(Part 1)"I'm not TRANS anything" (Part 2) Are TS's "brain damaged?"

[stephanie_craxford]

I just can't accept this incessant need to dissect everything to try and justify who and what we are.  Now we are brain damaged.  It seems that the religious right is correct in their assumption that we are unnatural, defective, perverse.  So what caused this brain damage.  What are the tests to support this.  Teri is post-op (forgive the label) is she cured did GRS/SRS fix this brain damage, or is she still brain damaged.

I'm sorry Terri but we are our own worst enemies.  It's bad enough that we have to jump through hoops, endure the ridicule, the isolation, the exclusion, the upheavals, the therapies, the letters, the jokes, the assaults, the murders, the idiots, the admirers, the lurkers, the jerks and the A**holes.

Why is it that just because I know that I am a woman infers that my brain must be damaged because I was born with a male body.

- from Terri -
I've said it before and I'll say it again, though it affects myself as well, so I'll just appliy it to myself to avoid including or offending others .... What I am is brain damaged from before birth by reasons that have never been scientifically confirmed and that damage causes me to be female in nature rather then what my chromisones dictate what I what I believe myself to be, as my mind is not made or oganized at per the biological plan of my genes.

List me as an a non-believer Terri - I cannot understand why you believe that you are brain damaged by reasons that have "never been scientifically confirmed".  As I mentioned earlier based on this, you, me and every other transsexual must be wasting their time with transition, as non of what we go though will correct the brain damage.  Every post-op is still brain damaged, we just covered up the brain damage with a shell that resembles what our damaged brain thinks it should look like.

I would think that based on this theory GID "is" a treatable psychological condition and not a medical one, and research should be directed at treating the brain defect, and not correcting the outer shell.

My thoughts,

Steph

[Terri-Gene]

Steph, I knew that saying this would be of objection to many, even those I like and care for, but I do not understand why most Transsexual people will acknowledge the hormonial and genetic conditions which are thought by medical science to cause the condition but resent it that it obviously means that the brain is NOT in the condition it was supposed to be.

This is why I do not put much if any stock in the many things people will say and think about me because of the condition.  I know and realise how and why it happened to me without haveing to degrade into philisophical and moral reasons for justifying it or explaining it.  It is simply like I used to say years ago .... An Is, so there is nothing anyone can say about me ignoring it or changing it.  it is simply IS.  And because of my understanding of the condition and it's effects on me I tend to encounter much less of the negatism of many people in the common world of the public.  I have nothing to prove or necessarily do to feel that I am right in what I believe about my own self.  Again it just IS and since it can't be changed, why should I worry about how it is accepted by people who are not affected unless it affects my ability to just be what I what I was born believing myself to be?  Will telling people you are a woman who was born in a male body make anything different from telling them you were a male who was born with a female mind?  And which can you supply informative, documented proof to?

Why is it that just because I know that I am a woman infers that my brain must be damaged because I was born with a male body.

And what is wrong with that being a fact? or that possibly there is some experience in your life which has affected your thinking in that way (environmental causes)?

This is why therapysts, even down to HBSOC, state that it is not to be associated with things like other common mental disorders.  Transsexuals have a "disease" that can not be corrected in any way through the mind, it has been accepted by the most part of mediicene that changing the body and the emotional state of the mind that has been affected is the only cure possible for those with the condition.  You don't have to agree with it, no more then a person that was born without eyes has to agree they will never see, but because it IS doesn't have to make you feel bad about yourself or of the medical fact.

I all to often don't understand the state of mind of many others Transsexuals who take offense at many things that are factually true but they don't agree with because it infers some kind of inferiority or whatever.  Facts are facts and I don't need to suger coat them over to make myself feel better about it, no different than a person born with a surgically correctable physical disorder z(such as ->-bleeped-<-) that they haven't been able to obtain does.

I hope everyone understands, I am not trying to throw dishsoap on anyones belief in themselves, just stating what and how it is in a medical sense and suggesting that it doesn't matter how or why it is, just that to survive in a world that will possibly never understand, we need to be at peace with ourselves and not always seek some kind of divine or mystical interpetation of why and how which  doesn't help much.  As long as one KNOWS who and what they are in a medical mental sense with no pretense, then they are what they should be.

did GRS/SRS fix this brain damage, or is she still brain damaged.

Interesting thought.  Because of what I know and understand of the science about it I would have to say that yes, one would still be brain damaged as science can not cure it, the question therefore is one happier and more in touch with themselves after SRS?  if they are, then they are sucessfull in being who they are and correct in what they believe they are.  If they are not happy with themselves in a physical and emotional sense after SRS then they were fooling themselves all along thinking they needed SRS in the first place, and that happens every so to often.

Don't take it as a rejection Steph, take it like you were born with 9 toes and fingers, thats not the way it was supposed to have been, but it is what you are in the everyday world and because it IS, you just have to accept it and hope that others do also.

Unless you want to accept that it is because of some divine intervention by some God or whatever

Terri

[stephanie_craxford]

Hey there Terri,

And to think that teri wanted to lock this topic... 

Don't take it as a rejection Steph, take it like you were born with 9 toes and fingers, thats not the way it was supposed to have been, but it is what you are in the everyday world and because it IS, you just have to accept it and hope that others do also.

Rejection, not in the least.  Being born with 9 toes doesn't mean that I'm damaged, if it is working properly then it's not damaged.  Just like the brain thinking it is a woman doesn't mean that it is damaged, and it's the word "damaged" that seems to be the crux of this.  Like you, I have read extensively about GID and I have yet to find competent references by the medical and psychiatric communities referring to the brain being "damaged" in these cases.

It's the old puzzle of the chicken and the egg, which came first and what determines what. .. Is it the body and it's x's and y's - physical, or is it the brain - psychological.

And I don't have to accept anything - except death I guess

Steph

[Leigh]

There are people who are right handed and ones who are left handed.  In some cases there are a few who are ambidextrious. Those of the later group may not see it as a detriment but as an enhancement of their abilities.

For what ever reason some of us were were born ambidextrious but cannot function using both hands and must make a possible life saving decision, -right or left.

Brain, body, nature or nuture what difference does it really make?  Its a fact, it happens!

[ChefAnnagirl]

Here's an interesting thought to throw into the mixture.....

Something that I found out that a "traditional" Christian family member had to say about me and my journey (of course, behind my back, as usual) which caused me to think long and hard about my own feelings and what they mean to me...

They said: "God never makes any mistakes, and if someone was born one way, then that's the way God intended it and that people (meaning me of course) should just learn to go ahead and live with it"...

Ok - so - even though I clearly identified what i would have to characterize as an overwhelming daily sheer tortous agony from my earliest childhood memories of the deepest possible desire and self-knowledge (from age 4) - of being completely obsessed as it were - wishing and hoping, every single moment of every single day - praying with all of my might - more than anything else that i could ever think of - for me to have all of my beautiful magical and girliest princess feelings of childhood to become finally realized - (how else could i possibly say it - it's overwhelming to beyond words - as so many of you are quite well aware) -
Like some magic wish that heartbreakingly never seemed to come true - I cant even remember how many times I stood and clicked my heels together just like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz - and then having to completely manage somehow to repress and hide and run from all of these feelings and a good part of my own memories, even from myself for the rest of my life up until just the last couple of years - even though it never REALLY went away -

What i'm really trying to get at is this...
Most all of the most incredibly human, deeply sensitive, wonderfully feeling and loving and completely self-aware people that i have ever had the honor and the blessing to meet and associate with, have been completely to severely traumatized to a large extent, and it is in fact this very arduous and horrifyingly difficult life's experiences that gave all of us, every single one, a truly different and usually much deeper sensitivity and awareness of life, living, and other human beings in general, as well as a real great abhorrence of ever again treating ouselves and others like how we were largely treated growing up and even onto much later in life.

If it were'nt for all of these incredibly striking, extraordinarily painful, traumatic, and deeply challenging experiences that we have somehow managed to survive, and still keep some sense of our most comfortable, and frequently, deeply loving and highly intelligent identities - which seem now full of incredible gifts of awareness of human pain and risks and deep feelings - that we can now still have the capacity and the capability to also share this with others - in beautiful strength and support together - just as all fellow human beings..

If it werent for the strength that was required to go thru all of that so far, we couldnt possibly have the strength to continue living through what most of us will, in some way or another, still have to go through, finally seek and begin to find the roads to feeling greater congruence between our physical bodies, and our minds and emotions...

I must therefore agree, in one sense, that I dont think that at least for me, it was at all mistaken, or that I was the victim of a horribly cruel birth defect or other such debilitating condition which must be corrected - i tend to think now that this was a quite natural part of my own mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual, evolvement.

As well, that it was in fact, all of that horrifyingly traumatic experience that has made me exactly the person that I am today - in many ways, even thankful for it - because without that, I may never have had the strength to come back to myself and finally begin living without the fear of what anyone else in the entire world thinks or says or wants to throw at me  -

I've already been there and suffered and been deeply tempered by the world's hatefilled ignorance, and now find myself extremely fortunate, and blessed enough to be living in a time in human culture and history where it has finally become technologically feasible and almost completely possible to become more comfortably "self-congruent", in so many incredibly wonderful ways..

Lovingly always,
Love forever,


ChefAnnagirl

[Leigh]

They said: "God never makes any mistakes, and if someone was born one way, then that's the way God intended it and that people (meaning me of course) should just learn to go ahead and live with it"...

In their view a child born with a cleft palatte or a curable disease should just be left that way?  Watch the hypocrites run to the nearest HMO when it happens to them.

They are to assinine to even worry about their opinion.

[Teri Anne]

Steph, you said, "And to think that Teri wanted to lock this topic... "
Yes, and I guess there's a lesson there.  Just when you think you have it figured out, along comes something new.  Life is just like a box of chocolates (and some of us get the yucky ones).

Again, Terri, thanks for sharing in what must have been a hard thing to say.  Last I checked, I don't feel "brain damaged" but maybe some at work would disagree (kidding).  It seems like we're getting hung up on the words "brain damaged."  You may be sayng it's broken or not formed in the usual way but most of us, so far, feel that it's just different (not that there's anything wrong with that).  While some can live with being different, we try to save ourselves in the only seemingly logical way we an think of, at this point in time. I read recently that a surgical team just did a FULL FACE surgery the other day.  Who knows.  Maybe, in the not to distant future, M2F's and F2M's will be able to just switch bodies.  Just when you have it figured out, along comes something new.

Having a cleft palatte seems pretty darn ugly to us but I'm sure you've see the many Twilight Zone episodes wherein someone thinks they're a freak...at the end, it's revealed that the supposidly ugly woman's face looks like us and the society in the Zone look, to us, like freaks.  I've sometimes daydreamed that there might be a land (not unlike the village at the end of Farenheit 451) where we coud live as we want, without operations.  Then I bring myself back to reality and realize that, to me, the appendage that used to hang from my torso was the thing that mainly upset me.  And no amount of societal acceptance was going to fix that.  Obviously, if I grew up in a time when GRS wasn't possible, I'd just live with it.

Chef Anna said that some of the most "completely self-aware people that i have ever had the honor and the blessing to meet and associate with, have been completely to severely traumatized to a large extent."  Yeah, that's us, lol.  I do take solace in that many of society's geniuses went through trauma...  Samuel Clemens, early in his life, considered suicide.  That supposidly crazy Van Gogh could sure paint.  Beethoven didn't seem to be a happy camper either...did some pretty good music, though.  Hey, maybe my great American novel is sitting right here on my laptop.  Awaiting to be discovered.  Ah, gosh.  I'm so misunderstood.

Thank you all again.  I turned off the TV tonight and read Susan's.  Sure glad I didn't hit "lock"

[Leigh]

   Sure glad I didn't hit "lock"

You might be good but you ain't that good Teri.  That function isn't available to you.

[Teri Anne]

No lock?  Hmm, could have sworn I accidentally locked and then onlocked a post I'd started.  Well, there goes my omnipotence. 

[Terri-Gene]

have yet to find competent references by the medical and psychiatric communities referring to the brain being "damaged" in these cases.

No, I've never met a psychologist/psychiatrist who would use that term in relation to the condition, I was simply using the word because that in essance is what has happened due to the fact that for hormonial reasons the brain never developed as it should have by the original blueprint.  I call it damage because it is different and not organised or made the same as it should have been, not that it is tore up or in pieces or bits, rather perfectly whole and natural but not meeting the criteria that it was intended to by genetics.

The "damage" I was referring to was in reference to the theory that all fetuses are the same in the first few months of development, then hormonial influeces in the mother react to the presence of a Y gene in the fetus body and when present triggers changes to it that make it the male that the Y gene is there to create.  if the Y is not present, ie XX, then nothing happens and the child is born female bodied and unless the female has simular differences in the brain, c

It can be demonstrated and proven that if the hormone wash is missing or lacking in strength then the male development can be affected or even non existant, resulting in a genetic male that is both physically and mentally female other then the presence of significant reproductive organs.

Sorry about my use of language, but if I build something that does not work the way it was intended to, then some part of it is not the way it was intended, or "damaged" in my mechanical means of looking at things and issues.

Anyway I don't really care about why I'm like I am in the gender respective.  I simply want to be the best I can while dealing with it and myself over it.

Terri

[Terri-Gene]

ChefAnnagirl, returning to posting I hope.  you have been in a few times here and there but not on any kind of frequentcy.  hope to see you return more frequently.  I used to really enjoy debating and talking things over with you.

Enjoy tommorow and be close with those that love you.

Terri

[Teri Anne]

Terri, you might be surprised to find out that I think you and I are essentially in agreement.  I stated here that one of the two main explanations I felt I was TS:  That, as a fetus, my mind and body developed at different times and, if there was a change in hormonal level when I was in the womb, that would make my mind one way and my body another.  The "hormonal wash" you mention may have been the cause.

Recently, you may have heard, chemicals ended up in the ocean outside of L.A. harbor and the resulting fish ended up part male, part female.  Were they "damaged?"  Yes, I think everone woud agree with that assessment.  It could be that the reason doctors do not use the word "damaged" in regards to us is because (1) it's not politically correct and (2) it places a subjective opinion on what should be pure science - what you call "IS."

Do I take offense at your term "damaged" in regards to me?  It's easier to take from a fellow TS than say, if a coworker said it but, in the end, it wouldn't change my opinion....Like the fish in L.A. harbor, I probably am, at best "altered," at worst "damaged."  In my life, I've always tried to be optimistic.  I look on this thing that happened - whatever caused it - to be more like "changed" than "damaged."  I think scientists would agree.  Evolution changed many species through time - who is to say that we are not some offshoot that might or might not work out as a third gender?  Until we see how this "change" plays out, to call it "damage" would, from a scientific point of view, be premature.  I would not compare my having a female brain to having a cleft pallate because, for me, having a female brain is not nearly as negative.  The negative part only comes in when we have to face how some in society sees us - that is, that we're just as freakish, in our own way.  People with cleff pallates obviously get more sympathy because their "damage" is visible to all.  Our "damage" is hidden in our brains and no one, even us, knows with certainty why we do what we do.  I'm a big fan of science and, the more you study things, the more complex things can get.

Why we are what we are...why there is life...why there isn't life nearer our planet...why the universe formed...for now, Terri, they're just, as you would say, an "is."

[stephanie_craxford]

No, I've never met a psychologist/psychiatrist who would use that term in relation to the condition, I was simply using the word because that in essance is what has happened due to the fact that for hormonial reasons the brain never developed as it should have by the original blueprint.  I call it damage because it is different and not organised or made the same as it should have been, not that it is tore up or in pieces or bits, rather perfectly whole and natural but not meeting the criteria that it was intended to by genetics.

The "damage" I was referring to was in reference to the theory that all fetuses are the same in the first few months of development, then hormonial influeces in the mother react to the presence of a Y gene in the fetus body and when present triggers changes to it that make it the male that the Y gene is there to create.  if the Y is not present, ie XX, then nothing happens and the child is born female bodied and unless the female has simular differences in the brain, c

It can be demonstrated and proven that if the hormone wash is missing or lacking in strength then the male development can be affected or even non existant, resulting in a genetic male that is both physically and mentally female other then the presence of significant reproductive organs.

Sorry about my use of language, but if I build something that does not work the way it was intended to, then some part of it is not the way it was intended, or "damaged" in my mechanical means of looking at things and issues.

Anyway I don't really care about why I'm like I am in the gender respective.  I simply want to be the best I can while dealing with it and myself over it.

Terri

Haaaaaaaa Terri, this is where we definitely agree.   I just hate the word Damaged

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 - Damaged:  Injury or harm to person, property, or reputation; an inflicted loss of value; detriment; hurt; mischief. [1913 Webster]

From Terri -
...rather perfectly whole and natural but not meeting the criteria that it was intended to by genetics.

And to me that is the definition of "Special" 

Have a wonderful Christmas Terri

Steph

[Hazumu]

This has been an interesting thread so far.

I, too, don't like the label 'damaged', but there's certainly something -different- about us when compared to a statistical cross-setion of humanity.

I've been pondering off and on what makes me different for some time.  The big thing was wondering why I seemed to be a bully-magnet whenever I got into a new situation and not being able to compete with the driven-competitor types that pepper the workaday landscape.

But I keep coming back to some hints my mother dropped in conversations with me just before she suddenly died (about 15 years ago.)

One thing I remember clearly was her mentioning to me that she had been prescribed some drug while pregnant with my younger sisters that had been found to greatly increase the incidence of cervical cancer in females exposed to that drug in the womb.  What drug?  I don't know/can't remember.  I thought she had told her daughters about it, but I just recently found out that they were in the dark until I asked them about it.

The other one is a dimly-remembered conversation about some drug she had taken while pregnant with me.  I don't remember what the drug or the possible harm might have been, but she concluded that topic with, "Well, anyway, you seem to have turned out all right."  As I said, just a faint recollection.

As an aside, I think she was always waiting for me to say, "Mom, guess what!  I'm a ->-bleeped-<-!"  But I never did, 'cause I'm not.  But had I done so, I'm sure of her unconditional acceptance of me, just as I'm sure she would unconditionally accept my decision to become her daughter.

Am I damaged?  No, I'm me.  I've always found it hard to function in the male team/sports-metaphor world where rules are made to be broken if you can get away with it, etc. But I make up for that deficiency with my creative and technical skills, and by building alliances with 'protectors.'  I am what I am.

But I'd sure like to find out what my mom was prescribed during her pregnancy with me and my sisters.  I think it's a good thing to know -- something to be added to my medical record for a variety of reasons.  Does anyone have any advice on how to go about tracking down that information?

Hope this hasn't sent the thread too far off on a tangent.  Moderators, if you feel this post is inappropriate to this thread, feel free to move it to its own topic.

[stephanie_craxford]

The name of the drug you are referring to is Diethylstilbestrol (DES)

From The CDC - Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a synthetic estrogen that was developed to supplement a woman's natural estrogen production. First prescribed by physicians in 1938 for women who experienced miscarriages or premature deliveries, DES was originally considered effective and safe for both the pregnant woman and the developing baby.

There is a lot of information that can be found on the CDC web site also check out this link in the Wikipedia

Steph

[Hazumu]

The name of the drug you are referring to is Diethylstilbestrol (DES)

There is a lot of information that can be found on the CDC web site also check out this link in the Wikipedia

Steph

uhh...

wow...

Thanks.  Now if I can track down mom's medical records from about 50 years ago.  I have no idea who the physician(s) was(were).

[Teri Anne]

Hazamu, your post was VERY apropos for it led to Steph telling us important info about DES (a strong estrogen hormone, now banned). 

Steph - I was shocked when I read your post and then went to the CDC website.  As I read the info, I felt that it perhaps corroborated what I'd always suspected - that I'd gotten a spike of estrogen hormone while I was in the fetus and that made my brain different than my body.  Unfortunately, my mom's dead so I can't ask her any questions.  I note, though that the CDC is doing studies around where I was born.

The CDC site said:
Psychosexual Characteristics of Men and Women Exposed Prenatally to Diethylstilbestrol (Titus-Ernstoff et al., 2003)
Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a strong synthetic estrogen, and animal studies suggest that estrogen affects the developing brain

DES estrogen "affects the developing brain."  Damn them!  I feel, while it confirms my long-held suspicions, like I've been hit in the stomach.  We can argue the semantics back and forth all night but, if DES "affects the developing brain," my brain may have been messed with.  Just like that toxic stuff that made fish in the L.A. harbor both male and female, this medical side effect of DES should have been presumed.  If it turns out that my mom had DES, I feel violated.  Giving hormones to pregnant mothers?  Whaaaaat did they think would happen!?!

Teri Anne

[Terri-Gene]

The big thing was wondering why I seemed to be a bully-magnet whenever I got into a new situation and not being able to compete with the driven-competitor types that pepper the workaday landscape.

Undersood Hazumu, I did know though, I was simply smaller and weaker and so over time I learned to be not so much bigger but a lot stronger and competed every inch with anyone and everything till they were left competing with me.  Isn't it a miricle how the the bullies seem to disapear when they have less or no chance at you anymore?

as to tracking your mothers medical records, look at your birth certificate.  They generally list the name of the doctor who delivered you when you were born and in those days (were about the same age) the doctor who delivered a baby was most likely her personal MD.  At any rate, with the name of the hospital, a photo of the birth certificate and the doctor of delivery name you should be able to obtain her medical chart from the medical secretaries of the hospital.  Easy enough, the hardest part is establishing a right to the records, but then you got the proof of being her son in your BC.  Always think in the simplist terms first before making it hard on yourself.

Terri

[Teri Anne]

Terri, being you're in the hospital biz -
If I have all the paperwork you noted above, how guarded are hospitals in giving out the birth medical records for me and my mom?  I would presume that hospitals wouldn't like to give out such records because they'd be afraid of being sued -- especially when they know there are CDC tests on DES side effects are being done in the area where I was born.

re: records -- I tried a couple of times now to get my craneofacial surgery medical records from Osterhaut.  They tell me that they'll send them but they never have.  Makes me, again, suspicious that they don't release medical records for fear of lawsuits (I just want them so I can give them to my GP - something I've told Osterhaut's office)

Teri Anne

[DawnL]

re: records -- I tried a couple of times now to get my craneofacial surgery medical records from Osterhaut.  They tell me that they'll send them but they never have.  Makes me, again, suspicious that they don't release medical records for fear of lawsuits (I just want them so I can give them to my GP - something I've told Osterhaut's office)
Teri Anne 

The law is very clear here.  The records belong to you and any medical provider is required to give you copies (usually with a written request). They are legally entitled to charge a copying fee as long as it's reasonable.  If you want your records, I would contact an attorney to write a letter to the doctor.  If that doesn't work.  Report him to the state medical board.

Dawn