Peter's comments on fixed gender identities

[Morgan]

Hi Peter and Sophie

I found your comments in the thread on "CAH and raised male" thought provoking.

... I am very much is favor of changing the world in which people feel that they have to conform to "male" and "female" gender roles. My mentioning the difficulties in challenging these roles was not meant to imply, in any way, that we should not challenge them. I respect you, as a person with 5aRD, for identifying as female. When I look inside my heart, I find very little that I consider male. On the other hand, although I sometimes feel "female", I am also generally clueless about what it means to be female. The other day, my father mentioned to me that the most perplexing aspect of my life, in his eyes, is that I do not have what he called a "stable identity". He said that he had seen a lot in his life, but is at a loss concerning my situation. I felt like joking with him, that not having a stable identity might not be as bad as he imagines. But that conversation is for another day. Heck, maybe I could even make some money out of my situation, by offering myself to medical conferences as a living example that sex assignment for intersex children does not always work. Or, maybe I could even help ISNA revise their guidelines on gender assignment for intersex children because it is too normative in its present form ;-).

I can fully empathize with your situation, Peter.

At my last endo appointment, my preferred endocrinologist actually asked me how I was feeling (!), and we ended up in a long conversation which is kind of relevant. Testosterone replacement isn't working for me. It's all tied up with my feelings about surgery and getting fixed. And I don't particularly miss it. I'm taking very low doses and they're worried about osteoporosis. So am I: I've asked a couple of times about Fosamax. A decision about this won't happen until after a planned bone density scan. But the endocrinologist mentioned oestrogen as an option and then went off telling or asking me something about changing roles.

I wasn't sure what she was on about, but she returned to the issue a bit later on. Forgive me for saying this, but heterosexuals tend to have very strange notions about roles in gay relationships, and so I commented on my own experience there (which I don't plan on doing here at BLO). I realised only afterwards that she was actually asking me about gender identity, and she confirmed this by telephone when she gave me my latest test results. Sure, I've questioned my gender identity, a lot. But I don't really know the first thing about being a woman and I can't say that I feel like one. I'm not sure that I know that much any more about being a man, either, and my ex didn't feel that I was enough of one.

I also had a letter in a newspaper recently, and it was picked up on by a right-wing commentator who spent much of a paragraph wondering whether I was male or female as he couldn't tell from my name. The term "s/he" was very pointedly used...

I suppose that I know what I'm not, and I'm used to a degree of ambiguity in how I feel, and in how people respond to me without seeing or hearing me first (no ambiguity there). But I also have less confidence than I used to. That's a bit different to not having a stable identity. Do you (or does your father mean) that your sense of self really changes?

Er, my test results were all roughly normal except low testosterone, btw, and I renewed my prescription for testosterone.

Morgan

[Dana Gold]

I feel that the requirements for a stable identity development (whether gender or otherwise) are dependant upon one's own core feelings and unobstructed evolution of such and the level of support or antagonism from one's family and other environmental/social origins. I use the term resistance in the phrase 'gender resistance syndrome' to imply resistance and/or denial from the environment and the self. An example would be the term gender identity "disorder". The etiology of such a disorder has its ground in the resistance and antagonistic psychological and physical influence by others upon the child in question (who is also questioning his/herself) Whether people believe intrinsic identity is nature or nurture is a moot point, for logically, both interact with each other to form a "stable identity"......hence the intrinsic self being the foundation and the environment's causes and effects upon the child being the "scaffolding" for future growth or "skewing" of the child's sense of self. Therefore when one's behaviour and or physical characteristics do not coincide with the environment's "choice" of our upbringing, then it is the child that is left without a nurturing support mechanism to evolve naturally. I base the above statements upon my own experience wherein I know that I was not "allowed to" development my own sense of self and was confused already at an early age; even to the point that the concept of male and female had no meaning to me because I believed that I was not "one of them". I transitioned to female in the hopes that such would provide normalcy for me (in the gender and sexual sense) that I could be a she, instead of a she-male. Alas, that is not the case because society still looks at me as a she-male...as they did in my puberty...which is just what I am anatomically This denial of my self, from "them" (leading to denial from me) has once again led me to believe that I can never really be "one of them".....and don't want to be....so I am left with just being myself....which is now predominantly gender female, with male having been interspersed within my physical, social, and psychological evolution.....I fluctuate (with female as the base) between female and an emasculated female, depending upon who I interact with and adjust my behaviour to "meld" with the person/s involved. I have noticed that some males (from those who know and those who knew me as my "former" self ) seem "put off" if I, in their minds' eyes act too female .......so I adjust slightly to male. If just me. myself, and I; well, it is predominantly female with "traces of male"....memories of it, that is. And yes, it is part of my evolution, so, logically, it is a part of me. That's how I have evolved; and I think that it cannot be regarded, like Peter mentioned, as a so-called "normal" stable identity, because it did not evolve into solid male or female. Therefore such a "stable identity" for many here at BLO is perhaps not be to regarded as a goal, or a necessity since some of our histories and evolutions have had mixed elements of the primaries (the binaries) forced upon us in the physical and or psychological sense, while struggling to independantly achieve a sense of self.....resulting in an "ersatz being". Add being "queer-bodied" to such a struggle and the effects of trying to "fit in"; and so-called gender dysphoria is literally to be expected....if left alone, that evolution of self (physically and psych-socially) would have been vastly different .....and more natural.....maybe there would have been a different outcome and sense of identity and gender., who can really say?...or, perhaps being "gender dysphoric" is somewhat normal for many here, whilst "heteronormity" is alien, because that concept has alienated us...i.e: being regarded as alien and/or not normal by the "normals". I regard the established norms of the physical and psycho-social binaries as "ersatz" and "man-made" for in nature that is not the case, and it certainly wasn't with me....and the term gender dysphoria is the effect of the cause of "violating" heteronormativity and being "queer-bodied" from early infancy or puberty.....and it is such people who have been "artificially raised" that must now pay the price for others' ignorances or worse. I feel especially pained because , if indeed, as I strongly suspect, that my mother took DES during her pregnancy with me; then humans "created" me certain aspects of my original, self....and I am only the "ersatz" result of that and of then future psycho-social (forcible male) and hormonal machinations (testosterone) upon me...(my surgery at 6 yrs was necessary to be able to pee) ..another reason for my transition and rejection of "normalcy"...to undo and reverse their sh*t...a matter of principle and satisfaction for my life, not theirs.....even though I may be perceived to be a psycho-social (gender) and anatomic "floater" .....which I see as quite normal.

Soooo, in light of all I've "said"....should it be that not being/feeling (gender identity) unequivocally male or female is an abnormal thing? Why does it have to be that way, to be considered "stable"? And whose criteria of "stable" should it satisfy?....yours or "theirs"? Does the concept of stable equal the concept of "fixed"...Can one be a "floater" and still be said to have a stable sense of self?


Dana :whipg:

[Dana Gold]

As an additional note to the post and topic of "gender dysphoria" of mine above: I used the term gender dysphoria to imply the concepts of not feeling either male or female; elements of both or neither, or oppositional body gender-sex; with or without accomanying confusion or distress. Not like many in society intrepret that to automatically mean transgendered or transsexual. I have read news stories or heard of certain individuals being "diagnosed" with gender dysphoria or gender identity "disorder" and that the individual is at once considered to be a trans person because of it.

Example:

Mr Abery was diagnosed with gender dysphoria, which meant he identified as being a woman.

http://bunbury.yourguide.com.au/detail.asp?class=news&subclass=local&category=general%20news&story_id=413072&m=8&y=2005

That concept, which reeinforces the binary, is perhaps another aspect of society's erroneous intrepretation of elements of trans and intersex experience and reality. Being gender dysphoric or having gender identity issues does not always equate to transsexuality or being "transgendered".....as some individuals here in BLO can testify to. Society is largely ignorant of the fact that in many instances an individual has been "made" gender dysphoric. That is, just because they don't feel, consider themselves to be solid male or female (whether intersex, trans, or largely hetero even)..and society having a "problem with it" , may cause socio-psychological distress within the (improperly) diagnosed individual....that is, they in many instances may be really suffering from reactive stress and anxiety/depression tied to societal rejection/alienation and/or self-denial from fear of such....something that when the truth of one's experience and existence has been physically altered , muddied and hidden causes a subliminal "twilight zone" feeling.....gender "dysphoria" and "disorder", indeed! :rolleyes2 :sarcastic

Anyway,

Dana :pizza: :confused6

[Morgan]

Hi Dana

Thanks for your posts - there's lots of food for thought in both of them.

I had hoped to give a better response before now, but I've too much work to do, and I've just found out that I have to do a medical - today - to support a visa application. Not fun, because there's too much that I have to write :(

M

[Dana Gold]

I should clarify one more point to the subject of gender "dysphoria". A person may have their very own well-formed gender identity early on; however the identity becomes dysphoric (abnormal) when outside influences or coersions (nurture) resist or are in "disagreement" with and in conflict with the person's intrinsic self (nature). Much of society and the medical/psych community would have us believe that the person's self (nature) is the initiator of conflict with the environment (nurture); thereby pathologizing the person as the "problem" and absolving the environment (be it peers, parents, and the community) of responsibilty or blame. In effect the victims become the perpetrators when situations arise where such persons are looked and acted upon (determined to be a "threat' to themselves and society) by reactionary/homophobic medical, psych, and fundamentalist religious groups as being mentally disturbed (psychiatric disorder), and/or an abomination to God (homosexual)

:pizza:

[Peter]

Dana, I like your term "gender resistance syndrome". I have always hated the term "gender dysphoria" as it makes gender issues sound like a bad thing. On a couple of occasions, when I have told my story of not being allowed to join the Cub Scouts, people who I assumed to be MTF, came up to me afterwards and said that they did not want to join the Cub Scouts as children. I love it.
How does one assign a gender? One of the deeply troubling aspects of Dr. Money's approach to David Reimer is that he wanted David and his twin brother doing mock "humping" exercises to re-inforce David's gender assignment. How can one distinguish between "good" gender assignment and "bad" gender assignment? Is not gender assignment inherently problematic?
As I think back to my childhood as an intersex person, two aspects of my gender assignment were problematic independently of my androgynous physical appearance. The first was that my genitals were sexually ambiguous, in that I have vaginal genital features that most men lack. The second, and this was also personally very painful, that at the age of seven after a discussion of my situation with my mother, I realized that I might not go through puberty in the way that other children did. My connection with the storybook character Peter Pan was very deep, in that I felt that I might never grow up. When I was seven, I remember for months on end, thinking about these two issues nearly every day as I walked to school.
Infant genital surgery is often crude in the way that Dr. Money's approach to David Reimer was crude. With many infant genital surgeries, the child will be aware of having a body that is different regardless of the intentions of the surgery to normalize genital appearance. I feel that infant genital surgeries that are not medically necessary are mostly done for the comfort of parents and other people. As it often destroys key aspects of a child's future sexuality, it is definitely not done for the comfort of the child.
I sometimes wonder about those studies where doctors go to places like India, and ask intersex children if they would want infant genital surgery if it had been available. In the first place, asking a child is in some respects already making them a moral agent in their own destiny, something that is routinely denied to intersex children in countries where infant genital surgeries are routinely done. Second, I wonder if the researchers fully describe the devastating effects that clitoridectomies and the surgical removal of micro-penises can have on a person's sexuality to the people they are studying. I fully agree with the San Francisco Human Rights Commission finding that infant genital surgeries, if not medically necessary, are a violation of an intersex person's human rights if performed without the informed consent of the intersex person. Beyond that, I believe that voluntary genital surgeries should be available to adult intersex people, just as sex re-assignment surgeries should be routinely available to transsexual people.

p.s. Morgan, I know that you asked me a couple of questions, and I am still thinking about them.

Peter

[Morgan]

Hi both

I like the 'gender resistence syndrome' term, too. Although I think I'm more of an abstentionist myself :umno:

This discussion is really helpful, but I can't say that I'm happy there's a diagnosis for the situation. More medicalization.

btw, I've just finished reading Alice Domurat Dreger's book "Intersex in the Age of Ethics". It's probably a little old now, but took me a long time, largely because the testimonies were so powerful and painful. It's not a light read. And I've seen my own story echoed in others' experience of surgery.

M

[Dana Gold]

I used the term gender resistance syndrome in reference to the perceivers, not the perceived. Depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress are normal psychological reactions to rejection, fear of and actual torment from those persons "suffering" from this resistance syndrome, especially when "they" try to "correct and control" the perceived and prejudged "gender bender". Diagnosis?...no, not really...no scientific data or religious dogma to back it up....just my opinion that the concept of a willfully established and chosen concept of so-called heteronormalcy (gender resistance syndrome) causes a lot of psychological damage to those who aren't "like they are"...and physical damage , too, as in "normalizing/corrective" genital surgeries and hormonal procedures.
Like someone once said: it's not such people (labeled queer, freaks etc.) that need to change, it's the society that looks down upon them.

[Morgan]

Hi Dana

What you're saying makes complete sense to me: you could be talking about my own experience, not just generalities and genital surgery, but also other gender-normative surgery.

On "diagnosis", I was really commenting on the use of gender dysphoria as something broad, rather than your gender resistence syndrome. A friend has also recently pointed out to me a "catch all" part of the US diagnostic categories that seems to include everyone who doesn't fit social gender norms.

Something that I find more than a little painful is that gay men tend also be strongly "heteronormative" in your use of the word. That is, gay men seem to strongly police the gender norms that I don't conform to. Transgressive behaviour is only really acceptable if it's for parody and entertainment - the drag queen on stage.

Morgan

[Dana Gold]

Transgressive behaviour is only really acceptable if it's for parody and entertainment - the drag queen on stage.
Yes, I have seen it myself. I once (last year) went to a "gathering" where most everybody there knew me and/or "of me". Later on, a skit was on stage with 2 men dressed up as housewives. The audience and emcee consistently referred to them as she and women. In my interaction with the audience before, during, and after the gathering, they (except for a couple of women friends) consistently referred to me as a he and a man amongst each other and to my face.; one even said to me something like this; "hey, guy!, the one with the apron, she was really funny, huh"!? I looked about the same as I do in the pic above and many people were aware of the seriousness of my life's experiences and "what I was doing" (i.e trans) because I had related such in front of a group of people in prior "gatherings"; yet the 2 on stage were seen as female as long as it "amused them". I guess I was not very amusing to many, and of course, some of these "let me know it", in their own "unique" ways :sarcastic...
gay men seem to strongly police the gender norms
One gay man I knew at the time (early on...in my "coming out") ,even laughed when I told him about my hypogonadism and how I looked in puberty.....I guess that was amusing to him. :sarcastic ....and later scrunched his face into a frown when I told him I was going to do the transition to female. We were friends before that and he avoided me like the plague thereafter, as many of the males I knew did (and some women, too).

:sarcastic

[Morgan]

Hi Dana

I'm sorry that you've had those experiences.

My worst experience was with my last partner - we split after well over 6 years, public commitment and a shared house, because I wasn't man enough. Two surgeries - one medically necessary (and most problematic for him) and the other socially necessary (and wholly negative to me) - were the last straw.

Reactions can vary. I er, came out, to two gay friends a couple of months ago. This was really supportive, and I thought that it would be, because one of them is good friends with a transman, and was a close friend during his transition.

Another, and much older, friend who I was talking to last weekend, just could not comprehend my feelings about the breast surgery. I guess he wouldn't cope very well with a friend transitioning, either...

For me, this has become a barrier to intimacy. But I suppose that I'm not unique in that.

all the best

Morgan

[Dana Gold]

After listening and reading many others' relationship experiences and reaping the effects of prior relationship and social experiences, I'm glad I'm not (intimately and/or closely) involved in such, whether "romantic", family, or otherwise anymore.... and for the most part do not ever want to be again. At this period in my life I enjoy life with me, myself, and I. I have a handful of friends, who I occassionally interact with and co-workers who I get along well with.. but for the most part, I like being a quasi-loner, especially in my private life.

Dana

[Peter]

Why be NoRmAL?? Thanks Dana for sharing your struggles. I was never very good myself at drag. I guess that I am not funny.

Peter

[Morgan]

Hi Peter

Thanks for sharing yours, too. And for sharing your picture. It's a bold step but, from where I'm sitting, it's great to put a face to your name :)

all the best

Morgan

[uriela]

Please excuse some trannie episodes.

I had finally decided to announce myself. Oh, I had gone to other meetings
in a dress before, but this time I showed up at a meeting in a mini-skirt.
One guy in particular was there who showed (if not feigned) great glee at
seeing me this way and was cracking jokes and laughing. I don't know why
I wasn't ashamed and was instead amused at his merriment. I forgot how
this played out. I know that I stayed for the rest of the meeting. Some of
my friends who knew me quite well were also there, one of whom still sticks
up for me.

Later on there was another person who also cracked jokes at me. One time he went to a different gathering which I did not go to, and made a fool of himself in a dress and net hose, running around flicking up the back of his skirt. We were in the habit of hugging after meetings and church and when I came to him, he was cracking jokes, and, I don't know what came over me, I kissed him on his neck! He drew back and had his fist ready to punch me out. I thought I was out of reach, but maybe because others were there,
he did not hit me. Afterwards, he told people about his great forebearance
in not pounding me to a pulp.

I told this on a list and was told that you NEVER kiss a homophobe. Well, I
did.

The outright homophobes were not the worst part. When I told my wife and she FINALLY believed me, her jaw dropped to the floor, she said that I had better seek counseling and get on with it and, since she was leaving for a week, find another place to stay and be out when she returned. She was crushed and I was crushed. But I did not move since I was paying the mortgage. We are better friends than ever, just not husband and wife, but that is another story and we still live in the same house.

A year and a half later I passed a letter to my supervisor, not thinking it would lead to my coming out at work. I was already showing breasts and there were remarks and kidding. There were a group of three of us who were in the habit of smoking together. We called ourselves The Three Musketeers.
:wavey: :wavey: We were close. They knew about my feelings.

The "coming out" was orchestrated by my therapist and our office and our
partners in the college attended. One person's comment was that "Now we
are going to have a man in a dress parading around here." At least the
whole college did not come. I could not say anything. Part of it is that
I am not good at public speaking, most of all when it involves myself.

A process started which I called "shunning". People would just not talk
to me and avoid me. One of the Musketeers would not talk to me at all.
The other, who had been a consistent defender, would argue with me.
Once she almost had harassment charges brought against me, but that
died when it was pointed out what she herself had done. One instance
with another co-worker instigated an investigation and was another
standoff. I approached a person I thought was a union steward and
mentioned bringing up harassment charges. She said she would try
to arrange a confab with management, but when she broached the
question to the office manager, he nixed it in no uncertain terms. She
was a bit cowed about the meeting and told me she had to back off.
Another union steward had already told me that she was not going
to be involved in this. At one point the office manager told me,
"People like you have to be tough," and he would not ease the
situation. My behavior went under the microscope.

For your information this is an almost all-female office.

In the meantime my wife went into the hospital. My step-son told
me, at her behest, that I was not to show up there in women's clothes.
I did, although I tried to avoid her family when I showed up. The
office manager told my therapist that if I stopped coming to the
office as a woman all the problems would be solved. She said she
did not think that I would agree to that. She was right. I did not
even entertain it as an option.

I lapsed into depression. I still tried to do my work. But I found it
hard to make any decision. I had to depend on my friends, who
are almost all not gender-variant or even gay. Sometimes I did not
even remember where I was. I almost did not know how to relate to
people.

That period is over, but there are still times when I walk into a room
and someone I have known for a long time acts as if they don't even
know me and that hurts. It almost makes me feel as if I weren't there.

"Dysphoria" is defined as "Abnormal depression and discontent". My
initial dysphoria was not in having my gender identity mirrored back
at me from the people I met. It was/is not a condition that is solely
dependent on me. The worst dysphoria was due to rejection of my
gender identity by those closest to me. That led me todisbelieve my
true feelings.

Before I started writing this I had an image of the musketeer who
still does not talk to me. And I was thinking of how much hurt I
have done to her. How could I dare to present her with such a
thing? I hope she overcomes her gender dysphoria.

Uriela

:wavey:

[Dana Gold]

still times when I walk into a room
and someone I have known for a long time acts as if they don't even
know me and that hurts
Yes, well, I used to feel bad about it, too....and I would feel "slapped in the face" and sad when I encountered long-time acquaintences that avoided me and/or gave me hard stares ....nowadays I don't give a da*n....I'm glad not to know them anymore, and it's wholly ok that they "leave me alone"...However I still get irked when they make ignorant remarks about me in front of others and in my presence; in which case I just leave or in some cases I have "avoided" them....hah, hah, hah!! :happy45: ....fork them! :sarcastic

:whipg: