What causes people to become trans?

[ForeverIsALongTime]

I'm not posting in the feminism board because I want quite a varied response from people who may not share the same opinion. I've seen so many threads on here relating to transgender and it's something I really don't know much about.

I feel terribly sorry for anyone who feels they were born in the wrong body. I find this a difficult concept to comprehend because our physical exterior shouldn't have to dictate anything in our lives. It shouldn't have to determine anything more than our biology.

Do people think that it's society having separate categories for boys & girls which makes people feel like they're in the wrong body? For example, boys clothes/girls clothes, brownies/cubs etc? I know as a society there aren't so many divides between the sexes as there once was. I'm almost 30 and we had a separate boys playground and girls playground at school. I suppose if I had grown up feeling as though i would have felt more comfortable in the boys playground than the girls playground and felt more comfortable at cubs than brownies and in the boys clothes than the girls clothes, maybe I would now feel as though I had been trapped in the wrong body all those years. The real issue in that situation though would be the divides we had created, rather than the person actually having the wrong genitalia?

I may be way off the mark and I'm really hoping to be educated by some people who are more knowledgable on this topic. It's such a big issue these days and it's something I feel I should understand better than I do.

The person I know 'transitioned' in middle age. His mother died when he was very young and he was mostly brought up by his mother's parents. His father was muddled afterwards and had an unsuccessful marriage and was in and out of his life. Family relationships were not good. By late teens, he came out as gay. Everything settled after that and they got on reasonably well.

In middle age, people often realise life has not turned out how they expected and try to find answers.

Uh-huh, that's interesting. You know homosexuality was a mental illness under the DSM until 1987, and the WHO only declassified it in 1992?

So do you think that gender dysphoria is a mental illness or not then? Doesn't India Willoughby refer to their gender dysphoria as a mental illness?

This is what I don't get about the trans agenda. On the one hand, it's a mental illness so we all have to be kind and understanding and accommodating and don't misgender because that it's just too triggering and we must be allowed to use the ladies changing rooms because anything else is just too upsetting for our mental health, but on the other hand don't you dare say it's a mental illness because it's just like being gay and being gay isn't a mental illness is it?

Avegemitesandwich I believe gender dysphoria is classified as a mental condition rather than an illness. The difference being that one is a state of being with no suggestion that it is pathological, and the other being something which is "wrong" with a person.

So if I have a condition that makes my hair green, you'd be pretty low to mock me for it. but i might like it, it's the way I am, it's unavoidable, it's part of "me" and that's fine.

If I had an illness that made my hair green you'd still be pretty low to mock me, and presumably this would be an abnormal thing for me and I'd want it to be cured so I could just be "normal"!

And I just dyed my hair green and looked like a knob, you could mock me all you liked for my terrible choices, but I couldn't very well cry "woe is me" about it, beyond thinking you weren't being very nice.

I just made that example up so it's probably waaaay less than perfect.

it s a severe mental health condition, akin to anorexia. Have a think about the difference in how these two conditions are treated.

But I don't believe all, or even a majority of trans identifying people have sex dysphoria. And it's not possible to change sex, regardless of your motivation.

it s a severe mental health condition, akin to anorexia.

Annorexia is a mental illness, not a condition.

Have a think about the difference in how these two conditions are treated.

Oh, I know why they're treated differently. One's discomfort causes them to want to change their body in such a way that they usually feel better. The other's discomfort causes them to want to change their body in such a way that they die.

from the NHS

Anorexia is an eating disorder and serious mental health condition.
People who have anorexia try to keep their weight as low as possible by not eating enough food or exercising too much, or both. This can make them very ill because they start to starve.

They often have a distorted image of their bodies, thinking they are fat even when they are underweight.

Men and women of any age can get anorexia, but it's most common in young women and typically starts in the mid-teens.

Not sure what you're getting at RiverTam; I'm fairly well clued-up on eating disorders.

I don't think there is an actual difference between a mental health illness or mental health condition is there? The word 'condition' in that context is a synonym for illness anyway isn't it?

Plus if gender dysphoria is a mental health condition would you say bring gay is a 'mental health condition'? If they are equivalent?

what don't you get? I've linked to the NHS page on anorexia and quoted the first few lines therein.

From what I understand the DSM makes a distinction Avegemite.

I would say being gay is a sexual orientation; I believe it's fallen out of the DSM altogether, except some variant whereby somebody knows they're gay but wishes they weren't. I paraphrase, but it's in my earlier link.

I'll take my lead from the DSM on gender dysphoria, but as we've seen things do get reclassified and removed from it completely in time. It's just a reflection of what we currently believe to be the case, and that changes all the time. I think there is a campaign to have it removed entirely; perhaps one day that will be successful?

what don't you get? I've linked to the NHS page on anorexia and quoted the first few lines therein.

Why?

I think there is a campaign to have it removed entirely; perhaps one day that will be successful?

Well yes of course there is a campaign. Its called 'self ID'. Super.

Self-ID won't result in gender dysphoria being declassified in the DSM

Why are you conflating being trans with being gay anyway?

Being gay is just what you are. Nothing is 'wrong', nothing needs 'correcting'. It's just a descriptor of which sex class you are attracted to (ie the one that you also belong to).

The whole premise of being transgender is that something is 'wrong' isn't it?

Self-ID won't result in gender dysphoria being declassified in the DSM

But isn't the whole push behind self id that being trans isn't a mental illness (or condition or whatever)?

Being gay is just what you are. Nothing is 'wrong', nothing needs 'correcting'. It's just a descriptor of which sex class you are attracted to (ie the one that you also belong to).

The whole premise of being transgender is that something is 'wrong' isn't it?

Well that's the whole point; there is absolutely nothing wrong with being gay. But if you'd been around 60-70 years ago you might have thought there really was, and that being attracted to the opposite sex was right and natural, and that being attracted to the same was wrong. People really did think that; barmy!

And if you'd been gay back then, you might think there was something wrong with you. You're supposed to be happy with sexual relations with one sex, but you aren't; you just aren't.

So today we have trans people, who used to think there was something wrong with them, but increasingly seem to think there is something "wrong" with their body. But they don't need to feel "wrong" for feeling that way, just like in the day you didn't have to feel "wrong" for being same-sex attracted, you can just do it - it's okay! Similarly now it's becoming more and more okay to make changes to your body or live your life identifying as the opposite sex; that's not wrong. It's okay.

For MtFs, perhaps demonisation of men?

If they're feminists (and almost all claim to be) they genuinely believe that to be a man, or behave like a 'man', is to be worthy of hatred or contempt unless you perform a rejection your masculinity (whatever that may be). They also note that emotional feelings are only legitimate if accompanied by a socially recognised state of victimhood. In order to end their internalised misandry they mutilate themselves mentally and physically to demonstrate their rejection of masculinity. At the same time they become the most victimiest-victims-ever-victimised so that they can feel as if their emotions are legitimate.

This explains why the vast preponderance of TRAs seem to be MtF, and come across as whiny entitled losers.

I think being transgender in terms of knowing you are 'in the wrong body' is definitely a thing - my mum's first cousin has been living as a man for over 30 years and he definitely didn't do that because it was trendy or anything. In fact he came from a country where such a thing wasn't even heard of, and was astonished to find there was a name for feeling as he did when he took up a job that allowed him to travel and where he learned about gender reassignment.

I have spent the whole day reading the heartbreaking ‘trans widows’ thread on the Feminism Chat board.

Raw and emotional accounts from women whose partners had transitioned during the course of their relationships. I won’t presume to tell their stories here, go and read the thread and hear it in their own, powerful words.

But, to answer the OP’s question: what struck me as uncanny when I was reading the trans widows thread was how many of the MTF trans husbands had the following things in common:

Narcissistic traits.

Emotionally distant or absent fathers.

Over critical mothers and a high incidence of mothers expressing to their son during childhood that they wished they had been a girl.

A very strong festishistic and paraphillic element to dressing femininely.

Either an actual ASD diagnosis, or similar traits including social anxiety.

And, really bizarrely, they almost all worked in IT!

Reading that thread and all the many different accounts, it seemed to me that there is a definite pattern of behaviour and correlating history of childhood neglect/abuse that could be described as pathological. I think more research is definitely needed.

I have a theory that SOME of it stems from gender roles being enforced. Children being told some toys are just for girls and some are for boys.

My son is three the girls at nursery tell him he can’t wear the play dresses as he is a boy. If someone is told a lot you can’t like that it’s for girls it may plant seeds in their head.

When young children say they are trans I believe a lot of it is just kids not being left to play with what they want, and like what they want without there needing to be sole reason for it. Of course this doesn’t apply to all cases.

I meant to add to my post that what I’ve described is a separate thing from dysphoria, which is much more about the dissociation of the sufferer from their physical body.

So today we have trans people, who used to think there was something wrong with them, but increasingly seem to think there is something "wrong" with their body. But they don't need to feel "wrong" for feeling that way, just like in the day you didn't have to feel "wrong" for being same-sex attracted, you can just do it - it's okay! Similarly now it's becoming more and more okay to make changes to your body or live your life identifying as the opposite sex; that's not wrong. It's okay.

But I thought the whole thing behind being 'trans' is that you were 'assigned the wrong gender at birth', that there is a 'mismatch', that you need to 'take steps to make it right'? That is the trans people themselves saying this.

Gay people never claimed this about themselves.

Plus, I don't believe it's OK for children to make irreversible changes to their bodies.

And I don't think anyone (at least anyone on MN) thinks that 'identifying as the opposite sex' is wrong in itself. That is different to not believing that TWAW and not thinking that transwomen should have access to women's spaces.

We have a young relative who was born a boy. They're the same age as DS1 (7) and have said quite matter of factly since they could first talk, that they're a girl and that they hate their penis. Some of the family use the feminine name they chose as an alternative to their 'boy' name, use the pronoun they prefer and, honestly, having watched them grow up for 7 years I cannot explain where it's come from if not from inside them.

There's no absent parent, neglect, abuse (that we know of - but I'd wager not) and they don't have any kind of history of mental health conditions in their family. This child says they are a girl, every single day since they were 2. I don't know how you can argue that because 2 or 3 years old is very young to be so certain about something - I doubt DS2 could have defined his being a boy so definitely at that age yet his cousin did, and continues to do so.

Idontbelieveinthemoon

That's really interesting. So is the thinking amongst the family/professionals that this boy has a 'girl brain' that has ended up in a boys body? Or that the child has gender dysphoria? What do you mean when you say it has come from 'inside them'? Is the child otherwise well adjusted and happy? Does he like girl or boy toys or both? Sorry lots of questions!

I think it's asking too much for a non-trans person to expect to understand exactly how it feels to be trans

It could come from anything or nothing.