Etiology, where things derive, is always an interesting puzzle. The puzzle more and more appears to be one of biological causation that prolly, at least researchers haven't yet found a link, is NOT hereditary. It could well be environmental in regard to the increased amounts of estrogenous compounds the chemical industry has placed into the environment over the past ninety years.
Although, with increased population one would still expect to see the presumed proportion of TS people rise. There's no evidence that we have in that time period. There's a lot of evidence that more and more of us are discovering who we are for the past fifty years due to first print media and TV and now to the vast increase in computer-generated information available to more and more people.
Momoftrans, the etiology you mentioned in your initial post is one put forth and defended vehemently by one Dr. Paul McHugh who retired as the chairman of the psychiatric department at Johns Hopkins University. As a devout Catholic he has advised the current and previous Popes on matters of transsexuality. He appears to find the entire notion of a biologically mixed-sex child abhorrent and impossible, although various degrees of body intersex have been historically verified for millenia: children born with anomalous and mixed genitalia. One doesn't need too much of a stretch to think that the basic dimorphism of the brain can be subject to the exact same syndromes as those of the body.
Dr. McHugh is easily discovered on the internet by a simple googling of his name. Various scientists and people who disagree with Dr. McHugh are also findable there as well.
For information be sure to check out the
Wiki feature at Susans. You may also find transsexual/transgender information at
tsroadmap.com and at the reconstruction of an old informational site
GID.com.
I would tend to agree with Arch, as he said above, that a gender therapist separate from one your daughter uses is a good idea. As a therapist I can tell you that any ethical therapist in the USA will not work you both simultaneously as the conflict-of-interests there is too large to overcome. She/he will not be able to work in such a way as to benefit the both of you without some severe issues about who her patient is and to whom she should be "loyal." Instead she/he may well have a few family-sessions to get a feel for how you interact, etc. But the patient will only be one of you.
As Kassandra said the
schizophrenogenic mother has basically been relegated to the psychiatric dust-heap of history. Modern
Attachment Theorists have made good cases for certain ways in which people find attachment from infancy onward. But the notion that parental distance or closeness having anything at all to do with homosexuality, heterosexuality or transsexuality are debunked and will hopefuly be dead forever once Dr. McHugh and his acolytes have passed from the scene.
Neither they, nor most of their followers, seem to toss these terms around to deal with fathers, families or groups and how children attach to those other than the mother. The main line these days sees that child-rearing is not simply the responsibility of the mother alone, regardless how that may play-out in some families.
In other words: try to forgive yourself. You haven't "caused" your child to be transsexual. The chances are infinitely greater that a biological quirk that is a random anomaly within the human gene-pool (think of a computer glitch that shows up occasionally but that no one can manage to "de-bug" and never propagates itself) and/or a result of high environmental concentrations of estrogenic and other steroidal compunds due to intensive uses of fertlizers, medicines, and other chemical agents our cultures use constantly to produce goods and services have caused your child's condition.
All that said, working on your relationship with your daughter is a very good idea. Of course that would be a good idea regardless of your child's sex. Best to you both.
Nichole
