Children who are heard have better outcomes than those who are not
Dr Helen Webberley on Times Radio: the gender debate, with Jo Coburn, Times Radio
The safest thing a parent can do is hold the line. Say no clearly enough, and the child will come through it fine. Listening too much, or allowing exploration, only makes things worse.
I sit with these children and their families, and I can tell you that the pain of being told "you cannot be who you are" does not protect a child. It marks them. The adults I have spoken with over the years remember, with extraordinary clarity, whether their parents said no or whether their parents listened. That difference shows up in everything: in their mental health, in their relationships, in how they feel about themselves decades later. Denying that gender incongruence exists at all, as Helen Joyce does, is not a neutral position. It leaves real children without language for something they are genuinely living. Listening, exploring, staying curious alongside your child, that is not permissiveness. That is parenting.
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