When sex-change is a mistake: Some transsexuals suffer bitter regrets. Sarah Lonsdale reports
SARAH LONSDALE
Sunday 24 October 1993
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/when-sexchange-is-a-mistake-some-transsexuals-suffer-bitter-regrets-sarah-lonsdale-reports-1512822.html (http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/when-sexchange-is-a-mistake-some-transsexuals-suffer-bitter-regrets-sarah-lonsdale-reports-1512822.html)
'I AM a non-person, an 'it'. I have let them mutilate me. Far from solving my problems, the operation has made things worse.'
Sandra, formerly Peter, had a sex-change operation in 1987, when she was 40. At the time of the operation she was having panic attacks and was heavily dependent on tranquillisers. Now she is finally coming off them, an alarming certainty is dawning on her: the surgery should never have taken place.
Because being a woman is more than surgery on a part.
Quote from: Mahsa the disco shark on November 14, 2011, 01:22:27 PM
Because being a woman is more than surgery on a part.
Other than the fact I was less than one year of age when that article came out.
Quote from: JasonRX on November 14, 2011, 01:24:14 PM
Other than the fact I was less than one year of age when that article came out.
I was 11. So yeah...
Quote from: Mahsa the disco shark on November 14, 2011, 01:25:23 PM
I was 11. So yeah...
I know, I'm yoiung, but really my point is that I'm sure surgeries must've improved since 1993.
1987 SRS, now 2011 and finally finding out about regrets, after getting off tranquilizers, oh yes?!
I say, best get right back on tranquilizers and enjoy what is... sorry, but this is just one more bloody BS news story at best.
If I sound cynical here - must be because that's what I feel.
Grrr,
Axelle
You must have dug hard to find an article from 1993, why is it relevant to today?
I saw it posted on facebook today, didn't notice the date until after I'd re-posted here. :embarrassed:
Z
There would be far less regrets if the regretters had been aware of more options to express their gender-identities.
The fact that there were more regrets backwards in time then there are nowadays, is simply because more and more people nowadays are aware that they necessarily don't have to confirm to either a strict male or female-role only, just because they are not satisified with their birth-assigned gender.
Many of the people that have had Sex changes done and regetted it, have realised firstly afterwards that they were not really transsexual at all but something else, such as maybe Bigendered, Androgynuos or perhaps just intense crossdressers, but resorted to a sex change because they did not know how else to handle their feelings and believed a change was the only solution.
An Androgyne may actually suffer from body dysphoria aswell, although He/she may not want to actually have a conventional "change".
And ofcourse, not to forget, the claim that someone "can never be a real woman" if the individual don't have full surgery, is a rant that is unfortunately nothing unusual even within the T-groups.
Then, there are also those that don't actually seems to have regretted what they did but rather seems to have been brainwashed into "regretting" it, usually by religious conservatives, although these individuals originally actually claimed by their own words that the change was the right thing for them.
One such example is Alan Finch, that became Helen at the end of the 1980's and happily stated in an interview back then that she would "never regret it", only to some years later move in with a woman that "encouraged" Helen to de-transition into a man again, which she did, turning her moody and instable, getting more and more angry and wanted someone to pay for that anger, whitch turned out to be his surgeon, who Alan(Ex-Helen) now blamed for even operating on him, hence deciding to sue the poor surgeon. In fact, he decided to sue the whole clinic. ::)
http://zagria.blogspot.com/2008/03/by-careful-what-you-wish-for-1.html (http://zagria.blogspot.com/2008/03/by-careful-what-you-wish-for-1.html)
My therapist was like, "I want to make sure you don't regret losing your penis"
And I said, "I'm losing my penis? Thats news to me. Maybe it might fall off in the shower like Pezzies said it would":
Quote'But I found the requisite two psychiatrists to recommend surgery. That is all you need. I had no money, so I could not afford any counselling, and was offered none on the NHS
.............
The NHS offers little counselling for people seeking genital surgery. Those without the funds to pay for private counselling must rely on occasional visits to consultant NHS psychiatrists to make up their mind about whether surgery is what they really want and need.
.............
But in practice, desperate people such as Sandra have found it all to easy to 'shop around' between psychiatrists until they have the recommendations they need for their operations.
I'm sorry, but this doesn't make any sense and I don't believe any of this article.
Firstly, any counciling would have been done by psychiatrists. Secondly, in the NHS, no-one 'shops' around psychiatrits to get what they want. The NHS simply doesn't work that way.
Finally, this:
QuoteAccording to studies in America and Holland, around one in 20 post-operative transsexuals changes his or her mind after surgery, and around one in ten never adjusts and often becomes deeply depressed.
Yeah right. No references though.
PS Anyone notice our Jenny was there? WooHoo!