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You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist is a podcast for seekers, dreamers, and questioners that intimately explores the human experience. Your host, Stephanie Winn, distills years of wisdom gained from her practice as a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. She invites guests from a broad variety of disciplines and many walks of life, including researchers, writers, artists, healers, advocates, inventive outliers, and creative geniuses. Together, they investigate, illuminate, and inspire transformation - in the self, relationships, and society. Curious about many things, Stephanie’s uniquely interdisciplinary psychological lens tackles challenging social issues while encouraging personal and relational wellness. Join this journey through the inner wilderness.
Swell AI Transcript: 100. Gabrielle Clark FINAL.mp3
Gabrielle Clark: Trust your instincts. They'll help you more than you know. Even if you make a mistake, don't think that that mistake is the end of the world. Your instincts can be right and your application of how to deal with the problem can be wrong. Trust your instincts. And if one method doesn't work, then try something else. And don't, don't wait.
SPEAKER_01: You must be some kind of therapist.
Stephanie Winn: Today I am talking with Gabrielle Clark of Affirming Reality. She is a parent turned activist and assistance coach. We've been acquainted over the internet for a couple years actually, so this conversation is long overdue. Gabrielle offers resources for parents who are concerned about their children being indoctrinated in the school system with regard to things like critical race theory and social emotional learning. which, of course, as we know, are code words for things that are not nearly as pleasant as the sound of social emotional learning. And Gabrielle has successfully helped her own child desist from gender delusions. And so she helps other parents with this as well. Today, we're going to talk about her work as a desistance coach. Her understanding is in the insights into the needs of different populations around the country, different needs of men and women. And we're going to talk about the work that both of us do, sort of compare and contrast, because we both help parents who are concerned about their children. Gabs, it's great to have you here. Welcome.
Gabrielle Clark: Thank you so much for having me, Stephanie. It's been a long time, right? Feels like it anyway.
Stephanie Winn: Let's chat a little bit about your backstory, just for those who aren't familiar. We are going to get into some really helpful tools and specifics down the line. But for those who don't know your story, how did you end up doing this work?
Gabrielle Clark: My son was being discriminated against in his school. There was a civil class that he was taking, and they were asking him to list his identities and attach the signifier of privileged or oppressed to those identities. And when he refused, they threatened to fail him for that class, and that would have prevented him from graduating. So we decided to file the first federal lawsuit against woke indoctrination in America in the K-12 education setting in December of 2020. And while I was fighting that, that form of indoctrination involving CRT, my daughter was socially transitioned into believing she was a boy through the SEL program. And that changed my whole trajectory on this fight. I was, you know, heavily committed to fighting CRT. But I decided that my daughter, her issues with gender were more pertinent to the cause that I needed to fight, which was just total indoctrination of our youth, period. And I had to start doing that with my daughter. So I've created a program for her to successfully desist. And I help people parent their children into desistance through the Affirming Reality method.
Stephanie Winn: That's awesome. And we're going to get into the details of what you discovered helped your daughter, what has helped the children of the parents that you work with. Can I ask what happened with the lawsuit? Did you end up having to set that aside to focus on your daughter?
Gabrielle Clark: During the course of the first year, I would say, probably, I mean, this was before school was finished, before the end of the school year. We did a series of depositions. And that was really eye-opening. So the school decided to relent and allow my son to opt out of that class. They expunged his record and he was thereby permitted to graduate. However, the damage had already been done. So we amended that complaint and refiled in, I think, July or June, something like, of 2021. And after a few, after, you know, probably a year or so of that, I decided, I just, we got switched around to so many judges and they wouldn't set a trial date. So we came to a resolution. And I'm under an NDA, but I was and I was homeless before, but right now I live in a nice beach house.
Stephanie Winn: A beach house? A nice bungalow.
Gabrielle Clark: A little bungalow on the beach, but yeah, it had a satisfactory resolution.
Stephanie Winn: It sounds like mixed results, like you didn't necessarily get the most ideal outcome, but at least they didn't hold it against your son. And I mean, I just want people to take into consideration what you're saying that your son had to apply this so-called teaching to himself, he had to label himself an oppressor in order to graduate. I think it's really important that you file that lawsuit even if it didn't achieve the ultimate outcome of raising awareness on the biggest scale possible or you know, setting a precedent necessarily for the fact that it's unethical to treat children this way, you know, to raise them with this mentality. And I'm sure you experienced this up close and personal ways. This was impacting your family how, of course, when you teach children to see the world through the sort of neo-Marxist lens of everyone is either privileged or oppressed, which for the therapist in the room, you know, that's also sort of the drama triangle of victim, persecutor, rescuer. When you teach people to see the world this way as their children, Of course, they're going to gravitate towards things like believing they're the opposite sex because it offers shelter from that. It's ironic that you went through this because if I recall correctly, you're a mixed race and you have children who appear to have different skin colors and that your children, who are all your own children, were being basically taught to divide themselves according to how light or dark their skin was.
Gabrielle Clark: Yes, I mean, I'm biracial and my first husband was black and my second husband was white. So some of my kids are black and some of my kids are white, visibly. I mean, if you look at them, that's what you would think. You wouldn't think that they were even biracial, most of them. So, so it was, it was a bizarre scenario for, for the way that they, you know, the way that they framed this oppression privilege matrix was that one of my kids, some of my kids were oppressing me and my other kids. I mean, that was complete insanity. It was a shame, too, because my son, we were living in a motel at the time, and my son was sleeping on a mat on the floor, and I was in a wheelchair. He was packing me up and down the stairs on his back. and pushing me around the city in a wheelchair on the bus at night in the rain. There's nothing privileged about that life. You know, there's nothing there's I mean, my husband, my late husband, he was a lawyer, but he died when my son was one years old. He doesn't have a single memory. There's nothing privileged about that life. So, you know, this whole neo-Marxist ideology, this critical race theory, this critical gender theory, whatever you want to call it, all of those, they're cyclical in their interpretation and in their application. So, yes, of course, if you're having this privileged and oppressed scenario through race, you know, they're implementing it into gender as well. And in the SEL program, in the CRT, they… they reinforce one another, right? So, you know, they have this where if you're a white straight man, you're at the, you know, you're at the top of the totem pole and you're, you know, telling everyone how they should live and how they should express themselves and all of this. And if you're a trans Black woman, you're just, you know, a Black trans woman, you're just at the bottom of the totem pole and you're the most oppressed person in the whole world. I'm sorry I failed to see how any of that has anything to do with an individual's life and the choices that they make and the place that they decide to start from, the place that they are forced to start from versus the way that they take their journeys so that they can end in the place that they want to be. This is America. You have options, you know, and we use those options and that's why we sued because You know, I'm an American. I don't have to just tolerate any kind of nonsense from an educator just because they say so. And we did that, and we did have a lot more successes than a lot of people really understand. Because of our lawsuit, there have been more than two dozen law firms either take up the mantle of fighting indoctrination, and some public interest firms have formed simply because of it. So, you know, I mean, and it did get it did get international attention. And, you know, we were able to create a huge buzz so that other people could now use the use the template of our lawsuit to fight. We got a lot of precedent set as well. There's two there are two opinions. in our case stating that CRT is in fact taught in high schools and that our our the lessons that my son was being taught they were in fact CRT and it is in fact harmful. to teach children to pit them against each other that way and to teach them that if they're black and a woman, they're not going to make it. And if they're white and a man, then they need to, they need to be less white in order to let the people of color around them, you know, shine more brightly. You know, I'm not going to give up any aspect of, of, of, you know, my aspirations and dreams for anyone. And I don't expect anybody else to do it either.
Stephanie Winn: Well, congratulations, Gavs, on starting. What's the word I'm looking for? Like, you sparked something there, right? And I hope that that's encouraging to anyone who knows that there's some mantle they need to take up in their lives, right? even if you don't have a 100% successful outcome, you have just started something that can influence other people. And it's, I mean, I just hear you coming from this place of deep patriotism, to the core principles of this country, even if We've been far from perfect as a nation in living up to those principles. I hear you sort of embodying that duty as a member of your country to speak up for the best parts of those principles and make sure that we're actually living up to them. the principles of freedom, equality, and just a dignified way of living, a way that refuses to be a victim, and refuses to let in this insidious ideology that makes it really easy, all too easy, for anyone with a nefarious agenda to hide behind the illusion of being a victim, because that's just such a Trojan horse. Anyway, let's move on to what you discovered through helping your daughter. Can you tell us about her desistance, whatever you're willing to share about her personal story? I understand you need to, you know, maintain your family's privacy and just what you've learned about desistance in general. Yes.
Gabrielle Clark: Thank you for that question, because a lot of people really they don't understand that social transition is not just clothes and nicknames and and, you know, wrong pronouns. A lot of people really do believe that it's an innocuous acceptance of this ideology, of this identity. When you're socially transitioning, it's not just names and pronouns. It's not just nicknames and funny clothes. It's a lot more than that. There's delusion, like real deep delusion. There's self-harm that happened with my daughter. I saw her, you know, she had gotten accepted into the Nevada Ballet Theater Academy on a 10-year scholarship. you know, that's like $100,000 worth of, you know, free ballet training that's very prestigious and hard to win. And she got that when she was eight years old and she was doing this for, you know, several years. And, you know, when this all started to creep in, there was this nihilism that nothing mattered and what am I doing anything for? you know, what am I, what am I living for, basically. She pushed away so many of us in her family and she was mean to us, you know, when it was, it was really hard to see my sweet girl, you know, who is so sweet. And if you see her on Twitter, you know what I'm talking about. She's, she's back to her normal goofy self. And, you know, she is a delight, you know, but during this time she became something I didn't recognize. And so, you know, watching that happen to my beautiful daughter was so painful and it was so tragic. I noticed that things were getting, getting weird when they, when the kids went back to school from the lockdowns. But just like every other parent, I just assumed that it was because they were isolated for so long. And so I just kind of put it out of my mind. But when one of the children in her class was admitted to a psych ward for self-harm, They allowed a therapist to come in, a counselor to come in through the SEL program. And that was when everything started to completely change. It wasn't just, you know, a little bit of sadness or depression here and there. It was something else. It was indescribable, really. Her outfits weren't creative anymore. They were costumes. And, you know, I'm an atheist, but they started to get demonic even, you know what I mean? Like, I was like, why does she look like Satan? Like, you know, and I was like, what is happening here? And so, I just, I just, I didn't know what to do. We, we, we went on a, on a trip to a rural area of Texas and there wasn't a lot of, there wasn't a good connection and there was no internet. There was no, the cell service was bad. So she wasn't able to really communicate with her friends and she wasn't able to get, you know, online and. And then about two weeks later, her personality returned. And I was just like, what is going on? I mean, you know, that just threw me. In two weeks, she went back to being, you know, the sweet girl, you know.
Stephanie Winn: I love sleep. Sound sleep is a crucial foundation of good mental and physical health, from mood and concentration to metabolism and cellular repair. And I sleep very well thanks to my Eight Sleep Pod Pro Cover. My side of the bed is programmed to be warm when I get in and cool down to a neutral temperature in the middle of the night so I don't wake up overheated like I used to. How would you customize your bed temperature? Visit 8sleep.com and use promo code SUMTHERAPIST to take up to $200 off your purchase. Even if they're already running another sale, this code will get you an additional $50 off. 8sleep currently ships not only within the USA, but also to Canada, the UK, select countries in the European Union, and Australia. Thanks for considering purchases that support the show. Let's pause here and talk about some of the important pieces you brought up so far. I really I'm grateful that you brought up the personality change part of things because, I mean, you just said a lot of important things. For one, you pointed out that a lot of people think that social affirmation is no big deal. And there's a few levels on which we can challenge that. I want to also make sure we mention that social affirmation increases the persistence of the belief that one is the opposite sex, which leads to the belief that one needs to be perceived that way in order to be OK, which leads to medicalization in order to try to appear more like the opposite sex. So we know that there is that sort of, you know, I call pronouns the gateway drug. But so there's that, right? And the medical consequences are serious. And of course, listeners of this podcast are well aware of that. But the personality change too, right? You're talking about the ideology that you encountered in your children's schools and how it was affecting them psychologically to be pitted against one another. to be taught this really cynical worldview. And I noticed this in my work with parents too, parents of gender questioning youth. Sometimes I find myself saying to them, it sounds like you have sort of two problems side by side. One is that you're concerned that your son or daughter has these delusional beliefs that will lead to lifelong medical harm. The others, you're concerned about the direction that their personality is changing, and those tend to go together because when you start subscribing to this really cynical belief system, then you feel like you start adopting this righteous victim mentality. You're part of a belief system that tells you that everyone is… You're just surrounded by horrible bigots. You should cut off your family and all this kind of stuff. So people observe these really nasty personality changes, and their kids stop doing what they love. They start isolating. So I just really appreciate that you brought that up, because that's a mental health concern in and of itself. And I've seen parents in situations where it's almost like as much as I understand they're trying to save their child from lifelong medical harm, I'm almost more concerned about the way that the child's personality is developing. You know, people can live with the scars of medical damage, although it's very difficult. But if you develop a personality that is fundamentally personality disordered, and that gets concretized by the time you're 30, like, you're going to have a really hard time functioning. So anyway, you were concerned about these personality changes, and then you started to talk about solution seeking. So it seems like one of the first solutions that you tried, which already made a big impact, was just that change in environment. You got her out off of screens, off her social media, away from those friends. Was it a natural setting that you were in?
Gabrielle Clark: It was, but it wasn't exactly a good situation. I mean, I was going to take care of a sick family member. So it wasn't necessarily a good situation, but she had a change in focus. You know, she wasn't obsessing about herself and doing something so self-centered. She had a new focus that, you know, we have a family, we have a member of our family who's down. and we need to help them. So taking, I mean, and I think that that's one of the very first things that I try to encourage my parents is to engage them in things that they loved before all of this. and put them in a situation where they have to volunteer. They're not constantly obsessing with their own stuff so that they can see that other people have real problems, not these made-up problems.
Stephanie Winn: Yes, that's so smart. I've even talked to parents who have seriously considered taking their kids to I don't want to say necessarily like third world countries, but yeah, in some cases like third world countries or places that have active war zones going on where, yeah, it really puts your problems in perspective. I think that coming back to those patriotic values that you have that you didn't explicitly name it, but I'm picking up on a very dignified way of being in the world, part of that is gratitude, recognition for what you have and gratitude for it and saying, and the humility to recognize, I am grateful for what I have. All this rejecting of privilege, it often sounds like people would gladly get rid of their so-called privilege. But it's really easy to think that about yourself when you're in your comfortable home with everything you need at the push of a button. So yeah, I mean, I think in some cases, getting your kid out into nature is great. But I think, especially with you, you didn't come from having a lot of money. You didn't have all the options in the world. But you took your kid to take care of a sick family member, and that put things in perspective too. All right, please continue. It did.
Gabrielle Clark: It did. Okay. So, I mean, getting back into nature is certainly part of it because the long journey that we had to take through winding Texas roads and seeing all of the, you know, enormous trees, especially having come from Las Vegas, where it's all bright lights, big city. That did, it did have an effect on her. I mean, we, we, she got to see moss for the first time and there were, there were, you know, critters and varmints and you know what I mean? All that sort of thing all over the place. And so, I mean, even in that two weeks, she got to see lightning bugs and just, you know, foliage that she had never seen before because she had never really ventured outside of the desert. So it was an eye-opening experience for her. And, you know, that increased her imagination and her wonderment, not just to how much she can It gives me how weird she can make her makeup or how weird she can make her outfit that day. But, you know, and how creative she was in that respect, but how, how complex real life is the actual life, you know, you know, trees and plants and nature. and seeing, I mean, and I tell my parents this as well, you need to make your children see it, touch it, feel it, smell it, all of that so that they can stay rooted in what's real, but also so that they can see the binary in all things. in all things real. In most real life scenarios, there's a life cycle and a process that's well documented and well understood. And it starts with, you know, with male and female parts, even plants have them. So, you know, teaching, teaching those aspects of, of real life, gratitude, of humility, you know, digging your hands in the dirt and really understanding what real life is all about, it really does just build enough confidence so that they find this, you know, gender victimhood a little trivial. Yeah. And that's what makes them move on.
Stephanie Winn: When it comes to the benefits of nature, you mentioned Wonderment, that's such a good word, right? Sort of getting out of her own head. So one way that I explain this to people sometimes is that in your brain, you have the default mode network and the task positive network. And the default mode network is like shower thoughts, driving thoughts, thoughts when your mind is wandering. Task positive is when you're actually focused on what's in front of you, what you're doing in that moment. People who are depressed and anxious spend more time in the default mode network, have a harder time getting out of it, and the quality of their default mode thoughts is more self-critical, more rumination. So anything where you're lost in the moment, anything where all of your attention is focused on what you're doing, where you are, who you're with, that's a moment that you're not depressed and anxious. And because the brain is neuroplastic, especially for adolescents, the more time you can spend in a state of awe and wonder, a few months go by, you're no longer depressed and anxious. So it's treating the underlying issue. Nature also, I'm learning about the benefits of just the natural light that the infrared that infrared light that bounces off of plants is super healing. And then you pointed out understanding the natural cycles and the binary of the sexual reproduction and all things so that we sort of have this humility to recognize we are no different, we are a part of nature, and these sort of ancient structures exist for a good reason.
Gabrielle Clark: Right, I mean, okay, so let me just, the entirety of the affirming reality process, you know, sometimes it can take months, but once you've gotten it down, right, once you've gotten it down, that entire process can happen in a single day. Which, let me just, my daughter, she was stressing out at school. She had missed a few assignments, you know, and I fussed at her, and she was feeling depressed, she went straight to her video game. And I saw, I recognized this, like I recognized this pattern. So I said, come on, we're going outside. We're going to go and unroll this roll of hay and fill our garden beds up with it. We'd been meaning to do it. And I said, come on, we're doing it. And of course I got the face, you know, I got the, you know, the, the, the face that, you know, they don't want to do anything. Right. So I got the face and I just ignored the face and said, stop making that face. Come on, put your put your shoes on. We're doing it. And she got up and she she got out there. She'd never seen hay before. She didn't know that. You know, she'd only seen hay on TV. So we got out to unwrap this hay. She asked, I don't know how many questions. What kind of, what kind, what is hay made out of? What is, where does it come from? Is it gonna, if I water it, will it get green again? I mean, what are these little seed things? Can I plant them? Will they grow? I mean, it just, it just opened up this whole thing. And, you know, for, you know, by the end of the day, she didn't want to leave the hay. You know what I mean? She stayed out there much longer than I did. And, you know, she didn't want to leave it because it was sparking something in her. That… That is how you repair yourself, right? You connect with these things and it keeps you from just sitting there and, you know, like you said, ruminating on all of your troubles. And then she was able to, once she got through that, she was able to fix the problems that she was having at school, she wasn't having any anxiety anymore, and she felt the confidence to move forward. And now she's talking about taking over the world. But that's, I mean, you know, we're, this is, this is where you want your children to be, right? You want them to be in this confident place where they feel like they can go out and conquer the world. So, I mean, that's what I teach parents. And I think that so many of us don't recognize how important it is to have those kinds of lessons for our children, because we think we've evolved past them somehow.
Stephanie Winn: When you describe the hay and the garden, it's such a familiar story to any parent, right? At first, the, oh, I don't want to. And then by the end of the day, they don't want to leave. And so you're not just talking about a passive connection to nature. You're talking about an active connection to nature where she's getting her hands dirty and her mind's working at it, too. And one of the things I share with my parents that I work with in this terms the similar type of coaching that you do, is that these kids are looking for identity. That's what they call this stuff. They call it a gender identity. We call it identity politics, identity cultural warfare. And what is identity? Well, it's a thing you build gradually over time. through experiences and a healthy identity is one in which you and the world around you pretty much agree on who you are. You feel like you're giving off a certain energy and that's reflected back to you through your interactions because you're bringing what's inside of you to the forefront, to your personality, your actions, behaviors, mannerisms, how you communicate. So you think of yourself a certain way, other people think of you that way too, you've successfully built an identity. The identity politics stuff says that's not how it goes at all, you just decide who you are, tell everyone and they're required to believe you and agree with you. But what you're doing is you're building a real sense of identity when you're giving your daughter something where she can build competence, which is the foundation of healthy confidence. We want our kids to have healthy confidence, not false confidence. So when you give them something they can become competent at through their bodies, their hands, their own work, then you're giving them the foundation to build a real identity from. And there's there's nothing healthier than that for these confused kids.
Gabrielle Clark: Certainly. And I think that the whole identity thing is that you somehow should want to step out of the identity that you were automatically born with, that you can't, you know what I mean? Your immutable characteristics. And, and somehow you're going to be judged so harshly based on them that you can, you can, you can just shed that. But I feel like that is, that's a disservice to who you are. You know, you're the whole point of, of being a free person is to be born into whatever environment you're born into and, and make your own mark with the tools that you have with the, with the hand you're dealt. Right. And, and when you, when you were born and you say, I don't like the, you know, I don't like this, you know, identity that I was so-called born with. I just want to change that. Or I don't think I was even born with that identity. You know, I I'm, I'm female, but I I'm assigned female at birth. Cause I was, that's not really who I truly am. I think that that's a cop-out, you know, I think that that's a cop-out because you don't want to do the hard work to try to find what it is that's going to make you happy in your purpose, in the body you're born with, with the identity that you, with your inherent identity, the things that you were just born with. And it is, it's unfortunate. And as I think I see, I've seen this with successful, with successful trans identifying people that, that somehow not satisfied with that, or they, or they weren't getting to the place that they wanted to get to. So they adopted a new, a new gender identity because they felt, they felt like they weren't getting enough. I think that's one of the reasons why I encourage parents I tell them, tell your kid to take a gap year and take her to Fallujah. She'll forget all about that. I don't even know where that is.
Stephanie Winn: She'll forget all about it. What's Fallujah?
Gabrielle Clark: Is it in Iraq? I think it's in Iraq. So, you know, I don't tell them to take them to Fallujah, but I do tell them to take them to South America or Africa, like take them to country and, you know, get them involved in mission work. Even if you're not religious, get them involved in some sort of outreach, you know, to South America or Africa and let them go down there and see what real life is really about. Because those people don't have, they don't have the pleasure or privilege of being able to just step out of their identity. You know, that's all they got. You know, that's it. This is what they have. And some of the truly, truly oppressed people in the world don't get the opportunities that we do. And they need to see that. And a couple of my families have been able to make that happen. And there is a tremendous difference when they do.
Stephanie Winn: So it sounds like it was really helpful and eye-opening for your daughter to get a change of scenery, I experienced the wonders of the natural world, working with her hands, also contributing, being of service, understanding the world doesn't revolve around her, that there are family members in need, there are people with real problems. So what were some of the other elements of what you found helpful for your daughter and then what you also found helpful for other people?
Gabrielle Clark: Giving her challenges that play to her skill set. And, you know, things that she was going to be able to use her own gifts to accomplish. You know, for example, we were staying in my cousin's townhouse that was unfinished. So she had, I mean, we, we were working on some of the, some of the construction in, you know, in the remodeling process. And one of those things was we had to install, we had to install the appliances. So, you know, she's really big with STEM and she, you know, she did one She did win some science contests and stuff like that. So I told her, I said, you know, go put the dishwasher together. You know, something that you wouldn't normally send a 13 year old to do. Certainly not a 13 year old girl who had never done anything like that before. She watched the YouTube, the YouTube tutorials and she read the directions and, you know, she put it together and it's still working right now to this day, even though there was a license plumber on site, you know, at the, you know, in our, in our, in the townhouse at the time. working on something else, she was able to put the dishwasher together by herself and install it. That, I mean, that was a major accomplishment and she wasn't super happy of, you know, while she was doing it because she was, you know, she was getting annoyed and frustrated at, you know, some of the things, well, probably at me talking to her and asking her a bunch of questions while she was doing it, but also at the process, right? But once she finished, you know, she will always be able to go there, even when she gets older. and we go over to my cousin's townhouse, she'll be able to say, I installed that dishwasher and the oven range as well. She did that too. Give her challenges, not easy ones either, real challenges, hard ones. so that they have a feeling of accomplishment in the area where they can shine.
Stephanie Winn: Yeah, building the confidence, competence, that sense of reward, and also along the way developing frustration tolerance, which is such an important part of emotion regulation. I have to remind parents sometimes that emotion regulation and frustration tolerance are part of executive functioning, part of the prefrontal cortex skill set. And that doesn't fully develop until your mid-20s. So your teenager is in the process, but it's by no means complete. Now, how can you help that process? Well, I think you're describing some really practical tools. You're accomplishing things. Your kid is getting that sense of accomplishment. And along the way, she has to tolerate her frustration. And she's learning some valuable life lessons that sometimes it's worth pushing through emotional frustration. And just because you feel a certain way in the moment, doesn't mean that's how you're going to feel in the end. And if she can learn that about assembling a dishwasher, then she can probably learn that about her gender-related distress. That just because you're feeling a certain way about your body in one moment, that doesn't mean that you can't ultimately be successful and overcome those feelings and be healthy.
Gabrielle Clark: Well, and two, we also, I also, you know, I also gave her challenges that she wasn't going to accomplish, right? I mean, I gave her challenges that, you know, that were going to require her to her to be disappointed in the fact that, you know, she is not, she's not strong enough to do this thing. You know, whether it's, whether it's, you know, when she was assembling chairs, you know, the chairs would always fall apart because she wasn't strong enough to screw them in tight enough. Even if she used a drill, she would just wasn't, she just wasn't strong enough to make that happen. So it was important to show her that her physical body has limitations as well. and, you know, putting her in situations where she was going to fail based on her inability to be a man. You know, if you feel like you're a man, then there are just some things that men are able to do that women just aren't, you know, and strength. strength and, and I don't know, height, those kinds of things are definitely it, you know? And so having to, having to experience that and understand it and really process that, you know, those kinds of lessons also need to be learned in order to, you know, in order to, you know, I don't know, live in reality, the reality that you're not a man. And even a boy of the same age as you is still going to be able to accomplish these physical tasks that you can't because he's a boy. She has a cousin who's the exact same age as she is. And he's six feet tall now. He's six feet tall now. He can stand there still and hold a book high over his head and she will not be able to get it. She won't be able to reach it. She won't even be able to tackle him. to get it from him. So, those are all, I mean, and I put her in those kinds of situations so that she could understand the limitations of her physical strength.
Stephanie Winn: You know, when I think about queer theory and what children are being taught, they're basically being taught to just cherry-pick whatever version of reality you want. So, I think part of the phenomenon is that girls think the grass is greener being boys, boys think the grass is greener being girls. Girls fantasize, well, as a boy, I won't be subject to all this pressure about my body. I won't be objectified. I can just be gross and sloppy and uncouth and it's cool. Boys are thinking, oh, as a girl, everybody likes you and everybody's so nice to you. Both are just cherry-picking what makes it appear that the grass is greener on the other side. which really reveals the shortcomings in their mentality and the lack of perspective-taking, the lack of compassion for the challenges of being the opposite sex. And so one thing about, like you're pointing out, one thing about being a male is you are expected to use your strength and your height and your physical capabilities in the service of those who don't have the same physical capabilities. You know, my fiancé is 6'1", 220, so you bet he does all the heavy lifting and all the getting things off of high shelves for me, right? And I'm happy to receive that, especially as someone with a chronic illness. I feel like I can't do squats sometimes. But I think in queer theory, they like to sort of pretend that things are whatever you make of them. And so I think these girls aren't given a realistic expectation that if you were to truly try to step into the shoes of a man and behave that way, that it means women aren't going to be as nice to you. It means women are going to be afraid of you, right? This is something that a lot of detrans women or women with regrets feel painfully, they're like, now that I look like a man, other women aren't as nice to me, they're afraid of me, and I don't feel welcome in female spaces, and ouch, that hurts, right? And that, yeah, you're expected to do the grop work, and you're expected to use your strength in the service of others. And is that a social role you really want to take on? Or do you just want to kind of pick and choose according to this Peter Pan fantasy? that being a man or being a woman or being a boy or girl is like whatever you want to make of it.
Gabrielle Clark: The way you appear to others has been like one of the first things that the parents, you know, that the parents come to me and say, how do I get them to stop? You know, because, you know, with girls, with girls, it's usually that sloppy, you know, slouchy. They want to, you know, look all disheveled and they want to look homeless so that it makes them look more like boys. you know, and then they don't understand why they're not accepted the way that they want to be. Because if you're a boy, you're supposed to be accepted more, right? I mean, in talking with parents about that and giving them little tips on how to change that behavior and how to get around some of those things, and that's where you set boundaries, you know? With my daughter, You know, I had a very strict policy with all of my children. This wasn't just with my daughter. You are not going nowhere with me looking like you're homeless. I'm sorry. Even when we were homeless, you ain't going nowhere with me looking like you're homeless. You got to wear clean clothes. They cannot have any holes in them. and you have to comb your hair and brush your teeth. There's just a base level of personal hygiene that you have to maintain when you're going to go out places with me and when you're going to go out places where people are going to expect a certain level of cleanliness and professionalism wherever you go, right? And so, you know, teaching kids about that and teaching them, hey, listen, you can, you can, if you don't want to be a prissy girl, that's fine, but you're still a girl nonetheless. So you can still, you can still be comfortable in the things that you want to wear, but you don't have to, you don't have to destroy your appearance in order to seem more masculine or more manly. And I think that, you know, the physical limitations, teaching about the physical limitations goes a long way with the appearance. Like some of these things, they roll into another, you know, roll into another thing. So once you start, once you start working on one aspect, it is, there's going to be a natural, natural and gradual, You know, I don't know segue into another issue, right? And I think that talking about the limitations of your physical body also starts to help with the with the I don't know the image issue.
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Stephanie Winn: There are some important questions here about self-image and presentation and I think some different norms and expectations across the generations. It seems like this generation is, you know, has this belief about how anything goes and freedom of personal expression is sort of the utmost value, but it seems like it also sets them up for unrealistic expectations about how others will perceive them and what kind of doors that's going to open or close to them. I wonder if this is actually a good segue towards something you and I were chatting about before we started recording, which is regional issues in the United States. So you're in Texas. You said you previously lived in Las Vegas. Here I am in the Northwest. And you and I both have consulting clients all around the country, and so we can sort of witness different cultural norms in different places. I would say here in the Northwest, all along the West Coast, and in places that are very culturally progressive, that there is this sort of anything goes aesthetic norm. Like at our local grocery stores, having green hair, is probably going to get you more likely to get the job rather than less. For example, I'm sure it's quite different in Texas. And it's different, as you mentioned, in the Northeast, in places where the culture is more elite. So maybe we can compare and contrast in other places that aren't this West Coast bubble that I'm in. Do you observe the same thing where it seems like the youth have these unrealistic expectations about how people are going to perceive them? Or do you see that as being different in other places?
Gabrielle Clark: When I look at the origins or causes or reasons why children get you know, get into this, it, to me, it, it seems very different, you know, according to region, right? Like it's, it does, it does seem like there's a regional breakdown, right? So all of my West Coast clients are all very liberal parents who, you know, who have just kind of, adopted the whole, you know, be yourself, whoever that is, kind of, I don't know, lifestyle for themselves and their children. You know, they, a lot of them still believe, you know, believe in, you know, in queer theory and even, you know, Some of this Marxism stuff, some of them are even, you know, I would dare say social, and they still believe in this. They just don't believe that their children are trans. They don't believe that that, you know, they think that that's part of the social contagion component of this and not the true trans as they, you know, as they call it, you know. But in New England, you know, the elite parents just never believed in it at all. And they just see this as rebellion. And it seems like that that's the way it is. And the image that is portrayed by both, it does seem, I don't know, It, it corroborates with, with what, what happens within, within different regions. So in New England, you know, there's this kind of, there's, it's not necessarily the blue hair thing, really, like it is on the West coast, you know, the blue hair and the green hair and the pink hair and all of these wild things. Just being part of it, you know, my kid had green hair, you know, from the time he was like five years old, you know, we just, that's just the way it was. He, we lived in Vegas. He was, you know, we did, we did that whole wild thing. Right. And when all of this started happening, I, I was, you know, kind of like, it's weird, but we're doing it, you know? And so I didn't make, I didn't think anything of it. I mean, it wasn't until my daughter's behaviors, you know, behaviors were getting, you know, her personality was changing that I started to really get concerned. I wasn't as concerned whenever the outer appearance, her image was changing. And I think that that's true for most West Coast parents. Right. They just everything is just so wild out there. They just don't they don't think of it as a big deal. I think in New England it is it is a little bit different and they see it as, you know, I don't know, rebellion. And I think that it is a rebellion. You know, I think a lot of especially with the young women, they don't want to turn into their caring mothers. You know what I mean? And and it just and it just kind of gets crazy from there. And there's this, you know, there's a level of entitlement and a little bit of, you know, spoiling that goes along with that in that regard. They're, they don't have a lot of rules. They don't have a lot of boundaries. They don't, they, they have lived in this environment where they have had all of these expectations from the beginning, so they never really questioned it before, and this is their way of breaking free from that. You know, where I live in Texas and in other, I would say, other red states like Florida, one of the things that I've seen is an increase in Christian homeschooling families having trans-identifying children. And I think that's because in those environments, trans-identifying parents and parents with trans-identifying children are homeschoolers too. So they're starting to kind of take over in that respect because There are a lot of them who have opted out of public school because they feel like public school is not safe for their children anymore. So the homeschooling environment in red states is, I will say, is filling up with gender ideology in a way that I don't think a lot of people were expecting. Wow. I didn't know that. It's a really interesting scenario that we're seeing all over the country. And I think it's different for, I mean, and that's why I felt like it was important to start a firmer reality connected because in America we have very specific and very different problems than say in Britain where their motivation is religious. We do have some of that here, but it's not the same. I mean, you know, it's not the same. Most of the families that I, that I coach aren't religious at all. And it's not even an issue. So, you know, region to region, it does vary.
Stephanie Winn: So you talk about this as a form of rebellion in some places, and I want to sort of, you know, counter that by saying, and maybe it's more of a form of conformity in others, you know, in places where it's as popular as it is in the West Coast. You also talk about rules and boundaries. And earlier when you were talking about giving your daughter tasks that you knew she wouldn't be able to do, part of the strategy there was helping her encounter the hard limits that are part of reality. And that reminds me of the concept from, I believe it's Hold On To Your Kids by Gabor Maté and Gordon Neufeld. In that book, they talk about the importance of your kids encountering the concept of futility, encountering those hard limits, The places where no means no, whether that's because you have a hard limit as a parent or because nature or the laws of physics or the economy has a hard limit for you, in any case, there are certain things that are just impossible. And they talk about the importance of your kids getting to that point. and then going through whatever emotions they need to go through, grief, disappointment, embarrassment, so that they can eventually move on and try things that are possible for them. So when it comes to the gender stuff, this is On one level, it's a failure to recognize those hard limits, that there are many things you can aspire toward in this lifetime. There are many things you can try to be. There are many educational and career goals, opportunities available to you. And most parents that I work with, at least, would say they're pretty open to who it is that you love, as long as they're a kind person. But changing your sex, that is something that's not actually possible. And your attempts to do so will only lead to pain, frustration, and disappointment. You will never completely look like the opposite sex, and you'll certainly never be it. But what you might be is you might be mangled and deformed and parts of your body might not work very well if you try to go down that path. So that's one of those places where most parents would like their kids to have a more concrete sense of the rules and the boundaries, not just their own rules and boundaries, but nature's. But I also want to talk about, you know, when it comes to rules, boundaries, and futility, how that pertains to parenting. Because, you know, as a parent, anyone who's experienced parenting to any degree, you will know that if your kids see an opportunity to push you and get their way, they will push until they get their way. It's only if you're consistent enough with your boundaries, and they understand that no means no, and they understand that in fact, pushing me or trying to bully me into saying yes is going to result in the loss of more privileges, right? It's like that has to become a consistent pattern over time for kids to get it. And some of the personality and conflict issues that I see families getting into, sometimes it's a result of problems going back years before they entered the gender issue. It's a result of loose boundaries in parenting. And so these kids have these personality and these behavior issues. Why? Because their parents taught them that if you just push me hard enough, I'll cave in.
Gabrielle Clark: So every time, every time we have a discussion about a certain, you know, situation that comes up, right. My first, my, one of the first things I say, okay, well, this was a lesson that they should have learned when they were five, but since they didn't, and a lot of the parents recognize that too. They're like, you know, we let her get away with so many things. Cause we thought as long as she was making good grades or as long as he was making good grades and he wasn't getting into any real trouble. them, then they can do whatever they want to do. And this is, this is, you know, there's no better way to represent that than with devices and technology. So they had unfettered access to all kinds of, you know, all kinds of devices and, you know, gizmos and gadgets, computers and phones and all this. Even, even when they had some sort of net nanny on, on their computers or Or, you know, guards or whatever on their phones, some parental controls, even that, you know, the kids are so smart now they can get around that kind of stuff all the time. So. Trying to explain to the parents and, I don't know, encourage the parents to, to take those things away and to find, you know, find ways to limit that, that access has been, that has been very challenging. So many parents think that telling your kids no or putting boundaries on your kids is some sort of, some sort of punishment or some sort of, some sort of cruelty or, or, you know, neglect. And so I, you know, when we talk about all of these things and it's just like your, your kids have to understand that there are some things that they just can't do. And because our society has, has so much access to everything. Sometimes we're going to have to put those boundaries and parameters in ourselves. Even, even when we don't want to, I even spent time. with my daughter where we did nothing because I wanted her to understand what it means to be bored. So that she didn't just freak out about being bored or experience some kind of anxiety or depression just because she was bored. You know, all of those All of those lessons are so important for our children so that they can grow up and really understand what it is like to be an adult, let alone the gender stuff. All of those things need to be taught to our kids because they don't come naturally anymore. You know, 100, 200 years ago, there were lots of limitations just because technology wasn't there, wasn't present. You couldn't just jump in a car, you know, 150 years ago and just go wherever you wanted to go. That wasn't, that wasn't possible. So, so being able to put boundaries around things, get, you know, telling them, telling your children, Hey, listen, you know, if you want something, you're going to have to work for it. Putting that. making their financial boundary or financial challenge for everything that they really want in their lives, and putting other challenges in front of them, that is going to make them understand, I cannot do anything that I want to do. And even though I can do most of what I want to do, I probably shouldn't. just to build my own character, just to stay grounded as a person.
Stephanie Winn: Well, I need to pick what really matters to me, what's really worth working toward, and I can accomplish things that I work toward, but it's going to take some energy, so I need to choose my priorities. That seems like it's part of the lesson. Now, you talk about frustration, tolerance with boredom. such an important lesson. And I think in a world where there is so much stimulation, distraction, so much access to screens, it takes almost like a detox period where the screens are off limits for long enough for the creativity, the imagination to come back about what can I do with the resources available to me. Now, when you talk about taking away screens, what advice do you give to parents who have given their kids unfettered access to screens who are now, you know, they know they need to set limits, but they're so nervous about doing it?
Gabrielle Clark: Well, one of the best ways to teach is to do it yourself. You know, the whole family's, hey, look, we're all, I'm doing it too. So, you know, modeling that behavior, and I have not always been as good at this myself, but I know you spend a lot of time on Twitter. I do spend a lot of time on Twitter. It's bad too, but I spend a lot of time waiting on other people, so I end up spending a lot of time on Twitter. The unfettered access to screens is not only affecting our children, it's affecting our ability to parent. you know, parent well, because we're so involved in our phones. We're so involved in technology. So modeling that behavior has been, that's the very first thing. The second thing is I tell them when you're trying to detox yourself and your children from this, you know, from these devices, go on a long trip, preferably in places where there's not very good cell service, make you a playlist so that you have music and get you a bunch of junk food and snacks and junk and crap and eat it on the way. So you're doing several things when you do that, right? You have this television called the window, right? Like this is your new teeth. So you can see out the window and see all of, you know, see all of the little, the little details of things that you never thought about before. See the, the houses that they turned into, into restaurants, you know, a little bit of Americana, like, you know, like, like you see when you travel, when you, when you go on down all of these long windy roads. You don't have any radio. There's no there's no live connection to anything because there's there's no there's no signals out there Put all of those phones in the glove compartment or on their chargers or whatever and don't touch them and, and, you know, experience what that's like. Go to a cabin in the woods where there is nothing and someplace that doesn't have air conditioning or heating. And so what, depending on what time of the year it is, you're either going to have to go out there and chop some logs or start a fire or whatever, or, you know, go out and get in whatever body of water is nearby so you can cool off. Either way, those, those are going, those, Those activities are gonna help you detox, but they're also going to inspire you to engage with nature more. And that's basically how I have told parents to fight against this. And then once they get back from these things, they set a new boundary to say, hey, wasn't that nice? Wasn't that wonderful? We didn't even use our phones. We didn't take pictures of anything. We were there, we were all there and we did this wonderful thing. We had this wonderful experience, even though we got splinters and we got dirt in our fingers and all of this stuff, it was still fun. We still had this wonderful time. And then they can, once they get home, they can set new boundaries for their family, you know, instead of going back to being slaves to their devices.
Stephanie Winn: I love that. It reminds me of a time that we, as a family, we went to this family campground type place. We were staying in a very rustic yurt without much more than some beds and a lamp. and without access to all the familiar things at home, without access to the screens, for the first time, the kids actually took an interest in what we normally do in the evening, which is we like to stretch and do some self-care, tune in with our bodies in the evenings. We found the kids actually wanting us to teach them stretches. It was so nice. It's like they don't usually realize that this is available to them, but with everything else taken away, just being here in this rustic little yurt, it's like we're finding new ways to interact. I want to add another little tidbit of advice I give to parents who are working on taking away screens, which is, I call it strategic apologizing. And what I mean by that is that your kids, whenever you're doing something they don't want you to do, they're going to be mad. They're going to feel like you're doing something wrong and they're going to try to guilt trip you and make you apologize. So you get ahead of that by knowing exactly what you're apologizing for and getting in control of the narrative. So it might sound like something like this. You know, honey, I owe you an apology. You're going to hate me for this. You're going to be so mad or you're going to be so disappointed, frustrated, whatever. You know, you're going to feel like I'm taking away something from you. And the truth is, I am taking away something from you. My mistake is that I gave it to you in the first place. That's what I did wrong. I should have never given you unrestricted access to your own iPhone or iPad or whatever it is. Because I didn't realize what I was handing you. I didn't realize I was giving you digital crack. I didn't realize that in this day and age, giving you this unfettered access to the internet and all these apps would have basically been the equivalent of when I was growing up 20, 30, 40 years ago, however many my parents just letting me roam the streets at night. Now that I understand, now that I've learned, so you're modeling humility, I realize I should never have given you in the first place. Now, I understand you're going to be upset I'm taking this away. Yes, it's going to be years before you realize why I did this. That's strategic apologizing. You're absorbing the blows of the fact that they're going to be mad at you, but you're saying, you know, what my mistake was, was giving this to you in the first place. So that now it feels like I'm taking something away. It's not a mistake that I'm taking it away.
Gabrielle Clark: There's an element of apology throughout this entire process, right? Because I mean, so much of the way that we parented before is what got is what made the kids susceptible to this. Whether it's whether and it doesn't matter what form of indoctrination it is I mean there there are mothers who are devastated devastated that their daughters have gone off to college and Now are ashamed of their mothers for not being more woke Right, you know that same that same? thing, it translates to this as well, because we didn't prepare our children for any of what we see now. And it's not like we didn't. Some of us, I guess, probably wanted Wanted to, I don't know, give our children a better start than we had. So allowing them to do more things than we were allowed to do. But you know, just because we can do it doesn't mean we should do it. And that, that is, you know, a lot of. A lot of where the apologizing, I had to apologize to my daughter. You know, I never really gave her unfettered access to the internet. That was never, that was never something that she ever had, but I did, I did, you know, treat her like, like she could handle it all herself. You know, like, like she was, was able to handle tasks and handle growing up. more than she really was. She's the youngest of five. And when she lost her brothers, that really had an effect on her. And I didn't ever, I never addressed it. I never, you know, I never really thought about how she would feel about her brothers leaving home and moving on with their lives and leaving her. You know, I never really thought about those kinds of things. I never really took into consideration that she, you know, she had other issues or problems. that I didn't know anything about. And yes, I mean, that, the strategic apologizing, you know, doing it whenever you're getting ready to, you know, to have to make some sacrifices in your family is certainly, I mean, that's certainly a helpful tactic. But I think, you know, as far as parents go, I think we all have a lot to apologize to our children for.
Stephanie Winn: Unfortunately, the trick is all about making sure you're apologizing for the right things and not for the wrong things. Because it's also, you know, I talked to so many parents who are so confused and conflicted about this, they're apologizing to their kids for using quote unquote, the wrong pronouns. and they're leading their kids on sometimes. They're afraid to get into conflict, so they say, this is all just really hard for me to wrap my mind around. I need time to understand. I'm sorry that I don't understand it yet. Basically, they're delaying the process of being flat out honest. with their kids about, actually, you're my son, not my daughter, and those hard limits they're afraid to assert. So as we're nearing the end of our time, I wonder if there's sort of, for parents who are listening, who are desperate for help, if there would be sort of one general piece of advice You want them to keep in mind through this whole process. What would it be?
Gabrielle Clark: Trust your instincts. They'll help you more than you know. Even if you make a mistake. Don't think that that mistake is the end of the world. Your instincts can be right, and your application of how to deal with the problem can be wrong. So just trust your instincts. And if one method doesn't work, if one situation doesn't work, then try something else. And don't… Don't wait. Watchful waiting, in my view, has been the worst, the biggest culprit in the pervasiveness of this situation. I think that People who have observed watchful waiting, if you, if you listen to mothers, you know, and fathers of children, you know, children in their late twenties who observed watchful waiting, they regret it because they, they feel like that was, that was a mistake. So trust your instincts that it's not, you know, this is not okay. This is not right. It is not going to be helpful for your child's success and it could end up becoming a serious detriment to their life.
Stephanie Winn: If you're looking for a simple way to take better care of yourself, check out Organifi. I start every day with a glass of their original green juice powder mixed with water. It contains moringa, ashwagandha, chlorella, spirulina, matcha, wheatgrass, beets, turmeric, mint, lemon, and coconut water. 100% organic with no added sugar. It's the best tasting superfood supplement I've ever tried. It's super easy to make and it makes me feel good. Organifi also makes several other delicious and nutritious superfood blends such as red juice, immune support, protein powders, a golden milk mix, and even superfood hot cocoa. Check out the collection at Organifi.com slash Sumtherapist. That's O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I dot com slash Sumtherapist. And use code Sumtherapist to take 20% off your order. Allow me to clarify, just in case anyone's confused about this, that the phrase watchful waiting used to refer to something very specific, which was the standard of care in the mental health field. with regard to typically young boys, mostly, who had gender-related distress. So, at that time, before the current cultural environment that we're in, before the takeover of the medical field, it was a standard of care that if a young boy thought he was a girl, you just didn't do anything about it, you just sort of observed, and what were you likely to observe? Probably that he'll grow up to be gay, right? So, it was an alternative to the now pseudo-standard of care, I put that in air quotes, of medicalizing these kids. But what I hear you describing, Gavs, is the idea that you can just sort of keep your fingers crossed that it's just a phase that your kid will grow out of it. It's like in this cultural environment, there are so many forces working against you to take your kids and send them down this rabbit hole. that you do have to be a lot more proactive. And I agree with that, and I want all parents to hear that. You know, I've said to certain parents, like, you don't need to work with me. So just to clarify for anyone who doesn't know this, I do parent consulting and you do parent consulting, or maybe you call it coaching. But I am willing to work with any parent, not in my capacity as a therapist, but in my capacity as a consultant where I give a lot more direct and honest feedback and where I give lots of information about the ROGD phenomenon and the psychology of these kids, the psychology of their social environments. And I say, especially when I detect an element of denial about how serious this could be, you don't need to work with me, but you do need to work with someone. So I refer people to my bookshop at sometherapist.com bookshop. The second section down is where I have my recommended reading for ROGD parents. I tell them about people like you, Gabs, and your program. Maybe your approach or personality is going to work better for some people than mine. I just want people to have someone with experience in this very particular issue who understands that this is a complete departure from how psychological issues are normally handled. It's a mass social contagion and there's a lot of money behind it. There is a lot of money in the gender industry and some really kind of predatory forces with their eyes on your kids. And those forces are designed to take advantage of normal developmental challenges, whether it's teenage angst, adolescent insecurity and discomfort with puberty combined with the tendency to want to rebel against your parents and to feel like you're cool and cutting edge as well as to fit in with your peers, all of that normal stuff. these kids have no idea that this thing that they think is so cool and special and unique about themselves is actually just sending signals to interests that they have no idea about that have greedy eyes on them. This is a medical patient for life. It is in many cases, if you're a parent, you might be the only person or you and your spouse might be the only people who are really on the side of your child's best interest and long-term health and well-being. So work with me, work with Gabs, work with someone who specializes in this issue and is on your side and does not believe that sterilizing and butchering kids and turning them into medical patients is an ethical choice for these families. Absolutely.
Gabrielle Clark: That's my… Wait, wait. get some help from somebody.
Stephanie Winn: Pronouns are a gateway drug. There's no such thing as a non-binary human being. If your kid starts to believe that they are neither male nor female, even if they're telling you they don't want to medicalize, you do have an issue on your hands because that is, for many people, not for everyone, but that can be the beginning of a pattern of thoughts, feelings, and actions that leads someone down a path where they do end up, as you were pointing out earlier, developing some personality traits that are really not going to serve them or anyone around them in the long run, and or you know, eventually leading them towards wanting to medicalize and harm their body. So, Gavs, now it's time to tell people where they can find you and any other details about your Affirming Reality program that you might not have mentioned so far.
Gabrielle Clark: Well, you can find me at affirmingreality.com, of course. And the ARC program is going to, the ARC website is going to be up soon. That's Affirming Reality Connected. I'm trying to create a community around this so that we can silo some of these problems. according to their need. And I would say, you know, you can reach out to me on Twitter, although I act bad on Twitter, it's at GabsClark5. And I'm a little crazy on Twitter, but, you know, it's not exactly my personality. But I would say with affirming reality, with the program, the desistance program, It's not, it's not as hard or as complicated as a lot of people think. I don't, I spend most of the time teaching families how better to connect with one another. And a great deal of it is really basically learning how to have fun with each other. And so it actually ends up being a lot more fun than most people realize. And the families heal as a whole, not just the single person who is being socially transitioned. The whole family is affected. The mothers are more connected to their daughters, and the fathers know how better to interact with their sons. So it is… It is a better way of parenting. And you can learn more about all of your own instincts and how they are going to help you parent in the future.
Stephanie Winn: That's great, Gabs. And I just want to highlight something you mentioned there about, so you have Affirming Reality. And right now, anyone can go to affirmingreality.com and find out about your coaching program. Also, you have a program for therapists. to learn how to help these families. That's at the consulting tab on your website, I believe. But when you mention Affirming Reality Connected, you talk about siloing these different groups, and that is something that we chatted about earlier. Basically, just that you recognize that the needs of fathers might be different from the needs of mothers. There also might be some different regional needs, maybe needs according to other demographics, like for example, Parents I work with, their kids are anywhere from 10 to 30, basically, right? And so the needs of a family who are still close to their young, impressionable child That's going to be different than the needs of a family where their kid is out of the house and not talking to them. So, and another thing that you mentioned before we started recording that I just want to highlight is that your ARC program is really, it's solution focused. And there are support groups out there. There are even support groups run by or affiliated with people I've had on this podcast. Like for example, there's the, the Pitt community, parents with inconveniences about trans. Partners for Ethical Care. There's all these organizations. And some groups are really meant to give parents a space to vent or a space to grieve, a space to empathize with each other. It sounds like you're really trying to keep it constructive, positive, solution-focused. Because in your experience and in mine, I mean, maybe I'm speaking for you at this point, but I feel like you can't afford to give up hope. Yes, there needs to be space to vent. And I do create that space, that listening space for people. But what I do with parents really isn't therapy. Let's learn everything we can about this. Let's understand your child's psychology and the psychology of the people in the movement around them. And then let's understand what tools you can use to communicate better so that you're controlling what you can control, which is your communication, how you spend your time, energy, money, what your boundaries are. And so I think it's important for parents to maintain that hope and stay solution focused. So that's affirmingreality.com. And then from there, they can find out more about Affirming Reality Connected, which is launching soon. And like you said, they can follow you on Twitter. Did we cover everything or did I miss anything there? I think we got it all. Okay. I'm really glad to finally have you on the show, Gabs. And I knew that this episode would be very relevant to my audience and to my own consulting clients, hopefully to some of yours as well. So I hope that we gave parents some really practical tools and insights into what they can do. Really been a pleasure having you, Gabs. Thanks so much.
Gabrielle Clark: Thank you so much for having me.
Stephanie Winn: This was lovely. I hope you enjoyed this episode of You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist podcast. To check out my book recommendations, articles, wellness products, guest episodes on other podcasts, consulting services, and lots more, visit sometherapist.com. or follow me on Twitter or Instagram at sometherapist. If you'd like to go deeper, join my community at somekindoftherapist.locals.com. Members can dialogue with other listeners, post questions for upcoming podcast guests to respond to, or ask questions for me to respond to in exclusive members-only Q&A live streams. To learn more about the gender crisis, watch our film, No Way Back, The Reality of Gender-Affirming Parents, at nowaybackfilm.com. Special thanks to my producers, Eric and Amber Beals at Different Mix, and to Joey Pecoraro for our theme song, Half Awake. If you appreciate this podcast and want more people to find it, kindly take a moment to rate, review, like, comment, and share on your platforms of choice. Of course, just because I am some therapist doesn't mean I'm your therapist. This podcast is not a substitute for medical advice. If you need help, ask your doctor or browse your local therapists online. And whatever you do next, please take care of yourself. Eat well, sleep well, move your body, get outside, and tell someone you love them. You're worth it.