This podcast explores holistic stress and trauma recovery. I am your host, Luis Mojica. My work, Holistic Life Navigation, was modeled after my own journey in healing myself from chronic illness and PTSD. I share this podcast with many brilliant minds who, like me, healed themselves through unique, unusual, and unorthodox ways.
For more information, please visit: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com
Written, produced and recorded by Luis Mojica. Edited by Fredo Viola. Intro song: "Wood Smoke" by Fredo Viola.
Welcome to the Holistic Life Navigation Podcast. I am your host, Luis Mojica. I'm a somatic therapist and nutritionist who combines nutritional therapy with somatic therapy to help thousands of people around the world, including myself, recover from stress and trauma. This podcast serves as a way for me to teach you what I learn for free. How can food aid in the recovery of stress and trauma? What does it really mean to be embodied? And how can simple somatic practices help us better navigate this strange and sensational human experience? Let's find out. This is what I mean when I say actual trans. What I mean are people who had to medically transition to intervene in life-threatening sex dysphoria. This is different from someone that wants to look androgynous, someone who's not trying to pass, someone who's gender non-conforming or non-binary and is enjoying body modification. That's fine. I'm not even against it. I just don't want to call it trans because I want to help protect this small marginalized group of people who suffer with sex dysphoria and have since they were kids. But with my upcoming parenting group, I want people to know that I'm offering a bonus dysphoria two-hour session with my friend Gray Doolin. And we're going to navigate and teach parents how we hold curious space, non-urgent space, non-fear-based space with kids who experience dysmorphia or dysphoria. And so I felt like this uh podcast might be useful for some of you. In 2023, I rocked many boats when I came out with my opinions about children transitioning via puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries. I recently just spoke with uh Dr. McKenzie Steiner about this. I recently just had Mackenzie Steiner, a psychologist who specializes in this on my podcast talking about it. If you haven't heard, I'm very much not in favor of it. I did a whole YouTube video about how my opposition to children transitioning directly relates to my support for adult transitioning when necessary. You can watch it if you're interested. We'll make sure to put the link in the episode details. This experience was probably the most visceral public hatred I have ever experienced or fell my entire life by sharing this opinion. Yet after the smoke cleared, the most amazing thing happened. I gained a new following amongst actual transsexuals, more on that later, and parents of children with dysphoria. And I realized that my opinions, albeit politically incorrect and unpopular at the time, actually served this very marginalized demographic of people who just weren't being heard. Dysphoria is something that has existed for a long time, and it doesn't always mean someone needs to transition their sex to treat it. Trans, sadly, has become a noun, an identity based on feelings rather than a verb, based on medical intervention to treat sometimes life-threatening sex dysphoria. Turning trans into an identity meant that anyone with dysphoria was now encouraged and expected to be trans. Therapists, school counselors, teachers, parents, and peers were all suggesting to gender non-conforming kids who had dysphoria that they were trans. I worked with, consulted for, and were friends with these people. It wasn't hearsay, but a direct experience I witnessed. Now I'm not here to argue about transness. I'm never interested in that. I have dear friends who are trans. I wish nothing against trans people at all. They're already dealing with enough. But what I am here to do is say something that hundreds of parents have secretly written to me over the past few years, saying, but dare not say out loud for fear of public hatred. And it is this their child is no happier after transitioning. And it's not because they face more cruelty. These particular people involve and cases involve children being highly rewarded, celebrated, and protected for transitioning. It's because of something very important and rarely discussed. Sex dysphoria is not the only form of dysphoria. Now let me include a disclaimer here. Sex transitioning is highly effective when dysphoria is rooted in biological sex, meaning when I don't relate to the male or female body I'm born into. I, as an intersex man, benefited greatly from gender-affirming surgery when I got my breast removed in 2010. So I'm not here to pretend it's never appropriate. Instead, I hope to expand people's understanding of dysphoria in kids so we can see the many roots of it, rather than chalking it all up as trans, which then sets them on the road for medical dependence and intervention for life. Some kids are just gay, and their homosexuality causes them to inherently non-conform to gender stereotypes, and this can create dysphoria, especially if you're born into a homophobic household or culture of some kind. Most kids who are going through puberty are confused by their changing bodies, overwhelmed by hormones, and even traumatized by pornography, which can all lead to dysphoria. Many kids, girls in particular, who I've worked with, were molested or sexually assaulted around puberty, which led them to develop negative associations with their female characteristics, which led them to experience dysphoria, especially around their breasts. Poor nutrition, sleep deprivation, screen addiction, and bullying are all sources of dysphoria. And sometimes children are actually sex dysphoric, which means their genitals and sex characteristics cause them massive amounts of shame, discomfort, and even suffering. This is what I mean, by the way, when I say actual trans. What I mean are people who had to medically transition to intervene in life-threatening sex dysphoria. This is different from someone that wants to look androgynous, someone who's not trying to pass, someone who's gender non-conforming or non-binary and is enjoying body modification. That's fine. I'm not even against it. I just don't want to call it trans because I want to help protect this small marginalized group of people who suffer with sex dysphoria and have since they were kids. I recorded an entire episode on navigating dysphoria nearly three years ago. If you really want to dive into it and understand it more, we'll put the link in the episode details. I'm speaking about this here because I want parents and any caretakers of children to know how common dysphoria is from the aforementioned sources. And due to the politicization of trans identities, we have begun to focus on only one source as the main reason. My upcoming parenting group isn't centered around this, but it definitely includes this because it's something parents have never had to navigate before. I have incredible resources for practitioners who are queer or trans themselves and know how to hold these experiences for parents who want more direct support and even their children. Believe a child when they tell you they're dysphoric, but don't assume it's just due to their sex at birth, especially when it was never an issue until puberty, or especially after some kind of stressful and traumatic experience. Topics like this are so difficult to speak about because of how politically divisive they've become. I can't stand seeing trans people or intersex people like me used in debates, political ads, or as pawns for either side of the aisle. We're human and should be treated as such. The better we get at supporting kids who are dysphoric, the more we can address the many facets and possible causes of that dysphoria without choosing gender-affirming surgery and medicines that are largely irreversible. Then, after balancing the child's body through nutrition, movement, lifestyle changes, and especially any family or personal therapy necessary, that child can have a much more successful transition when their body's done maturing as an adult, if indeed they do need medical intervention to treat their dysphoria. A colleague of mine, Kai Cheng Thong, came onto my show a year ago or so to chat with me about my views on this after one of my posts triggered her. She herself, being a trans woman, came on with an open heart to disagree with me, and we ended up finding way more commonality than either of us imagined. Again, we'll also put the link to that episode in the details. I have worked with transgendered individuals, I have written recommendation letters for surgeries and hormones, I have worked with detransitioners, and I've worked with people who were truly confused and needed more time to find clarity and weren't trans after all. What I learned is this be curious, not confrontational. Debating someone's identity or feelings isn't useful. But learning about what is informing their feelings is invaluable and can teach us so much. If you need support around this, please check out my upcoming parenting group because this is just one piece of the parenting puzzle. Some of you are dealing with this, some of you will never deal with this, some of you will deal with it in the future. But it's a great thing to begin working with, to understand. So if it does come into your field, your sphere, your experience, you know how to hold it. You don't have to respond with urgency or fear. You don't have to shut it down. You don't have to acquiesce out of fear of being bigoted for having questions. There are beautiful ways to ask, be curious, and hold. And this two-hour session I'll be providing is actually a bonus session in my upcoming six-month group, Embodied Parenting, will focus on this and you'll have that support one-on-one through the whole six months if this is something you're you're experiencing. If you can't join the parenting group, don't want to for whatever reason, but this is really hitting something for you, please write in and my team will be happy to send you some resources for people who are curious and experienced in this and can really help you. That's the end of today's episode. Take a moment to notice where you feel the episode. Take a breath into that place. Maybe even put your hand over it and let whatever wants to come up come up. And remember, our bodies speak through sensations. What's yours saying right now? For more information on any upcoming events, please visit holisticlifenavigation.com. And feel free to check out my YouTube page where you can watch any of these episodes, leave a comment, and even request a future topic for me to dive into. I'll see you next time.
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