Bodies Like Theirs

[Peter]

I think that someone should start a support forum called "Bodies Like Theirs - An Inter-gender Support Forum". I think that our discussions often bog down around here, because sex and gender are conflated. It does not get any better outside of this forum. I remember a conversation with a woman, who said that she believed that anyone should be able to personally identify as intersex. I disagreed with her position. In response, I asked her if anyone, man or woman should be able to personally identify as a lesbian. She quickly said no, and added that lesbians would never allow that to happen. I could see that she was somewhat startled by my question. Later, in thinking it over, I realized that she was probably conflating being intersex and being inter-gender. In my view, intersex people are people who are born with physical bodies, or physically develop at puberty, in ways that are not regularly expected in terms of sexual development. Intersex people come in all flavors, male-identified, female-identified, or self identified as a blend of both male and female, or neither male or female. I have been called "classically intersex", because I closely associate intersex with genital ambiguity, and related issues. I am still not sure what it means to be "non-classically intersex". A problem that I sometimes have with inter-gender discussions is that the conversation is often framed in a very abstract, male-oriented manner. I want to hear the specifics of inter-gender experience, not empty words. I am sure that there are many people who self identify as inter-gender, who have beautiful, funny, and interesting stores to tell about their lives, but somehow it often gets lost in the telling.

Peter

[louisev]

I have been called "classically intersex", because I closely associate intersex with genital ambiguity, and related issues. I am still not sure what it means to be "non-classically intersex". A problem that I sometimes have with inter-gender discussions is that the conversation is often framed in a very abstract, male-oriented manner. I want to hear the specifics of inter-gender experience, not empty words. I am sure that there are many people who self identify as inter-gender, who have beautiful, funny, and interesting stores to tell about their lives, but somehow it often gets lost in the telling.

Peter

I might be a case of 'non-classically intersex' because even though I was mistaken for a male before puberty, once I grew breasts I could pass as female easily enough, because most of the disordered part of my anatomy was internal - as sometimes happens with non-classical CAH, and the external parts were far enough within normal limits as to not alarm anyone. If they did, my RN mother kept them from looking closely. This has saved me from a certain amount of social abuse, but not all. Because I was much too aggressive for your average female, and because I didn't associate with nor dress in a feminine manner I was treated with a lot of hostility; but not the kind of hostility of those who are further along the male spectrum and are seen as swishes and sissies. But that has a lot to do with American culture having a much broader spectrum of tolerance for atypical "female" behavior than for "male' behavior.

Not sure if that's what you were going for, I would say I am much more of a borderline case when it comes to 'classical' intersex.

[Peter]

Hi Louisev,

On the basis of your CAH diagnosis, you are classically intersex. I am not trying to create a new catagory of intersex, but rather was just briefly using what my friend said to illustrate my general views on intersex. I don't know for sure, but I believe that being non-classically intersex would refer to what is generally known as brain intersex, wherein transgender people search for personal answers in the biology of the brain. I am not a scientist, and have not studied the evidence. Maybe the answers, that they are looking for, are in the brain. To me, it seems that the term "brain intersex" conflates gender and sex. I think that ultimately, there may very well be answers in the brain, but I leave that up to the scientists, and their investigations.

Peter

[louisev]

Hi Louisev,

On the basis of your CAH diagnosis, you are classically intersex. I am not trying to create a new catagory of intersex, but rather was just briefly using what my friend said to illustrate my general views on intersex. I don't know for sure, but I believe that being non-classically intersex would refer to what is generally known as brain intersex, wherein transgender people search for personal answers in the biology of the brain. I am not a scientist, and have not studied the evidence. Maybe the answers, that they are looking for, are in the brain. To me, it seems that the term "brain intersex" conflates gender and sex. I think that ultimately, there may very well be answers in the brain, but I leave that up to the scientists, and their investigations.

Peter

ah, I see. Yes that makes sense, with the distinction you're using. I think that it is unfortunate that transsexuals can only be diagnosed by psychiatrists due to GID being classified as a psychiatric condition, which as Peggy pointed out just now elsewhere, leads to a burden of shame as with other psychiatric diagnoses. However, that being said, the difference between a person with GID and a person without, with the exact same phenotype, genotype, and hormone levels, with apparently no other underlying condition, is indistinguishable under present medical practice, absent the subjective 'feeling' of being in the wrong body. Intersex persons have incontrovertible proof of difference.

I had always felt that I was "probably a male" until puberty proved me definitively wrong by producing the occasional menstrual period; but the difference between me and a FtM transsexual is that I didn't think the absence of male genitals - or the presence of breasts and menses - was a problem to be overcome or changed. And that's really the difference here. I didn't worry about not being a real boy because I was as male as I always was and didn't need a dick to make me pass - I wasn't trying to pass. But I wasn't upset by people mistaking me for a male either. I guess, considering the anguish that transsexuals undergo, I ought to be grateful that I have CAH instead, except for all the problems that come with THAT.

[peaceandparty]

ask yourselves this:

if there was more options to tick for sex or gender on application forms

if there was more than just male or female officially recognised

how many of you would not be able to call yourselves these sexes and genders you describe yourselves as being?

secondly:
are you always displaying 100% characteristics of your chosen or given gender and sex?
are there not days that you display other gender roles?






i am quite convinced we as people have all been lied to by the medical classification system
males cannot function in society as 100% males and male characteristics for a lifetime
females cannot function in society as 100% females and female characteristics for a lifetime!
equally intersex in the brain and intergendered,pangendered crossdressing "males"(because women supposedly are allowed wear anything) cannot function at all because the in betweens are still not recognised as anything other than weirdos!

thanks to the disorders of the medical establishment

[Peggy]

Hi all,

Peter wrote,

...I think that our discussions often bog down around here, because sex and gender are conflated. It does not get any better outside of this forum...

It's not just that. "Gender", as different people use the term, can have a lot of subtly or no-so-subtly different meanings. People are vague about what exactly they mean when they talk about "gender". Sometimes all they really differ about is the meaning of the word.

...I remember a conversation with a woman, who said that she believed that anyone should be able to personally identify as intersex. I disagreed with her position...

Sure, people can "identify" as anything they want. They can use the word "intersex" any way they want also. That's okay, just as long as it's clear whether they mean "intersex" as an observable physical condition, or something different. If they want "intersex" to mean both things at once, though, they are just playing games with words. I think that often, people do try to make the word "intersex" mean two different things at once.

Louise wrote,

...I think that it is unfortunate that transsexuals can only be diagnosed by psychiatrists due to GID being classified as a psychiatric condition, which as Peggy pointed out just now elsewhere, leads to a burden of shame as with other psychiatric diagnoses...

I meant that, but also something beyond that also.

The shame and stigma attached to being transsexual is more than just that of having a condition that has been classified as a mental disorder. People don't have the same level of concern with things like depression or anxiety, which are also psychiatric diagnoses.

The stigma of being gender variant is possibly the greatest one of all in Western culture. Even small children use pejorative terms for feminine males as insults, starting even before they know the literal meaning of the words.

Transsexuals reject the stigma of having a mental disorder, but they reject even more strongly the stigma of not living up to the expectations people have for males, and even more than that, the stigma of having a sexual "perversion" like autogynephilia. I believe people find the idea of paraphilia especially stigmatizing because of the sex-negative attitudes we are exposed to as children. Having something mixed-up about ones "identity", with nothing to do with sex, is so much more socially acceptable!


Incidentally, you mention how "... transsexuals can only be diagnosed by psychiatrists due to GID being classified as a psychiatric condition..." as though this is merely a matter of convention, but the reality is that there are no known physical markers of transsexualism.

Peter wrote,

I don't know what causes a person to be transgender, but I also reject the notion that being transgender is necessarily a mental-illness...

The question of whether transsexuality is a "disorder" or an "illness" can never be resolved because is not in the realm of objective fact, but rather, in the realm of value judgement.

A condition is a "disorder" if people don't like having it. There isn't any more objective way to determine whether something is a "disorder".

Is an infection with the Vaccinia virus a disorder? People have, in fact, died after being unintentionally infected with it. At the same time, most infections with Vaccinia have been deliberately induced by physicians for the benefit of the patient (for protection against the related but more virulent Variola virus.) During the era of universal smallpox vaccination, not having been infected with Vaccinia was treated as a "disorder" requiring treatment.

Friendly greetings to all,

Peggy

[louisev]

Hi all,

The shame and stigma attached to being transsexual is more than just that of having a condition that has been classified as a mental disorder. People don't have the same level of concern with things like depression or anxiety, which are also psychiatric diagnoses.



Very true. I remember at one time undergoing aggressive steroid treatment, and the treatment shut down my adrenal glands, (due to the undiscovered CAH), and I underwent an extreme depressive episode. It was than that I realized what depressives speak of - until then I thought it meant "sad." Sad does not begin to describe profound depression. And there's a big misunderstanding of just how debilitating some of these conditions can be.




Incidentally, you mention how "... transsexuals can only be diagnosed by psychiatrists due to GID being classified as a psychiatric condition..." as though this is merely a matter of convention, but the reality is that there are no known physical markers of transsexualism.


I believe they have started coming up with evidence of hypothalamus features as well as estrogen and testosterone levels that seem consistent among groups of transsexuals, but they are just now starting to assemble the studies. These are complicated by the fact that so many transsexual persons are taking hormone treatments, rendering hormone studies difficult.

[uriela]

I'm a transwoman and my endo said that my T level was "higher than the average bear". Now, I don't know if that is true of all transwomen. I'll be seeing him again in a week or so and I could ask him if I remember.

I've also been like this as long as I can remember. I was very good at hiding it for a very long time. I'm old enough to have been afraid of being cooped up for it. They did that in the "good old days". "Diagnosed by a psychiatrist"? The psychiatrist wouldn't have known if I hadn't told him. But others acquainted with people like me knew it right off. One of them told me she had wanted to talk to me then about it twenty years afterward. Ultimately the one who makes the diagnosis and decision is the individual involved. The psychotherapist is a facilitator, one who allows/helps you become aware and may give validation. By the time I went in it was more like turning myself in. Another individual, on the other hand, needed a bit of help out of denial. Most of us say it is the one syndrome that is self-diagnosed.

Pragmatically I believe that transsexualism is not merely psychological. For one thing, the psychological explanation was making me nuts. Against what some people think, I believe I am more sane now than when I was pretending to be male. The old books would have called my case "late onset transsexualism." There wasn't any "late onset" about it. Except for my admitting what I had been aware of, but had been denying, most of my life. The general ways of our feeling about ourselves, which are so similar, and since that is the way I have felt almost all of my life, make me believe that it is not merely psychological. I expect more corroboration of this.

The sex region of the brain is in the hypothalamus (I am so sure you will correct me if I misstate). I don't know that they have found any way to explore it except for slicing to show the area that Diamond, et al. believe is involved.

Eventually we might get GID out of the DSM. They put one of the old stalwart anti-gay therapists on the board, so we will see how that plays out. That's enough to delay things.

Don't forget there are transmen too. I have met a number of them. Another at our last PFLAG meeting. Finally one about my height! Just out of high school. They don't make the news as much as transwomen. I didn't make the news either but my coming out was a big event.

[louisev]

Pragmatically I believe that transsexualism is not merely psychological. For one thing, the psychological explanation was making me nuts. Against what some people think, I believe I am more sane now than when I was pretending to be male. The old books would have called my case "late onset transsexualism." There wasn't any "late onset" about it. Except for my admitting what I had been aware of, but had been denying, most of my life. The general ways of our feeling about ourselves, which are so similar, and since that is the way I have felt almost all of my life, make me believe that it is not merely psychological. I expect more corroboration of this.

The sex region of the brain is in the hypothalamus (I am so sure you will correct me if I misstate). I don't know that they have found any way to explore it except for slicing to show the area that Diamond, et al. believe is involved.

I have no doubt that like homosexuality, there is far more to GID than a 'psychological' component. Since we are now discovering the chromosomal location of many physically-evident disorders (i.e. CAH - which has been mapped on the genome) these locales and these features will eventually all be known. They may also come up with better treatments than the invasive surgeries as well.

[Dianne]

Having lived the experience in the 1950's I KNOW there has to be a physiological component! I KNEW from earliest childhood that I was a girl and never doubted it despite horrendous abuse, threats, and everything else directed my way to try to convince me that I was wrong, shrinks suggesting I be given testosterone to "make a man of me" and being threatened with institutionalization to "cure me of my delusion". Yet it seemed obvious to most everyone "That's a girl, not a boy" because I was so stereotypical and developed the way other girls did (socially and emotionally) - there was no "passing" as a boy - it just never worked.

Puberty indicated some kind of physiological abnormality with mixed hormone levels (mixed gonadal dysgenisys?) but by the time I came of legal age and was able to have surgery, I was highly suicidal and no one bothered to follow up on the physiological questions. Testing many decades later could not find any medical anomalies or genetic variations.

Regardless of what may or may not be found, there is no way a child would have gone through what I did if there were not some physical imperative driving it.

[louisev]

Puberty indicated some kind of physiological abnormality with mixed hormone levels (mixed gonadal dysgenisys?) but by the time I came of legal age and was able to have surgery, I was highly suicidal and no one bothered to follow up on the physiological questions. Testing many decades later could not find any medical anomalies or genetic variations.

Regardless of what may or may not be found, there is no way a child would have gone through what I did if there were not some physical imperative driving it.

Just a question for my information (I don't know alot about MGD), is it true that the only two ways of finding evidence of this condition is through a biopsy of the actual gonadal tissue, or a possibly lucky karyotyping that shows evidence of mosaicism or chimerism, so it can't easily be proven without such surgery and diagnosis? And they wouldn't do that unless there was strong external evidence of genital ambiguity?

[Dianne]

Gonadal dysgenisys can be caused by a number of factors including missing or ineffective genes, by hormonal abnormalities during development or faulty receptors but the only certain diagnosis requires histology of the gonads. Since my surgery was a charity case (the doctor waived his fee) and I had no money for anything that wasn't urgently necessary, no histology was done. Quite extensive medical testing (including genetics) was done last year but no evidence was found of any abnormality.

[Kailana]

Just a question for my information (I don't know alot about MGD), is it true that the only two ways of finding evidence of this condition is through a biopsy of the actual gonadal tissue, or a possibly lucky karyotyping that shows evidence of mosaicism or chimerism, so it can't easily be proven without such surgery and diagnosis? And they wouldn't do that unless there was strong external evidence of genital ambiguity?

Dianne Gonadal dysgenisys can be caused by a number of factors including missing or ineffective genes, by hormonal abnormalities during development or faulty receptors but the only certain diagnosis requires histology of the gonads. Since my surgery was a charity case (the doctor waived his fee) and I had no money for anything that wasn't urgently necessary, no histology was done. Quite extensive medical testing (including genetics) was done last year but no evidence was found of any abnormality

MGD just as with many conditions that fall under or within GD, there really does need to be extensive testing to determine what is actually going on. From Mosaicism to Chimerism to True-Hermaphroditism, without extensive testing ie simple Routine karyotype testing which is commonly first used can or will be missleading.

For everyone's information:

Common misdiagnosis happens for many conditions, like XX males who can be missidentified as normal males sometimes due to a small X or partial short arm deletion or translocation which causes the small x or partial x to appear in shape like a Y chromosome.

For other conditions like MGD, Ratios of cells can also vary from different sources within the same body, and a routine blood karyotype also does not check for most structural rearrangements to the so called sex chromosomes when they are looked at. PCR, Micro-array, Fish, reverse Fish and who knows how many other tests are much better for looking at chromsomes then a routine blood test.

In addition there often can be missdiagnosis of mosaicism as well as chimerism when insuffucient studies are done. ie someone might look chimeric ex: XX/XY but with further testing and i mean detailed testing, sometimes it is found that a person is not really chimeric, but mosaic due to nondisjunction, ie random uneven cell cleaving and recombination. Yet it really makes little difference on a cellular level whether one is chimeric or Mosaic, ie an XX cell line in most cases is female, and an XY cell line in most cases is male, but when there is unusual combinations of cell types, ie XX/XY or XX/XY/XO, XX/XXY, XX/XXYY or whatever, you really won't know what someone is, particularly when parents and or drs' chose a gender for someone the only way to honestly be sure what someone is, is by letting them tell us what they are. Chromosomes are well just chromosomes, they may hint at what we may be, but what any of us actually are is self determined, not assigned by others.

[uriela]

In response to Dianne, although I know she is speaking specifically of her own case, what finally made me decide to physically transition was the way my own body responds. One transwoman (who happened to have Klinefelters) said that our(transwomen's) bodies are wired differently and that testosterone is poison. At least for myself I agree.

[joneyhits]

In response to Dianne, although I know she is speaking specifically of her own case, what finally made me decide to physically transition was the way my own body responds. One transwoman (who happened to have Klinefelters) said that our(transwomen's) bodies are wired differently and that testosterone is poison. At least for myself I agree.

Being a person who no longer produces it and due to complications, can't get shots of testoserone, I find not having it is actually a liability. Woman produce it, just not as much as a normal male. I hate to use "normal," but need it to explain.

I get colds easier. I get an acne type rash on my arms. I also have no libido to speak of. It is partly the cause on my severe depression. If I didn't have good coping skills, I would be as basket case.

So I would feel that it was poison. I think some fear the effects they think it will cause. One transsexual I know actually had herself castrated to remove testosterone from her system. Telling her wife it was to help with depression. I told her, "You know they give woman testosterone in low does to help with depression and libido." To this day, she tries to tell peopel to follow her path to help with transition.

Still, to each their own.

[uriela]

joneyhits,
I had heard about eunuchs when I was nine or ten and thought it would be a good idea for me then. When puberty hit, which I had hoped it wouldn't, I couldn't stand erections and something else hit me. My grades dropped even though I still ended up being valedictorian (class of 11, whoop-de-doo) and later was a member of Mensa about 20 years ago now. After I finally came out as a woman, the treatment at work, ostracism and baiting and berating, and opposition from family, plopped me into clinical depression which was finally alleviated by castration two years later. It was gone, just like that!

There was a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman about a woman who becomes a man. She starts going out as a man and a dullness descends over her. I rather doubt that is what happens to transmen or why Gilman even wrote her short piece, but that is what puberty felt like to me. And then on. I suppose I had a low-grade depression. Luckily I have always had a good sense of humor, a feel for the ironic, but I still became an alcoholic to dull the pain. (It'll be 15 years sober this year. Yay!)

The DSM is for mental problems. So, when I first posted about transsexualism I stayed within the parameters of GID. I think it should be treated as a physiological situation, but I don't know that anyone has ever written a study in that vein. Maybe. I certainly haven't read everything.

I still have my adrenals. And I still get horny only taking estradiol. I'm a little confused by your post, but I'm not in the swim about your situation.

Ciao!

[joneyhits]

I still have my adrenals. And I still get horny only taking estradiol. I'm a little confused by your post, but I'm not in the swim about your situation.


In me, lack of testosterone causes a health risk. Doctors often give woman testosterone to help with depression and libido.

Hence why I am always curious as to why castration seems to help depression and what not. Not denying their claims, just curious. Like I wonder if hormone levels are out of balance; therefore cause depression or too much testosterone, possibly causing anxiety.

Everyone is different, so I find this fascinating. Your the third person I have heard of going through this procedure. Are there any other side effects good or bad? Like reduced beard growth. Other body changes.

As for the Arenals. I have a friend who, despite having SRS still produced a lot of testosterone and still have to take testosterone blockers for years after her surgery. Chloe Prince has also made mention of this.

[uriela]

Joneyhits,
For me it was certainly a reduction of the effects of depression: I wasn't as paranoid, I was able to concentrate more and did not get "lost" so much that I could not remember what the heck I was about just one second before. My depression was bad, bad. I am much more upbeat about things.

Otherwise, since I was still taking estradiol, my breasts did grow. My beard did not go away. I don't think it grew as fast as it did before. But then I am an old bird and my beard and now my hair are turning gray. I have lost quite a bit of my musculature. I used to be able to shovel out a road but oddly, I think I am still pretty strong. Certainly not that strong. I was in my 50's then and now am pushing 70.

I did not want to end up with osteoporosis so of course I did not stop my patch. I am worried that my cartillage has suffered. I am bone on bone in one wrist, but that could have been @<hidden> the long years of taking notes by hand.

My skin is not as oily and has much more of a tendency to be dry. My phallus, which was about 3.5 inches before, seemed to shrink into its cubbyhole. I would have to pull it out to pee. I had been sitting to pee as a matter of principle, and the pee would shoot out where I didn't want it to go if I didn't. That was a bother. But I could look at it for a change and think that it sort of looked cute nestled in the empty scrotum. (The surgeon had also removed a varicocoele and the thing, frankly, looked quite gross before.) The scrotum ceased looking like a turkey's neck. Sometimes I wished I could have taken a picture of it, it looked so cute, like a pink mushroom. Nonetheless I was not unhappy to have it gone a few years later.

I don't have to worry about having to masturbate because that thing was always giving me an irritation which I knew I could only alleviate by releasing semen. And masturbation was never easy for me and could be quite painful. But I think that stuff had finally ceased a bit before my orchie under the influence of estradiol and Proscar.

I still have to depilate and shave. The bone structures do not change. My voice did not change. I'm stuck there. I still have good nails, but I think they have more of a tendency to break. My pubic hair switched from bright orangish and having a glorious curl to being straighter and kind of kinky. More like a brillo pad. My skin is softer. My fat distribution has changed and has a tendency gravitate just above my pelvis in the back.

My hairline did not change either. But it has not receded any more.

I am told I am more bitchy now. But i can have my flare-ups and then, they will be suddenly gone, and often don't linger with them. I still hold grudges, but I am working on that.

I am still a liberal. I still am one who tries to make the peace in times of rancor. I am much more a feminist than ever, but I am accepted more as a woman and am better able to identify with the issues of feminism, as well as women's issues in general.

And I still have a tendency to get off track, which I have just done.

This is probably too much information. I just hope it helps.

;)

[joneyhits]

Thanks for your reply. Helps me understand a friend of mine more.