When close-minded therapists turn you crazy

[Karla]

It is just so frustrating that he wants me to build my body up to that of an average guy, just to see if it would make me feel better.

To me that sounds just like emotional abuse and invalidation but maybe that's their job(?), how is that different from a non-accepting family member telling you to 'man-up' or "go get a girlfriend and you'll change you're mind" or a mom offering to pay for an 'organ' enlargement operation (*sigh*).

Thank goodness for consent-based treatment. I'm not insured and I can't afford a therapist off my own budget so eventually when I see one it will be because they were going to help me work through things.. not to grant me letters and basically be a god whose approval I have to garner and I still have to pay them for that.


Fencesitter, I fully share your disappointment about the sausages, it's really hard work to find decent sausage here. And omg it would a big stinky mess without public bathrooms 

[Lisa]

To me that sounds just like emotional abuse and invalidation but maybe that's their job(?), how is that different from a non-accepting family member telling you to 'man-up' or "go get a girlfriend and you'll change you're mind" or a mom offering to pay for an 'organ' enlargement operation (*sigh*).

Don't know, I see him more as an adversary now. Just a game of who outsmarts who.

Thank goodness for consent-based treatment. I'm not insured and I can't afford a therapist off my own budget so eventually when I see one it will be because they were going to help me work through things.. not to grant me letters and basically be a god whose approval I have to garner and I still have to pay them for that.

The shrink is payed by Medicare, so no cost to me, and since I got over being depressed I no longer feel useless, so have been able to go out and get things sorted myself. Now that I don't need a hrt letter from him anymore he has no power.

[Aidan_]

I wonder if the fact they are a medicare provider makes a difference. They probably get paid less for your visit, so maybe they don't see much motivation in helping you.

Not saying that it's okay for them to think that, just trying to see why some shrinks are total asses while some are angels.

[Fencesitter]

Anyway, had all the "sex" questions. What is you're fantasies, how many men/women have you slept with, how did it feel, etc...
All stuff I kind of don't want to share with him.

Oh I see... kind of like the same questions I got. They're difficult to answer anyway. Where does "have sex with" start, where does it end? (Ask Bill Clinton... a blow-job was no sex according to him.) It gets even more fuzzy if you've ever been into BDSM clubs and "did" something there. Some of the "try" stuff is almost purely technical and doesn't have much to do with sex ("I've bought this new whip, could you please try it out on me" - "Er, not that I get off on that stuff, but I can do it, sure, hand it over to me.") Also, sometimes you can be strongly involved, and at other times, you just play a kind of assistant's role in a session, sometimes you do it just out of  boredom or cause you're a nice person. ("Slept with her? - er no, but on her mistresse's request, I organized ice cubes at the bar and handed them over to her mistress and she used them on her, and I watched what she did there..." etc.) Try to count this kind of fuzzy situations happening in-between "having sex" and not having it. No chance!

Well I did not tell of these pastime leisures to my shrink anyway as it's none of his business. He also was a lot into psychoanalyis. Psychoanalysis interprets lots of things, and they love this kind of accounts to put their theories on. But psychoanalysis is not scientific at all, rather esoteric, so I don't trust it, didn't trust him therefore etc. I really did not feel like telling him anything about my BDSM stuff at all.

I got this question asked by my shrink: "How many people did you have sex with in your life, and of what sex?"
My answers were:
"1. The gender doesn't count, it happened by chance, I'm bi and don't care about it, and did not make a body count by genders/sex, sorry, I can just give you a total number, not divided by gender or sex."
"2. I slept with a couple of people in my life who were women but had a male body or vice versa, it just happened, how would you make your body count there?"
"3. How many people I had sex with depends on your definition of "sex", er... remember Bill Clinton and the Lewinsky affair?" And when I told him that, it made him laugh.

Then I gave him a fuzzy answer, my real supposed "body count" divided by two or three so that I did not seem too much of a slut but not too unexperienced either. Who is honest about their sex life anyway?

Then he asked me about HOW I had sex with these people and I answered him by asking him whether he was looking for hints to spice up his private sex life. He did not like my reaction. And went on asking, telling me it's important for the diagnosis. Gosh I hated this. Don't have trouble with telling "spicy" stuff, but not on request.

It is just so frustrating that he wants me to build my body up to that of an average guy, just to see if it would make me feel better.

I see where he's coming from, but that seems stupid to me. I had an affair with a very skinny guy. He had a metabolism disorder, an overactive thyroid, that's why he was so skinny. He said - I could get this fixed by taking medicine, but I don't suffer from it. The main effect is, it makes me skinny, so it's just cosmetic and I'll go with what nature gives me and be fine with myself and my body, I don't suffer from it otherwise, so it's okay. I mean he found his personal solution and he's not a trans woman. Being trans is different from not fitting to your ideals.

Yeah, and I really think, good German bread and sausages are something which might enrich US american culture a lot.

Best wishes.

[Lisa]

I wonder if the fact they are a medicare provider makes a difference. They probably get paid less for your visit, so maybe they don't see much motivation in helping you.

Not saying that it's okay for them to think that, just trying to see why some shrinks are total asses while some are angels.

Doubt it,
More like no risk of me taking my money else where, as well I can't.
But really I don't think this has got anything to do with money or him having anything against me. It is just that last time he had anything to do with anybody transgender was about 20 years ago in a different state.

I got this question asked by my shrink: "How many people did you have sex with in your life, and of what sex?"

Yeah, I was being honest with him about that one. Only result of that was he told me I was inexperienced and then the next 3 months pretty much went with him telling me I needed to go out and get a boyfriend. To me that is the wrong approach, I mean you can't just go out and find someone to love, it is going to happen when it happens, not at a scheduled time and place.

The question I really hate the most is this one:
So if you get this sex change then are you going to sleep with men or women?

I mean how could I possibly answer that, as it is now I prefer guys as I just feel uncomfortable sleeping with women. But I do feel attracted to some women so, who knows how I am going to feel about it in the future.

[CaitJ]

I've had some issues with my counselor/therapist being very...gender essentialist - i.e. "Girls don't do X" and  "Only boys do Y", which is very irritating.
Consequently, I'm changing to someone else - not to mention that I've had all my treatment for GID now, so there is no requirement to see a gender therapist.

[Layn]

my therapist here in germany is all "You gotta do a year RLE before hormones!" too. I didn't go right into the hormone thing, because i didn't want to give the impression that i am there just for the hormones. of course i am, but i'm thinking that makes him more open to what i have to say. However our talks feel very antagonistic, and i really don't know what to talk about. lately a lot of the time no one says anything, which really bothers me because when theres silence i need to fill it. at the beginning he made some odd questions about sexuality, but i think once he got that i'm asexual, he stopped. it scares me that i feel happy and that i feel victorious when he contradicts himself or i feel that i have outsmarted him.
anyway, as for hormones, he was really REALLY against it. I can't remember all his arguments, i only know that a few times he said contradictory things and that it really bothers him that i want hormones and haven't been out as a woman, and only have come out to parents, brother, and a close friend all of which don't live near me anymore. Now not long after though, i've got my letter! and an endo has taken my blood! and im waiting for the results to soon start HRT!
i'm not sure what convinced him, after all i did say quite a few things. But the argument i liked the most was "Look, i'm depressed, i'm tomboyish, i just grabbed some sort of unisex male clothes i had lying around, didn't take much care of how i look because i don't care since i'm depressed, and have come here to your session. The only person i've talked to since leaving home was you and you know me as [girl name]. I am a woman and haven't acted otherwise the entire day. i just haven't worn female clothes nor make up. quite a few women do that. If anyone assumed i was male, it was because of how i look. you know what might help with that? hormones."
i'm not sure if he said it that session, i think he did. he told me he'd write me the letter if i called an endo, and he did.

[E]

I definitely have an antagonistic relationship with my therapist (who's the kind of therapist to refer to post-transition trans women as "he", and tried to cheer me up by telling a story about how "he" managed to "fool" his partner into thinking "he" was a woman for years). She asked me the question of what sex I am in my sexual fantasies - I told her the truth: Female.

I came in to session 1 with high hopes. I left more depressed than I've ever been in my entire life, and haven't recovered fully since. At this stage, she is my enemy - my nemesis - and I have to defeat her.

So, yeah, I'm right there with you.

[Lisa]

When I first brought it up with my psychiatrist he started down the line of genetics, and when I stoped him in that track by saying that the currently possible is good enough. Well then he just continued, saying that he had seen a dozen trans women and that it was easy to tell.

At the end of that same session he tried to tell me that my hands are too big, I mean seriously!! How is that supposed to help???

[rejennyrated]

When I first brought it up with my psychiatrist he started down the line of genetics, and when I stoped him in that track by saying that the currently possible is good enough. Well then he just continued, saying that he had seen a dozen trans women and that it was easy to tell.

At the end of that same session he tried to tell me that my hands are too big, I mean seriously!! How is that supposed to help???

To which there seems to be an obvious answer - You just tell him "Well that is as maybe, but I would still sooner be obvious and accepted for what I really am (ie a transwoman) than pass for something that I am not (ie a normal male)."

Obviously most of us do manage to blend in afterwards, so the guy is really just using it as an excuse, but perhaps if you can convince him that you don't care then he has to either find something else or he has to give up on that approach and start being more constructive.

He may be only trying to test your resolve because transition is certainly not for the faint hearted, but it is also possible that what you might have to accept is that this guy may not be the right person to help you and if he persists in this negativity then you might need to find another doctor to work with.

[Lisa]

To which there seems to be an obvious answer - You just tell him "Well that is as maybe, but I would still sooner be obvious and accepted for what I really am (ie a transwoman) than pass for something that I am not (ie a normal male)."

Obviously most of us do manage to blend in afterwards, so the guy is really just using it as an excuse, but perhaps if you can convince him that you don't care then he has to either find something else or he has to give up on that approach and start being more constructive.

He may be only trying to test your resolve because transition is certainly not for the faint hearted, but it is also possible that what you might have to accept is that this guy may not be the right person to help you and if he persists in this negativity then you might need to find another doctor to work with.

He has never brought that line of argument up again after that day.

Now he wants me to get in contact with support groups in different states, cause well, talking with others in this state is not good enough for some reason.

[Fencesitter]

Yeah, I was being honest with him about that one. Only result of that was he told me I was inexperienced and then the next 3 months pretty much went with him telling me I needed to go out and get a boyfriend. To me that is the wrong approach, I mean you can't just go out and find someone to love, it is going to happen when it happens, not at a scheduled time and place.

It would be silly to force yourself, and not honest to your new boyfriend as well. However, finding someone to ->-bleeped-<- in the gay scene is not  difficult once you know how the scene "works". But if you're not interested in sex, then of course that's no good option for you.

The question I really hate the most is this one:
So if you get this sex change then are you going to sleep with men or women?

Oh, I got that asked too.Well, my answer was different from yours (and honest, mind you!): "I haven't ever cared yet, I don't think I'll ever care in the future. I have loved both sexes and genders and have ->-bleeped-<-ed both as well, don't see much of a difference there in terms of attraction, so why would that change?" Maybe it's just nasty to deal with a full-blown bisexual and transsexual patient if you're a therapist and need or want clichés to cling to. P*ssed me off as well as I thought - what does it matter??? But from the viewpoint of psychoanalysis, being bisexual means... I don't remenber it in detail, but it was some very weird quasi-esoteric explanation which probably makes bi people highly fascinating for psychoanalysts as we don't fit neatly into the scheme, even less if we're trans. Has something to do with your anal or oedipal or whatever phase being resolved in an unusual way or whatever. Psychoanalysis is just quackery, pseudo-science (see Wikipedia entry), so who cares what exactly they mean by that. Best advice: don't take that for serious. It's no more scientific than astrology.

my therapist here in germany is all "You gotta do a year RLE before hormones!" too. I didn't go right into the hormone thing, because i didn't want to give the impression that i am there just for the hormones. of course i am, but i'm thinking that makes him more open to what i have to say. However our talks feel very antagonistic, and i really don't know what to talk about. lately a lot of the time no one says anything, which really bothers me because when theres silence i need to fill it. at the beginning he made some odd questions about sexuality, but i think once he got that i'm asexual, he stopped. it scares me that i feel happy and that i feel victorious when he contradicts himself or i feel that i have outsmarted him.

Sure, you haven't been open and out right from the start for what you want from him, so of course that does not help for the relationship. On the other hand, it's interesting how much the non-hormonal 1 year RLE is sooo important in countries where you don't pay the therapist yourself, and in other countries it tends to be much cooler. They seem to be very aware of who pays them... As long as you got the letter, it's fine.

Whatefer, if you have a pseudo-therapeutic relationship with your therapist, best thing to do is: throw pseudo-issues into the sessions which you may work on together and where he may "help" you and feel fine about having been able to help you. I did this with a sick building syndrome of my parents, but based on real toxic substances where they lived, and other stuff as well. Didn't need him for any of that, but it helped us avoid sessions without any talk. That was a good pastime.

I definitely have an antagonistic relationship with my therapist (who's the kind of therapist to refer to post-transition trans women as "he", and tried to cheer me up by telling a story about how "he" managed to "fool" his partner into thinking "he" was a woman for years). She asked me the question of what sex I am in my sexual fantasies - I told her the truth: Female.

I came in to session 1 with high hopes. I left more depressed than I've ever been in my entire life, and haven't recovered fully since. At this stage, she is my enemy - my nemesis - and I have to defeat her.

So, yeah, I'm right there with you.

Sounds awful, and hope you'll be better soon. I did not have that depressing effect. But dealt with a shrink (psychoanalysis again) for my second letter, and in her writings, she refers to trans people throughout with their gender assigned at birth, even after operation. That was weird. Very weird. But at least I knew where I was with her. You know you deal with a person who does not respect you at all in what you are. I told her that and got a typical semi-esoteric psychoanalytic fuzzy response to my question which I cannot reproduce any more, something with development phases and creative solutions to them. I mean, why don't they send us to astrologists right away? Or people who use a pendulum to figure out if we're trans or not? Both my shrink and she are psychoanalysts, by the way. Very weird.

I hope things will work out fine for you.

[Lisa]

It would be silly to force yourself, and not honest to your new boyfriend as well. However, finding someone to ->-bleeped-<- in the gay scene is not  difficult once you know how the scene "works". But if you're not interested in sex, then of course that's no good option for you.

I know it is easy to find someone for sex, I just didn't like the way he put it up as a requirement.
If I want to ->-bleeped-<- someone then I will go do that, but no way am I doing it because someone else tries to push me, no way. In the end he gave up after 3 months and never brought that up again.

[E]

Sounds awful, and hope you'll be better soon. I did not have that depressing effect. But dealt with a shrink (psychoanalysis again) for my second letter, and in her writings, she refers to trans people throughout with their gender assigned at birth, even after operation. That was weird. Very weird. But at least I knew where I was with her. You know you deal with a person who does not respect you at all in what you are. I told her that and got a typical semi-esoteric psychoanalytic fuzzy response to my question which I cannot reproduce any more, something with development phases and creative solutions to them. I mean, why don't they send us to astrologists right away? Or people who use a pendulum to figure out if we're trans or not? Both my shrink and she are psychoanalysts, by the way. Very weird.

I hope things will work out fine for you.

An astrologist would probably be just as suited to this, yes. Perhaps more, because they'd likely have fewer preconceptions, and you might be able to just bribe them into letting you through.

I hope so, too. Next session is in a bit less than a week, and I'm quite nervous. I'm unsure whether or not I can expect to be referred on immediatey, or to be held there for another half year, or anything in between. And I hope thing works out for you.

As far as I know, my shrink is not a psychoanalyst, though.

[shiinee]

To me that sounds just like emotional abuse and invalidation

Completely agree.  E, Lisa, Layn-- it sounds like you have a relationship with your therapist based on blackmail.  The psych has something you want/need (such as access to hormones), and the root of your interaction is quite simply a threat: "If you don't pass my tests, answer my questions correctly, or behave as I tell you to, I will deny you what you need."  This is emotional abuse pure and simple.  Of course you feel like your therapist is your enemy, because they treat you so antagonistically. 

My response when I had a therapist who attacked me like that was to blackmail her back: I told her if she didn't respect me, I would kill myself.  She was clearly distressed by it, and things escalated into a pretty epic shouting match where we were both tossing around accusations and delegitimizing each other.  Of course she was perfectly capable of recognizing abusive behavior when it was directed at her, but completely blind to it when she directed the same behavior at me.  After that fight I walked out and never went back.  She sent me a letter pleading with me to return and saying we were at a critical point in my therapy, ahahaha no. 

As for how to better deal with that situation stay far afield of any therapist who are "psychoanalytic," "psychodynamic," or mention Freud without laughing.  Unfortunately that doesn't cover all the subtly nasty gatekeeper types.  In that case I admire Fencesitter's tactic of both responding to the question and turning it back on the asker.  I can hardly believe you asked him if he was looking for tips on his own sex life, that's fantastic.  It still seems to make you uncomfortable though, Fence-- you know that if you don't respond in a certain "right" way you are being invalidated.  And even though you are in my estimation a BAMF, all that manipulation and disrespect would hurt anyone. 

You often don't really see the extent of the damage to yourself until it's all over.  That was and is definitely true of me.  I still hear that witch's voice in my head sometimes telling me there must be a "reasonable explanation" for my gender identity and I start to wonder what "issues" in my life could have caused me to be me.  It's a stupid line of thought; I know I either deal honestly with myself or waste my time in fantasy land, and I pick the former.  But it's still there subconsciously as an intense fear reaction whenever something reminds me of her. 

An astrologist would probably be just as suited to this, yes. Perhaps more, because they'd likely have fewer preconceptions, and you might be able to just bribe them into letting you through.

I think I prefer astrology in these circumstances.  I once had a horoscope told by one of my friends, which said that due to the juxtaposition of Venus and Mars I should expect to feel especially transsexual that day.  What do you know, she was right!

[E]

Completely agree.  E, Lisa, Layn-- it sounds like you have a relationship with your therapist based on blackmail.  The psych has something you want/need (such as access to hormones), and the root of your interaction is quite simply a threat: "If you don't pass my tests, answer my questions correctly, or behave as I tell you to, I will deny you what you need."  This is emotional abuse pure and simple.  Of course you feel like your therapist is your enemy, because they treat you so antagonistically.

Yes, definitely. This is what invalidates her opinion - she blackmails me into behaving, and in return I try to manipulate her into believing I'm a good, little patient. I can't confront her, because I can't risk upsetting her enough that she wants to punish me, so I try to suck up to her, and be a good, little ->-bleeped-<-. After all, my situation is entirely temporary, and if I'm lucky, I'll be referred on by Monday.

You often don't really see the extent of the damage to yourself until it's all over.  That was and is definitely true of me.  I still hear that witch's voice in my head sometimes telling me there must be a "reasonable explanation" for my gender identity and I start to wonder what "issues" in my life could have caused me to be me.  It's a stupid line of thought; I know I either deal honestly with myself or waste my time in fantasy land, and I pick the former.  But it's still there subconsciously as an intense fear reaction whenever something reminds me of her. 

I don't believe word she says. First session, I pretty quickly learned what type of therapist she is, and thereafter, it's essentially a tug-of-war between us. A tug-of-war I can't lose, because on my end I'm firmly rooted in the ground, and in order to lose, I'd have to be uprooted completely, whereas on her end she has no stake at all. She can make me angry. She can make me depressed. She can make me despair. But she can't make me doubt myself - out of all the people in the world, she is the one whose opinion matters the least to me.

I think I prefer astrology in these circumstances.  I once had a horoscope told by one of my friends, which said that due to the juxtaposition of Venus and Mars I should expect to feel especially transsexual that day.  What do you know, she was right!

My only experience with astrology was my French teacher seating us by star sign.

[Lisa]

Completely agree.  E, Lisa, Layn-- it sounds like you have a relationship with your therapist based on blackmail.  The psych has something you want/need (such as access to hormones), and the root of your interaction is quite simply a threat: "If you don't pass my tests, answer my questions correctly, or behave as I tell you to, I will deny you what you need."  This is emotional abuse pure and simple.  Of course you feel like your therapist is your enemy, because they treat you so antagonistically. 

Thing is, I cant just put my personal feelings on a shelf and go act as someone wants me to. This is why I have given up on ever getting a letter of approval from this shrink.
The reason I am still seeing him is I am somewhat afraid of what power he might have if I cancel the next appointment and never reschedule. I believe he is really dedicated and genuine proud of his work. With Medicare paying the bills I have no power to cut payment.
Well that, and I am curious to see his reaction when he learns that I have bypassed him.

My response when I had a therapist who attacked me like that was to blackmail her back: I told her if she didn't respect me, I would kill myself.

There is no way I could even threaten to kill myself, it just goes completely against how I am as a person.

You often don't really see the extent of the damage to yourself until it's all over.  That was and is definitely true of me.  I still hear that witch's voice in my head sometimes telling me there must be a "reasonable explanation" for my gender identity and I start to wonder what "issues" in my life could have caused me to be me.  It's a stupid line of thought; I know I either deal honestly with myself or waste my time in fantasy land, and I pick the former.  But it's still there subconsciously as an intense fear reaction whenever something reminds me of her. 

On the last one of those "list your goals for the next 6 months" questions, I tried to say that I wanted to get started on my transition, I had already got most of my clothing changed by this time so to me I was already well on my way, but would like to at least talk about how I feel about it all.
The only words I managed to get out before getting cut off was "I would like to get started..." that's it, he cut me off half sentence with a "if you do anything now you will be a mental casualty", that really scared me, I couldn't say anything after that.
For the next month or so I was feeling really miserably, wondering if it all was worth it. In the end I decided he was wrong, and if by chance he is right then it is an acceptable risk. I feel so much better now after disregarding his warning and moving ahead anyway.

[Layn]

There is no way I could even threaten to kill myself, it just goes completely against how I am as a person.

me neither, and i'm pretty sure i've told him that i'd probably never commit suicide.

[shiinee]

There is no way I could even threaten to kill myself, it just goes completely against how I am as a person.

I think that's a good thing, it was supposed to serve as an example of how not to respond, lol.  Unless you really like fights.

[Ayaname]

It was like being beamed into a culture where I was pathologized for being left-handed and had to pass exams for being allowed to write with my left hand. And then being judged as a real or non-real left-handed guy based on the fact which hand I use when I wipe my ass. By right-handed people who had written or read theories about people like me, often prejudiced or dismeaning theories, and where the ass-wiping had become a central criterium to allow left-handed people use their appropriate hand.

HAHAHA! This analogy is soooo perfect! XD