Medical or Mental?

http://ben-girl-notesfromthetside.blogspot.com/2011/04/medical-or-mental.html
4/21/11
By Elizabeth

Is this a medical condition or a mental condition? I guess I am one of the people claiming that a lot of the later transitioners and even others have created a dichotomy in whether this is truly medical or mental. I think the issue is not that someone is a late transitioner.  It is the simple fact in this day and age there are too many late transitioners and too many transitioners period that are lesbian.

If one is truly born with a female brain then that problem is there from early on and should be set around puberty until somewhere in the mid to late teens. Many people can fool themselves into doing certain things I will never understand but that does not mean I hate them but I do tend to judge the ones I am forced to deal with individually. The simple truth is you either are born transsexual or you are not.  If you believe this then we have a problem in the transsexual community.

Quote from: Natasha on April 21, 2011, 11:06:53 AM
Medical or Mental?

http://ben-girl-notesfromthetside.blogspot.com/2011/04/medical-or-mental.html
4/21/11
By Elizabeth

Is this a medical condition or a mental condition? I guess I am one of the people claiming that a lot of the later transitioners and even others have created a dichotomy in whether this is truly medical or mental. I think the issue is not that someone is a late transitioner.  It is the simple fact in this day and age there are too many late transitioners and too many transitioners period that are lesbian.

If one is truly born with a female brain then that problem is there from early on and should be set around puberty until somewhere in the mid to late teens. Many people can fool themselves into doing certain things I will never understand but that does not mean I hate them but I do tend to judge the ones I am forced to deal with individually. The simple truth is you either are born transsexual or you are not.  If you believe this then we have a problem in the transsexual community.

I knew i was different as early as i can remember.  Social forces prevented me from exploring that possibility, so i died a little each year on the inside no knowing why i was different from other people, until i had to do something about it because it wasn't going away.  Its like having cancer but not treating it till it becomes serious.  Just because you don't treat it right away doesn't mean it goes away, it just grows to the point you have to do something about it.  It is my theory that as your body matures the GID becomes stronger and stronger, at least it was in my case.

Wow ... what an opinionated, narrow-minded blog that is!!

Let's begin with the late-transitioning issue ...

Many, many, many of us battle against our dysphoria. We deny it, suppress it, or simply try to live as best we can in our natal gender because the risks or losses associated with transition seem too great. Then we find we have marriages, children, dependents, etc and suddenly we have to think about them and their needs. And they come first. So we bury our trans identities even deeper. I'm not saying that's a smart move in the long run, but it often arises from good intentions and concern for others ... and it certainly doesn't make our feelings of dysphoria any less valid.

As for the notion that no MTF should ever find women attractive ... well, sexual proclivity and gender identity are two totally different things - which is why transsexuality and homosexuality are two different categories.

I have an FTM friend who was a lesbian as a woman, but is now a gay man. His homosexuality remained constant, irrespective of gender. Like a lot of MTF-identifying men, I love women, find them attractive, have been married and had girlfriends ... but I find sex problematic, often unsatisfying and frankly frustrating as a man. I would far, far rather be in my female partners' role. As a man I do not desire other men. As a woman, I'm 99% certain that I would - in fact, I've fantasized about it all my life.

I grew up at a time, and in a culture where gender issues were far, far less understood or accepted than they are now (and, yes, that's saying something). I repeatedly told shrinks about how I felt and was repeatedly told by them that I was imagining my dysphoria, it wasn't real, I should just get over it, etc. So I tried my absolute damnedest to be the man they expected me to be, and in some ways it worked. I got the wife, the kid, the house, the career ...

... I just didn't get me. I'm trying to get to the point where I can do something about that And in the meantime, I don't wan to hear that I'm somehow not a real, or good enough transsexual because i wasn't able to fulfill my dream at 16 - which I certainly would have done if I'd been given the chance - and live my whole adult life as a woman ...

Based on the picture used I would say this is a young person.  And as such she has no idea what many of the "older" people with GID went through.

We were not of the Internet age.  Information was not readily available to those who were teens in the 50's, 60's and maybe even the 70's.  Its no wonder many are coming out at older age, they just found out there was a name to their problem.  Many (myself included) were told by "professionals" that we had mental problems and that we should just "suck it up" and live as was expected of us.

By the time many knew there was something that could be done about our feelings they were married and had children.  Again that meant waiting until they were grown.

I won't respond to the lesbian aspect of their blog.  But I think there are reasonable reason for that also.

Wow.
Like many of the other late in life transitioners I lived with this private hell for decades. I did my best to take this secret to my grave. Seems I failed. And good thing.

I have seen these elieteist opinions before. Ussually it is a young woman who has been lucky to be diagnosed at a young age with the resourses to do something about the problem.

Quote from: Sarah Louise on April 21, 2011, 11:54:23 AM
Based on the picture used I would say this is a young person. 

You know, I thought that too ... until I discovered that her picture was taken in 1971 ... So she's old enough to know better.

I also see, from reading other posts on her blog that her disdain and even hatred for late transitioners in an ongoing theme ... and she's incredibly harsh to any late transitioners who dare to question her views.

Personally, I think it's incredibly sad to see intolerance and narrow-mindedness like this within the TS/TG community. We face enough trouble dealing with other people's bigotry and ignorance. Do we really have to create more of our own?

There are plenty of lesbian GGs why shouldn't there be lesbian transwomen as well.

I am blown away by her asertions that women should only have sex with and be atracted to men.
My mother is a semi bisexual lesbian. My sisters are bisexual. Why would it be any surprise that I also would be a bisexual woman. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

She is narow minded.

She is also plain wrong. The research data is very clear on this ... "In adult patients with GID, Blanchard (1989) noted that a large majority of biological females with gender dysphoria have a gynephilic (homosexual) sexual orientation--that is, they are sexually attracted to other biological females--whereas biological males are more equally distributed between an androphilic (homosexual) and a non-androphilic (heterosexual, bisexual, or asexual) sexual orientation (see also Smith, van Goozen, Kuiper, & Cohen-Kettenis, 2005)."

In other words, many MTFs are attracted to women pre-tramsition and of those it's reasonable to assume that many will continue to be attracted to women post-transition. Others will discover, as many of the Susan's Place family have done, that they respond sexually to men once they have female hormones and a female body. Either way, why should anyone judge or criticize them?

We all have our own individual experience of GID ... one of the great joys of a site like this is that it allows us to share the things we have in common while celebrating those that make us unique.

I am only harsh to those that are harsh to me. I really have no big issue with Transgender as long as the transsexual are differentiated. I could not reply on the I do not understand post because replies appeared to be closed.

I do not understand because my life experiences are totally different from late transitioners and by late I mean post 45-50.  Dr. Benjamin and I both thought the numbers would have dropped dramatically by now but they are increasing and that is an issue. I am fully aware what lengths people will go through to push this deep inside themselves but I have no idea how they do it. That was not my life nor my experience. I openly fought my fight as a child in the 50's which was not normally a good idea except I had a mother that loved me despite the pain in the ass I was. I could no more have allowed myself to be a boy than willingly allow myself to be a leper although kids like me were lepers at times back then.

I wrote that post hoping people would actually respond and explain how they handled it and what they do to get through it but nobody did that. If attacked I am Welsh and can dish it as well as take it. I know many post operative women born transsexual that are both straight and yes lesbian but I have questions but one never gets answers. All one gets is late transitioners telling others they must be accepted because they say so and maybe they qualify as transgendered but last time I checked people do not turn transsexual at 50.  It is a life long drain on your very existence.

There is no such thing as painless transsexualism. What is one to think when some 57 year old man says he is transitioning on a specific date; will have surgery exactly 14 months later;  will then be a role model for all transsexuals; plus his wife will stay with him; and immediately knows everything about what it means to be a woman and transsexual; plus his wife and his new fem self will not be lesbian. Sorry that is a giant red flag and makes Blanchard and Bailey smile with joy because that is classic ->-bleeped-<- in their world.

Many people are in a battle to get transsexualism removed from the DSM and defined as a medical condition. Right now that is a dead issue because of what is happening in the transsexual community because Blanchard has a ton of evidence on his side everywhere.  I had one person quote Blanchard as an example of a "researcher" in trans issues. I was a research Engineer for around 40 years and that ->-bleeped-<- cannot spell research.

I wish absolutely not one single person under the transgender umbrella any harm nor prejudice in their daily lives. Everyone deserves the right of the pursuit of their own happiness but like all things in life there are limits.

I find some ->-bleeped-<- and cross-dresser bloggers both insightful and actually funny and endearing because they admit their condition and it is not transsexual.  I find others offensive and beyond dumb but that is their right in the blog world.

If you want to scream at me then post on my blog and explain things.  I will listen if it is rational and non-confrontational but I will respond otherwise. I do not know everything or sometimes much at all but there is no type of transsexual that is better than another one.  There are differences between Types of transsexuals and that is in intensity but it is always with us regardless of the intensity. There is no such thing as sudden onset transsexualism otherwise this is not a medical condition and Benjamin knew it was medical 50 years ago and even Freud thought it was medical and not mental. Bet you did not know that one.

Peace and be gentle or be rough or just be.

The other thread was closed off because of the posts of someone other than you. Your argument here is reasoned and expressed in a sensible manner and as such is perfectly fine.

my concern is slightly different to yours. I am one of the very rare childhood transitioners from the 1960's. I am now in my 50's. Externally I am indistinguishable from a late transitioner and I have once or twice been wrongly assumed to be such by a youngster. They fail to see that we all grow old eventually and looks do fade.

When I was younger I had similar attitudes about older transitioners and I felt somewhat considerably different from them. However I find that now that I am aging that we actually have a lot in common.

My point is this. Most perceived differences are in fact probably more to do with age than anything else. Like you I don't know how someone suppresses something that long but evidently they do, and I think it is probably counter productive to our cause to start establishing further division of an already small group.

^^This, as they way...

It's very hard to separate out the feelings of difference that are made up of age, gender, sexuality, race, etc. etc. and people's individual need to feel like part of a close group, which usually means feeling like others aren't part of it.

I don't expect transitioning people in their 20's to be having an experience remotely like mine. This reminds me of the film Lost In Translation (which everyone I know seems to have a different take on!) - to me, the story was partly about how the older man was able to engage with the world of the younger woman (because he had been young before), whereas she was hopeless at engaging with his. Been there, done that, from both ends of the scale.

It will be interesting to read what she thinks a few years down the track, when she is an "oldie" herself. 
Be that as it may however, just remember those of us who lived survived the 60's did it first, whatever it was, and did it better!

Karen, unleashing her inner hippy.

As one having been involved in the comments of both blogs in question, Elizabeth. I find your attempt at contrition here quite interesting. And, no this is not an "attack" upon you. Let me get that out of the way right now. It's simply my view. My attempt to put your statement in a different light. I understand how difficult it is to read inflection into another's written word. Thus the reason for this advance disclaimer. I've already apologized to you, and sincerely so, for your interpretation of what I commented in response to your original "Never going to Understand" post. You looked upon my response as an attack. Thus you feel that this and other people's comments gave you the freedom to chastise, belittle, denigrate, goad and judge the differing feelings and personal experiences about themselves. What began as an attempt to honestly respond to what I still feel are disingenuous intents (your premise's for never understanding), quickly devolved into name calling and derogatory judgment. I hold a personal feeling that you are a very uncaring person of others life conditions. I think you are a mean and angry person. It's just my opinion though and others can form their own.

Here's my first comment for others here to judge for themselves:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cOoY7dek8ZC0Tg2SttbmQg2WcfPVPQO2i8RcayJJPZI/edit?hl=en&authkey=CN_2keID#

Perhaps you felt the attacks happened at some other point. But, I think the real truth is you use the thought that you were attacked because of your not-understanding about late transitioners as an excuse to be prejudicial in your own right. I don't believe you ever had a thought as you claimed in your above comment about,

"......hoping people would actually respond and explain how they handled it and what they do to get through it......".

If that were true, why then did you give the following response to my comment?

"There is not one single reason I should understand because the difference between you and me is night and day and just to be clear that does not make me better nor worse than any other transsexual."

And this:

"You may or may not have been born transsexual. I have no clue either way but it seems to em you made pragmatic decisions. The only question I would have is does your wife enjoy sex as a lesbian as much as she did as the wife of a man?

I am sure she does. Let me guess. All the girls love you and accept you as one of the girls and all that crap.

You are just another convenient transsexual"

And lastly this:

"In the case of your poor wife it was obviously for "better or for lesbian". I am betting you still get the strap-on"

Mostly, these are vile responses. And, you no doubt will continue to characterize me as someone who is 'only a ->-bleeped-<- and/or pseudo-transexual', and I'll continue to know and assert otherwise. But, by your writing and readable laughter at another persons story, plight and reality, it truly goes to the reflection of what your heart actually is. It's not a great stretch for someone to see that you really do not wish to understand. As you've already so claimed in your responding comments on your blog. Yet you come here and try to obfuscate and be contrite in expressing a  seeming willingness to all of a sudden "understand" with the caveat that they pass your muster. Yet again you say, "but nobody did that". Now it's my turn to call b/s on you, Elizabeth. You simply cannot 'allow' the thought that it is possible to be a 'transexual' and a late transitioner at that. Tell me, what's your rule book you go to for this statement:

"All one gets is late transitioners telling others they must be accepted because they say so and maybe they qualify as transgendered but last time I checked people do not turn transsexual at 50."?

Dr. Benjamin, I presume? As great and compassionate a man as he was. I still cannot let go the fact that his work is not the 'be all and end all' of research into this phenonena. He himself said so and YOU know it! What assessments he made at that time are because of his work to the level of awareness and scientific biological research done and his knowledge at that time. Today there are tons more data that are arriving to show that people really are transexual even when they just say so. Regardless of their age or life's achievements. I think Dr. Benjamin probably would have signed on to the new and latest evidence being delivered. He probably would have prescribed to reassess his own standing table of group and types of ->-bleeped-<- and transexuals. No, he likely would not support the notion that transexuals and transgender people are even associated. I don't believe they are either. But, it's just my opinion, and I may be wrong on it.

The way that I see in how you represent that all coveted title of "true transexual", is like you and others who were fortunate enough to have received your 'birthing' rights from the good Doctor, are the only people who ever should be, or could be granted this 'status'. For those who have come after Dr. Benjamin's passing you won't be granted access to the 'club' unless; you never get married, have a (near written) record of proclamation from not long after birth of feeling like a girl, made that transition at the earliest of moments (regardless of others involved with your life), and are actively in pursuit of a male partner (or female if your on the opposite side of the gender being discussed here).

Well, allow me to ask this. Since we recognize that transexuals have been around for eons, who qualified them? What do we know of their pitiful existence on this earth? Not much really except as described in stories handed down from history about eunuchs and such. How do we know they didn't in some cases try to live a "normal life" rather than be chastised, ridiculed and denigrated. At least in their time. Yet, who are we to say that just because they did/or did not end up living a normal life, somehow, they simply weren't who they really thought of themselves to be. The human being is a very adaptable creature.


Dawn 

It is a medical condition plain and simple because GID can only be treated through medical means. I have read the 22 page WPATH 6th edition SOC and while (and rather unfortunately) GID is still listed as a mental health disorder, the document also makes it clear that it is a medical issue. Taking hormone replacements and using dilators for the rest of one's life is a medical issue. SRS is not "cosmetic" nor a "simple choice" for people with severe GID but considered a medically necessary and effective treatment. Women with a transsexual medical condition can be lesbian, bi, or straight. I for one am getting sick of the "transgender community" spreading disinformation about medical transsexuals in an attempt to de-legitimize our medical needs and forcibily assimilate us into their agenda.

Quote from: Valeriedances on April 23, 2011, 09:43:57 AMI am binary-minded. I am transsexual. I am post-op, post-transitioned. I am heterosexual. I am many more things, including compassionate.

I am not a proponent of the transgender umbrella, though I find myself on a transgender site. I am not in agreement with many things, but I am here still. I am hopeful that I can support and help others. To give a voice to the medical nature of this condition (which is your thread title) and work toward removing transsexuality from the DSM so the medical community can better treat transsexual people. I have made many friends here, not all with the same views. Yet, we can still get along, respect each other, and try to give support in our lives.

This pretty much describes me as well. Like Valerie I am post-op, post transition, extremely binary regarding my gender, and heterosexual.  I don't feel I belong under any umbrellas.  I never had children; I never had to personally deal with coming out to some unsuspecting wife.  I was born transsexual and knew it at age 4, was ready to die because of it by age 10.  But somehow I coped, for a while.  The details of that are very traumatic and very personal, and I won't be posting them publicly for anyone.  But if you ask me do I wish I had taken a straight path from childhood to transition?  We probably all wish that at some point, but gee while we're wishing why not wish it was never necessary at all?  The past is passed; I am healed, whole, cured, and at peace now, and I honestly never thought it could happen.  Mostly I just feel lucky to have ever made it at all.

I admit to being puzzled by the behavior of some people.  I too find I am not in agreement with a lot of what passes for transgender political correctness.  In essence, I have to say there are some things that I simply can't understand either. But one thing I am in agreement with is a low tolerance for intolerance (is that an oxymoron? lol) by any side of the gender debate.  When I see mean-spirited, hateful, ad hominem attacks on others, no matter if I agree in principle with the overall complaint or not,  it pretty much closes me off to anything else that person might have to say.  That applies just as much here as it does anywhere else.

I will say this: Sitting and passing harsh judgments on anyone is not helping any of us, or furthering any cause.  I'm glad the moderators locked that other thread because it became downright hateful.  How can we ever hope for the world to respect any of us if we can't try to respect each other?  I just  think we need to do better.

One thing I don't understand about this whole thread .. and that's the question itself: medical or mental?

My point is, that's a totally artificial distinction. Mental is part of medical ... In medical terms, physical and psychiatric conditions are part of the same whole and are often so closely intertwined that it becomes virtually impossible, and not necessarily helpful, to distinguish between the two. Anorexia, for example, is a psychiatric condition with extreme physical symptoms which, in turn, profoundly affect the patient's brain and thus their psychiatric behaviour.

To the best of my knowledge - I have been asking Maddie Secatura about this on another thread - there are no reliable physiological/genetic/brain-scan tests for what DSM V will in future define as 'Gender Incongruity'. So far as I know, the diagnostic tests are all psychiatric/behavioural. So - for the time being at least - it has to be considered as a psychiatric condition.

But so what? A condition is not any less real because its origins are in the mind.

I have a very good friend who is a forensic pathologist in New York: a real-life CSI:NY. If I were to die right now and be laid down on his dissecting table for a post-mortem, he would not be able to find any evidence that I had ever been transsexual. But from our many conversations on the subject he, like me, has no doubt that I am.

It's mental. It can have profound physical consequences. In both cases, it's medical. If you don't believe me, ask a doctor ... or a shrink.

Quote from: Valeriedances on April 25, 2011, 08:16:43 AM
Treatment is a very serious, grave issue. If treatment is denied or delayed because of political movements and backlashes, then individuals, especially our youth, are being harmed. I think this is what Elizabeth and others are saying. I agree with her on this point. There is the appearance of exploitation by political groups, that raises concern as it is alarming. While some may benefit from political causes, what is the price to others?

Valerie ... I totally agree with you that it is really important that people should get the treatment they need, the support they need and the protection from hatred, ignorance and intolerance that is their human right.

But I don't think that's what Elizabeth was talking about, particularly in her original blog. She was essentially saying that she could not understand late transitioners who have lived as straight men - especially those MTFs who have lesbian post-transition relationships, and even more so those who stay with their former partners/wives. Furthermore she suggested that they were in some way less-than-truly transsexual and did a disservice to 'true' transsexuals, who had transitioned young, having never had heterosexual male-female relationships. In Elizabeth's mindset, the ability (or necessity) to cope as a male disqualifies one from being transsexual ... and it fuels the prejudices of those doctors/psychiatrists/researchers who try to say that transsexuality is essentially a form of sexual fetish (or as she would put it 'mental') and not a genuine medical condition at all.

My personal view is that Elizabeth's attitude is an example of discrimination between transsexuals, within the transsexual community and it can only encourage and to some extent validate those who are prejudiced against us.

In other words, she is unintentionally doing precisely what she wrongly accuses late-transitioners of doing -  assisting the enemy.

But perhaps I have misunderstood her ...

I think the author's goal was simply to drive traffic to her blog, she essentially said so in her post in this thread.   Not that that is necessarily an ignoble motivation or anything, but please let's take it for what it is..

That notwithstanding, I want to say I'm with Chloe on this one.  I don't really need to repeat what she said, so I'll just leave it at that I suppose.

Leaving out the inciteful language, the medical vs. mental question is a topic worth discussing I think.  It also is a topic I've never seen us be able to handle civilly and that makes me sad for us.

Quote from: Jen on April 25, 2011, 10:15:31 AM
I think the author's goal was simply to drive traffic to her blog, she essentially said so in her post in this thread.   Not that that is necessarily an ignoble motivation or anything, but please let's take it for what it is..

That notwithstanding, I want to say I'm with Chloe on this one.  I don't really need to repeat what she said, so I'll just leave it at that I suppose.

Leaving out the inciteful language, the medical vs. mental question is a topic worth discussing I think.  It also is a topic I've never seen us be able to handle civilly and that makes me sad for us.

I agree, Jen ... which is why I'm suggesting that perhaps the argument would be less heated if we accepted that it divides us unnecessarily. Because, in the end, this is a false dichotomy, one that suggests there are medical reasons (therefore 'real') and psychological reasons (therefore 'unreal'). My point is that you can't separate one from the other and both are equally valid.

We all KNOW - as transgendered people - how we feel and who we really are. And it doesn't matter how much anyone else wants to tell us otherwise, we're going to keep on knowing it because it's real and true and valid for us. Of course it's natural that we would also want to know WHY we are the way we are ... I would love for someone to give me some kind of definitive answer. But until they can, it's just down to each one of us individually to deal with the hand we've been dealt as we see fit. To some of us that means transition and SRS, to others it means coming to terms with our gender identity while remaining the way we were born and to others again it means finding a point somewhere along the road where we feel comfortable. But wherever we choose to be, I don't think it's right for anyone else to say we're somehow less than anyone else ... or better than anyone else for that matter.

I would love to be as feminine and beautiful as you, for example, Jen, but that has not (yet!!) been my fate. We're each just doing the best we can with what we've got ...

... and good luck to us all!