torn

[emmicd]

i have been talking to so many therapists lately my head is spinning. they all have different views and i feel so confused now. all i know is that my feelings are very real and i know in my heart and soul i am female.

the conflicting opinions are driving me crazy and i am so torn.

if i went to a therapist well versed in gender issues would i finally find the answers i already know in my heart and finally reach a concensus.

the differing opinions do not help me at all. i realize it is good to have a second opinion but when they are totally opposite i feel like i am getting nowhere.

have others faced this confusion in their efforts in learning who they are? i am a male to female ts but i feel held back.

i am in such a tizzy about this!

i am torn!

emmi

[Danika140]

Emmi,

My initial roadblock was picking a random therapist to talk with. Despite her claim to being TS/TG experienced, she ended up not knowing much about it. I spent a lot of money "educating" her on what a TS/TG is rather than progressing forward with the therapy sessions for HRT. I finally had enough and started looking for therapists specially for Gender Identity Disorder and would call them to ask questions to gauge their experience and knowledge before I would even schedule an appointment. So far that has been working but it takes time to research therapists and call them.

I am like you in that I know without a doubt that I am a TS and want to transition yesterday. However, keep your head up, stay focused, patient and relaxed and you'll find the answers you seek in time.

v/r
Danika

[Bree-asaurus]

Emmi, I can't recall from previous threads what kind of town or city you live in. But do you have a local LGBT support group you can go to and maybe find some recommendations?

Seeing as you are in NY, there has to be some kind of organization within an hour's driving distance.

Talking to therapists that are just guessing about gender issues will get you nowhere, as you see... :(

[Frances]

It is a therapist's job to test you and confront you. If they ask you if you are sure, and you show ambivalence, then you still need them. I went through the harshest gender program out there, think Blanchard and Zucker. When the ambivalence was gone, they opened the doors wide open. No one is stopping you from transitioning other than yourself.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Emmi-- I will be honest again..

You gotta stop asking, and you gotta start telling..

We don't know...we can't answer anymore open ended questions...

the way to make your dream come true is to do it... take the real steps... if i recall, some you are already doing..if so, then chill out and let it happen.. focus on the DETAILS>... how much electrloysis is left? for example..

this is not about outings and dresses...

i didnt ask to start HRT, i decided to start.. Do you want HRT? then do it.

If you are concerned about family issues, that makes sense and you should talk to your family more and work this out step by step..

this takes time..lots of it.. plus patience and more time...

[MC-lite]

@emmicd: You're in my neck-o-the woods. IMHO, Gender therapists on Long Island are not all they're cracked up to be. Before I found Callen Lorde, I went to a therapist in babylon. She was just too ambiguous. It seemed like she was more interested in making money than helping me to start the process of transition. (I was a TS, and I've always known that I was a TS. I was just waiting for the right time to transition.)

Call them. Set up an appointment with them. They're really good at what they do.

http://www.callen-lorde.org/

Best,
:Miki.

[Bree-asaurus]

Emmi-- I will be honest again..

You gotta stop asking, and you gotta start telling..

i didnt ask to start HRT, i decided to start.. Do you want HRT? then do it.

this takes time..lots of it.. plus patience and more time...

(edited your quote to get to the points I want to highlight)

If you're trying to find out who you are, you need to look into yourself and find out for yourself. The only thing other people can do is challenge you. They can't tell you anything because this is all about YOU.

I told my therapists, my doctors, my family, my surgeons, etc what I needed to do. I told them who I am. After I told them, that's when they could see it in me.

Other's experiences can help you relate, but only you know what you need to do.

You've been able to talk to a lot of transsexuals here, get a lot of opinions and hear a lot of experiences. But when it comes down to it, YOU need to start deciding who you are.

[Noemi]

Hi Emmi,

Keep posting and keep talking. You are becoming ready to either transition or not to transition.

If you know that you are a woman, then you already are a woman.
I know this about myself.

I personally avoid the medical community. Most of them go into to it to make $$$ so they are going to string you along to fill up their calendars to pay for lavish life styles, that is the ambiguity you are hearing.

You can learn what you need quickly, see the truth before you, you will feel it.

I am rooting for you as are many people who follow your posts.
(hug hug)

♥
Noemi

[Sharon]

If you're trying to find out who you are, you need to look into yourself and find out for yourself. The only thing other people can do is challenge you. They can't tell you anything because this is all about YOU.

I told my therapists, my doctors, my family, my surgeons, etc what I needed to do. I told them who I am. After I told them, that's when they could see it in me.

Exactly! Therapists, or at least the good ones, do not tell us what we are or are not -- we tell them and then they respond and, perhaps, challenge us with questions that provoke more thought.

I don't understand the need to speak with "many" therapists, Emmi. Naturally there are going to be different reactions. Pick the one you feel the most comfortable talking with and then concentrate on yourself and your own true feelings.

Good luck! :)

[Bree-asaurus]

I don't understand the need to speak with "many" therapists, Emmi. Naturally there are going to be different reactions. Pick the one you feel the most comfortable talking with and then concentrate on yourself and your own true feelings.

Yuppers.

If you go to two therapists and you get two totally different responses from them... does one sound more rational to you? Does one sound like they get you more than the other? Don't just assume they know what's best for you or that they know who you are at all.

You have a responsibility when choosing a therapist. The ball is in your court, not theirs.

[Cassi3]

(edited your quote to get to the points I want to highlight)

If you're trying to find out who you are, you need to look into yourself and find out for yourself. The only thing other people can do is challenge you. They can't tell you anything because this is all about YOU.

I told my therapists, my doctors, my family, my surgeons, etc what I needed to do. I told them who I am. After I told them, that's when they could see it in me.

Other's experiences can help you relate, but only you know what you need to do.

You've been able to talk to a lot of transsexuals here, get a lot of opinions and hear a lot of experiences. But when it comes down to it, YOU need to start deciding who you are.

I couldn't agree more... Get a new therapist and tell them what you know and feel in your heart 100%. Look inside yourself, if you can honestly say, this is who I am and this is what I want, tell your therapist exactly that.

I'm rooting for ya!

[KellyJameson]

Hi Emmi

I know this feeling well and I'm sorry you are going through it.

You may want to think of a therapist as a spiritual guide so if you are talking to more than one you will be given many different paths to enlightenment but not find the one that is meant for you.

Many psychologists and psychiatrists do not believe someone can be born wrong bodied and insist GID is a childhood developmental disorder.

I believed my GID was a childhood developmental disorder and the understanding that it is more than that took a long time.

When a baby is born it does not know if it is a girl or boy and so identity is a learned process. (sense of self )

I lived conflicted because I could look at my body and see a boy and people told me I was a boy so I must be a boy but........ I could not become a boy because my mind was not built to be a boy. The flesh of my brain could not contain or create the mind of a man psychologically. This goes way beyond just identity and affects cognitive abilities such as spatial awareness, logic, language, math, peer relations, ect....

The expression of my mind was and is female, this is my natural energy born from the structure of my brain that like a vessel holds me, (my mind) which must be shaped by the shape of the vessel it is housed in. The vessel sets limits and creates potential.

The damage done to me in childhood confused my understanding of myself because I assumed that my female identity had been created by what I experienced in life and it could not be possible that I was born this way so I could be "fixed" and adopt a male identity if I would just man-up. I believed the professionals and fought the need to become what I needed to feel whole and complete with a physical form that expressed my soul.

I personally cannot imagine anyone who has not or does not experience GID being able to understand it because even those who are "living it" find it almost impossible to express.

The only person I would risk being in therapy with is someone who believes that it is possible to be born wrong bodied and that there is a physiological basis for it (innate) that the psychology is built out of. (identity and everything else)

Try to remain neutral about labels such as TS and what you are or are not because what you are has already happened and so what you really are doing is just learning about what has always been but you are only beginning to understand. You cannot make yourself TS and no one can unchange you if you are.

A good therapists will assist you in developing a deeper understanding of yourself and this understanding will change you by making you aware of what is already there.

You are in a tizzy because they have created doubt in you. Doubt can be a good thing when it is in the hands of someone with understanding and compassion because we must be challenged to look honestly at ourselves but this must be done with people who believe in us first.

[Aprilrain]

Two therapists? You're stealing money from your electro fund! ONE therapist versed in gender issues will suffice.
I have spoken with people who had been given a diagnosis of GID or transsexualism and STILL could not muster the courage to transition, probably because it doesn't require courage but rather desperation! Are you desperate to change your physical form so as to make it match your identity?

Therapist are good for hormones, letters and the ups and downs of daily living they are not there to tell you who you are.

[Frances]

Two therapists? You're stealing money from your electro fund! ONE therapist versed in gender issues will suffice.
I have spoken with people who had been given a diagnosis of GID or transsexualism and STILL could not muster the courage to transition, probably because it doesn't require courage but rather desperation! Are you desperate to change your physical form so as to make it match your identity?

Therapist are good for hormones, letters and the ups and downs of daily living they are not there to tell you who you are.

How many times do we all have to repeat this same message for it to finally sink in?

From all your posts Emmi, it sounds like you someone in the medical establishment to tell you what you should do, but transsexualism is not like cancer, it has to come from you. Are you desperate enough, like Aprilrain says?

[Julia_in_Pa]

I fully agree with Frances concerning transition.

No one is stopping you other than yourself.

Emmi, listen alright? You already know whether or not your TS and whether or not you need to transition.
I know what avoidance is because I avoided transition for a long time.
You are placing roadblocks in your way in hopes that one of them will not be able to be crossed.
I don't blame you Emmi.
This is a life changing situation.
With that said, without action on your part, you my dear sister, will be caught in an endless cycle of endless questions used by you to place the real and yes painful reality of transition in a holding pattern until you die.

All of us are on the sidelines here watching you spin around in circles again and again and again.
The therapist can't magically make this monster go away.
What he or she can do is help you deal with it so you can move forward.

Move forward Emmi.


Julia


It is a therapist's job to test you and confront you. If they ask you if you are sure, and you show ambivalence, then you still need them. I went through the harshest gender program out there, think Blanchard and Zucker. When the ambivalence was gone, they opened the doors wide open. No one is stopping you from transitioning other than yourself.

[Kathryn Martin]

Emmi,

You are suffering from medical justification syndrom. Medical justification has nothing or little to do with you and is essentially a tool some of us use to explain things to their social environment. Somewhat in the "see I am not crazy" kind of way.

What I don't understand is why you are seeing and discussing your situation with multiple therapists. For me it was my clinical psychologist only and my medical doctor who simply was told not asked whether and what he thought. Gender therapy is actually not so much about uncovering what you are but rather about transition advice. Granted many of us have issues to work through which becomes part of therapy to get to transition advice, but really it's about resource advice (for me where to find a good electrolysist, a good hairdresser, etc.) and to provide when the time comes the hormone clearance and SRS clearance.

Giving license to someone (even a therapist) to make determinations about your life is a deadly business because it will never coincide with your own feelings about yourself. That painful journey through self discovery and doubt is yours and short of verbalizing your doubts to therapist no good therapist will actually tell you who you are. They can't, it's outside their jurisdiction. If you need someone to tell you you are a transsexual then no one will or should.

From your posts it is clear that you are deathly afraid to cross the threshold to the inevitability of transition. That in itself says much about where you are. The question of who you are is clearly not at all resolved in your own mind, and until it is taking small steps is what you need to take. When you say you are torn, then you mean between a life transitioned or a life sustained. That is a clear message too. So relax for a while and give yourself some time to calm and reflect. Right now you are on a roller coaster which is the worst jump off point you could possible find.


i have been talking to so many therapists lately my head is spinning. they all have different views and i feel so confused now. all i know is that my feelings are very real and i know in my heart and soul i am female.

the conflicting opinions are driving me crazy and i am so torn.

if i went to a therapist well versed in gender issues would i finally find the answers i already know in my heart and finally reach a concensus.

the differing opinions do not help me at all. i realize it is good to have a second opinion but when they are totally opposite i feel like i am getting nowhere.

have others faced this confusion in their efforts in learning who they are? i am a male to female ts but i feel held back.

i am in such a tizzy about this!

i am torn!

emmi

[ColleenA]

Two therapists? You're stealing money from your electro fund! ONE therapist versed in gender issues will suffice.


There are enough replies here telling Emmi not to look to others for validation of what she needs to know about herself that I'm not going to comment on that.

However, I do want to say, Aprilrain, in response to your statement about needing only one therapist that it must be heavily caveated with the "versed in gender issues" phrase. It took my BFF five tries before she found a therapist who confirmed her self-diagnosis, even though the first four were all supposedly specialists on the topic. Of them all, the one that made her the angriest was the one who pronounced that she couldn't possibly be TS because she had never cross-dressed.

To this day, she mostly dresses tomboy-like - much like Ellen DeGeneres. She has some very pretty, even sexy, outfits, but the occasions when she wears them are quite rare.

[emmicd]

once again thank you all for being stand up with me. i appreciate your honesty. my therapist has referred me to a psychiatrist who is placing me on antidepressants as i am long depressed. my situation is in a holding pattern.

emmi

[Bree-asaurus]

once again thank you all for being stand up with me. i appreciate your honesty. my therapist has referred me to a psychiatrist who is placing me on antidepressants as i am long depressed. my situation is in a holding pattern.

emmi

Everyone's situation is different. However, I know for me that antidepressants were able to take away that debilitating sadness so I could actually focus on my issues and work towards improvement. My first medication helped a little and got me started but I would still spiral down occasionally. I then switched to a different medication that helped immensely and I haven't been depressed since. It really helps you think clearly. I hope the meds help you, and if in the coming month or so they don't, make sure to tell your doctor so maybe you can try something different that will.

[IamSara]

I fully agree with Frances concerning transition.

No one is stopping you other than yourself.

Emmi, listen alright? You already know whether or not your TS and whether or not you need to transition.
I know what avoidance is because I avoided transition for a long time.
You are placing roadblocks in your way in hopes that one of them will not be able to be crossed.
I don't blame you Emmi.
This is a life changing situation.
With that said, without action on your part, you my dear sister, will be caught in an endless cycle of endless questions used by you to place the real and yes painful reality of transition in a holding pattern until you die.

All of us are on the sidelines here watching you spin around in circles again and again and again.
The therapist can't magically make this monster go away.
What he or she can do is help you deal with it so you can move forward.

Move forward Emmi.


Julia

Well Julia
You have done it again! You have taken me back to ground level and helped me determine exactly where I am living. Somedays I just don't won't to go on at all.
Emmi. Listen as you have there is a life time of advise here. I sure am!!

[ReneeT]

Hi

I personally avoid the medical community. Most of them go into to it to make $$$ so they are going to string you along to fill up their calendars to pay for lavish life styles, that is the ambiguity you are hearing.


Noemi

Noemi,
Did you really think tht statement would sail by without being challenged? The Tg community works really hard to dispell stereotypes and to demand its members be judged as the individuals they are. Now, if you are speaking from your personal experience as a greedy member of the medical community supporting your lavish lifestyle, thats one thing. However, if you are just generallizing based on misinformation and ancdotes, we would all be better off if you kept that tripe to yourself

[Sam-antha]

Renee, the medical comunity over here do tend to have a money grabbing rep. The government supported Gps are intending to strike over a claim for a half pay retirement level which will average at around £1,000 per month.
That apart I do suspect the competence of therapists and many psychiatrists in this or any area.
Do lets us know the anti-depressant application time scale as well as your progress away from the cause of your depression, namely, it seems therapists.
~S~

[Jonianne]

Emmi, maybe the bigger issue at the moment, is something other than worrying about transition or not. Maybe your biggest issue right now is finding a sense of self, gender notwithstanding. I spent nearly 8 years in individual and group therapy just to be able to learn to take a stand for myself, respecting others, yes, but being able to say who I am and what I want. When I went to my gender therapist to get started, I told her I wanted to get started on transition and live the rest of my life as a female. I gave her my history and shared my heart. Then she helped me to start taking the necessary steps. I already had an idea on how to get started from wonderful PM's with those here, who have already gone down that path.

[Sam-antha]

...............I spent nearly 8 years in individual and group therapy just to be able to learn to take a stand for myself, respecting others, yes, but being able to say who I am and what I want. ......................I already had an idea on how to get started from wonderful PM's with those here, who have already gone down that path.

No comment required on this post.
~Samm