How To Get Classified As A Mental Disorder

[Julie Marie]

1. Be different.

2. Don't succumb to the pressure to be like everyone else.

3. Tell others you like the way you are.

4. Go out into public expressing your true self.

5. Make sure you spend a lot of time being yourself with phobic, insecure, uneducated people.

6. Get as many like you as you can to do the same so you can get some media exposure.

7. Hope the 'different' that you are is high on the social taboo list.

8. Sit back and watch as the "experts" analyze your difference and try to figure out a way to cure it. 

9. Given enough exposure, you should eventually get listed in the DSM.

10. Enjoy your success.

Julie

[chrysalis]

Heh.

IDK, I disagree with the sentiment. On one level I understand your position, but on another I don't (and this may be entirely due to my own lack of understanding, I certainly acknowledge this).

IMO the DSM is flawed, but because, I assume, you disagree with the gender related areas of it doesn't warrant such mockery. There are some legitimate disorders in there and while I'm sure there has been a lot of damage caused by those who had incorrect ideas about gender related "disorders", consider the situation apparent if you and others like you were simply swept under the rug (or worse) by the Psy community.

While you find recognition to be a bane due to problems in labeling and classification, there are others who clamor for it because it does come with benefits.

Being recognized helps push through research and attract interest which can help to further your and others understanding of themselves. At the same time this can help society understand and learn to accept you and others like you. Indeed in the absence of science we are left with rumor, wives tales, and the fear of the masses. That of course bore witch burnings and the like.

[Julie Marie]

The underlying message here is society determines certain behaviors are wrong.  While I understand that when an act harms another person, I don't understand it when no harm comes to anyone. 

If society thought the same of transgender persons as it does of rock collectors or ornithologists there would be no need for us to enter into therapy because we wouldn't suffer all we do as a member of a taboo world.

It's society's insistence that we are mentally disturbed that allows them to discriminate, persecute, reject and even harm trans people without feeling guilty.  They wouldn't do that to people they thought were normal because they know it's wrong. 

I don't believe transgender belongs in the DSM.  In an open minded society it wouldn't be there.  But I do believe it should be considered a physical disablilty and therefore necessary surgeries should be covered by insurance.

We only need therapy to help us live with the uneducated masses who think we're freaks.  Erase the stigma and imagine what the world would be like.  That's where I'm coming from.

Julie

[Sandy]

I agree with you completely, Julie!

But also realize it took literally decades to have homosexuality removed as a disorder.  It is something that will happen.  But not soon I fear with the current makeup of the board reviewing code of the DSM-V revisions.  But not all tyrants live forever.

But we shall overcome, my sister.

-Sandy

[chrysalis]

I'm a Psych major in college (switching into Social Work/Human Services looking at being a Mental Health Counselor) so I'm admittedly biased here. However I must say the "establishment", in my experience, has been only understanding and open regarding these issues.

Psych is known as a liberal haven and really they/we want the best for you/us.

I understand it's annyoing to have it classed as a "disorder" when it doesn't seem to cause any direct harm outside of that within the society it is based in. Trust me when I had my therapist pull out the DSM IV and explain to me that I had GID it was not helped at all by the fact that it was implicitly a disorder. But really the goal here is help and yes people are going to be misguided in doing so, it happens everywhere. In race relations they call it color blind racism. Wole Soyinka wrote a great play about it called, "Death & The King's Horseman".

The fact is it is behavior which occurs in a very small percent of people. It makes the bell curve. Or to put it as they do, it deviates from the norm. These are always more likely to be studied because there seems to be such a clear line between 'us' and 'them' but inevitably they find that there aren't as many differences as previously thought.

Also, part of the "need" for therapy is because people desire sex changes for many reasons and it is to keep the deluded from making mistakes. Right now it is very rigorous because this is very new and they want to be sure, after all there is a lot of controversy around it. I'm sure things will change with time both as attitudes ease, and understanding increases making diagnosis easier.

We may well have a neurological test available in the next ten years. I'd encourage you to cultivate an understanding as opposed to combative attitude. Psych is a very new science which means it is prone to mistakes. However, being as new as it is, it is also very easily altered.

I encourage you to work with it, as opposed to against it.

[Steph]

I have to agree with chrysalis.  Lets face it (for e.g.) people born with a male body, raised as males who now need to surgically change their bodies to match what some would say their female brains, is not normal.  "We" certainly think it is but to the majority of people and medical systems around the world, it's not normal.  One could say we are abnormal.

To get the medical treatment and the services that we need, the condition has to be diagnosed first.  It's unfortunate that we're classified as being disordered; I for one think I'm perfectly ordered, but compared to the rest of the world I am different.

I don't think that there are many people out there who like being labeled as having any type of medical condition, but heck I have more important things to worry about than being labeled disordered.  I am what I am and I've been successfully treated, I'm a survivor of my disorder.

-={LR}=-

[Julie Marie]

Chrysalis, I am not working against the Psych world, I am making a point that when you label something a disorder it gives many in society justification for their prejudices by citing an authority that states there's something wrong with the group against whom they have a prejudice.  The Psych world has a responsibility to avoid any classification that can create harm towards an individual or group that does no harm to anyone else.

Today 63% of people believe homosexuality is a choice.  For decades it was labeled as a mental disorder and gays were severely discriminated against.  It's been 36 years since 'homosexual' was removed as a disorder and there has been a slow but steady improvement in public opinion.  What would it have been like had the DSM never categorized it as a disorder?  Hard to say but I have heard many people over the years justify their prejudices by calling people "mental".  And if they can go to a book like the DSM to prove themselves right, it becomes a serious problem for the affected people.

LR, I look around the world I live in and see nothing but normal people.  Yet each and everyone of them is unique.  How can this be?  Normal conjures up images of being like everyone else.  Unique is just the opposite. 

If a cited abnormality is a social taboo it is often isolated and becomes the sole measure by which a person is judged.  And our society is perfectly okay with that because it's easier that trying to understand.  What is often missed is it's not understanding but acceptance that is important.  I don't understand people who go swimming in icy waters but I accept them.

We see geeks mocked all the time.  Until the age of computers brought them out of the woodwork and we could see most of them were brilliant, they suffered the cruelty of the so called "norms" from grade school on.  Decades ago, there was a social stigma attached to being a geek that was pretty severe.  I watched so many kids being tortured it hurt.  They were considered abnormal.  Was geek ever listed in the DSM?

There are hundreds of other examples but the point is if we list a so called abnormality as a disorder it can hurt those who fall into that category.  If it hurts no one, it should not be listed as a disorder. 

We live in a world that preaches "March to the tune of a different drummer!", "Be yourself!", "Be an individual!", "Stand for what you believe in!" as long as you walk, talk, act, dress and talk like everyone else.  No wonder so many people are in therapy! 

If it continues to list harmless differences as disorders, the Psych world will have its hands full.  Is that what they want?

Julie

[juliekins]

Amen, SIster!

[Lisbeth]

Julie, you missed step 11 in the process.

11. Have a therapist who does research trying to prove his theory that you are disordered become chairman of a DSM committee.