Mental Health Problems Plague Transgender Kids
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 20 February 2012 Time: 09:50 AM ET
http://www.livescience.com/16110-transgender-teen-mental-health.htmlKids who are distressed because they feel their physical body doesn't match their gender suffer from high rates of psychiatric symptoms, such as depression and suicide attempts, a new study finds.
In a sample of children and adolescents treated at the Endocrine Division at Children's Hospital Boston, young people who experienced distress about the "mismatch" between their body's sex and their mental gender had high rates of psychiatric complications (before any gender treatment). Kids who don't get treatment, whether for financial reasons or because their parents aren't supportive, likely have higher rates of psychiatric problems, said study researcher Scott Leibowitz, a psychiatrist at Children's Hospital Boston.
"Individuals who are not transgender take for granted what life must be like when our minds and bodies are incongruent with one another," Leibowitz told LiveScience. "Personally, I've seen so many kids who experience such high levels of distress with their changing bodies that it impairs their emotional and social functioning," he said.
