Kathy Blazer-Williams wrote that a five-year-old trans girl named Stevie, with a host of medical issues, is not only being kept from her parents by a faith-based hospital, but is being forced to live as a male, the sex she was assigned at birth.

The child has type 1 diabetes and epilepsy. The family's lawyer, Rina Infelise, has confirmed that the parents have not signed any documents surrendering their or their child's rights or authorizing any treatment for her gender identity. The family has attempted to move her to another hospital but that has been denied.

Originally the Illinois Department of Children and Families had decided not to become involved. Then the DCFS took custody of Stevie last Monday. DCFS and Stevie's family will be in court this week before a judge.

For the past few weeks, Stevie has been undergoing what her mom described to Blazer-Williams as something that appears to resemble so-called reparative or conversion therapy, which aims to change a transgender child’s gender identity.

The hospital is only giving her boy toys. Stevie is playing with the legos to build dolls, ghostbusters, ponies, and shopkins. They are refusing to use her name or pronouns, more importantly they are breaking this bright shiny happy child. Their reasons for taking her have changed several times, the accusations ridiculous. For weeks the hospital has lied and deceived, even claiming that Stevie admitted to being a boy to DCFS and was “happy, and doesn’t miss you” to the parents. Her parents are good people who wouldn’t care if she was a boy, if that was her choice. One look at her proved that was all a lie. The hospital took her because they couldn’t make her well and her family wanted to change hospitals . The family had also filed several complaints against the hospital, as recently as days before the “intervention”. Of course the fact that Stevie is ill could not be the hospital's faults, it must be the parents. After testing and proof she was in fact sick, they sunk their teeth into miscellaneous nonsense claims and the fact she identifies as female. For over a month the family has had an empty bedroom in their home. They are losing hope. Court seems to not want to step in against the hospital.

--Blazer-Williams

The hosptial is Advocate Children's Hospital (Hope) in Oak Lawn, IL.

They originally held her on a therapeutic separation. She never signed anything. It was an oral agreement that does not require action by the court until after 30 days. Then the Department of Children and Family Service has to go to court for a temporary order to take custody. After that, they have a hearing. The first one was Tuesday, but went into continuance. Before that, DCFS did not involve the courts, and they are not legally obligated to.

--Blazer Williams

The ACLU is working with Infelise and Lambda Legal has expressed interest, as has the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

They (the parents) saw her for the first time in nearly a month yesterday. That visit is why I am writing this. Stevie is being addressed as Stephen, and she affirmed several times “my name is STEVIE!”. As they walked in they were shocked. She had appeared to have lost weight (she had little extra to begin with), her hair was different and seemed possibly shorter, they taken all of her clothes, dishes and toys, and her lips had an unusual cast. Her demeanor has changed dramatically . Her parents called me in tears after the visit, devastated for their child.

--Blazer-Williams