I am writing to implore this Board to not bar legally licensed psychologists and counselors from giving help to those who are confused or questioning their sexual orientation or identity. If someone needs and wants this counseling they should be able to receive it. To me, you are messing with the right of freedom of speech and of religion because you know faith based counseling might free them from the mental confusion they are suffering. Why would you want to keep people from receiving mental health help?

I have read that 98% of boys who are gender confused and 88% of girls eventually accept their chromosomal sex by adolescence or adulthood if allowed to do so. The counseling you are trying to outlaw helps people, there are many success stories out there.

The Virginia State legislature stopped something like this earlier and now it seems to me that this board is trying to get around that and force people who want the counseling (no one forces this, people seek it) to stay in their suffering. The mental health concerns of our citizens should have help available for their all their needs. Confusion over what sex someone is, is definitely a need. Again, this would also limit the basic rights we are guaranteed in the Constitution of the United States in the areas if speech and religion.