The Privilege of Working with Gender Nonconforming


Children


| GERARD F. CAVANAUGH, PHD, LPC, LMFT-S


Psychiatric Association (2013) removed gender identity disorder as a categorical diagnosis and replaced it with a more benign gender dysphoria diagnosis. Although scholars, researchers, and others have taken a more open and accepting view of transgender persons, that view has not generally translated to the public at large, and particularly for children who are exploring their gender, are gender nonconforming, or consider themselves to be a gender not associated with their gender assigned at birth (Roberts et al., 2012).


I 30 | PLAYTHERAPY | June 2020 | www.a4pt.org


t is only within the last decade that the literature has begun to view transgender persons through a lens that does not consider  Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), the American


The Williams Institute estimates that about two million (0.6%) adults identify as transgender in the US, based on those transgender persons who voluntarily disclosed the nature of their authentic selves (Flores    for clients below the age of ten. There are too many changes that occur in puberty to label a small child as transgender (Steensma et al., 2011). However, an integration of Adlerian play therapy (Kottman, 2011) and strategic family therapy (SFT; Sheehan & Friedlander, 2015; Watzlawick et al., 1967) may provide novel ways of helping gender nonconforming children navigate the human condition. Adlerian play therapy is fundamentally an egalitarian experience for the therapist and client, which is critical for children who are exploring the true nature of


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