Why must we have to justify our identities to gatekeepers?

[tekla]

California requires a Master's Degree in the field (family psychology for a family psychologist, etc) a criminal background check and a lot more.

[CaitJ]

This forces some of us (like me) to edit our narratves just to get horomones.

I have to ask; have you actually had any experiences with gatekeepers?

[tekla]

California also has informed consent, so you don't need to do any of that.

[Arch]

I think that it is also time to separate 'psychologist' from 'psychotherapist' as they are very different things particulaly within the world of gender therapy.

Psychotherapy is psychological treatment/counseling (i.e., usually some form of talk therapy) and can be practiced by a psychologist, a social worker, an MFT, even a psychiatrist. In the U.S., a psychologist is not the only one who can write referral letters for people.

[tekla]

even a psychiatrist

Ummm, a psychiatrist far outranks a psychologist, as they are licensed Medical Doctors, and can write scripts.

[MillieB]

Yeah, I was basing my comment very much on the NHS system which is one referal from a Doctored psychologist and the other from a mental health professional (who can be a psychotherapist) with a least a masters degree and two years experience of working with transsexual people.

But again people are ignoring the point that I was annoyed about, that we are all idiot 'hired friends' with no ethics morals, experience or qualifications and that there is no oversight standards or codes of practice to govern this which isn't true at all. You have to have a decent level of training and experience before the NHS will even give you an interview and better credentials still if you want to be in private practice and have membership to one of the reputable governing bodies.

The problem is that as has been said, there isn't a set standard that applies internationaly and although there has been talk of this for years, or even a set British standard, the powers that be haven't made this happen. I for one would like to get rid of the charlatans from the profession as has been shown here it gives the ill informed license to ridicule something that helps a lot of people, and would make it easier for people to feel confident that the person sat in front of them has the required skills to help them. It might also dispell the idea that people trained in other disciplines  (nursing/social work) could possibly have the required knowlege to practice psychotherapy in an effective manner.
Most of these things will have modules where listening skills are taught, but it is not the same thing, it can't possibly be as there simply isn't the time to incorporate the more in depth elements and the practical side of the training. I'm trained to dispense medications but I imagine that Spacial would get upset if I claimed that made me a nurse.

I'm not claiming that Psychotherapists are the worlds biggest genii or even that they are all particulaly great, as I have said, there is good and bad in every profession and I usualy don't have any problem with people venting about a hopeless cousellor as some really are. But when I see phrases like 'psychopatic and evil' and 'disgrace to humanity' and then I think that people might actualy beleive what has been said, I think that it borders on abuse.

[tekla]

there isn't a set standard that applies internationally

I don't think there are any international medical standards for anything, other than what the UN might mandate for their people and the drugs they distribute.  Doubt there would ever be.  National standards are about as much as you can hope for.

[MillieB]

I think that a lot of it comes under WHO control now, although I'm not 100%

[VeryGnawty]

Ummm, a psychiatrist far outranks a psychologist, as they are licensed Medical Doctors, and can write scripts.

This is true.  Psychiatry is a medical field.  It is much more regulated than psychology.

[Arch]

even a psychiatrist

Ummm, a psychiatrist far outranks a psychologist, as they are licensed Medical Doctors, and can write scripts.

I mainly meant that psychiatrists don't necessarily do talk therapy. Sorry if I was unclear.

[Tammy Hope]

does the Wiki, or TS roadmap, or some other site, have an up to date list of informed consent providers?

I'm betting there's isn't one close to the Memphis area but I'd love to find out i was wrong.

[Hermione01]

Spacial, I fail to see how linking to the organisations who do ensure that practitioners are qualified and working to a set of ethics and standards proves that you know what you are talking about, if anything it suggests the opposite.

You will see from the CPCAB website that it takes 5 years to qualify as an independent practitioner. Not 6 weeks. And seeing as I have done four of those years with them, I know exactly what it entails.

Just suggesting that someone's qualifications are meaningless because they are not nursing is a little childish. I know good and bad psychotherapists, I know good and bad nurses but I wouldn't dismiss a whole profession because of it.

I agree. 

[Renate]

There is Informed Consent on Susan's Wiki.
It lists some of the big informed consent institutions.

[PixieBoy]

In my country, we don't follow the WPATH. And there are no standards, which means that every time our gender therapists say "oh, but according to the standards/rules/whatever, I have to do this...", they're lying.

In my country, for a person to change their legal gender (that M or F in the passport and on the ID and in the social security number), they have to agree to be castrated and to get SRS. This means that a trans man who wants to be legally a man MUST have a hysterectomy AND a phallo/meta, regardless of wether his downstairs area bothers him or not.

In my country, one of the steps of getting the diagnosis transsexualism (that coveted key to acquiring surgery, hormones and name change) is doing a Rorschach test. You know, that test they stopped using in the 50's?

Now, where do I live? What is this barbaric, bizarre country? Is it Saudi Arabia? No, it's Sweden. 21st century Sweden.

[spacial]

Which is exactly what I said! And is a far cry from 'these people have no ethics' 'they will break your confidentiality' etc.

With respect, I think you're missing the point.

There are, undoubtedly, many of these people, (using the generic term therapist), who are compassionate, caring and seek to help. More importantly, unaffected by their own insecurities.

There are, equally, many professional oganisations which genuinely seek to ensure proper filtering, training, supervision and enforcement.

But there is no established international, or even national consensus of what any of this means.

A Degree in medicine, for example, will follow a broadly predictable path. There is general agreement on how the body works. But there are no established principals on how the human mind
works. Indeeed there are many points of view that are in direct contradiction with others. So two people can hold degrees of equal value, yet have entirely contradictory opinions. Hence,
the equal value is no value at all.

Psychology, at any level, is a belief system. A set of beliefs and principals upon which, people seek to rationalise their own positions in relation to those seeking support. The
application of science is a deliberate red herring to give the impression of scientific credability to what is farcical. Similar tactics are used, though to lesser effect, by the TM people
and Scientology. The science doesn't make these credable. It just seems to.

The last 40 years, has seen an explosion in the numbers of therapists and an even greater explosion in the numbers of new and increasingly exotic conditions, almost all with snappy titles
using 3 letters. SAD (Several definations), MAD, ->-bleeped-<-, BDD and so on. One of the most ridiculous of course is the ODD. It describes young boys who disobey parents and teachers!!

On threads on this forum and many others, there are successive posts with people exchanging these labels like football cards. Yet, for the most part, they are utterly meaningless and serve
the egos, not to mention the incomes of the therapists, more than the client.

Since there are so many different opinions being made by these people, it's possible to choose the therapist who best suits the objective.

The psychologist who has been selected to rewrite the DSM, for example, seems to have views, which owe more to Republican politics than to those of other, equally qualificed psychologists. Not to mention, the welfare of Americans.

So, here is the problem of ethics. These people are not governed by a system of general principals, they are governed by the objectives of those that pay them. Little can be done by those
who may already be in a delicate emotional state, finding their life destroyed by a therapistwho chooses to repeat what has been said in confidence.

Such a therapist is not professional at all. Other therapists will claim that they are not like this, of course. But that is scant reassurance to the rest of us, since we cannot know what
any of these people may do. The whole industry is pot luck.

In their drive to create work for themselves, these people are continually finding morbid diagnoses for what are otherwise natural aspects of life. The human experience is being vitiated
along with liberty and normality. Death is now an illness. The greiving process is compulsary.

The drive for this is the need, by Drs to have a filter system, to shield them from the many numbers of otherwise healthy people, so that they can concenrate upon the sick. We use to call
this triage. We've previously had receptionists, junior Drs, nurses. But therapists have taken this to a whole new level, creating for themselves, a money earning job backed by meaningless
qualifications.

In any other area, this would be called beurocracy, the creation, by a minion, of work, self importance and promotion.

For us, the approach to these people should be a careful limitation of what we say and concentration on the facts. For society, the problems would seem to be a bit more serious.

I'm trained to dispense medications but I imagine that Spacial would get upset if I claimed that made me a nurse.

Not really. That would be like saying someone trained to change the oil on your car is a car mechanic.

[MillieB]

It's quite clear that me challenging you just causes you to talk more rubbish, so I won't bother but a lot of  trans people find therapy useful as do people in general. So you are entitled to your largely irrelevent arrogant, paranoid opinions. I'll just get on with helping those who want my help, I have never dragged anyone in from the street.

[spacial]

so I won't bother but a lot of  trans people find therapy useful as do people in general.

I'm very pleased we can agree on this point.

It's unfortunate that we can't discuss others without hurt feelings. I'm sure there are many constructive points we could build upon. But none can be achieved when personal feeling get in the way.

Take care lovely Millie and I wish you a happy and succesful New Year,

[tekla]

You can find a therapist or a good bartender, pretty much the same.  Both ruin about as many lives as they help.

[MillieB]

You can find a therapist or a good bartender, pretty much the same.  Both ruin about as many lives as they help.

I kind of agree with this and I don't think that I would have sought a therapist if the whole going to see the bartender every night/afternoon/morning thing hadn't gone so horribly wrong.

[rite_of_inversion]

In the states you can't call yourself a Psychologist unless you have at least a master's degree.
Nor can you call yourself a licensed clinical social worker (Which is what I'm moving toward at glacial speed).
I don't *believe* you can call yourself a therapist either.

You can actually call yourself a counselor and set up shop in many states.  I'm under the impression that the majority of people who do this are Christian counselors.  Not to say that even the majority of Christian counselors are unlicensed. I have no data.

But what I would say is that a doctor's going to probably ignore any note from an uncertified therapist.  So make sure they have at least a master's in psychology, counseling, or clinical social work, otherwise you're wasting your time/money.

As to why the system requires this in most places...the hormones and drugs cause irreversible changes.  The idea is to try and make sure the person asking for the pills/shots/surgery is sane enough to be making a decision they're going to remain happy with, and realistically assess the risks.