Genuine question - can trans women experience cramps during their ‘time of the month’?

[Picklemeyellow]

This is a genuine question as I am baffled.

I looking on Tik Tok last night (don’t judge me, I’m addicted lol)and I notice on my For You section there is often a trans women doing live Q&A’s. I stopped and watched for a while, out of curiosity tbh as DH has a couple of transgender people in his family and I do try to remain as ‘on the fence’ as possible with this subject.

However, this person on TT said something which does not make much sense to me.

They were saying they take HRT and this gives them ‘a time of the month’ when they experience a very emotional dip and have crying spells and feel low etc. I suppose that may make some sense due to the hormones they take but then they went on to say they also experience cramping during this time and started rubbing their lower tummy in the area where a woman’s uterus is located.
It was difficult to establish why this happens because anyone actually questioning this gets blocked and only those agreeing with them get to stay to ask questions! I appreciate they probably receive some very negative replies but blocking doesn’t answer the questions to people who really would like to know.

I genuinely can not understand where the cramps would originate in a person without female anatomy?

As someone who has been under the gynae department for 20+ years, has had to live their live around horrendous periods, has had endless hysteroscopies and uterine polyp removals, ovulation so painful I couldn’t sit properly, a failed uterine ablation, going through an awful perimenopause and now, at 50 only just discovering this is probably all due to the fact I actually have endometriosis and adenomyosis and have been gas lit for all this time having being told that some women just have awful periods etc, I more than understand where my cramps and pain come from. From my shit malfunctioning uterus and hormones which have never been my friend.

But where would a trans woman’s ‘time of the month’ cramps come from? What part of their body cramps due to the addition of female hormones? I’ve tried googling this but there’s very little. Can the hormones cramp the muscles or bowel in this area or something similar?

He’s male because he’s got an XY DSD. Your sex isn’t dependent on whether you’re a biological parent. You can also be a parent without being biologically related to the child(ren).

Sport can easily have an open category as well as a women's category then Semenya can compete in the open category.

Elite sport should be amongst equals, that's why drugs are banned and why the paralympics has so many catagories.

Lots of discrimination is codified into law. Personally I'm OK with that, if I get on a plane I want the pilot to be hearing and sighted and qualified.

Try getting a driving licence if you are blind.

Try getting a job as a stripper in spearmint rhino if you are a man.

Rabbis, priests, vicars, ministers etc have to be of the faith they are ministering (sorry I can't think of a better word) to.

We put people in prison, on tags and give them curfews all of which interfere with their human rights.

Currently if you are undergoing an intimate medical examination you can request someone of the same sex, and that should not be made illegal.

Grow up and learn to be an adult.

No one is 'assigned' a sex.

As for the numbers of people who are intersex, that figure includes people who have the tiniest abnormality eg maybe the opening at the end of a penis is slightly off to one side, or you only have one ovary.

Sladurche · Yesterday 15:29

Honestly, those saying that Castor Semenya isn't biologically female (technically she's intersex) don't understand sexual biology.

No, as has been demonstrated ad nauseam, the exact opposite is the case; he's a man. Anyone who thinks that he's a woman has been taken in by propaganda and has very little understanding of biology.

(See Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · Yesterday 15:52 5α-Reductase 2 deficiency)
(See NoBinturongsHereMate · Yesterday 16:43
Who, exactly, doesn't understand biology? Testosterone is an androgen.

+ + She was brought up as female and identifies as female. + +

Incorrect. School photos show him in the boys uniform. He played boys sports (football team, not netball team etc). In his recent autobiography there is a photo of him, age 15, in swimming trunks on a school trip

Etc etc.

But as I said upthread he has fathered two children which women cannot do so...

You can also be a parent without being biologically related to the child(ren) Thanks for this little gem. AS an adopted person this had never occurred to me.

But as I said upthread he has fathered two children which women cannot do so.…

He and his wife have children and they have shared they had medical assistance to do so. To the best of my knowledge they haven’t shared whether the children are biologically Casters and thus we cannot say whether he has “fathered” children. Whether he has or not is none of our business and has nothing to do with whether he should be competing in women’s sports. His biological male body is the only criteria on which sex category he belongs.

That's true, but if he is the father of his wife's children, if he provided genetic material to fertilise his wife, it serves unequivocally to blow a hole under the waterline of any claims that he's a sort of woman.

Even people taken in by the slick propaganda operation will be able to understand:

Donated sperm - men only - he's not and cannot be a woman.

I get your point, but I am deeply uncomfortable with linking parenthood to defining sex in people’s minds because it works both ways. I am not less of a woman because I have not birthed children. Which is why i think it is none of our business, and the family is entitled to their own privacy, much as i may have my own cynical opinion on why the information on the identity of the biological father has been kept private even while the wife’s medical history has been made public.

Caster’s own legal case against the IAAF stated the nature of his DSD, so that is the key matter of legal fact and public record, not his parental status. As far as I know, Caster has never claimed a trans identity and has described himself as “a different kind of woman” when it comes to sports. I haven’t seen him show any form of performative femininity as described in the opening post of this thread or claim to “womanhood”. So discussion of Caster is a distraction from the original topic, but I think it was necessary to address the incorrect facts of an earlier poster. I’ll shut up now.

I love it when a thread takes an educational turn.

You are not less of a woman because you have not birthed children.

You would, however, be less of a woman, i.e. not a woman of any description, if you had fathered children using your own sperm.

You are a woman because you have a reproductive system which, barring vanishingly rare disorders of sexual development or any other condition causing infertility, is designed to be capable of conceiving, gestating, birthing and breastfeeding children between the menarche and the menopause. Whether you ever use it for that purpose, whether you ever fulfil that potential or not, is irrelevant. It is still what makes you specifically a woman and not a man.

And this is really crucial, because I cannot personally think of any element of my own lived experience of being a woman, as opposed to a man, which isn't directly or indirectly related to the fact that I am a member of the childbearing sex.

I'm heartened to see this thread in Chat, with so many women agreeing that the trans cosplaying of female-specific biology is offensive nonsense.

To the posters who jokingly asked if the transwomen want menopause too, I am delighted to report that my workplace (a top-ranking university!) had an event on menopause, with 1 of the 3 sessions devoted to trans menopause. When I queried this I was told it's ok as it's all "just hormones".

What did you say to that utter shite?! @Beowulfa

I sent a carefully worded response explaining why women might be put off by having menopause mansplained to them by a male who'd hever had a period. I pointed out that we work in a STEM department so needed to be clear about scientific language in healthcare. No response, and the event was still being desperately advertised on the day so I guess attendance was low.

Funnily enough, a few days later another department sent round an ad for a session on men's mental health. Clear concept, clear language, all welcome to attend but about helping men specifically. No section devoted to trans issues.

No surprise anywhere there.

Any women helping out on that men's health session?

Yes, that's how the word "transwoman" is currently being used. I prefer "M2F trans" (or F2M trans for transmen) to avoid confusion since many people who only know about this mess from the mainstream media haven't a clue what all the terms being bandied about actually mean.