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Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for being with us today. If this is your first
time joining us, KSOC stands for Knowledge Network For Systems of Care. Or system sf
Cares Television. I'm Gary Blau, chief of the child adolescent ad family branch at the
substance abuse and mental health services administration r SAMHSA. Through KSOC TV
SAMHSA hopes to provide you with timely, relevant, technical assistance on critical issues
related to mental health needs of children, youth, and familie. Most recently was
explored the mental health needs of young adults. That and other episodes are archived
for viewing on demand at www.samhsa.gov/children/multimei a. Today we're going to focus
our discussion on the specific mental health needs of children and youth had are LGBTQ12-S
and they're families. Through our discussion we hope to provie families and the
providers that serve them with concrete ideas for supporting youth and helping them
thrive. Before we get started, I want to talk about the terminology we're going to use
today. We want to be as inclusive as possible. LGBTQ12S includes lesbian, gay, bisexual
and transgender youth as well as those who are questioning intersex and two spirited. Two
spirited refers to native Americans who define themselves as LGBTQ in the native context.
Intersex refers to individuals whose section does not fit typical definition of male or
female. For this program we will be using the shorter acronm LGBT to refer to that
larger group of individuals. Throughout today's discussion we encourage to you join the
conversation by tweeting questions to hashtag KSOCTV, clicking on ask a question icon just
above your screen, or calling 1-800-527-1401. Before we begi, let's check in on what's
happening in children's mental health and systems of care acros the country, specifically
related to LGBT issue. Stephanie Dukes is at our news desk with the latest headlines.
>> Thanks, Gary. Here are top toirs. Pop sensation Demi Lovao Demi Lovato music video
for her new single really don't care reflects her commitment to supporting LGBTQ youth.
She served add honorary chair person for national children's mental health awareness day
in 2013 and was recently Grand Marshall at LA pride parade. Se also co-hosted New York
City pride rally in June to kick off that weekend's events. 92 percent LGBTQ individuals
enter treatment with a co-occurring disorder. LGBTQ people are also twice as likely as
heterosexuals to report physical and emotional abuse and they are three times more likely
to have a history of *** abuse. They are also significantly more likely to suffer from
depression and anxiety. A new bill just passed by New York State lawmakers seek to
pregnant LGBTQ youth by prohibiting licensed therapists from attempting to convert the
*** orientation or gender identities of minors. The bill which was introduced one year
ago saw rapid movement through the legislative process and earned by partisan support.
Last year Kentucky's system of care conference became the first to specifically address
the needs of LGBTQ youth and their families leading to a new LGBTQ consortium that meets
on a quarterly basis. Since thin collaboration has grown between state agencies serving
children, youth and families and LGBTQ advocacy groups. Youths say they feel more
connected with their community. And collaboration at this year s conference is
diskectomied to be even stronger due to partnerships between Kentucky's system to enhance
early development, gay, lesbian, and straight education network, BLUEGRASS, chapter, and
Youth M.O.V.E. Kentucky. The 2014 Chicago homeless youth summit remediate realize a
report estimating 40 percent of homeless youth and young adults self-identify as LGBTQ.
The idea is to bring key stakeholder together to collaborate on solutions for homeless
youth in Chicago.
>> I just knew that I was a fateful practitioner. That god would heal me from this.
>> Final lay compelling new documentary called just gender takes an in depth look at the
lives of transgender people. Screens will take place across the country. Filmmakers say
they hope to shed light on the day to day experiences and challenges of those within the
transgender community. To find out how to suspend a screening visit the official website
at just gender.com. And that's the news, back to you, Gary.
>> Gary: Thanks, Stephanie. Today we have a great panel of guests and an important
topic to cover, so let's get started. Our guests today include Dr. Caitlin Ryan, director
of the Family Acceptance Project. Diego Sanchez, policy director at PFLAG national,
parents, families, friends, and allies of LGBT people. And Jordan Geddes youth outreach
specialist, Maryland Coalition of Families. Welcome, everybod. Today we're going to to
start by talking about how communities and providers and family members can support LGBT
youth and their families. We're going to start by talking about the role family
acceptance has in the mental health of youth who are LGBT. e certainly know a great deal
about the negative health outcomes that many LGBT youth face and have faced for decades,
including suicide, homelessness, substance abuse, and ***. Caitlin, why are families so
important to the overall health of LGBT youth?
>> Caitlin: Well, families socialize and nurture cher children and accepting families
also buffer stigma and discrimination and protect them from harm. And we found in our
research, Gary, that we identify also a hundred accepting and rejecting behaviors that
parents and caregivers use to respond to their LGBT children and we linked these behaviors
with specific negative health concerns and wellness such as suicidal behaviors,
substance abuse, risk for *** as well as self-esteem and the conflict in family rejection
that ultimately leads to homelessness or removal from the home. Families acceptance is
like a vaccine that protects your child from harm.
>> You talked about these 100 behaviors, accepting and negatie -- can you tell
a little bit more about what it is that you identified as those behaviors and how they
related?
>> For the first time we actually in a big qualitative study adolescents and families, we
showed that behaviors like trying to change your child's *** orientation or gender
identity preventing them from having a LGBT friend, from learning about who they are, frm
finding resources in the community, those are very harmfl and some of those behaviors we
identified really more than 50 rejecting behaviors, had a nine times greater likelihood of
attempted suicide. Which was shocking to families who thought that those were ways to
protect their child and promote well-being. We also identified also 50 supportive
behaviors sufficient as welcoming your child as LGBT friends to the home, finding positive
role models to give them a sense of the future and even talking with them when parents and
caregivers felt uncomfortable but wanted to try to learn what was happening with their
child from their child's perspective, without ridiculing or punishing them or trying to o
something harmful
>> Gary: So this kind of family acceptance or rejecting behaviors actually contributes
to the types of outcomes and research has been published in a bunch of place
>> It has. We publish our research in peer review journals and been developing a lost
multicultural multilingual family education tools, educational resources in assessment
materials based on our research
>> Gary: All of this is part of your Family Acceptance Projet
>> Caitlin: We developed a whole new family oriented model of cause bear before we
started doing this work the focus was to protect LGBT people from society in general,
including from families that were perceived to be harmful. Our research demonstrated that
families come to their LGBT children with a wide range of responses from highly celebrated
to highly rejecting.
>> Gary: Thank you. Diego, building on this, how does PFLAG see the role of families in
producing positive outcomes for our young people?
>> Diego: We see families as one of the three legs of a stool with the other being faith
or community or social construct for acceptance and the other being schools. So without
one of those, it's very harmful. We find that families keep that stool, that keeps that
child feeling either accepted or supported in place. I look at people like myself, when
I was a child and I told my parents at age five that I was born in the wrong they found
ways to socialize me no matter how I would turn out that it would be okay. So while
there were not so many professional constructs for how my parents could love and show e
acceptance, today we have so many peer system supports and others for families to be able
to find ways to embrace their children in supportive ways
>> Gary: That's what PFLAG does, right? What exactly is te organizational structure of
PFLAG?
>> Diego: PFLAG operates with, one, is support, and there are relatively three types of
parents or grandparents we have. We have the parents or grandparents who did it right te
first time with their own children, we have ones who did not do it properly with their on
children, and others who learned to do it well with their childrn by learning from
each other and from other behavioral health and interventions that were available. So
that's one support. The other is education. For us to educate about resources, about
ways that families can be supported to each other and for themselves. And the third area
is advocacy. So we're doing things like anti bullying bills and the new segment about
New York getting rid of repairive therapy
>> Gary: Jordan we'll turn our attention here. You spent much of your adult life
struggling with mental health and gender identity issues. Can you talk a little bit about
sort of what your family's role and how your family was involved in in a?
>> Jordan: It was interesting because my parents are very supportive. But for a long
time they assumed that I was going to be a bunch lesbian because from age of two I was
saying that I was a boy, I'm a boy, I'm a boy. And they just didn't know about anyone
transgender or about that ever happening. They spent a lost time making sure I knew that
they were accepting of gays, but I never heard anything about anyone being transgender
because they just didn't know. When I came out as gay they were supportive and put me to
PFLAG, and when I came out as trans, they didn't know what to do. They were very support
ive and tried to find resources but even ten years ago there really wasn't much out
there. So it was really important that they didn't dison me, didn't try and change me.
They understood, but I think having the -- if there had been more resources at that time
it would have been a lot easier because they would have known what to do and say and known
about pronounce and how to transition and they just stumbld through it. But the fact
that they were supportive and accepting was huge because that point the school and friends
and all that, it wasn't the same. Having it from them was a big thing
>> Gary: So Jordan is a real life example of research right here in that level of
acceptance. To follow up on this, Jordan, I think that there are terminologies here and
I think people like me who want to be helpful and not sort of pt their foot in their
mouth kind of thing, but you said my parents thought I would be a butch lesbian or
somebody mentioned ***. What kind of terminology is actually okay? How do you help
people have that kind of communication?
>> Jordan: That's something that it's honestly it can be a person I by person thing.
Certain words that some people are okay with be used and some aren't. I identify as ***
for my sexuality but some people find that offensive. One of the things that a good way
to go about it is if you're not sure, ask. That's like if someone comes to me in a really
supportive manner and says is this word okay or what term should I use, I'm not
going to be offended by that. I'll be really happy you asked e rather than just throwing
a term out that there you don't know how someone is going to to react to. Just because
you have a friend with you using one word doesn't mean that everyone is going to be okay
with using that as well. Really just being open and asking and saying I don't know,
is this okay. The biggest thing behind it is the attitude
>> Gary: You may use a word with your friends or people that are comfortable with it and
if I used it it might be somewhat challenging or offensive. I think the idea of asking
people and putting it out there is something that I guess is legitimate. We actually now
have a video to show you. Before we do, we'd like to remid everyone that you can tweet
questions to hashtag KSOCTV. If you're on the web you be also click the ask a question
icon or you can call us at 1-800-527-1401. We've been trying to see if there was any
geographical differenceses in the country watching today to se if anybody would be
calling in. So please feel free. Let's take a look at a video preview, part of a short
documentary series from the Family Acceptance Project that shows a transformation of one
family as it integrates deeply held personal beliefs and values with love for their
child.
>> Being gay was not -- I did not want to be guy.
>> I was the captain of the baseball team, the football tea. I went into the Marine
Corp. I would look at EJ and think oh, my gosh, if he's gay, what am I going to do?
>> I figured I couldn't talk to my dad about it. I don't want o because I already knew
what he thought about the it.
>> This is concur child. Who is hurting and in pain. How can we not do anything?
>> I just hated school and I didn't want to be there. The people who were the most
accepting were the people who did drugs and drank.
>> What really hit home with Edward was when he saw those cold, hard facts, those
statistics, that this is what was going to happen to his son f he didn't make a change.
If he didn't get more information. If we didn't do something for ourselves and for him.
>> Shortly after he came out, he came to me and said, dad, amI going to go to hell? If
we have such a loving god, how can god condemn my son to hell?
>> I'm so proud of my husband, how far he's come. I know in my heart that we have made a
difference in EJ's life, that he's not going to become another statistic.
>> I'm not disappointed in my son at all. I'm proud of my son and who he is. (End of
video)
>> Gary: Well certainty know there are families who believe that homosexuality is
wrong. Caitlin, can you talk about how those working in children's mental health can
actually help families shift that conversation away from morality to protecting the healh
and well-being of a child they love.
>> Caitlin: Well, Gary, we developed a host of educational and assessment tools and
resources like this video that helps families make that transition. Families love their
children, they want to help them. They want to keep their families together. They don't
want to hurt their children. And yet what we've done in doing the kind of research we've
done that's based on behaviors, we can show them that behaviors they thought were helping
their children like trying to change who they are, preventing them from learning who
they are, telling them, for example, that god will punish them is actually related to
these very serious negative outcomes as a young adult. Now we can help them separate what
does it mean to love and support your child from accepting an identity that they may
disagree with or think is morally wrong. There's a range of behaviors such as requiring
respect in the family, standing up for your child when others mistreat them. Those are
behaviors that engender and show support your your child, increae connectedness and
parents and families can respond in those ways and make sure ther child knows they love
them. The parents who say this isn't part of our belief and we love you, we're
going to be there for you no matter what. What an incredible thing to say to a young LGBT
child rather than some of the very negative reactions that coe out of a place of anger or
disappoint and hurt that may in a moment change the future for that child
when, for example, they get thrown out of the home. Part of our research was not only to
study intact families but also families who had thrown their children out of the home or
been placed in foster care. We found that so many families wanted their children back but
they had done things out of anger or misinformation, they didn't know how to help their
children. Part of what we're doing is an educational process, skill building piece. Some
is counseling, some may be family counseling. Largest part is psycho education and
helping them understand a little bit change makes a difference ak there's a relationship
between their words, actions and behavior and what happens not only to their child but
also to their family
>> The idea here in terms of providing them with information about a potential outcome,
the good ones or negative ones based on behavior and then also finding ways to help them
to engage in more positive behaviors. You have like a whoe program related to this
>> Caitlin: We have a program and it's strengths based. Working with families from all
different ethnic backgrounds, and been successful because we meet them where they are. We
don't try to change who they are. You can't change anyone. But we can help create an
alliance with them to help them understand how to promote their child's well-being,
protect that child from harm and really help their whole family. One of the things we
found from families that had thrown their children out of the home, did he thnt realize
that their action and is behaviors would affect the whole family. And that maybe their
family would never be the same again.
>> Gary: As you have done this work around family acceptance ad the importance of this
research which I think is huge, have you also worked with -- you mentioned the faith
community. And in terms of this idea that it's more retaliate versus health and
well-being and how has that sort of transpired
>> Health and well-being is morality as well. We don't focs on text and doctrine, what
we focus are the underlying themes in the major religions, compassion, hope, love. And in
fact we've worked with LGBT young people and families from very conservative religious
backgrounds, we've done a lot of work, for example, with Mormon families, that's the topic
of one of our faith based family education booklets in the best practices registry for
suicide prevention and one our family intervention films, Catholic, Jewish families
as well as African-American clergy and families. Targeted populations where faith is
part of their cultural world. They get up every day and see te world through that lens
of faith. We also, a part of it is teaching compassion to providers. Because many
providers see families who is may be engaging in these rejecting behaviors and think they
want to hurt their children. They don't. Their trying to hep their children. Part of
is to teach providers to have compassion for families to help them understand how to have
compassion for their children. And also to build an alliance, because if you can't build
an alliance with a family to help them support their child you're not going to be
effective. It's not going to work. And it involves really simple things like listening
to them. Having the parents and caregivers tell their story. It was staggering when we
did thousands of hours of these incredible interviews, we found that hardly any family
member even those who came from families with means and resourcs who could afford to get
support, hardly any had told their story to someone who can just be there for them in a
non-judgmental way to bear witness to it. So one of the things we found not surprisingly
that doing our research was a form of narrative therapy. It was a way to help parents and
caregivers connect the dots in a way they had never done before and so even those from
rejecting families when we reached out to them said we dont have very much to say and
we would say we need to hear your side and bring extra tapes and find those spruce could
go on for four hours. Because they had never talked --
>>: They had the opportunity to share
>> It was extraordinary to later on as we did, we began to put the pieces together. We
studied the experience of all of the key family members. And so we saw it from the
perspective of every individual. Then we could see all these missed opportunities for
connectedness.
>> You mentioned the importance of alliances, makes me think of Diego and PFLAG. This
kind of change in thinking is actually pretty difficult for families, especially around
cultural, spiritual, different ethnic backgrounds. How does that relate?
>> Diego: We agree with the research of course but also its implementation and what
we've found in PFLAG families is that not only are their youth coming out as gay, lesbian
or bi or disclosing as trans but the family members themselves have their own level of
disclosure to deal with other family members. The benefit we have is that through things
such as PFLAG or its protocol, we have a lot of straight people advocating for the welfare
of their families that includes people who may or may not be straight as well. So
bringing those pieces together, building community alliances, bt allowing families to
develop language that let's them come out on their own or discloe on their own either
through or faith program or our healthcare program and we're vey pleased to be partnering
with SAMHSA in having those resources available on your website. The availability for
conversations and the level of influence that non-LGBT people can have with other people
who are non-LGBT makes it safer for the broader, the entire aspect of families and
community.
>> I imagine things have changed over the years. Now we're seeing more states that ae
passing into law the ability for people to marry, doesn't matter. As this as evolved, you
must be somewhat encouraged by that in terms of PFLAG and these kinds ever issues.
Do you see that or are you still sort of saying well, we still have so much more to go
>> Diego: We're very pleased at the gains that have been made by laws and courts.
There are a couple of ways these are done. Behavioral health, access, general medical
health access, homelessness, suicide prevention, anti bullyig that work remains and it's
as important, marriage equality is very important, but serving the very lowest common
denominator is what our youth really need as well, and we're very focused on continuing
that work.
>> Gary: And I think very clearly we see that people that identified as LGBT, especially
young people, have such higher rates of challenges, whether it be suicide, we mentioned
before, or bullying, these are you call it that common denominator. Jordan do you see
your friends and those kinds of differences?
>> Jordan: I mean, yeah. Being young and being LGBT, I mean, there's -- it's hard
enough being a teenager, hard enough being different in any way. When you're dealing with
your family's reaction to you, how your peers are reacting to you and friends and
general public with identifying -- looking at the trans, there's a safety thing all the
time. I always have someone if with me to the bathroom because otherwise I would get
yelled at or kicked out or get attacked. When you add that ono what's already hard time
for anybody, is it surprising the rates are higher? I mean, t makes sense.
>> People are dealing with so many of these issue. Thank you. As we're continuing, it's
time for us to take a look at our next video featuring a LGBT youth from Hattiesburg,
Mississippi, who discusses impact of coming out on his mental health.
>> My name is Oliver Lee Cole and I self identify as transgender female to male. Prior
to coming out my overall mental health was pretty stable. Not being out as transgendered
didn't affect my mental health as much as. I was still out as liking female bodied people
and my overall mental health was definitely up. Before yes, I dd experience issues with
substance abuse, but it wasn't because of not being out, it was due to other things I got
myself involved with the wrong people and I will honestly admit that. But I quickly got
over that and I'm doing much, much better now. In the beginning my dad wasn't very
accepting even though his extended family was. And they immediately called me their
nephew and used male pronouns and my male name. And it felt great. My dad is still
having a really hard time coming around to it, but that's because dads love their quote,
unquote, little girls. I know this is a grieving process for him, but he has come around
much more now. In the beginning it was really hard because I wanted him so badly to
accept and understand me even though I didn't accept and understand where he was coming
from. Definitely took a toll on me. And on my mother's side I basically cut them out
because they are not accepting. But my mother and my sister and my father accept me now.
I feel that's all that matters. The most helpful thing for me during my process of coming
out was my friend Vic. He had already been out for about two years, so I went to him and
I asked him for resources and he gladly gave them to me. He was very, very helpful
whenever I was asking about what therapist to go to, who I should go see for hormones, if
I have questions about how my body is changing or how my moods are, all I have to do is
send him a section, give him a call, and he's definitely been one of the most helpful
people. Now that I'm past the coming out process even though it's still a rough time to
time with with different I'm much happy your now with myself. Being able to to be myself
in my own household is very uplifting.
>> Gary: So we have our first question that's come through on Twitter. The question is
do mental health problems sometimes mask the underlying struggle with *** identity? If
so, how can families and community mental health provides get to the root of such an
issue? Jordan, I see that hand over there.
>> Jordan: I actually -- that was something that was really bg issue for me when I was
dealing with my depression because it was always a question of well is the gender identity
stuff or depression or what's going on? Should we wait on ths and deal with the depress
first? For a long time it was something that never really got answered. And something
that I was kind of wondered about. I'm been on hormones for two and a half years now. In
high school my emotions were like this all the time. Even after I got better they were
still like that. After going on hormones for the first time untl life I just feel
happy. While I'm sure there was -- obviously there was chemical stuff going on too, now I
kind of know that like at least for me, I'm so much happier now and my emotions are
so much easier to manage I've never been in a better place in my life. I've talked to a
lot of people with that experience. And I don't think you can say that it's one or the
other, but I'm sure there's definitely some intertwining of the issues. For me obviously
there was a lot.
>> Diego: In our country we don't have nationalized healthcare where we are watching
children from cradle to grave in one consistent healthcare network. In countries that do
where they've been measuring people such as transgender peope such as Jordan and myself,
they have found that once you provide the proper medical and behavioral health
interventions, you are getting a person who is more well. And that research stands for at
least 20 years so far and shows that if we were measuring it moe consistently at the
research, we're more codified if folks were giving more money ovr to programs measuring
research we would know more than we do. It's not a separation bt it's the fact that a
person is having to deal with both, if you treated it all as parallel, behavioral health
and medical health, then you get better health outcomes.
>> So the combination, whether sort of that question chicken or egg, is it my depression
leading to some of these thoughts or -- so what would you tell a provider in terms of
something like how should they approach this?
>> Well, one thing now there's a lot more options now, whereas ten years ago it was like
well, do we let a 16 year-old decide to go on hormones who's n and out of the hospital.
Now when there are options where if a youth comes out as transgender, especially before
puberty, you can go on hormone blockers so they don't go throuh puberty in their
biological sex and nothing is irreversible. They have time to go to therapy and deal with
that and then make that decision. More and more youth are being allowed to transition
physically as teenagers and everyone I've talked to has hada hill good results with it.
One of the things I wouldn't discount it. If you have a youh coming to you saying that
our youth is trans, and then they're depressed, should we --I would just say try and do
both at once. There are ways to deal with both at once at that aren't inreversibility.
I know people have concerns, you're so young, you can't make this decision. Also
there are ways that you can make improvements without making irreversible changes too. So
it's something --
>> It's interesting, you talk about how to help providers do a better job. We have a
question that came in on email almost specifically around that. It says I work for a
community mental health program and we want to deal more with LGBT issues. Who should we
be partnering with in the community?
>> Everybody. They're all there. The good thing is there are many states that have
worked closely with SAMHSA for decades and have developed modes that work and they're all
based on community connections across different cities and states. So there are good
models that exist for collaboration, and we'd be glad to help match those up.
>> PFLAG is certainly an area that folks could partner with as a community provider.
Other partners?
>> The schools with the faith communities across all of the health and mental health
systems in general. Part of the whole concept of systems of care is those incredible
linkages. If you're going to be serving LGBT young people we ned to address all of
them. One of the points I want to make is the very young ages f coming out. I think
there's a perception that maybe children are understanding they're gender diversity at
young ages which is certainly true at around age three childrn have a sense of gender
identity. But what we've seen in our research and family support work is young people
coming out increasingly as gay between the ages of seven and 12 and then and that has
to do with access to information about who they are in a positive way that just wasn't
available historically. The stigma has been decreasing and now we're beginning to see
more normative ages of identity development and child developmet and that means that
everything we're doing has got to go upstream to early childhod education. You'll find
not much of this information there except for parents who might be LGBT themselves raising
their own children, but if we're going to do prevention around suicide and substance abuse
and other behavioral health concerns and early onset depression related to the kinds of
issues we're talking about here, we have to go upstream. So I want to put that point out
for all our listeners.
>> It's an important point. And in terms of this question, f you're a community
provider, you have ideas or suggestions for how do you go upstream, make that
conversation, how do you talk to people?
>> Education is essential. We do training all over the U.S. ad other countries, we'll
be happy to come in and work with these systems. We do it al the time. But part of what
we're doing is helping them see families as allies and not be afraid to talk to families
and diverse families, families from conservative backgrounds, pull them in. They want to
help their children. They want to keep their families together. And we have to partner
with those families as part of this system work, not just the agencies or the other
institutions
>> Finding those folks out there that are experts, have expertise to bring in. If I'm a
community provider I may want to reach out on PFLAG. Can you tak about listen.
I don't know if that was important or if there's places o connect with schools.
>> There are. There are also things like state departments of public health that often
have community planning groups that CDC mandated by anyone who receives funds much most of
those groups each often will be able to connect to organizations they deem as providing
services throughout communities so the systems are there to sea we'd be glad to connect
them to the things in any of their states. Thing we've found in PFLAG, we had about 40
new chaptsd last year bringing us close to 400. We're in all 0 states. Where the growth
is mostly in gender none conforming kids, very, very youg people, telling their parents
I'm not quite a boy, I'm not quite a girl. I'm just me. And parents being able to reach
out and find systems of comfort, care, and also support is critically important because
they are getting better knowledge younger and the kids are coming out.
>> I want to put in a plug for the professional associations at the state level.
American psychological association, national associatin of social workers, and
professional/community groups like the American foundation for suicide prevention that has
chapters across the U.S. There are organizations that are dealing with these issues that
have LGBT practitioners and they're in our communities and are great sources of
information referrals and support.
>> Jordan?
>> About how to connect with more LGBT youth, partnering with these groups is great, if
I'm a 12, 13 year-old kid I'm not not going to ask my parents for information, I'm
going to look online. If you want to have resources for that demographic and want them to
know who you are, is to have a really strong online presence ad make sure if they're
Googling for resources in their area, to do deal with LGBT, that they can find you.
>> And so many questions that I think are popping up as part of this conversation.
Another one, this time from Los Angeles. So this is a person that writes in I work for
the RISE project at the LA LGBT Center as a clinician and would like to know how to better
support families, build connections with the community. It's a similar thing. People ae
out there trying to learn ways that they can build these connections with the community.
Diego?
>> The RISE program is fantastic at the LA center. And there are a lot of -- even
through things like national safe schools coalition is one that connects and there are
active players in Los Angeles. Be glad to connect them directly to a lost LGBT centers
are important. GSA network
>> Can you tell what that acronym is?
>> It's called gay straight alliance but it's actually -- it means the connections are
made across geographic areas but then nationally, and doctor of best practices
recommendations so that no matter what your zip code is you can find something similar in
our country that's been tried and true.
>> Also reaching into the institutions that serve out of home youths. That what's that
RISE program is LA is about. We have to transform those institutions from within, can't
just be connect the up with the LGBT programs in the community. There are all kinds of
guidelines and procedures through the work we did in California with legal services for
children and national center for lesbian rights. We developed early guidelines. The
education that needs to be done inside those institutions, the child welfare system, the
juvenile justice system, the whole out of home youth system, that needs to continue to
move forward and that's a critical anchor in terms of reconnecting families, assuring
permanentcy. Who can help that person. When we started doing the work at the family
acceptance projects we found not only the were LGBT programs not involving families of
LGBT people but the whole concept of a homeless program reaching out to the family of a
LGBT young person, it wasn't happening because the assumption was they don't want them
back, we're never going to be able to reconnect them and thats not what we've found. The
need to assert, affirm, find permancy is the birthright of every child.
>> We have so many questions coming in. One thing we're really interested in, turning
a little bit towards Diego here, about some of the dos and don't. Those are things that
families want to know or caregivers who think they may have a LGBT child. What are the
things that are -- here are some things you can do and here are some things I would not
recommend you do.
>> Gary, first I would always recommend leaving room for a child to do its own kind of
disclosure. And I said its because I don't want to do -- finding ways too express things
that aren't always gender specific is sometimes a do. And I would say allow children to
have toys and things that support what it is that they wat to have. Don't prejudge
things like that. Someone you think of a girl wants a trunk, let that person have that.
There is no harm in allowing children to express the full fluency of who they are or might
be. And one of the don'ts, I would say, is to not measure yor own sense of like in the
film we saw, I was the captain of the football team, don't measure yourself, regardless of
whether you support what you're looking at or who you think your child is being, or the
person that you're providing care for, don't cut them off for your own sense of
self-fulfillment. We all get one life to live. If we can focus our life and allow others
to live that one life they have, there's going to be better outcomes. And I think the
most important thing is to remember that labeling is not important, but love is. And tht
when you're thinking about giving a label is this person a boy or girl, it doesn't really
matter. You don't want someone today to have to live as I had to, being initially
publicly out there as a young adult in the '80s where I would go to parties and neither
eat or drink because I couldn't go to a public bathroom for another ten hours and had to
calibrate my body in a way that could have been medically harmful. What we want and what
to do is offer support, reach out, and don't be afraid to say you don't know, because not
knowing is not the harm. Not caring to know is the part that gives harm.
>> That's great, Diego. Thank you. I'm taken back to when I was raising my own kids and
there was a wonderful album called free to be you and me. I don't know if any -- I think
about that and hopefully now that I have grand kids
at least one to start with, that whether William wants a doll or fine. That's one of the dos I'm taking home today.
>> We have developed with the input from really diverse families and we have it in
English, Spanish, Chinese, and series a booklets called supportive children ... supportd
families, healthy children. Those are available. We have them across the U.S., teach
people how to use them. Those are educational tools, how to help support your children,
ways of educating and informing someone about *** orientation and gender identity and
expression in ways that parents can understand.
>> It's interesting because as we're talking about this we're talking about just
trying to find ways to be a good parent.
>> True
>> Sort of leaks over into all of these other possibilities.
>> Resources and thankfully they're on SAMHSA's website.
>> We pleasure the plug, Diego. That's a good things. We also have an email from
somebody who wants to share a resource. It's very important for service providers to open
conversations with local universities and organizations, I'm going to spell this, ALGBTI.
Association for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues in counseling and apparently
the ALGBTIC website has information. Again, the idea here is that our viewers are looking
for ways to help each other. So I think that's awesome. One of the things that you
mentioned before, Diego, that I'd like to follow up on is the idea of -- it's a
terminology thing. Talked about gender nonconforming. One of te terms that I have been
more exposed to lately is this concept of gender neutrality.
>> Different people identify them differently. Someone that -- you will hear the word
gender variance, gender nonconforming and sometimes they're generational and sometimes
they're class. More college level material, you may have different language. Really it's
about a child's comfort or young adult's comfort in being who it is they feel they are at
a particular moment. Not feeling like you're taking one passport photo for the rest of
your life but seizing that moment for that moment and allowing to be living without
judgment.
>> I hear people who identify as either gender neutral or gender ***, and with them
it's not necessarily so much that it's -- they just don't wat to decide or they don't
want to say I'm this for the rest of think lives but it's tht they know for certain that
they are not either or that they're both. And that it's moe of a constant. But either
inclusive or exclusive. Those terms are also used for that.
>> Trying to get through a couple more of our website questions. This one actually talks
about even when parents are supportive and Caitlin talked about that, it can be really
hard for them to go through this with their child. How can communities, providers help
families with what could be even e even grief and depression that comes from these kinds
of experiences?
>> We know that counseling is incredibly important and helpful and often family
counseling. But having be an opportunity for families to talk with a provider, to tell
their story, and to hear from their peers, peer support from your cultural world, your
faith community, from others, from your background. We know from our own work and Diego
knows a lot about this, that that's incredibly important. Families want to know from
someone who shares their values, who speaks their language, who has walked their walk and
getting peer support from those kind of cultural worlds makes a huge difference. If you
don't have that resource in your community, create it.
>> That was actually one of the questions which has to do with potentially families,
young people that live in rural areas. Where can people go to find that kind of support?
>> That's why we're making this series of films and ultimately I want to make a series of
ten of these. Shows documentaries that shows how people from ethnically diverse
backgrounds make that journey from struggle to support of ther LGBT children. We know
from learning theory one of the ways people learn is through roe models and the
experience of others. Using those kinds of materials, we hae little stories that are
real stories of lived experiences of families. Family education booklets
families with gender variant children. If you live in a rurl community you can sign up
and participate and connect with other families in other part of the U.S. Online and phone
and -- this is breaking the barriers of rural communities where yes we don't have as many
resources but the information age is changing that
>> These parents are coming out or disclosing in their own way, as I was saying earlier,
they have their own coming out or disclosure stories. Finding those connections matters.
I will say we do have a transgender, gender non-conforming advisory council. Most of the
chapters we saw grow last year were all in rural or small towns across the country. All
rural. And that shows that those support mechanisms -- buid it if it's not there --
that's part of of what our chapter growth is about
>> That's what at that family did in that film. They're in a rural area. There were no
services for LGBT kids within really tens of miles of them, ad there weren't services for
families from their background. They created it.
>> I want to plug something else, which is community health centers. One of the outcomes
of the affordable care act is we're going to see people focusd on improving overall
behavior as well as physical, medical health outcomes. The growth that we're seeing in
community health centers and the funding that is behind them as well as the growth, that
we will see more growth and cultural competency needed in these community health centers
that will be available to a lot of people who before this past year had no healthcare,
behavioral health or medical health. We're only going to see that number grow.
Connecting and make sure there are providers in the community health centers are ready for
they're about to see is also part of the obligation we all share.
>> We only have a few minutes left. If you could offer your one best advice to a family
member, a community provider that you would want them to take home message
>> You can love and support your child even if you disagreea little bit of change makes
a huge difference. It increases connectedness. It decreases the sense of hopelessness
that young people have. And hope is such a great antidote to all of these negative
outcomes that are increasing these health disparities for LGT young people.
>> I would say the thing I've heard a lot of people have the problem with is a lot of
parents don't necessarily believe that their child is what they say they are or they think
they're going through a phase or their mistaken or they just dont buy it or think that
their doing it for attention. I would say keep in mind that that doesn't matter. Even if
they aren't, it doesn't matter. Listen. Support them. Go by te program they want you
to go by. Accept the sexuality they say they are. Whether or not you believe they are or
not doesn't matter. If they're going to be healthy you have to just listen to them and go
with what they tell you.
>> I would say that not everyone, even in our country, s fortunate enough to have a
family, but if you are fortunate enough to have or be part of family, love every member
equally and don't be afraid to ask. Because sometimes people are just waiting for you to
ask a question.
>> Well, first of all, I want to thank all our panelists today for taking part in this
KSOC TV webisode. We're so happy you all could join us. Fr a list of additional
resources from our panel, I encourage you to go to www.samhsa.gov/children/multimei a. If
you have more questions about how to support LGBT youth, our technical assistance network
will be hosting virtual office hours on Wednesday, August 13, from 4 to 5 eastern time,
and are the call in number and pass code are on your screen. And for those of you just
tuning in, you can view this program in its entirety at 3:30 p.m. eastern time today and
of note that if you're watching the replay, we're not going to e able to take live
questions, but we do appreciate everyone being able to join us. We also want to say to
please join us again on October 27 for our next webisode which will focus on youth and
trauma. Thanks for watching KSOC TV.