This Reddit post has been on my mind (cross-posted to r/ftm and r/FTMover30) all weekend: Currently, I'm a 30-something, very masculine/male passing person that ID's publicly as a gay woman (so I guess butch? like... very butch). I've been describing to her how a large portion of my social anxiety comes from first meeting folks, and that very awkward, cringe part when the other person learns I'm AFAB (like someone I know introducing me), and I feel like I can see the thoughts in their head trying to reconcile my femaleness with how I look and how the thought that runs through my head all the time is "This person thinks I'm weird. I'm so f*ing weird."
Illuminating. People come into therapy all the time looking for "answers" to why they feel the way they feel or why they've been treated poorly. Believing that there's something "wrong" with us allows us to believe in a just world: "If I weren't so xyz, I'd feel better/people would treat me better". Some of the most heartbreaking examples of this are when people have been mistreated by their parents--the desire to believe "there's something wrong with me" gives one a sense of hope and control because "If I can just fix what's wrong with me, things will be better." But that's not how the world works. We live in a world that ranks people based on shit they can't control like their sex. Women are so thoroughly blamed and gaslit that it's much easier for some to believe "I'm not a woman" than it is to believe that you're a member of a group that's been systemically oppressed (and still is) for thousands of years for no other reason than being female.
This is what people are doing to fill the God-shaped holes in their souls. As a secular non-believer, I would say that it's sad, but--sadly--it's just a human thing. Most people are very motivated by emotion and belonging.
It would be interesting for a scholar of evangelical Christianity to analyze these conversion narratives and compare them to contemporary--or even historical--Christian conversion narratives. I see a lot of connections here.
I think it's important to remember that there ARE people in the world who have genuine gender dysphoria, and maybe it is the right thing to guide those people into transitioning -- although such people should be informed right from the get-go about what is involved: hormones, multiple operations, being a life-long medical patient, etc. I do think, however, that a responsible therapist will first try to get the patient to accept herself as she is. My problem with transgenderism is that they are pushing people -- mainly children -- into transitioning who would otherwise grow out of whatever phase they are in. I think the focus of us anti-transgender activists should remain on saving children from harm (in addition to preserving women's single-sex spaces). Middle-aged people who have never been happy with themselves aren't the issue for me.
Remarkable and scary! Why is it they ignore the scar damage to the chest in "top surgery" which interferes with the functioning of the vagus nerve? This is a different version of the film, Gaslight.
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (universe, 2022)
The line about pronouns starting to hurt... I wonder how many of these children even felt "gender dysphoria" before they dove into the reddit/yt/tiktok groomosphere? It seems able to create it where it didn't exist before.
Illuminating. People come into therapy all the time looking for "answers" to why they feel the way they feel or why they've been treated poorly. Believing that there's something "wrong" with us allows us to believe in a just world: "If I weren't so xyz, I'd feel better/people would treat me better". Some of the most heartbreaking examples of this are when people have been mistreated by their parents--the desire to believe "there's something wrong with me" gives one a sense of hope and control because "If I can just fix what's wrong with me, things will be better." But that's not how the world works. We live in a world that ranks people based on shit they can't control like their sex. Women are so thoroughly blamed and gaslit that it's much easier for some to believe "I'm not a woman" than it is to believe that you're a member of a group that's been systemically oppressed (and still is) for thousands of years for no other reason than being female.
This is what people are doing to fill the God-shaped holes in their souls. As a secular non-believer, I would say that it's sad, but--sadly--it's just a human thing. Most people are very motivated by emotion and belonging.
It would be interesting for a scholar of evangelical Christianity to analyze these conversion narratives and compare them to contemporary--or even historical--Christian conversion narratives. I see a lot of connections here.
I think it's important to remember that there ARE people in the world who have genuine gender dysphoria, and maybe it is the right thing to guide those people into transitioning -- although such people should be informed right from the get-go about what is involved: hormones, multiple operations, being a life-long medical patient, etc. I do think, however, that a responsible therapist will first try to get the patient to accept herself as she is. My problem with transgenderism is that they are pushing people -- mainly children -- into transitioning who would otherwise grow out of whatever phase they are in. I think the focus of us anti-transgender activists should remain on saving children from harm (in addition to preserving women's single-sex spaces). Middle-aged people who have never been happy with themselves aren't the issue for me.
Remarkable and scary! Why is it they ignore the scar damage to the chest in "top surgery" which interferes with the functioning of the vagus nerve? This is a different version of the film, Gaslight.
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (universe, 2022)
uteheggengrasswidow.wordpress.com
These hurt to read
So Much Naval Gazing!!!
The line about pronouns starting to hurt... I wonder how many of these children even felt "gender dysphoria" before they dove into the reddit/yt/tiktok groomosphere? It seems able to create it where it didn't exist before.