Doctors set out medical guidelines for trans men giving birth - Times

@Whatwouldscullydo yes I agree with all that you said. Thanks for adding in and clarifying - it does need it. There are many wonderful parents who are not women/mothers. Some mothers struggle. But for the majority the foundational relationship of our lives is with our mum. Many who don't have that seek the maternal relationship elsewhere.

Completely agree joody

That's what's missing I think. We should be able to recognise that the connection cannot ever be created in the same way and that by acknowledging that it doesn't mean we dont think that a baby can thrive with 2 dad's or be aware that Sometimes its best fir the baby to not be with the biological mother , and That dads can be amazing dads . Now it's just automatically twisted to make it sound as if people are against adoption or same sex couples having a baby. But that's not the case. There are many lousy mothers. Amd many amazing gay dad's. But we should never forget that there will still be issues surrounding babies when they don't know where they came.from and/or dont have a mother.

There are many people born into the world who lose their mum early or later in their lives. People suffer when they lose their mum. The relationship is foundational to a feeling of security and of being nurtured. When we have difficult relationships with our mothers this often plays out over the course of our lives in various ways. This seems to me to be the height of selfishness and entitlement to bring a baby into the world while rejecting what the baby needs from the get go. A baby needs its mum. Remembering the visits from the health visitors when I had my own, the writing in the red book to ensure you were "mothering properly", the looking out for PND. How society has changed in such a short space of time. This really highlights to me that child welfare, safeguarding, is no longer the priority. We are going to have generations of messed up kids. Mothers matter.

In Ireland men need to be included in maternity legislation as legislation allows anybody over 16 to get a GRC, as you can guess rather than add to the maternity legislation the current government are removing the words woman.

The danger point is not direct discrimination around leave but indirect discrimination where the senior managment are promoting more young males and only older women.

There is also a ideolgical push to have "shared" maternity leave rather than legislating for personal leave to the partner

But is there proof this is linked?

I imaging numbers (so far) are very small and if no one is monitoring for statistical analysis I doubt a link can be proven.

By right, linked health care problems should be reported to the pharmaceutical company as potential adverse side effects to taking the medication, except for the little problem of being used off lable.

Is it, at least partly, about control. Your (the TM) body is their business, they do what they want with it. But forcing HCP and wider society to dance to their tune. Particularly, if they feel they've previously been ignored and marginalised.

Changing the established medical language is a really disproportionate response to a tiny problem and it brings health risks to the wider population. Unclear language is especially likely to be detrimental to those for whom their first language is not English, people with learning disabilities and other disadvantaged groups of people.

It is inescapable that biologically female attributes such as having a functional uterus, vagina, breasts etc, enable pregnancy, childbirth and nursing. Changing the language might slightly ease the dysphoria of the (tiny minority of) trans men giving birth, but it won’t address the deeper dysphoria of doing such an inherently female thing as carrying and birthing a baby, then feeding it your milk made by your own mammary glands.

The NHS should fund counselllng for the tiny minority of trans men who want to give birth and are considering to nurse their babies. And leave the language that’s widely understood by the wider population alone.

Yes there's alot of picking and choosing alongside chastising people for not keeping up with whatever menat to be offensive that day.

Another reason to not indulge this..solve one problem and another is created because the whole thing is steeped in victim mentality. No ones actually interested in solving all the " problems" which is clear through the outrageous and dangerous suggestions which i dont think anyone actually expects anyone to go " sure ok yes we will do that " and every time theres a yes something even more ridiculous becomes the next target. All for people who will never actually be happy because the identity is being a victim..

I can never understand how trans men have dysphoria over words like “breast” and so it needs to be “chest feeding” but magically suffer no dysphoria from getting pregnant, gestating a foetus, giving birth and breastfeeding all while being off their hormones which are supposedly life saving medication. If men can give birth they can surely breast feed.

@JellySaurus is right on this.

Could you imagine a scenario where a very small minority of people (with a questionable ideology), who spoke a different language, wanted clinical guidance re-written, and actually whole clinical services changed, to not only accommodate their needs (preferences?), but to centre them?

In and any healthcare context apart from women’s health, they wouldn’t they just be told a ‘polite no in three paragraphs’, if that?

As for electing to have a Caesarian to ‘support dissociation from the baby/birth process’, this is wrong on so many levels that I’m struggling to begin.

And they can FOTTFSOF with their ‘cis’ nonsense as well.

@IcakethereforeIam

I do know of a couple of cases. Certain primary liver cancers are more common in men due to testosterone and the very first thing the oncologist did was order the (female) patient to discontinue testosterone.

I have no idea if these cases are reported for long term statistical monitoring though. I suspect not.

I wonder if a transman got breast cancer (if they had some remaining breast tissue) if we would have to call it chest cancer? A small number of men get breast cancer and the name isn’t changed. So what’s so upsetting about breastfeeding as a term?

Ive not read the guidance, but does it include guidance on the effects of testosterone on the developing foetus or breastfeeding? Surely that would be a pretty important thing to look at? (Guidance from literature is to avoid pregnancy and breastfeeding if you are taking testosterone)

But having specific guidance for a specific group of people makes sense to me. If they want to call their own mammary glands their "chest" then that really makes no odds with me.

If that was what was happening, then these pages would be as quiet as the Feminism: Chat board. I doubt ever the most ardently gender critical feminist would take issue with it.

Unfortunately all these 'guidelines' and 'inclusivity' policies do not recommend tailoring language to the individual. They recommend imposing de-sexed language across the board - at least where women are concerned. It's a complete reversal of patient-centred medicine.

I'm sure I read somewhere that trans identifying females who are taking testosterone are at increased risk of certain cancers. Does anyone know anything about this or did I imagine it?

Is there a consensus in the comments under the Times article?

Gives the hospital an out too.

1 man recorded as a man dying in childbirth would be negligible in stats. If it was 100 percent of transmen at that time or the death that would trigger a review if included with women it could be dismissed...

More harm for women and transmen

Yes I agree. I very much reject the move to referring to all mothers as "birthing parents" etc. This very clearly has a huge impact on society as a whole.

But having specific guidance for a specific group of people makes sense to me. If they want to call their own mammary glands their "chest" then that really makes no odds with me.

FFS
It makes no sense.

Sorry Mumsnet you need an edit button

and regardless of the consequences to that individual, too!

Why should trans-identified people get substandard care? Because that's what unclear language is in medical - substandard.

Individual decisions that don't affect anyone else are not really not an issue for society as a whole are they?

The effect of compliance with (submission to!) this ideology is to impose the that individual's personal choices upon everyone else, regardless of others' beliefs or needs, and regardless of the consequences to others.

Precisely; exactly what I said.

I makes no sense at all.

I just don’t understand why, if you firmly reject being a woman (which is fine, everyone has a choice), you would then want to have a baby which is not part of being a man which they say they identify with instead. Just hurts my brain.

Excellent point.

I do not understand being Transgender at all. It seems like extreme stereotypes to me on both sides (except apparently for men wanting a baby) I am a woman I like frills and lace, but wear minimal makeup and have no intention of taking on the emotional load in a relationship- a grown man ought to know how to feed himself for example. On the other hand I am not into manly stuff like cars etc. I look after my car but that is all.

I would never be unkind to a trans person as they are obviously going through what makes no sense to me.

Maybe I am Non Binary and haven't worked it out ( I thought sarcastically)

It does effect everyone else though.

Because indulging this for one person means that they are accepting that men and women are nothing more than a collection of undefined feelings inside someone's head. Medical care deals with sex bodies and should be based in facts/science. If we see that the nhs dont even know what sex is then how can anyone trust them with life and death decisions

“Some patients identifying as women retain male sex organs”

When you replace the word some with the word most which more accurately reflects the situation , then the anxiety that vunerable women lying in a hospital ward feel becomes a lot easier to understand doesn’t it?

Can someone, anyone , explain why the feelings of one person who has made choices in their life are seen as more important than the feelings of other people who have not even been asked what their choices are?

You would assume that a hospital of all places was a bit more clued up on what bodily attributes constitute a persons sexual identity.