Susan's Place Transgender Resources

I read a lot the last days about transsexuality. Mental illness describes my problems a lot better than the belief i would be woman. I'm no woman. I don't see it in the mirror. After all, I'm found out that I'm mental ill. And of course. Everything what i beliefed is a lie and a fake.  :embarrassed:

Big hug! Are you saying that you read something that describes transsexualism as a mental illness? Because if you did, I suggest you check the date, or the source. We're not mentally ill, we're wonderful people. Pissa, in fact!  8)

Hugs, Devlyn

You can found it on a huge count of sites and medical articles.

Sure you can. I can find anything I want on the internet. I don't go looking for negative things, though. Modern medicine and modern people understand we're just trying to live our lives like everyone else.  :)

Hugs, Devlyn

One can be mentally ill, and be trans, or be just mentally ill, or just trans, or none of the above.   I really dislike this sense that one should feel shame if they have a mental illness.    Do you feel shame if you get the flu, or sprain your ankle?

If you have a mental illness, get some treatment, or develop some coping mechanisms on your own if you want and are able.   It doesn't make you less of a person.

Your information much be from the wrong websites. http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/being-transgender-no-longer-mental-disorde (http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/being-transgender-no-longer-mental-disorde) is just one of many sites saying otherwise.

The American Psychiatric Association has revised its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and it  no longer lists being transgender as a mental disorder, among other changes announced this past weekend.

Transgender people will now be diagnosed with "gender dysphoria," which means emotional stress related to gender identity."Gender identity disorder" had been listed as a mental disorder since the third edition of the DSM more than 20 years ago.

In an interview with The Advocate, APA member Jack Drescher explained the new revision, saying, "All psychiatric diagnoses occur within a cultural context. We know there is a whole community of people out there who are not seeking medical attention and live between the two binary categories. We wanted to send the message that the therapist's job isn't to pathologize."

The classification of "transgender" as a mental disorder has been used in the past to prove that being transgender is a psychological problem that can be treated. In one case, the Associated Press cited over the summer, a transgender woman was at risk of losing the children she fathered before her transition.

"The argument is that one criteria for terminating parental rights is if one parent has a severe, chronic mental illness that might be harmful to the child," psychiatrist Dan Karasic told the AP. "A lawyer is apparently using that to argue that because the person is trans and has a diagnosis of GID, she should have her parental rights terminated."

Homosexuality was also considered a mental disorder by the APA until 1973. The DSM-5 is scheduled to be released in May of 2013.

personally. I'm just grateful to make it to the next day. I have a list of things I've gone through in life and being trans is somewhat of a blessing. I've been diagnosed with your garden variety of mental diseases from schizophrenia . borderline personality disorder , addict , Christ complex etc. I find that the transgender label suits me well and gives me reason to live. I really am just happy to be me , whatever that is and to not be ashamed to wear my dresses in public.

Quote from: rwOnnaDesuKa on August 22, 2016, 08:33:43 PM
One can be mentally ill, and be trans, or be just mentally ill, or just trans, or none of the above.   I really dislike this sense that one should feel shame if they have a mental illness.    Do you feel shame if you get the flu, or sprain your ankle?

If you have a mental illness, get some treatment, or develop some coping mechanisms on your own if you want and are able.   It doesn't make you less of a person.

Absolutely. Well said.

A coping mechanism for such a broad category as mental illness would be that the sufferer finds a specific treatment for their own particular mental illness, rather than announcing irrelevances to complete strangers. If I had a broken leg, I wouldn't seek out a website for people on chemotherapy.

What is the treatment of F64.0?

That would be hard to discuss in that fashion in the US as F64.0, ICD "transexualism" is a disorder per WHO, but not by current US/Developed World standards.    General US standard of care is WPATH, which is a mix of therapy, hormones, a bit of song and dance, and surgery to meet the needs of the patient.     Other countries have their own standards as appropriate to their payment models and cultural sensitivities; ie, some make it really really hard to get, some make it mandatory and enforce it rigorously (eg, Iran).

From a least harm standpoint, I'd have to give the top prize to WPATH its pretty well thought out; though of course, a doctor may deviate as they see fit to meet the medical needs of the patient.

For a couple of years before Maryland finally passed their TG Rights bill I went to the state Senate committee hearings on the bill. The "Loyal Opposition" has no problems parading out "Learned Experts" as well as cite "Published" authors on how TG people just have a "Mental Disorder". People of that ilk also cited how being Gay was mental disorder. People of this ilk is why "Conversion Therapy" has been outlawed in many jurisdictions as well frowned upon by medical organizations.

My own internalized transphobia, combined with two failed transition experiments in my early 20's drove much of my Need to just be a "Normal(ish) Guy". I may have actively stopped any efforts towards transitioning, mostly stayed away from HRT, never really stopped my escapes from maleness by CD'ing; I never stopped thinking or knowing I was and am trans. Real "Normal", as in cis people I've been often told don't feel the way I do about their gender. If I am not cis then I am left with trans.

The diagnosis of "Gender Dysphoria" is pretty straight forward. From DSM-5
1 A strong and persistent cross gender identification
2. Persistent discomfort with their assigned natal sex and its associated gender role
3. Absence of any physical intersex condition
4. Clinically significant distress or impairment of social or occupational functioning

What this neglects is GD is spectrum encompassing a universe or two between cis-female and cis-male. To put it in other words, If you think often that you may be TG, you are. The real trick is where in the spectrum you are. How strong is your discomfort? How persistent is it? How much distress does it give you?

Just because you are TG does not imply it's an all or nothing or "All In" scenario. For many of us, yes, a full social and/or medical transition is needed. For many others, not so much so, if at all. Only you ultimately know or will come to discover what your particular needs are to manage the condition.

I tried fighting it for decades. I also sabotaged my life by not handling being trans. Seven years I took it on for real. I've been on HRT much of that time. I am no longer a lifeless, soulless "Thing" that existed merely to do "What was expected". Today I have joy, I am happy being in my skin, I still live and present primarily as male. In a perfect world world, I'd be doing more. I may want to do a full social transition, I do not need to, most days, which I am thankful for. If the situation reverses and "Most Days" is my need to, you can be sure I will to survive and continue to live a life filled with joy and wonderment.

Looking at posting history, user galaxy had SRS with a bad outcome.   I think a lot of people don't take this final step seriously enough out in the regular world; they see the show with the cute boy that gets turned into the cute girl in Brazil or something.    Not saying that is galaxy's position, but I worry about folks that read SRS and think appendectomy or nose job.

It is MAJOR surgery.     The risks and complications are not minor.   The recovery period is long and hard.   With WPATH and well informed consent the patient should understand the risks involved before beginning, and understand that they very well could be themselves on the receiving end.   Balancing their current untenable situation in life against the very real possibility of death and harm.

Any MAJOR surgery can kill.
Any MAJOR surgeries can utterly destroy your life.

It doesn't just happen to some unknown "the other guy".

When I take my arthritis meds, I *know* a rare combination effect could obliterate my kidneys quite rapidly; but the persistent benefit of being about to move and exercise and live, outweighs that risk.    If I do get unlucky, I will not believe the doctor incompetent nor the meds a mistake.   

Speaking specifically of MtF individuals, researchers have found that we do have far more in common with ciswomen in many instances when it comes to physiology and that we also exhibit what can be thought of as mild AIS. While the differences are vast people tend to look at gender identity and secondary sex characteristics much more than a person's androgen receptor genes, their digit ratios, feminized brains, corresponding levels of white matter, the same reactions to pheromones as ciswomen, even right down to the ridges in a person's mouth. "Transsexual" is actually an intersex condition that is more subtle than most which leads to the uneducated, willfully ignorant, and the uninformed to declare it doesn't exist. That creates controversy and essentially we're left with identities rather than conditions which are fairly easy to dismiss.

Meanwhile, over at the mentally ill camp, they have no evidence that transsexuality is a mental disorder - just right wing talking points that don't even dismiss the claims that transsexuality is a medical condition. This is how they typically look.

Them: It's mental, penis = male and vagina = female.
Us: Lots of men and women don't have those corresponding parts and many are born without them. Some people lose them in war. It doesn't make them any less than what they are.
Them: Yeah, but XX is female and XY is male.
Us: Not really, plenty of people aside from transsexuals have opposite combinations of chromosomes and sexes to what you just listed.
Them: Yeah but that stuff is intersex and intersex disorders rare - happening to only a few people out of every hundred thousand.
Us: Transsexuality is more rare than many intersex disorders. For example, Triple X and Klinefelter's occur every one in one thousand births. Transsexuality is one in AT LEAST in the tens of thousands of births if not even fewer.
Them: Surgeries are not effective because transgender people are mentally ill and the suicide rates after surgery are very high and this proves that transgender people have underlying mental issues.
Us: Actually the rates of people who will get surgery and people who have had surgery are nearly identical. The suicide rates of transgender people skyrocket from other factors, such as homelessness and mental illness.

And it just keeps going from there but the point is that they have no studies (Paul McHugh's rigged ones don't count) that suggest any of what they're saying is true - only half truth excuses that are evident of their lack of competence on the subject.

Galaxy, the first thing to remember is how you felt before you transitioned. We don't do this without feeling very uncomfortable in our former life. I know you have had a great deal of difficulty in your transition and unfortunately I don't have a magic solution to make it go way. Some recent posting connected in my head this evening that might be related to your condition. Go to Wikipedia and look up Estrogen insensitivity syndrome. I can't post the link for you but I reviewed your earlier posting history tonight and it might explain what you are dealing with.

The background of my doubts are the following:

Aside from the fact that my transition, and specially my postop-Life is a nightmare, we had a long talk with my family about my currently problems. I'm depressed and suicidal (and may something of posttraumatic stress/embitterment  disorder). And sure, i understand, that they not be able to handle this all for me. Therefore i visit a psychologist.

On the other side the told me in roundabout way that they have their "own opinion" about transsexualism and that means clearly they believe i'm mental ill. I never had these thoughts and now after all the time huge doubt about that all and i fell unsure if it was the right - the HRT, the surgeries, the SRS ... Am i a woman? Really? What part of me is feminine? I lose all my hair and dreamed all the years of long hair - nobody can help me - ive pain every day ... i had so much dreams and goals and it ended up in a nightmare. And now ... my family came up and think i'm mental ill.  :embarrassed:

Ah, so we're really talking about a lay person's concept of "Mentally Ill"; in other words "nuts".   A lay person's definition of mental illness is simply, someone that doesn't behave in a manner that I am comfortable with.     By that definition, I am absolutely mentally ill, and, more importantly, do not care.    The appropriate treatment for this mental illness is simple; they can either shut up and go away, or they can find a way to become comfortable with what they are not.

The problem, the treatment, is entirely ON THEM.

Unless of course, your family is filled with licensed Psychiatrists who can make a real diagnosis, and prescribe a real treatment; but even then, diagnosing family members is kind of frowned upon because it effects objectivity, and physicians are inclined to be too lax with required record keeping when they make a diagnosis at the dinner table; which can cause all manner of problems down the road.   

And again, I'd like to forcefully assert, there is nothing evil or repulsive about having a mental illness, whether YOU have one or not.   Brain is just an organ, it can fail in all sorts of magnificent ways; sometimes you can teach it to accept and work around the failure, sometimes you can alter the chemistry and mitigate the failure, sometimes there's a surgical intervention, and sometimes you can't do anything and just have to live with the way it is, as best you can.

But a bad outcome on a major surgery should not surprise or shock the patient or the doctor.   They will always happen, the docs try to learn from what went wrong, and they can try and mitigate the suffering that results.   What they can't do, is undo what went poorly.

Everyone else has done a fantastic job of establishing that the idea that being trans is a mental illness is a backwards idea with no science supporting it.

So, and I'm going to say this as gently as possible, it may be that you are trans and also have a touch of mental illness (many of your posts seem to dwell on certain issues to the point of obsession). This is not an insult; personally, I'm both trans and have clinical depression. HRT and transition sparked a euphoria that canceled out the worst of the depression... for a while. But after a couple of years, I found that I was back to being depressed - and I along with several trans friends of mine have found that depression triggers obsessive thoughts about being ugly and horrible and failed at transition - so I've sought treatment for that as well.

It's sad to hear about people that are trapped in turmoil, it's just not fair how life is sometimes.

For me personally this is the best thing ever and I feel much more happy and complete than when I was younger

Thats one oft the major problems: I started to late. Much too late. Most problems wouldnt there if i  had started in my 20s of earlier.

I totally understand that! There are times I lay awake at night wondering what it would have been like when I was 20 to come out...but then I think back to the early 70's and there was zero awareness and resources where I lived and how unbelievably hard it would have been to try.

Quote from: rwOnnaDesuKa on August 24, 2016, 06:16:18 AM
Ah, so we're really talking about a lay person's concept of "Mentally Ill"; in other words "nuts".   A lay person's definition of mental illness is simply, someone that doesn't behave in a manner that I am comfortable with.

As far as I understand it, it's not only a concept of lay persons: "mentally ill" primarily means "shows unwanted social behavior". It's also kind of a "small criminal law": all the things which are unwanted, but not illegal, can be classified as "mentally ill" and – if desired – persecuted accordingly (forced treatment etc.). Just have a look at homosexuality: first, it was illegal (and it's still in many countries!), then it was still a mental disorder, and nowadays it's neither illegal, nor a disorder and most poeple don't care about it. What remains are the destroyed lifes of jailed and "treated" persons who were (and still are, in my countries) degraded and persecuted for nothing.

So, as soon as one leaves the well-prepared paths of how they are allowed to be and behave (for instance, by questioning their assigned sexuality or gender), they will automatically touch upon being seen as mentally ill, hostile, etc. That's just how social norms work.

What it means to me: I don't care about what's mentally ill and what's not. I'm myself, and I know that other people have "their opinions" on that. It's sad, but you can't do it right for everyone. I guess it's better to find people around you who don't care about "mental illness".

Quote from: galaxy on August 23, 2016, 06:43:05 PM
What is the treatment of F64.0?

Doesn't matter as it about to be removed as a disorder by the WHO - who are the only group with any standing that actually still list it as a disorder..

j-unique, I don't seek to disregard the suffering of those whose lives were destroyed in the past by malevolent practice.    The poster is, however, living with us in the present and referencing the notion of being mentally ill.

As much as folks don't like the idea, mental illness can compromise the ability to give consent and make informed choices; and thus, there will always be legal pathways available for involuntary commitment.    That is not a bad thing, it is just a real thing.   We should always do our best, however, to insure that any involuntary commitment is done with the greatest possible dignity, comfort, and well being of the patient in mind; it is NOT supposed to be, and shall not be treated as punishment.     That is our modern world.

The biggest challenge for most though, with regard to mental illness, is getting some form of treatment in the first place,  without having that treatment or the fact of having sought it, break the rest of their lives.    In short, the legal framework for an ethical treatment of mental illness is largely falling in place, something to be proud of;  but societal prejudice lags far behind, and can exact an atrocious price on those who would voluntary seek out help for a mental illness.

Quote from: galaxy on August 24, 2016, 08:34:25 PM
Thats one oft the major problems: I started to late. Much too late. Most problems wouldnt there if i  had started in my 20s of earlier.

If I "Followed Through" on either of my two transition experiments in my early 20's, I'd either be A) Dead, B) dead, or C) Well Pickled and soon dead. Age does not equal maturity. Back then I was a basket case. None to well negative self esteem. Been teased unmercifully as a kid because of my physical differences. Been a social outcast, loner, introvert, whatever you want to call it as much as I could. Though I lived in the shadow of NYC, or "TransCentral" as my wife calls it, I never dared to reach out to anyone about my "Sickness".

It took me a good 30 more years before I came to some level of accepting myself for being this "Thing" that I am. What helped me immensely was a support system that had run the gauntlet and survived, otherwise known as my TG Support group. If I had to rely on my somewhat supportive wife but.... not thrilled, I's either be A) Likely Dead.....

My point being, your only support system seems to be people totally, completely and morally "Justified", against your decisions. You are in a no win situation, as you likely realized before starting on this path. If anything changed it's their empowerment now to say "I Told You So"

No One in their right mind wants to be trans. It totally sucks. The truth is No One who isn't trans cannot understand the breadth of issues we face on what often seems like an hourly basis. My gender therapist, God bless her soul, is great with keeping me sane. Being able to grok what I often go through.... well not so great but still offers the insights I guess I need since I continue to see her.

You are far from alone in questioning "Did I do the right thing". If you really think about it, it is the human condition. I get paid pretty well to "What If....." things to death. A lot of what I design and deal with will lay a world of hurt on people if they do something silly. And that included doctors in a past life. I am often paralyzed in applying that same well honed skill to myself. It is so very hard to know for sure before, and after a major life change if you did indeed "Do the right thing". There will always be others that have opinions on why something should have been done one way or another. Engineering is no different. With designing stuff you have the luxury of knowing many others haven't a clue. When it comes to "Life".... Well, it is so much easier to tell others what to do with their life, then it is to fix your own life. So people feel free to offer their unsolicited advice.

I know one trans woman very well. She is some..... 30 years post-op. She has questions. Her life isn't "What she expected.....". The alternate scenario is far grimmer. I doubt there are many people in today's world that say "Hey! My life is EVERYTHING I want it to be".

Did you follow this path for yourself? Or, did you do what 'Others' told or expected you to do? Most people take the easier road of doing what is expected. I sure did for decades. I am thankful that I stopped and started or tried to do for Me. The hardest thing I ever had to do in my life. Seven years later it still eats up a tremendous amount of emotional energy. They joy I feel in return easily pays that tab.

Such is life

Ok, so I'm a few weeks late seeing your post JoanneB, but wow, you sure hit the nail on the head. The choices of A, B,  or C, the eventual leaving off of people who really don't have your best interests at heart, the time frame of realizing which way is up, and so on. I understand this was directed at Galaxy, but who couldn't appreciate the truth about life as we know it now? And the questions keep coming, and the answers are not always there. Thanks for posting this.

Quote from: galaxy on August 22, 2016, 07:57:01 PM
I read a lot the last days about transsexuality. Mental illness describes my problems a lot better than the belief i would be woman. I'm no woman. I don't see it in the mirror. After all, I'm found out that I'm mental ill. And of course. Everything what i beliefed is a lie and a fake.  :embarrassed:

I recently realized that after a life long problem with  depression and pain and being trans is that I'm mentally ill. It's the only fact that makes any sense.