For the first time, former transgenders and homosexuals and those who love them will gather to discuss bringing hope to troubled lives.

Standing for Truth is a first-time gathering of national experts, therapists, doctors, attorneys, religious leaders, former homosexuals, parents and friends of former homosexuals, children of homosexual parents, and those with transgender surgery regret who dare to speak the truth.

About 20 speakers will be contributing to the day-long conference October 26 in Salt Lake City. I’m that last one in the list above: the one with transgender surgery regret. Detractors have called me a pseudo-celebrity but I find that preferable to living out my life as a pseudo-female or pseudo-female transsexual.

No matter how uncomfortable or inconvenient it may be to LGBT people and their supporters, the rates of transgender regret and suicide remain high and therefore cannot be dismissed as unimportant. Research has shown that more than 60 percent of transgenders suffer from comorbid disorders. To me, that proves transgenders are misdiagnosed a majority of the time. Comorbid disorders are a direct cause for the staggering and shameful attempted suicide rate among transgenders of 41 percent.

Don’t Confuse Transgender and Gay People

I have some hopes for the outcome of the conference and for the people who will be joining me in speaking truth.

First, let me clear up a common misconception. The stated focus of the conference is understanding homosexuality. The funny thing about having me participate is that I was never homosexual, and in my work with regretful transsexuals none of them has been homosexual. The politically incorrect truth is that the vast majority of transgender regretters with whom I’m familiar are, in fact, not homosexual. The transgenders I work with are individuals who suffer from powerful feelings of gender identity confusion but are not dealing with same-sex attraction or homosexuality issues.

The politically incorrect truth is that the vast majority of transgender regretters with whom I’m familiar are, in fact, not homosexual.

Throughout my life, uninformed individuals have assumed I was homosexual. Perhaps that is why I was invited to participate in this conference. I cannot help but wonder how many of the speakers and attendees will be disappointed that I’m not homosexual and never have been.

While I’m on the subject of homosexuality, I’d like to clear up another misconception people have about me and my viewpoint. Some people say I must be anti-homosexual. I’m not. My Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor of last 30 years is a homosexual. I have dinner and spend time with him and other homosexual friends from time to time. So when someone says I’m anti-gay, it shows how little they know about transgenders in general, and about me specifically.

In fact, my homosexual friends encourage me to speak out about the regret they see among transgenders and transsexuals after gender change. LGBT supporters, however, like to blast me as being rabidly anti-LGBT. The truth is, I’m rabidly anti-suicide for transsexuals and transgenders, and I don’t support the many unnecessary gender reassignment surgeries performed on hurting individuals that often result in deep regret.

Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way

Some of the therapists presenting at this conference will be touting the effectiveness of controversial reparative therapies. I have found two truths about therapy and its effectiveness. The first is that no therapy of any kind will be effective if the client is unwilling to participate.

If someone truly wants help and has a real desire to stop troublesome behaviors, the type of therapy doesn’t matter: Change can and will happen.

The flipside is if someone truly wants help and has a real desire to stop troublesome behaviors, the type of therapy doesn’t matter: Change can and will happen. If someone truly wants to change, no one can stop him. On the other hand, if someone does not want to change, no one can influence him to change his behavior.

The conference presenters include religious participants who may talk about how LGBT is transforming the church. Some homosexuals, in defiance of the King James Bible, have prepared their own, called The Queen James Bible, which omits or rewrites all references to homosexuality as a sin.

But I have always felt uneasy when religious leaders focus on the sins of homosexuals and transgenders as if they themselves are free of sin. Scriptures calls all of us sinners in the book of Romans: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).”

Scripture does not give religious leaders any high road over anyone else regarding sin. We are all sinners and fall short of God’s glory: religious leaders and homosexuals are alike in that regard.

We are all sinners and fall short of God’s glory: religious leaders and homosexuals are alike in that regard.

Church leadership might reject homosexuals outright, thinking they are beyond Christ’s redemption. I found out firsthand how some religious leaders want nothing to do with transgenders. While I was living as Laura Jensen, my transgender persona, I attended a church one Sunday. Later that day, the pastor delivered the harsh news: “We don’t want your kind in our church.” Thankfully, that wasn’t the end of the story.

Another church leader welcomed me and allowed me to become a part of the church. Because of this church, whose members and leadership loved and prayed for me, a transgender, I was eventually redeemed and restored. Pastors need to trust God that Christ’s power and grace can, and often does, redeem transsexuals and homosexuals.

A Desperate Need for Legal Beagles

What major conference would be complete without attorneys addressing the legal ramifications of the LGBT agenda? I have a personal interest in the legalities of gender designation on birth records. I hope the lawyers at this conference will speak the truth about the roadblocks regretters encounter in restoring original gender markers on their birth records.

Judges so far have not allowed my birth record to be restored to male.

From the legal viewpoint, my life has been destroyed twice. The first destruction came in 1983. After the surgeons feminized my appearance with their knives, the courts agreed that my gender changed and my birth record could be legally revised from male to female. The second devastation has been courts’ repeated denial of my petitions since 1989 to restore my male gender designation on my birth record. Lawyers have helped me prepare a strategy and the paperwork several times, but judges so far have not allowed my birth record to be restored to male.

My last attempt to restore my male gender marker on my birth certificate was in 2011, after California changed its law to allow anyone to change his or her legal gender without having to have surgery. (Previously, gender change surgery was a legal requirement for this.) A California Superior Court judge denied my right to legally restore my gender to male. After all these years of being restored to life as a male, my birth record still has the wrong gender.

It is crazy how easily newly-minted transgenders can change their gender in the courts. But for those who regret undergoing gender change, the door slams shut. Like me, they are sentenced to pay for their regretful decision by having the wrong gender specified on their birth certificate, with no legal recourse.

Medical Truth Tellers

Physicians will speak at the conference, and I know some of them will address the obvious fact that is biologically impossible to change anyone’s gender. Sure, the cosmetic surgeries can make it look that way, but it is all an elaborate surgical masquerade. Cosmetic changes are incapable of producing a biological change of gender. Some regretters have told me how tiring it was to keep up the masquerade.

Perhaps the most amazing truth during the conference will come from the stories of Janet Boynes, a former homosexual; Regina Griggs, parent of a former homosexual; Andrew Graham, a former homosexual; Dawn Stefanowicz, who was raised by a gay parent; and even myself, a transgender regretter.

I hope an open forum across various disciplines like what is being presented at this conference helps people better understand both sides of the social issue. Keep your eye on this first-of-its kind conference, and pray. Pray that it will breathe truth into those who struggle with gender identity issues or same-sex attraction and the families who love them.