Dr. Shefali Shares What Drives Gender Dysphoria

I want to create a space here of just complete and total expression and safety with no fear present whatsoever about the topic. And that is gender dysphoria. I don't think it's a topic we should fear. I think it's a topic that deserves communication and really it's asking for peace in itself. I learned this from Paul Levy on the podcast. He said every time there is some type of wetiko or dark matter presented, there's actually a longing for healing in the call for it itself. What do you make of this whole gender dysphoria narrative? The dei, Larry Fink and Blackrock. There's so many, it feels almost like demonic energies in the world. Dark matter that is trying to confuse. Boys to be girls, girls to be boys, mothers to be fathers. Fathers can now lactate. Look, it's no matter who you are, everybody feels in their heart and soul that something just isn't right here. I'm not here to tell anyone how they should think, but I'm just offering a different perspective, hopefully through you. How do we make sense of this whole thing?

Well, I think there is a small portion of humans that are experiencing a genuine biological maladaptation or disconnect. For those individuals, there is a conflict between the psychological and the biological and they deserve great compassion. Besides those people, I think there's a whole other bunch of people who are genuinely just confused and they are so unhappy in their current state that they, instead of learning to just sit in that unhappiness, are perhaps grasping for straws and glomming onto this idea that they could be better in another body. And we know that that can't really be fully true because we have not been in that body, so we don't know. You can't say I'll be better there if you've never been there. But what you can say is, I'm really not happy here. And therefore we need to go slowly and carefully, especially when it comes from children with great compassion, with great respect for their inner turmoil. Understand as parents or caregivers that what we're seeing is unhappiness in the current state of being. And not to, you know, just invalidate them, to honor them, but also to take it very slow because children are not yet developmentally able to make life changing, surgical body transforming decisions way into their 20s. Right? So I tell parents, understand your children, don't invalidate them, honor them, but also at the same time, understand it needs a lot of thinking through and a lot of time. We just don't get gender Restructuring surgery until the person is a full functioning adult, we just cannot, you know, and when they're an adult, they can make their own decision with their body and we will, I have to honor that. But as children, we have to protect them until they're developmentally more ready to make such potentially life changing decisions about their body. And I'm like this, Even if the 16 year old comes to the mother and says, I want enhanced breast surgery, I will say to that child, no, you need to wait till you are an adult. So it's not that I'm only about the gender part, I'm about just surgery in general, which has to do with coming from a desire to seek a solution for something that is deeply unrestful within. Whenever a child comes and says, you know, I want a Lamborghini because I'm unhappy. Oh, you're not gonna get it. I want breast surgery because I'm unhappy. No, you're not gonna get it. I want a nose job because I'm unhappy. No, you're not gonna get it. I want to live in Iceland. No, you're not going to get it. I want to be a boy if I'm a girl. No, you're not going to get it right now, right now. Because these are two big decisions for a child to be making right now. So, but it also doesn't mean that we are angry with our children. We're upset with them, we're mean to them, we're shaming of them. We have to understand this psychological component here and we need to wrestle with it and, you know, go through it. But also I've seen that these things get trendy. You know, all things, even breasts for 16 year old girls, they become a trend. You know, now their butt implants are the trend of fake lashes are the trend. And so in the same way, gender dysphoric solutions, solutions for gender dysphoria could also be a little bit trendy. All I'm saying, and I'm going to be unpopular after this now thanks to you. All I'm saying, I hope people can hear, is that we have to take it really slow and we cannot just jump in to do anything that's life altering for the body of our children because their minds are not yet developed. And I've also said, be compassionate, be understanding, be honoring, understand that there's a psychological component and for some people it's a genuine issue, but we don't know yet for who it is, what, until we wait and allow the child to develop.

I feel like you could be A parent to the nation. I feel like if everybody just listened to what you just said, then every single parent could parent better. Because that slow, even the cadence in which you spoke, it's a very charged issue. And it's a charged issue because children are suffering. It actually leads to the third main block of the book. Learn to accept your child and connection will flow. Parents are seeking connection. They're seeking it. No. What parent ever wants to see their daughter or son suffering? None of us. When my son hits his head, I'm the first one to run to him and hold him when he cry, like, moves me emotionally. So I have compassion, I have understanding for the parents that are going through this. Oh, my God, my child's experiencing, you know, this gender dysphoric conditions. But at the. At the end of the day, it is our responsibility as loving parents to shepherd, to make sure that we're protecting our children essentially from society and from themselves. If we don't let children pick their meals or go buy alcohol or join the armed forces, why in any logical form would we ever allow a child to mutilate their bodies? I think that wisdom has been lost and it's actually extremely. It brings up sadness for me that the wisdom you're speaking about even has to be spoken.

Well, it's because, you know, we are also entering a dangerous era with AI and social media, which is perpetuating this insane idea that we need to be comfortable right away, right now, fast.

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