This is probably very offensive to everyone. (**skip down to question if you don't want risk being offended**) But I've been thinking. There must be something that's messed up in our heads, because our bodies are fine. But we still have this urge to change it. Even if it will never really look normal. And I've read about people who think that it's not a mental illness. Which I found extremely weird. How could you think that it's not? I mean, really?

And sometimes I even have a hard time believing myself. Not about the fact that I have constant dysphoria and is very close to just cutting my chest off and bleed to death. But, that I'm not crazy. Like my doctor said when I talk to him for the first time (he's the one who will then prescribe hormone blockers and T and what not). He said that the reason they change the body, is because they don't know what's wrong in the brain. And I gotta tell you, I've seen countless of questions asking, "if there was a pill that would make you feel like your body is right, would you take it?" And people say, "no.". WTF?? I understand some people are different but what the hell?

That would be the ultimate ->-bleeped-<-ing pill, I'd swallow it in a hearbeat. I'd do anything to feel comfterable the way I am.
And I'm really starting to worry because I'm really starting to feel like looking into those things like, where you "fix" the brain. Although I haven't done it yet. Kinda like those camps making gay people straight type of deals. Because I'm just ->-bleeped-<-ing tired of it all, and I'll try anything.

**QUESTION**:
How can people say or even think, that it's not a mental illness, or a disorder? I don't understand.

It is a physical birth condition characterized by a brain-body mismatch. Literally a male brain structure in a female body or vice-versa and this has been seen in autopsies. Men have twice as many somotostatin neurons (cells that are in the central part of the gender identity bed in your brain) as women. The number of neurons of an MTF transsexual is similar in the female range and the number of neurons of a FTM transsexual is in the male range.

It is therefore a physical condition with psychological symptoms.

By the way, I understand your question and am not offended - I once thought the same way.

Quote from: AbracaDebra on October 04, 2011, 02:15:13 AM
Well, that question has got me very varied responses, but those that can think logically all say of course they would take it.  If it made everything right who wouldn't !  I mean, who does not want everything right !

I would not take the pill because doing so would change everything that makes me who I am; kind of like a lobotomy. I'd be unrecognizable personality-wise, and what good is that?

Hi Thomas I think this is one of the question that doesn´t have one right answer. There are many things in the world that we don´t fully understand. Things are not only black and white. And our mother nature do mistakes - we think that they are mistakes but it´s just the way the things are. Not good, not bad. They are. And I think it´s not a mental illness. Each and every living being has two parts - the physical body and the mental soul. If everything is allright, the body and the soul are the same. But sometimes they can be different - a male body can have a female soul and vice versa. The question is - what part is ill? Body? Soul? Does it have to be ill? Why? The body is healthy. The soul is healthy. But they just aren´t the same. I don´t see any illness there... And no mental illness at all. I think the soul is much more important than the body and that the body is like a house for the soul.  The body helps the soul to live in this material world. The male and female souls have different needs. So if they were born into the bad house, they have to move

Speak for yourself, not for the group, unless elected to do so.

If you want so much to be insane, perhaps consider that transsexualism is real, you just don't have it. Have you spoken to a therapist? I am sure many will be glad to tell you what's wrong with you. Run with it.

I just don't make it my whole life. There are way worse things in life than being trans.

I find that so many trans people become so obsessed with their dysphoria and social roles and acceptance that they seem to think that their problems are the absolute worst and that no one understands their kind of pain. Ever.

Get over it, who gives a ->-bleeped-<- if it is a mental illness or not. It is what it is, what you do about it is your call.

I think it's  safe to say that everyone is f'd up in the head. And technically, it is a mental illness, because last I remember it's  in the DSM. But in any case, there are more explanations for people like us, maybe moreso than homosexuals.

Quote from: JPurcell on October 04, 2011, 08:41:45 AM
I think it's  safe to say that everyone is f'd up in the head. And technically, it is a mental illness, because last I remember it's  in the DSM. But in any case, there are more explanations for people like us, maybe moreso than homosexuals.

Homosexuality was once in the DSM. Do you think a gay or a lesbian is F'd in the head too? Do you follow your convictions based upon what is in the published pages of a debated manual? Or do you think on your own?

I know this is in the FTM section but the question kinda reaches to all trans.

If you all wanna think you are mentally insane or ...how you put it "f'd in the head" then be my guest. It's your mentality and not mine.

For me, my brain is perfectly fine. I am not f'd in the head. Had to take a psychiatric exam to be Ordained in the Church. Had to take one to be a police officer. I am sane.

My body is simply transitioning to what my brain feels. My body is wrong. My brain is right.

So, no. Not everyone is f'd in the head. Sorry

I could make a very long post about why its not a mental illness but I will try make it short.

for me its more a question about our sociaty than about our Brain.

to have another gender identety than our body isnt abnormal, it happent in many culture and times, and in the animal world as well as the human world that our gender and sexualety is fluent. but its not all place who wanna belive it, we have alot of strucktures and unwritten rules about how men and women should be and what is right and wrong, and its rule we from place to place make up ourself but not nessesarry true.
I dont see us as ill but as diffrent from what is expected of us,
to be ill is for me is not the same as being diffrent. we are all diffrent but we arnt all ill. somethimes we just get in this situation where being diffrent is not accepted or dont fit in, and then people say we are ill because its more easy.

but I wont disagree our brain could be diffrent. I think its very likely it is,
but there is alot of people who has diffrent brains, in fact we are all diffrent.
----------
I usunally say yes I am f** up but not because im transgender.

what in our sociaty makes us mentall ill or healthy is more a question what we find accepting or not.
homosexualety have been mentall ill and are still someplace where other place there fine, its not because there sick somewhere and healthy other places, its because there accepted someplaces and some places they are seen as being sick people.
--------
when we talk about chancing body then I feel it also as much a question about sociaty again.
to be honest I would like to have a male body, but if sociaty just accepted me as a guy even with my body then I guess I wouldnt be so worked up about it. I think this is not only a question on transgender people but ALOT of people in general.
we get jugded alot on our looks sadly but true.

Quote from: Annah on October 04, 2011, 08:58:20 AM
Homosexuality was once in the DSM. Do you think a gay or a lesbian is F'd in the head too? Do you follow your convictions based upon what is in the published pages of a debated manual? Or do you think on your own?

I know this is in the FTM section but the question kinda reaches to all trans.

If you all wanna think you are mentally insane or ...how you put it "f'd in the head" then be my guest. It's your mentality and not mine.

For me, my brain is perfectly fine. I am not f'd in the head. Had to take a psychiatric exam to be Ordained in the Church. Had to take one to be a police officer. I am sane.

My body is simply transitioning to what my brain feels. My body is wrong. My brain is right.

So, no. Not everyone is f'd in the head. Sorry

When I say, "F'd in the head" I mean different. I do not mean it literally. And no, I do not follow the DSM religiously. I just know that it at least gives some explanations for people like us, instead of just calling us disordered. Maybe your opinion of the DSM is skewed, but all that it attempts to do describe the "disorders".
I'm not calling homosexuals mentally disordered, I'm just saying that they are different than the "norm", and again, when I say "f'd in the head" I mean different. I did not mean to seem argumentative. I was just stating that everyone is different in their own way.

Quote from: Da Monkey on October 04, 2011, 07:39:00 AM
I just don't make it my whole life. There are way worse things in life than being trans.

I find that so many trans people become so obsessed with their dysphoria and social roles and acceptance that they seem to think that their problems are the absolute worst and that no one understands their kind of pain. Ever.

Get over it, who gives a ->-bleeped-<- if it is a mental illness or not. It is what it is, what you do about it is your call.

^ agreed. Suffering is part of the human condition. We all go through pain, we're all tormented by something whether we realize it or not. The poor suffer every day and see their own suffering in their lack of housing and food, while the rich blindly suffer their own pride and greed. People suffer from disease, loss, natural disaster, discrimination, abuse. It sucks being trans, it sucks having to crush one's chests or genitalia just to appear to the world as the way you see yourself. It sucks to have to fork out hundreds to thousands of dollars just to make our bodies look and feel the way we want and it sucks to have to go under the knife to do it. But there are people who literally HAVE to have body parts removed just to survive an extra year and some can't even afford it either.

I have to admit though, if someone offered me a pill to end my dysphoria and make me want to wear women's clothes and call myself "Amanda", I'd question said person's motives. I like being messed up more than I like the idea of being forced to fit into that role. On the other hand, if someone could offer me a way of being completely, 100% male in every single way, I'd also turn that down. Being what I am is being who I am, this is a part of my suffering as much as my financial instability, my chronic pain, my lack of a mother. It's no worse or better suffering than anyone else's, it's just mine. It's what I understand and to be honest, if I were given a chance to "fix" it, I'd miss it.

Here's the thing, in life, you either stand on top of a pile of ->-bleeped-<-, or you stand in it. The choice we have isn't whether or not we deal with ->-bleeped-<-, but whether or not we let it overwhelm us. We are trans. It's ->-bleeped-<-ty but we either run with it, or let it overrun us.

Actually, I believe that I took the MMPI and I'm the most normal person my psychologist has ever seen. My results are better than hers, and the only abnormality anywhere on the thing was a gender disorder. HOWEVER, it's not a MENTAL disorder. Yes, our brains think differently. Trans individuals have a different brain development than those found to be typically in the "norm" within our society. Studies show that it's a difference in white brain matter, and last I checked a physiological disorder of the brain(yes, it's the brain, but it's a PHYSICAL abnormality) is still a PHYSICAL problem.

I don't want anyone in my family to read this. They would suggest that I'm merely clinically ill. That's why we all have to see therapists. To make sure we're NOT ill or a danger to ourselves or anyone else. Some people want to change their body just for the general appeal of changing their body to reflect anarchy and a sense of rebellion against their general social group. That is not what trans people do. We have ALWAYS felt that we belong in a body unlike our own, and it's up to us to modify it in a way that makes us happy.

My brain tells me I'm male. Brains develop before genitalia. Therefore I am male. Besides that, we can't exactly MODIFY OUR BRAINS now can we? It's much more cost effective, healthy, and generally well adapted to modify the body that gives you grief. My brain is fine. I'm an intelligent young lad in university studying cell biology and I graduate in a year. If I was clinically insane, I don't quite see how that could be a reality.

And Da Monkey, you're right.

I don't make it my entire life either. I don't shout it from the rooftops and I don't run rapid in the streets. I merely know this is a small part of who I am, yet realize that it's not WHO I am.  However, it isn't a mental disorder. That much is proven.

Quote from: Thomas. on October 04, 2011, 02:01:37 AM
**QUESTION**:
How can people say or even think, that it's not a mental illness, or a disorder? I don't understand.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20032-transsexual-differences-caught-on-brain-scan.html

Quote from: Da Monkey on October 04, 2011, 07:39:00 AM
I just don't make it my whole life. There are way worse things in life than being trans.

I find that so many trans people become so obsessed with their dysphoria and social roles and acceptance that they seem to think that their problems are the absolute worst and that no one understands their kind of pain. Ever.

Get over it, who gives a ->-bleeped-<- if it is a mental illness or not. It is what it is, what you do about it is your call.

Agreed. I've watched my mom go through spinal surgery and fear that she might lose use of her right arm. While there are worse things than even that, that was my wake up call to realize it could be so much worse.

I also agree with Annah. It's my body problem not my brain. Nothing wrong with expressing how you think or feel Thomas, only saying that I disagree.

I honestly dont think I am mad.
The gender of my brain just differs from that of my body... that is all there really is to it.

That you BECOME nearly insane because of this situation... that is a different story.

Quote from: JPurcell on October 04, 2011, 08:41:45 AMAnd technically, it is a mental illness, because last I remember it's  in the DSM.

It's in the DSM because it's a statutory disorder. There isn't a test for transsexualism that can be done whilst you're alive. The only way to have it diagnosed is by talking about the symptoms.
The brain structures of transsexuals have been proven to be similar to those of cis individuals of their gender. It is a physiological disorder, not psychological.

Thomas mind rules body and if I had a choice of making body to fit mind with a pill then I would do it.

Think how many pills and shots we take to try to make our body fit image in our mind!

............

Just like general population trans community also has depression and anxiety.  In fact it seems to be higher than general population.  Fixing one thing does not mean something automatically gets fixed.

............

I asked a close friend if getting a vajayjay solved her issues and she gave me an answer that made sense to me.  She said when I lived as a male I always needed to get back to being a female and now that I live as a female I have no need to get back to living as a male.  That was only big difference for her.

Yes I am certainly confused and glad to talk to people  that might understand.  However real weird thing is I feel better doing things that reduce confusion.

I do believe trans is yet another variation in nature and nature would say variation is quite normal.

hehe hey come now our brains are perfect just our moms kinda built us the wrong bodies a pity but hey move on not saying  i ain't a total f'd brain tho i mean i stabbed a kid for trying to spit on my school project that made me laugh until i went to court  hehe oh well but yea its not a big deal  to have a girls mind or boys mind just don't waste it any who hmmm i say everyone's diff lets not assume anything

I don't think there's anything wrong with either my brain or body.  It's just like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.  There's really only how much shoving into a wrong form someone can take.