to prevent himself from self-destructing.
The thought that they will put this kid under the knife just makes my stomach churn. Then again, why should we be so surprized? There are tons of warped parents who abuse their kids.
Brute,
I guess I am not as trusting of everything people say as you might to be.
Jon,
It was a joke given the nature of the surgery this poor boy will endure.
Abat,
Thanks. At least one person gets it.
I read your original post and thought similarly (without any expertise mind you). Then I considered that the therapists involved was also pushing the diagnosis. That’s when I figured it’s the type of situation best observed in person rather than form an immediate opinion.
I asked you if you believed the condition existed because you had formed your opinion, as an expert no less without observing the kid. I suspected you had some pre-conceived notion that these cases were nonsense. It hadn’t occurred to me that as an expert you’d just gamble with your opinion.
I think you should reserve much of that criticism for the therapists involved. They appear to be enabling the mother’s craziness. Should they not be the ones observing the relationship between the parents and the child? Or are they just in it to get their names in the paper for having an 8 yr old’s genitals mutilated?
Sorry Charles. I only read the first story to which you linked, and it said nothing of surgery.
I don’t want to comment on this specific case, but a few quick thoughts regarding the two surgeries:
1. This is different, categorically, than routine circumcision. There is nothing routine about this.
2. Routine circumcision is often defended as a means to ward off other medical/health difficulties for which there is absolutely no diagnostic evidence. In this situation, there is evidence. The questions are, is it trustworthy evidence and is it compelling evidence?
3. Routine circumcision is often hailed as a treatment for ailments or potential ailments when there is no supporting evidence (eg HIV transmission in North America). I’m pretty sure gender re-assignment surgery will treat the issue of someone being “in the wrong body” (if you will). So for circumcision the treatment is faulty; in this type of situation the diagnosis is (possibly) faulty.
4. In this situation – as opposed to routine infant circumcision – the child is a part of the decision-making process. Granted, I wouldn’t let an eight year old do whatever he or she wants, but consultation is better than imposition.
All that being said, maybe the parents are wrong, or have some sort of agenda. I don’t know. When a case is played out in the media, one gets the impression that participants are attention-seekers, but that impression is not proof.
I hope the parents are doing the right thing. I hope the child can accurately gauge the situation. I hope that the experts to which the parents have turned are competent and will be able to help this child have the best possible life.
Beyond that, there’s not much that I can say. I just wish Josie all the happiness every eight year old deserves.
Charles, here in North America we have to follow a protocol when dealing with transsexualism. It’s called the “Harry Benjamin Standards of Care”. If you wish, you can read it for yourself at
http://www.genderpsychology.or....._2001.html
Published in the International Journal of Transgenderism; ISSN 1434-4599; Volume 5, Number 1,2001
Many people dealing with this protocol believe it is extremely “un-trusting”, but it is the standard medical professionals have to adhere to.
Brute,
Instead of telling me to go read pages upon pages of esoteria, how about you tell us how the protocol to which you subscribe can weed out what I suspect?
Charles, pretty much what it boils down to is that at least 4 professionals have to be in agreement before sexual reassignment surgery (SRS) is done. It starts with a diagnosis from a person trained in recognizing gender identity disorder (GID), which is arrived at by examining and evaluating the patient, the patients family, the medical history, and any issues that are found during the exam/evaluation. A full report must be completed. Then another psychologist with GID training must be consulted and must agree with the first persons diagnosis and recommendations. If both mental health specialists agree (in writing!) an endocrinologist will start treating the patient. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) may consist of simple puberty blockers, or if the situation warrants it, may be actual hormone replacements designed to change the body. This is usually only done after some years in therapy. Actual surgery has to wait till the patient is an adult unless there are extenuating circumstances. (Such as a supposed “boy” starting to have periods… it’s happened, and surgical intervention is critical to save the patient. Sepsis kills.)
Charles, “gender swapping” isn’t something that somebody can do by dropping into the corner clinic. Two different p’shrinks have to spend lots of time (typical time is a year) with a patient. The patients family is also evaluated. Somebody would have to be extremely smart to hoodwink the p’shrinks, because they are looking for any inconsistencies in a couple of different peoples stories and they will err on the side of caution if something doesn’t seem right. Heck, it’s their signatures on the papers and the courts will hold them responsible if something goes wrong… so there isn’t a lot of “trust”.
Dr. Brute,
There is most definitely a lot of trust. You just ignore it because, I presume, it makes for the appearance of being a follower of science rather than of faith.
Pretty much what you are saying is this: “We have a protocol and we follow it. Therefore, you should just trust us.” So, I had to read through that entire Harry Benjamin link if I wanted a good understanding. As I suspected, there is still nothing there that weeds out the possibility that this child is lying to please his parents. Regardless, I am glad that I read it all because it cemented my doubts in what is obviously a developing clinical field.
I understand that these professional decisions are under the threat of litigation which acts as an incentive to make the right decisions. If that gives you confidence of the soundness of their decisions, good for you. However, that confidence still involves trust because the courts are going to defer to more professionals who likely have the exact same mind set in the exact same field who were trained in the exact same way to follow the exact same protocol.
I know that I am stereotyping to the extreme but the point being: the threat of litigation is only an incentive to stand up to the scrutiny of their peers. Depending on the state of affairs, the same people may end up judging the same things.
So, until I read the documentation of Joey’s therapist and all of the independent corroborations, I will maintain my skepticism a priori.
My skepticism has expanded to doubt the integrity of the professionals too. To think that Joey has successfully jumped through the Harry Benjamin hoops is laughable due to his age. I now fear that this poor boy is just ushered through the HarryBenjamin protocol because he is one of the very few eager lab rats who can afford this sinister experimentation. I mean, from the perspective of a practitioner in the field, this kid is gold.
For his purported goals, Joey probably has the most unbelievably supporting parents the world could offer. As such, I find it outrageous to think that he is in dire need of getting a sex-change before reaching puberty. We just have to trust all those professionals that Joey is not just a confused transvestite or homosexual who has convinced himself otherwise to gain the acceptance of his mother’s wishes, dreams and desires to have a daughter.
I guess I will have to look on the bright side. Thank God that Joey is not convinced that he “truly is” a dog or a cat.
“So, until I read the documentation of Joey’s therapist and all of the independent corroborations, I will maintain my skepticism a priori. ”
You’re just saying that to please your parents.
Charles, I think you may have missed a point. Easy enough to do when relying on media reports. You said; “As such, I find it outrageous to think that he is in dire need of getting a sex-change before reaching puberty”
Points of fact;
The child will be placed on “blockers” and be monitored by an endocrinologist until at least age 12.
There will be no hormone replacement therapy before age 12.
There will be no surgery before age 18.
Point 1, blockers are used to prevent unwanted secondary sexual characteristics from occurring. In effect, they keep the child a child.
Point 2, humans need hormones or there are health problems. Serious problems that can be life threatening. So, at some point the health care team monitoring the patient must decide which ‘sex’ the patient will be. Puberty triggers massive changes, and puberty on average starts around age 12.
Point 3, Sexual reassignment surgery (a lot more complicated than ‘circumcision’) will NOT be done before age 18 in North America UNLESS there is a compelling reason, such as “Oops, how come we never noticed that uterus before now!” or “sorry to tell you this mom and dad, but when little Billy went over the bicycle handlebars… he left his testicles and penis on the bars!”
Anyhow, if Josie is only 8 now, there are at least 4 years of psychiatric and medical monitoring before any irreversible changes will take place. Surely, if it’s the ‘mother’ forcing this, that will come out during that time.
Two more things. The link to the article on the Benjamin protocols does not take you to the actual protocol. It’s more of a synopsis. A very good one, but it doesn’t contain all the “if’s, ands, etc.”
Second thing, would you mind removing the sig on the bottom of my previous post. I’m just so used to signing off reports that I automatically included it and I shouldn’t have, not in a discussion like this.
You know, Dr. Brute, I want to thank you for your persistence in this discussion. I am not sure that my mind has changed but your last clarification is certainly important. The omission of the news articles did make it seem like he was facing the knife soon which is now obviously not the case.
Not a problem removing the sign off. In the future, feel free to send a message to the blog editor, Greg Farries to request a prompt response.
Charles, thank you for removing that sig. I’ve made a note of the contact-us info and when (not “if”) I make an ooops it will be handy.
One of the major reasons I’m being so persistent on this topic is easy to explain. Unofficial stats on transgenderd kids indicate that 50% of them attempt suicide.
As you said, this is a developing field and no, we don’t know all the answers. Maybe someday there will be an easy test to determine if a child has a male or female brain. At present, there are studies that support a hypothesis that there are psychoneuroendocrinological links in the development of transsexualism, that is, that the endocrine environment impacts on the neural organisation of potentially sex dimorphic areas of the brain; these, in turn, influence the psychological identification as male or female (Translated, that means the brain is wired for one gender, either male or female, but the body is the other gender. Male brain in female body, or female brain in male body.)
At our present level of knowledge it’s very difficult to tell if a person has a male or female brain without using invasive procedures. Scooping out a section of someones brain in order to look at it with a microscope in a lab can have drastic consequences, eh!
So we are left with a matter of “trust”. Run tests to check the karyotype, do more tests to see how the patient responds to situational cues, p’shrink the patients head, compare the results to a list of expected responses… and make the best guess you can. And the kicker is that if you get it wrong or simply don’t believe there is such a thing as GID, you could end up with a corpse instead of a child.
As a final note, one of the key responses a p’shrink looks for during the evaluation is this. “I’d rather be dead than live in this body.”
So if somebody has a child that says “I think I’m in the wrong body”, get competent medical help. Somebody trained in GID. If your family doctor says “balderdash, tell the boy to suck it up and be a man!”, run, don’t walk, to a real doctor. Unless you want to help bury your child…
Abattoir writes:
If this kid grows up as a girl, and realizes he’s really a man inside a man’s body, he’s going to have some serious problems to deal with.
The converse is also true. Gender transition as an adult is a minefield – both emotionally and practically.
This is why the WPATH Standards of Care (SOC), and the complementary Endocrine Society Standards of Care for Transgendered Individuals just published this year make it absolutely clear that no irreversible changes be undertaken until the patient is old enough to be able to make those decisions for themselves.
@Brute – you’ve done a great job of laying out the reality of these situations, both the clinical and emotional aspects of them.
Yes, the parents are nutty… They said he “cried a lot, as an infant”. So the logical conclusion is that he is transgendered? So what if he likes girly things, let him have them, BUT remind him that he IS a boy – don’t brainwash him into letting him believe he is a girl. Insist he put on the boy clothes and go to school, what he does at home is his choice. Some kids want to be Superman, do you let hem jump out the window to see if they can fly? The parents are OVERINDULGENT, what he needed was firm boundaries (they probably let him eat whatever crap he wanted to, instead of healthy foods) and maybe a psychiatrist. Plus, they have a screwed-up kid and go and adopt another. Hmm.. a girl? Seems that is what they really wanted. Once the child has the maturity and intelligence to understand his situation, then he can decide if he really wants to be a girl.
For all the people saying that the parents brainwashed the kid, have you ever doubted your gender? I have never doubted my gender and no amount of dresses or make up could have made me say that I’m a woman. In fact, in sure I would have beco
e severely depressed if not suicidal.
To say that someone could brainwash something so fundamental to one’s identity is what is silly and shocking. And entirely unemparhetic. Is empathy a dirty word now?
Read most of Charles’ work and you will not see much empathy for anything.
Empathy costs too much tax payer money!
Children are born daily with physical issues, i.e. parasitic twins, extra limbs, missing limbs, disfigured faces etc. that have to be corrected. They are born with uncorrectable physical problems and mental diseases like Downs Syndrome, hermaphroditism and some forms of siamese twins, and we have learned to accept that.
We say we must accept, and we must love despite this and that. Why is it that we don’t and/or accept the fact that a child can be born with incurable issues involving gender. When it comes to that we say “impossible,” “God this and nature that.”
I tell you “you are wrong.” I won’t argue here, but I have lived with these issues, and I have felt your prejudice, your destruction and your ignorance.
Please reconsider your position, you are not so smart, nor are you God, nor do you speak for God or nature. You are manipulated by ignorance and/or by a lack of understanding and prejudice, just like those wo persecuted Jesus and Galileo etc.
I say, “Fly Josie, fly. Fly away, I understand and I love you. May ignorance of people fall out of their Amen.”
I happen to know the mother very personally and I can assure you that what Charles Anthony assumes is right on , I spent a year as her boyfriend in 1996 after she left her girlfriend. She is bisexual and is very open when it comes to sex , she has a son thats probobly about 20 now that she doesnt talk about either , she abandoned him when he was 13 ! Just left him withe her ex girlfriend and up and left with me to drive truck over the road. She always wanted a girl and used to refer to a penus as a birth defect and I noticed in her video with her son that he calls his penus a birth defect ! How strange.This girls has many many mental issues and multiple idenities. I could tell you many many stories about what this woman has did and the lives shes destroyed on her path. but whats the point. if you want to hear more let me know.
How dare you assume parents are nuts for wanting their child to be happy. You read an article and without even attempting to spend any time with the child in question form your own bigoted opinion and ride your high horse on your way. People like you are the reason transgendered people stay in hiding until so late in life.
The child will not be getting surgery at 12. She will get medicine to block male puberty. When she is old enough, usually 18 in the US, she can then decide to have surgery.
I was in the same position as this little girl when I was 4 years old.
I’m now 55.
I made several unsuccessful attempts to change, but there was a lack of support when I was in my teens. (Not to mention, homosexuality was illegal).
To suggest that this child’s parents are coercing her, or that they are nuts suggests you don’t really understand the very real problems some children have to deal with.
I really don’t care how I got this way. I don’t need justification.
I and those like me expect the automatic and unfettered right to express ourselves as we choose.
Your article sounds pretty narrow-minded. Call me an idealist, but the biggest problem trans gendered people face is social acceptance. The lack of social acceptance starts with opinions like this.
I’m a 30-year-old trans gender woman, so I feel for this child. I started wearing girls’ clothes and hiding Barbie dolls in my room when I was 8. I grew up in a rather conservative, southern-baptist home, so even bi-sexuality was something that would get you ousted from the family. If you think it’s weird, that’s your opinion. But, I would assume that a society more advanced would be a little less harsh on a poor 8-year-old kid who has to choose between an extremely difficult social life, or being someone she isn’t.
It wasn’t until recently that I realized that I had been suppressing the girl in me all my life, and now I understand it will be next to impossible to fully come out as this child has done, and have my family, friends and coworkers take me seriously. It is too late for me to start taking hormones or looking into SRS… but, fortunately for this little girl, she has parents who are just weird-enough to hold the desires of their child over ignorant opinions like yours.
- Soyon
Do not presume that because I write this that I do not support transgender, or discriminate against any lifestyle. I do not.
However, I know this woman, and I have to say this. She has a past of reckless story telling that has always had an adverse effect on her children. I do not believe this is so much about Josie or Joey, but more so about the parents. I have been privy to many destructive devices that this person has orchestrated, and this seems to just be another.
Without justifying it from past behavior, just living with facts alone….I would have to say, that to love your child is to support them, adore them, commend them on their behavior. I get that. However, at no point did this child ever wish to be a “media” frenzy. If in fact your child is “transgender” then be supportive, but for God’s sake let your child determine how he wants to deal with the public. Most transgender people I know, do not walk around proclaiming that they are men, dressed as women….they feel as they are a woman, and therefore they are a woman….the last thing they do is broadcast their “manhood” being changed into “womanhood”. How dare a parent make those assumptions and publicize her child that way. Even if your 7 year old says “ya let’s do this mom”….where is this mother’s common sense. If “Josie” walks into school and announces it, that is her business at 6 or 9 or 12 or never. Publicizing her to “help” others, hinders her control over how she wishes to handle her own being and sexuality. A parent supporting her child that is transgender, and a parent becoming famous for her child’s transgender lifestyle are two very different things.
I helped raise her first son. I know her, and I know that Josie is a middle child….who was quite happy playing cars with his big brother for quite a few years. Maybe he is transgender, or maybe he is an image created to be transgender. Maybe playing with cars and barbies is what everyone does….or maybe there was more to it for this child. If the past behavior of this parent that I have witnessed is any indication, I would have to say this child is a victim of more than society’s misguided prejudice.
What is this? Oh, I know, prejudice shallow thinking. :-/
Josie and Kyle are boys and that is that. They have male features and you can see it in their face and their voices. Little drag queens.
The mothers are odd they both wanted girls and got boys. Chris is repulsive. His mother lives with a woman. Chris is definitely a girl you can hear his voice and see it in his face the same as Bailey
who is a cheeky little girl and thinks he is a boy. The doctor is also strange. These children should have been removed from their parents. Hope they are in a tough school where students tell them straight out to stop kidding themselves and refuse to have them dress in drag.