Middle aged brothers suddenly finding a trans identity

30 replies

Transister · 29/09/2025 14:37

So as not to derail another thread. And I can only comment on our families actual reaction to a middle aged man going down this route. I think he now has very little in common with himself as a teenager.
My brother - a 6ft hetro sexual decided he was a trans woman a couple of years ago. It was a massive shock because he had been very much a drinking, slightly homophobic, lots of sexist banter kind of bloke.
He has suffered from poorly managed mental health problems since teen years. A functioning alcoholic, I suspect but don't know for sure he may now be adding ketamine to his system along with various types of HRT bought from risky websites.

He is quite erratic with the shear amount of stuff he is medicating with so it's hard to truly grasp whether he is ill, poorly prescribed via the health service or suffering from whatever he has taken over the weekend.

@ilod hope you find this thread!

OP posts:

Original poster

Transister · 29/09/2025 15:31

My brother has very much failed to get a grip of his mental health as a grown man.
He didn't have a cruel childhood but looking back he had a few health problems, which spun my mum into 'making up for it'. So basically whatever my brother wanted - be it food, toys, holiday destination he got. Of course this was never going to be enough so as a late teen, early 20s he was disappointed to find the world refusing to revolve around him. He looked elsewhere for answers - drinking, drugs, casual hetro sex. It didn't work.
He has been very dismissive and unengaged with therapy - CBT and various other types. He makes the same mistakes in different decades.
Trans is the latest and he is going for it, wants surgery, researching endlessly, taking up trans causes, it's all consuming.
I have limited contact between him and my children. After the funeral it was apparent that he was getting kicks out of talking to young women and men about sanitary protection and loos. It's was creepy, and I felt he'd read about it online and was just trying his luck in real life.
I would worry about young people developing their love life through the broad range of specialist literature on line. Pretty hard to change or fulfill those pathways mapped out as a young person.
I think my brother after a fairly normal 90s life, led a celibate life within a relationship and turned to porn.

To his face I mostly now use his new chosen name, I would use she. I slipped up once after a long day and he was clearly just waiting for an excuse to be angry.
As a family we use he when talking about him. mostly as his problems, social life and joys are generally about being trans and not something my mum and I would instinctively recognise as a ' woman''s ' thing. My mum had to be very strong, angry but pragmatic about success at work in a patriarchal time. She's totally torn to see her golden child claiming now he's wearing lipstick he's a woman.
He's started to overplay his hand there.

OP posts:

ilod · 29/09/2025 15:30

every trans identifying adult I’ve met has had serious mental health issues, which have been ignored because the only concern “professionals “ had was their trans identity. Often, autism with comorbidities like depression and severe anxiety, going untreated and ignored. And the side effects of wrong sex hormones are often extreme mood swings. Add that to an already unstable cocktail.
But doctors have been selectively forgetting their medical training and safeguarding in their rush to be inclusive. Even when it harms patients.

eqpi4t2hbsnktd · 29/09/2025 15:19

If someone with mental health issues and a serious drug problem decided they were anything / anyone else other than themselves we would intervene with care and medical professionals.
A man with mental health issues and a serous drug problem decided he is a woman and we discuss which pronouns to use.
This poor man needs proper mental help.

deadpan · 29/09/2025 15:11

If there's one thing that's come out of all this it's highlighted how bad me tal.health services are in the UK. People moan about paying more tax but we drastically need a massive investment into mental health.

ilod · 29/09/2025 14:44

hi, yes, I’m here! I was wondering how you manage things with him? Do the family affirm him? Our relative is much younger and was very much affirmed by his parents, which I suspect is part of a wider issue. I believe he would have benefited from exploring his identity more and being comfortable as a male with long hair and
makeup. Instead people have just bought into his delusion and told him he can be a woman. The parents are
considering all sorts of dodgy routes to get the oestrogen which, after agreeing to prescribe it for a year or so, the NHS have now stopped. His mental
health issues remain unexplored and ignored because professionals seem hellbent on attributing all
his issues on Trans.

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