98 — StoicMom: Using Her Child’s Trans Identity for Personal Individuation

StoicMom is a certified life coach and former classroom teacher who has some unique ideas about parenting and education. Like other moms whose lives have been altered when their teens adopted a trans identity, StoicMom was initially determined to rescue her daughter from this dangerous ideology. She quickly recognized what she was up against and sunk into desperate fear and rage. StoicMom did “all the things” to get her daughter to desist — she even moved her family to a small town in a red state — but this backfired, as gender identity theory was everywhere. Repeated failures at getting her daughter to desist left her feeling impotent and hopeless.

Eventually, StoicMom had to accept that her approach was also taking a toll on her health and relationships. To restore sanity and stability to her home, she’d need to find a better way. So, she turned to her life-coaching toolbox and decided to reframe what was happening to her daughter and to herself. Knowing she couldn’t really control her daughter’s experience, StoicMom decided she would take charge of her own.

In addition to immersing herself in studying attachment theory, conflict resolution, and communication skills, StoicMom focused on the gratitude she felt for her family members’ healthy qualities. She grounded herself in her values and worked to let go of the focus on her daughter’s outcomes.

Earlier this year (2022), StoicMom launched a substack where she wrote about her approach and hoped other parents would find a bit of solace from the outrage culture. StoicMom also relaunched her coaching practice and now works 1:1 with parents who are interested in changing their inner worlds as a way to heal and grow through this destabilizing experience. Her 18-year-old daughter still identifies as transgender, but, as you’ll hear, StoicMom now recognizes her child is on her own individuation process, and she’s actually doing great. StoicMom now expresses gratitude for this journey with her daughter and is using the process as inspiration to become a better human.

Quotes & Link:

• “It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” 

― J. Krishnamurti

• “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” ― Albert Einstein

• StoicMom Substack: 

https://stoicmom.substack.com/

Extended Notes

• StoicMom makes suggestions to parents but doesn’t consider herself a parent coach.
• Has this generation taken away a child’s ability to be adaptable and survive?
• StoicMom and her daughter bonded over the incongruencies in the education system.
• The relationship between StoicMom and her daughter started to crack when they disagreed on the daughter’s desire to become diagnosed and medicated.
• A friend informed StoicMom that her daughter preferred a different name and identity.
• StoicMom and her husband both worked in Wilderness therapy prior to their daughter’s intervention.
• After the Wilderness program, when StoicMom asked her daughter about her identity her daughter told her it didn’t exist.
• StoicMom realized her daughter was binding her breasts.
• When StoicMom and her daughter finally conversed about her being trans-identified.
• In the Pivotal Moments piece on her substack, StoicMom reframes her experiences into gratitude.
• StoicMom’s daughter never went back to the traditional education environment.
• StoicMom adopted the practice of stoicism to focus on what she had control over.
• StoicMom is testing the waters of calling herself an Individuation coach.
• StoicMom strives to be a model for her...
  
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