Therapy to change 'feminine' boy created a troubled man, family says

AC360
By Scott Bronstein and Jessi Joseph, CNN
June 7, 2011 -- Updated 2323 GMT (0723 HKT)

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/US/06/07/sissy.boy.experiment/index.html

Editor's note: Tonight at 10 ET on CNN TV, "AC360º" examines a shocking "experimental therapy" designed to make feminine boys more masculine. See what one family says was the devastating result in a special report, "The Sissy Boy Experiment."

Los Angeles (CNN) -- Kirk Andrew Murphy seemed to have everything to live for.

Therapy to change 'feminine' boy created a troubled man, family says

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/06/07/sissy.boy.experiment/index.html?on.cnn=1
6/9/11
By Scott Bronstein and Jessi Joseph, CNN

Los Angeles (CNN) -- Kirk Andrew Murphy seemed to have everything to live for.

He put himself through school. He had a successful 8-year career in the Air Force. After the service, he landed a high profile position with an American finance company in India.

But in 2003 at age 38, Kirk Murphy took his own life.

Here's a blog entry by Spark In Darkness on the issue, including a link to a video:

http://www.sparkindarkness.com/2011/06/tragic-story-of-kirk-murphy.html

Quote from: Nemo on June 09, 2011, 12:54:15 PM
Here's a blog entry by Spark In Darkness on the issue, including a link to a video:

http://www.sparkindarkness.com/2011/06/tragic-story-of-kirk-murphy.html

The old question of nature vs nurture, solved in a way.  Here is someone who went against built in systems and was forced to live differently by conditioning or brainwashing in a way.  It only goes so far until you crack.  I cracked a similar way on the path to suicide, but got help and now i am a functioning happy member of society, unlike before. 

I seriously cried watching that video... it hit far too close to home.

After my parents divorced when I was 3, I was forced into therapy by the courts and the method of therapy was clearly Freudian as I was diagnosed as having an Oedipal complex.  My dad and stepmom used that report against me for my entire childhood to explain my effeminate behavior, and while my stepmom believed that her fist and the buckle end of a belt were the answer for everything, I got double helpings when I cried because I didn't "take it like a man."  She used to haul off and hit me for nothing more than the fact that I was a "sissy" and a "mama's boy" (her words).

I left their house to live with my mom when I was 13, but the damage was done.  By 13, I'd already attempted suicide twice on my way to over 20 attempts before I turned 27 (thankfully none in the six years since).  I had also completely suppressed my feelings of being trans and did everything possible (including a three-year marriage) to prove I was a straight man.

In the end, nothing my stepmom ever did to me worked, because I chose transition and self-acceptance over the grave.  Izumi brings up nature vs. nurture, and as soon as I rejected the idea that there was something wrong with me and my feelings were innate, the doors opened to everything else I could do.

And here's that effeminate little thing my stepmom tried to destroy, but couldn't...