A lot of parents start this conversation with the same quiet fear: what does it mean about my kid, about our family, about me, if my child is exploring a gender or sexuality that doesn’t match what I expected? On this roundtable episode of the Men’s Therapy Podcast, host Marc Azoulay brings back two returning guests. Relationship and dating coach Shana James (author of Honest Sex) and psychotherapist Jack Lambert, who works predominantly with gay and queer men, to talk through exactly that fear.
Shana speaks both as a coach and as the parent of a 14-year-old gender-expansive daughter, walking through the years of “brain-breaking” it took to let go of a binary view of gender. Jack brings the clinical lens, unpacking why the question “is this real” is the wrong question entirely, and why a parent’s job in the early stages is simply to be a safe, steady presence rather than an interrogator. Together with Marc, they get into the grief that often goes unspoken when a child transitions, the sneaky ways homophobia and gender rigidity shape even well-meaning parenting, how a child’s exploration can surface a parent’s own questions about their sexuality, and concrete, practical ways to open the conversation without shutting your kid down.
This episode is for parents, especially fathers, of a child who is questioning, exploring, or transitioning their gender or sexuality. It’s for anyone who has felt that instinctive flash of fear or grief and didn’t know where to put it. And it’s for therapists, coaches, and anyone supporting families through adolescence who wants language for the difference between healthy exploration and something that actually needs more support.
Marc frames gender exploration as this generation’s version of a social revolution, the way sexuality was for millennials and institutional questioning was for the generation before. Jack pushes back gently on collapsing gender and sexuality into the same conversation, noting they’re distinct dimensions that deserve separate understanding. Shana adds a personal note: raising a gender-expansive daughter since she was three or four forced her to keep breaking her own paradigms about what’s possible outside a strictly binary frame.
Jack calls this the wrong question to ask. Whether or not a label is 100% fixed in a given moment doesn’t change that it’s real for the child right then, and the more useful move is curiosity, asking what they mean by it, rather than trying to verify or debunk it. Shana agrees, adding that medical systems have real checks and balances, nobody is handing out hormones or surgery casually, and that middle and high school is naturally an exploratory time for identity, style, and friend groups alike.
Marc describes a composite client: a father grieving the loss of the child he thought he knew, struggling with old photos, an old name, and a future he’d imagined differently. Jack is direct that this grief is valid and needs somewhere to go, ideally not onto the child, since processing it with your kid risks becoming traumatizing for them. Marc’s framing: your child right now is like a baby bird that needs to be fed and nurtured, not challenged or pushed to fly before they’re ready. The heavier, harder conversations about your own feelings belong with a therapist, a partner, a support group, or friends.
The group traces how deeply “acceptable” hobbies and expressions get gendered, why a father might feel unable to admit he loves braiding his daughter’s hair for fear of being seen as predatory, and how that same rigidity convinces some fathers their transitioning child can never play baseball with them again. Jack notes that assuming a straight, cisgender default in how we raise kids, like being told only “don’t get anyone pregnant,” quietly signals to queer or gender-expansive kids that they don’t fit the norm.
Shana suggests starting by identifying what specifically feels most triggering and tracing it back, a childhood memory, a lesson absorbed, cultural conditioning, and questioning whether that belief is actually reality or just the box you were raised inside. Marc adds a genuinely accessible entry point: watch queer stand-up comedians. It’s a low-pressure way to build empathy and understanding for a culture and experience that may feel unfamiliar, without it feeling like being lectured to.
Shana James can be found through her website and Instagram. Jack Lambert can be found at his website and on Instagram, where he’s open to consultations and informal conversations, not just full therapy engagements.
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