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Michelle789
01-03-2014, 12:40 AM
I read a lot about this phenomena called "white noise" which many trans people claim to experience. I also read this article about indirect dysphoria - symptoms that often occur along with gender dysphoria but are not specifically gender related.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/zinniajones/2013/09/that-was-dysphoria-8-signs-and-symptoms-of-indirect-gender-dysphoria/

I'm gonna focus this thread on point #5 from the article, which deals with the "white noise" phenomena.

My question is, how do you experience "white noise"? Does your experience sound similar to my experience? Do you consider it all to be "white noise" or is some of it just noise or toxic noise or background noise?

Anyone who has experienced gender dysphoria to any degree may respond, whether it's a milder case of GD or a more severe case of GD. You may answer whether or not you identify as TS, and if you're TS whether or not you've transitioned. All MTF and FTM, all CD, TS, and other gender variants who have experienced gender dysphoria to some degree may answer.

Here's how I experience the white noise.

1. White noise in the purest sense, just static in the background that interferes with my ability to think or get anything done. It feels like my mind is in a fog, the noise doesn't make any sense, it's just static in the background. This often comes after an acute high stress event or after overanalyzing and overthinking things in my head for a very long time. It may show up at any time though.

2. Overthinking and overanalyzing everything that's related specifically to gender. What is considered masculine and what is considered feminine? Am I more masculine or am I more feminine?

3. Overthinking and overanalyzing everything that's not related specifically to gender. This could be about anything, be it family, work, friends, relationships, religion, politics, human behavior, weather, geography, science, disasters, or replaying my day over in my head.

4. Sudden bursts of thoughts that I really don't want, and once it comes into my head, it stays for a long time and it's hard to shake it off. Often something needs to happen, or I need to get some sleep, to finally rid these thoughts. They're really toxic thoughts, and could be about wishing ill on someone, thinking of an impending disaster or doom, fires, doing harm to a friend or loved one, a friend or loved one doing harm to me, a technology glitch, illness.

5. Stressing about the past or the future, often as a consequence of #2, 3, or 4 above.

6. All of the above prevent me from actually living in the moment.

7. #1 to 6 above are always present to some degree, but it ebbs and flows meaning it gets worse at some times, and subsides at others, but it's always present to some degree. At its best, I get things done but have difficulty enjoying the moment. At its worst, I literally can't concentrate or get anything done.

Edit: I experience these along with direct gender dysphoria symptoms too. The attached article suggests that white noise and other indirect symptoms may or may not be experienced along with the direct gender symptoms.

Angela Campbell
01-03-2014, 01:08 AM
I don't think I ever experienced the "white noise" I have been aware that I was really a girl since I was 4 or so and mostly I worked very hard to hide it. Every thought I had was in making sure I wasn't found out. I can't do that someone may suspect....I can't say that, someone will figure it out.....I can't wear that, I can't like that, I can't look like that or act that way..........

Coping mechanisms I know well but not the white noise so much. Until the day came and I knew I just could no longer control or hide it. There was no static and there was nothing subtle it was strong and overpowering and I was no longer in control. I knew with no doubt what I wanted and needed to do I just had this huge fear of doing it. Once I got past the fear and began transition everything settled down quite nicely.

Diane Smith
01-03-2014, 02:30 AM
Other than #2, I'm not sure I could attribute any of those feelings to consequences of gender dysphoria -- they seem like common symptoms of a busy, modern, stress-filled life that could well occur with or without GD. I am concerned, though, about your #4, and having negative or violent thoughts toward yourself and others. It may be nothing serious, but I would second the suggestion that you consult a professional counselor -- ideally one experienced in gender issues as well -- to help you sort through them. Any non-professional advice we offer here could do more harm than good.

- Diane

sandra-leigh
01-03-2014, 02:45 AM
A number of the points listed in the article, and a number of the points you list, are symptoms of depression and anxiety. There may be "reasons" associated with the feelings (e.g., if you are in a situation that is inherently stressful), but there may biochemical causes that call for short-term or even long-term treatment.

Depression is correlated with gender dysphoria, in that on the order of 70-ish % of people with gender dysphoria experience depression. It is not, however, known whether gender dysphoria "causes" depression, or if there is a mechanism in common.

For example, if you had structural differences in your brain, areas that grew as "female" while other areas grew as "male", then the conflict between the areas is likely to interfere with brain functioning in ways that are classically described as "depression" (e.g., problems with mental functions). The biochemical conflict in such a brain could depend upon how the brain was "being used", in such a way that there was distress experienced in acting in ways associated with one gender and different distress experienced in acting in ways associated with the other major gender. Such a person might then find it overall less distressing to act in the mode of one gender than in another. This could reach the conscious experience as gender dysphoria. In this hypothetical situation, the brain cross-wiring could be the common cause of depression and the experience of gender dysphoria.

But we do not know what causes the experience of belonging to one gender or another, and we do know that at the levels that have been probed so-far, obvious structural brain differences are only more likely to be found and are not always found. So to the best of our scientific knowledge, the feeling of belonging to a different gender can exist independently, for reasons not triggered by brain structural differences. A person who had such an experience would have reason enough to be stressed enough to trigger "emotional" depression. Stress is known to modify body function and reshape the brain itself, potentially leading to physical interference with brain functioning. One would hope that in such a case, restoration of the body balance could be achieved by resolving the gender stress.

PaulaQ
01-03-2014, 03:46 AM
I suffered from severe depression and anxiety disorder. I believed these were caused by my gender dysphoria. (Ultimately, so did my psychotherapist.) I took anti-depressants and anti-anxiety meds. They barely dented the surface of these feelings. Xanax helped some, at least when I had full blown panic attacks. (Unfortunately, Xanax tends to help for mostly the same reasons a glass of bourbon helps too - I went real light on the Xanax...)

A couple of months into HRT, and those feelings were largely gone. I have to believe that at least in my case, there was a cause / effect relationship here. Getting some hormonal congruence saved my life.

Joanne f
01-03-2014, 03:56 AM
Hello Michelle,
I am a sufferer of white noise or tinnitus as we are inclined to call it , it sounds like a constant hissing / television left off Chanel sort of thing , I use to get up in the night thinking that I had left something on and listen in each room to see where it was coming from, whether it is brought on by stress I do not know but I became acutely aware of it after having a 12 1/2 hour operation so I guess that my body was under some sort of stress, at the time I just thought that an oxygen pipe was leaking but 14 hours under anesthetic does mess your head up a bit ( now I have a good excuse):heehee: , I personally do not think that it has anything to do with GD or TS issues although I may suffer from some of those as well but I will leave that to the experts on here as they know a lot more than I do .
If you are suffering from a great deal of stress then I suggest that you take the others advise and see someone that may be able to help you relive some of that stress or at least sort out what is actually causing it which can be quite a few things in this so called modern world .

Michelle789
01-03-2014, 04:03 AM
Perhaps white noise is actually a separate phenomena from indirect dysphoria and what I mentioned in my OP, which is basically an elaboration on one of the indirect dysphoria points. But it's still interesting if others who experience gender dysphoria also experience depression and anxiety (e.g. indirect dysphoria article points, and the points in my OP).

Ineke Vashon
01-03-2014, 04:10 AM
"White noise" can also be mechanical, like a fan running somewhere or the TV left on. Sometimes that helps to mask outside noises like barking dogs or cars. After awhile you don't hear the "white noise" any longer. I differentiate that from tinnitus which I've had for many years and which I just live with. I don't think this has anything to do with any mental issues, at least in my case.

Ineke

Angela Campbell
01-03-2014, 06:46 AM
I can say that the dysphoria works in strange and sometimes sneaky ways. Over the years I never really felt it, but it was at work silently behind the scenes. Slowly. I began being antisocial, I would spend more and more time alone. I slowly stopped taking care of my body. I ate all the time and was obese. I rarely went to the doctor or dentist, and when I did I wouldn't take the medicines I should. I began to take jobs where I worked alone, stayed in hotels a lot and traveled a lot. When at home I had no friends, would ignore my wife and family, wouldn't talk on the phone. I got a haircut once every year or two, shaved once a week maybe, bathed only when I had to be around people.

It started so slowly I never noticed it until I was almost 300 lbs, blood sugar and cholesterol in the upper 300 range, and completely isolated to the point that I could not be around anyone for more than a few minutes before I had to go off and be alone.

That is until the event. Then I knew something had to be done. It was there all along, I just didn't notice it.

Frances
01-03-2014, 11:08 AM
I have used the term white noise consistently over the years on this forum. It's how I would discribe gender dysphoria in my experience. I could not even really hear people talking to me, it was so loud. It stopped after transition.

Michelle789
01-03-2014, 12:28 PM
Frances, when you say white noise, do you mean it in the same way as Joanne f described it (tinnitus), or is it your way of describing gender dysphoria?

Frances
01-03-2014, 12:32 PM
Yes, pretty much the same. Even in my sleep. My dreams were filled with this stuff.

Michelle789
01-03-2014, 12:41 PM
I guess what I experienced is different than "white noise", but rather is point #5 in the indirect dysphoria article I posted in the OP (essentially, overthinking and confusion). However, both my experience and white noise could be manifestations of GD. Like Angela said, GD can manifest itself in weird and sneaky ways, and what was mentioned in the article was just some of them, but there are more ways not mentioned in the article.

mary something
01-03-2014, 01:08 PM
maybe this is a bad analogy but I tend to think of white noise as similar to the effect of having to use google translate to communicate with someone who speaks a different language. It's like emulation software that doesn't exactly work as well as we wish, microsoft would call them "features" but everyone else calls it bugs. In this case it's trying to fill a social role that doesn't come natural but because we know the rules we can play the game, it just takes a toll though. A lot of the thoughts that you describe have a similar purpose in shaping your behavior don't they?

Frances
01-03-2014, 01:53 PM
That's on the level of interactions and communication, Mary. White noise is more like a constant thought process impeding input or preventing enjoyment. I would watch a movie and I was not really watching it for my obsessive thinking. Or someone would talk to me and I would watch their lips to see when I was supposed to respond. I could not hear them. It was hard to go to a concert and have only a part of my brain participating in the event. Most ressources were being devoted to the thoughts. It's not white noise in the litteral sense, but the inability to stop thinking about feeling wrong somehow and about all that should be done, should have been done, and could be done. The barrage was so overwhelming as to appear like white noise.

For those of you of have not yet transitioned. Imagine getting up in the morning and not thinking about your gender right away and for the rest of the day. That's the absence of white noise.

Joanne f
01-03-2014, 01:54 PM
"White noise" can also be mechanical, like a fan running somewhere or the TV left on. Sometimes that helps to mask outside noises like barking dogs or cars. After awhile you don't hear the "white noise" any longer. I differentiate that from tinnitus which I've had for many years and which I just live with. I don't think this has anything to do with any mental issues, at least in my case.

Ineke

Ineke, I do not doubt what you are saying is right for some and I have often thought this myself so in the interest of things I thought that I would just do a small experiment, with the computer running I can hear the fan running quietly yet it also sounds like I can hear a noise coming from the monitor screen , turn the computer off and the fan noise stops but the other noise does not , and I would have thought that if it was stress related then the noise would vary according to the stress level which for me it does not and I really cannot think of anything inside of my body that might cause it but that does not mean it could not so that leaves an external source and just to prove it again that I am quite mad :heehee: it almost sounds like you can hear the back ground sound the cosmos makes , maybe people like me are not just capable of being in touch and sensitive to other things about ourselves that most people are not but also sensitive to things in the cosmos that others are not , so I have just contradicted my first statement and started to over analyse things , so is Michelle right , dammed if I know so no sleep for me tonight because of you Michelle :uzi::D

mary something
01-03-2014, 02:41 PM
That's on the level of interactions and communication, Mary. White noise is more like a constant thought process impeding input or preventing enjoyment.
yes, like I've said it wasn't the best analogy. The constant obsessive thinking is what I was describing as it applies to interactions and communication. Then you tell me that it kept you from interacting with movies, concerts, and life in general. Sounds to me that we are both talking about how it impedes interactions and life itself. The could have, should have, and need to thoughts are about living our life in real time and not through an emulation layer. We need to disable some of those running programs and free up our hardware resources, heck maybe even a hardware upgrade also. It would be like running an emulation version of windows on a mac, then running a virtual machine in windows, then running multiple emulators inside of those virtual machines to do something very resource intensive, such as emulating a console system in software to play software designed for different hardware. Maybe that analogy only works for people with an egghead side.


Imagine getting up in the morning and not thinking about your gender right away and for the rest of the day. That's the absence of white noise.
that would be like running the same software on the hardware and software environment it's designed for, everything works seamlessly. If not we can find a simple patch or two to fix the issue.

I simply was trying to make a model to understanding why it's different from your ordinary OCD or other types of disorders that can cause someone to be unable to feel emotions in the normal contextual way. I think that is what makes it so hard for people to understand that haven't felt it.

To me it's simply about learning to live in the moment.

Michelle789
01-03-2014, 02:47 PM
Joanne, that was the point of this thread.

1. To see if anyone else had experiences similar to mine.
2. To figure out what exactly we mean by "white noise", is it a hissing or TV static noise, or a phrase for constant thoughts interfering with your ability to participate in and enjoy life.

Frances, what you said in #16 sounds exactly like my experience (except I haven't transitioned - I plan to see a therapist to get professional advice on what's going on inside my head, and to figure out if transition is the right path for me - I'd like to start therapy in Jan/Feb)

In my case, I would think about anything, often non-gender related stuff too. I really hated myself and looked for anything that was wrong with me, and tried to fix it. This is called a designated issue. Examples: geographic location, housing, computer issues, staying away from certain people, and even stuff I really have no control over anyways. Every time I would fix a designated issue, nothing would change. I would just find another designated issue to focus on.

I would also think about gender, why I'm in the wrong role, what's really masculine and what's really feminine, is my behavior and thinking really masculine or feminine, and devote resources to trying to fight any behaviors that are feminine. "I can't do this, or can't say this, because people might think I'm gay or too feminine" As hard as I tried to act like a man, people still read me as gay.

Angela - I also let myself go. I drank, smoked, overate, didn't exercise, didn't see doctors or dentists, and I slowly started fixing all those. I quit drinking. I quit smoking. I started eating right, and started exercising. I've started going to doctors and got some dental work done last year. It seems the more I take care of my body, the worse the GD is getting. But that could also be because I'm getting older and they say that GD only gets worse as you get older if untreated. I also find myself isolating more and more.

I realized this might actually be my gender when it came to this psychic I used to consult. She was trying to pressure me into dating, and I found every excuse not to. I hated gender roles, and every time I complained about the male role, she would either tell me "that's too bad" or that in today's world gender roles don't matter as much amongst the younger generation and men can fulfill the women's role, but it isn't just about gender roles, it's about who I am and how I identify as. Yes, it is gender roles too, but it goes deeper. It's about who I am.

Btw, I fired the psychic last August after she told me that "gender confusion comes from the devil".

Joanne f
01-03-2014, 03:44 PM
Btw, I fired the psychic last August after she told me that "gender confusion comes from the devil".

Blooming hell maybe that is what I can hear in my hear , the firers of hell burning , now I am worried .
( sorry I just had to do that one ) back to sensible before I get a PM from the lovely mods.

Rachel Smith
01-03-2014, 07:04 PM
My white noise was like the kind Frances is talking about. I used to describe them as lightning bolts in the sense that there was no pattern to the thoughts, completely random like the design of lightning bolts. I was diagnosed with ADD at the tender young age of about 45. I medicated for that with very little success and I mean VERY little. There were days it seemed better and days when it seemed just as bad as ever. Then I came clean with myself and those around me and started transition at 57. Low and behold NO MORE LIGHTNING BOLTS. The first time I noticed it was about 2 weeks after starting HRT. That is not to say everyone that is diagnosed with ADD has GD all I am saying is since I have acheived some level of congruency 99% of it has stopped. I used to be exhausted by the end of the day, now I am tired but that exhausted feeling is GONE.

Michelle789
01-03-2014, 08:06 PM
I get the lightning bolts too. For example, I was driving today, and suddenly this random thought out of nowhere came to mind, Saturday, Saturday, and I just obsessed over Saturday, and suddenly fearing what might happen on Saturday, for at least 30 minutes, sometimes the episodes last much longer. Is this the kind of lightning bolts you get?

Or I might get a lightning bolt where I suddenly think of a fire, fire, fire, and obsess over a fire.

Or another time it might be fear of a friend getting upset with me, and obsessing over that. Not that he/she was actually upset with me, but I obsessed over the thought of that for 30 mins to all day.

All of these kind of thoughts just come out of the blue. Just out of nowhere, from peace of mind to suddenly a barrage of toxic thoughts. This is on top of the other overanalyzing and overthinking about gender and non-gender stuff.

Other times it could be a series of completely different random thoughts just bombarding my head for a long time. Many different random thoughts happening at once - stuff that if I told you about you'd all think I was nuts - as if my brain was just telling me jibberish, yet the jibberish may be standard English words that make sense by themselves, but put together make absolutely no sense. Once again, it just comes out of nowhere all of a sudden.

Debglam
01-03-2014, 09:23 PM
Lucky me! I also have tinnitus and it reminds me a lot of that experience. Sometimes I am perfectly fine and the noises from tinnitus are not even noticeable. Sometimes they are so loud that it is extremely difficult to focus on anything but the noise. My GD is a lot like that. The "white noise" is always having to think about or consider my gender to some extent and how it should be other. But I developed tinnitus later in life so I know what it is like to be "normal," that is to not hear these random noises. I have always had GD so I find it almost inconceivable that cis people go through life and never ever have to think about their gender.

Deb

Angela Campbell
01-03-2014, 09:59 PM
There is no pain, you are receding
A distant ship, smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves
Your lips move but I can't hear what your saying

When I was a child, I had a fever
My hands felt just like two balloons
I have that feeling once again
How can I explain you will not understand
This is not how I am

And I.......Have become Comfortably Numb

Rachel Smith
01-04-2014, 06:22 PM
Michelle I rarely had the obsession problem, sometimes but not often. The obsession only seemed present when I felt I let someone down. Then I would obsess over what they were thinking of me, how they must think I am stupid, why can't I do anything right. Most times it was just random thoughts one being no more related to the previous then an elephant is related to a pencil.

Jonianne
01-07-2014, 07:38 AM
Very interesting. I have had tinnitus for years and sometimes it can be very loud. The first time I heard it, I was driving a car and thought there was an air leak. Finally, I figured out what it was. To me it sounds like a high pressure air leak that is constantly in the backgroud. (In the Navy, I heard it all the time around steam lines) The only time I don't hear it is when I am not paying attention to it. I don't think it has anything to do with depression or GID. At 57, I expect these kind of things as I get older anyway.

Suzanne F
01-07-2014, 05:33 PM
I don't know what it is but it is always there now. I am with Debby in that I am always drawn back into thinkining about wrong gender. The white noise sounds similiar to when I am manic and my thoughts become unintelligible. I hear a humming noise when it gets very bad. Thank God I am able to control that now. Since coming out last year as a transgendered cross dresser the thoughts of gender have become even more prevalent. It was always there but now it has found a voice. Does this sound crazy? My therapist has helped and she says I am confronting and accepting my true self. It has not been easy. I hope it is ok to post here in this thread. I know it is more than wearing a dress for me. Where it will end I don't know. I think the enormity of it all is just now sinking in. It's not all as exhilarating as I had thought. It is more difficult than I ever imagined. Thanks for letting me rant!
Suzanne

Joanne f
01-07-2014, 05:51 PM
Michelle if you think I am going to far of track from your original post let me know but you have got me with this white noise and if I may add the over thinking and analyzing , ever since you started this thread I have be trying to figure out where it is coming from , as I mentioned about the fan on the pc you can pinpoint where it is coming from , now this white noise is difficult to pinpoint , it is not coming from inside of your head and it is not coming from any particular direction the nearest I can get is that it is like a layer of noise just outside of the ear , I do not know if anyone else has tried this but holed your hand flat and then put it about a centimeter away from your ear and it seems to amplify the sound or at least it does for me .
Let me know if you think I have gone to far off track and I will get it moved to the lounge or something .

melissaK
01-07-2014, 08:45 PM
This thread is confusing to me

- tinnitus is a real auditory problem that sufferers describe as a TV or radio tuned off station making static or as a high frequency hiss (I have this, my whole life, I understand it);

- white noise as a symptom of gender dysphoria is an anxiety symptom, one that clouds thinking and reasoning. And yes, in my worst moments when fighting transition, fighting self-acceptance, I could describe my thinking as clouded that way.

At least IMHO they are different things.

Edyta_C
01-07-2014, 09:16 PM
I would not ordinarily comment here in this section but I found this thread so interesting. I suffer with Gender Dsyphoria. Noise is an interesting description of the funny changes this makes in your mental processes. It is probably the interaction between the male brain function and the female brain function. Once one side is dominate, the noise goes away. In transition the interaction probably causes the "noise". When my GD depression is worse, I have trouble getting to sleep. My eyes, while closed, see a kaleidoscope of colors. If I am more in-tune with my female side, I done see these at all. I would guess that this is similar to the "noise" being discussed.

Edy
Thanks for allowing my comments here. I retreat to lurking here to understand what I will need to go through.