Trans widow and feel so much pain for her

[Hotandbithered]

I know this is not actually my grief but DH has a good friend who we have known throughout our marriage, let’s call him Steve.

Steve was married to Jess and had two children.

We spent a lot of time with them over the years. Camping trips, dinners, bbqs, birthdays. Steve was your classic sort of male really. He was quite attractive, funny, polite, well educated and both he and Jess very successful, had a beautiful home.

Anyway getting to the point. Almost out of the blue (to us at least), a few years ago Steve began transitioning. He is not short of money and has had facial surgery multiple times, paid for himself. He is extremely supportive of the trans community and recognises he is lucky he can access this sort of treatment.

Jess stayed with him through this, went to the appointments, talked to their kids about what this meant (primary age) and tried to stick in the marriage. It’s now broken down and they are doing their best to be great co parents to their children.

Jess’ grief is immeasurable. This couple always seemed so in love, so respectful of one another. She says she feels like her husband has died yet she has to experience this new person in his place, like he’s been stolen from her. I too have felt this obviously to a much lesser degree, but its truly life changing to even be affected by it even a little bit.

I should add that I have no strong views on what or who people choose to be but I suppose I am shocked that a person can live a lie for so long and especially put their children through it? DH has tried to be supportive but I think struggles more with Steve’s new interests more than anything, as in they don’t have much to talk about anymore as Steve is consumed by this (I suppose understandably) and his focus on what makes him a woman rather than anything else.

I don’t know what I am asking really. Just feel grief for Jess and for DH and wonder if others have been through similar how they navigated it.

My friend told me it was worse for her cos her ex was still alive than it was for me because my DH was dead. Different but worse, absolutely not.

In Jess' case she's mourning the loss of her husband as was, I get that, but her husband isn't dead, he's different. As a person widowed young with young kids, I take umbridge ref the use of the term widow.

However, Jess has significant adjustments to make - it won't always be easy. Her DH had been living a lie. The decit of behaviours like this are really what gets me. I couldn't be jointly doing the transition with someone who lied to me about who they are. I take my hat off to Jess.

Odd for people to get so hung up on the term 'trans widow'. The point is that this man has become self-obsessed as well as obsessed with a fantasy about himself that typically has sexual overtones, and expects both Jess and their child to play along to it.

So yes it's a different kind of pain from losing someone to death. But it's still bad, especially as the man has turned coercive. Confusing children about the immutability of sex messes with their social learning and is potentially dangerous if it throws off their 'creep detector'.

Poor Jess. Grey rock Steve, try to support her.

The insane women on here who live in their transphobic echo chamber under the false guise of ‘feminism’ won’t like that but yes you are correct.

Nasty women who thankfully make up a very small portion of the population no matter what they think!

Wow, don’t hold back will you!

Unfortunately for you, the men who have reported on the feelings of attraction to the idea of themselves as a woman they experience prove you wrong.

It’s not insane to know that people can’t change sex,
It’s not insane to know that children and vulnerable adults are being harmed by this ideology.
It’s not insane to say that so called ‘gender identity’ is based on a term coined by a man who carried out horrific and abusive experiments on children that culminated in the suicide of the two brothers he sexually abused. It is not a defined concept and has been weaponised to decimate women’s rights and harm children throughout the Western world.

I’d say that ‘insanity’ is demonstrated by the people that refuse to accept reality and insist that ‘gender identity’ is more important than sex when that is quite clearly 100% scotch mist.

I’d say that nasty is personified by the people who advocate for lying husbands to make their kids call them ‘mum’, male rapists and paedophiles in women’s prisons with mother and baby units, men in women’s sports and men in women’s spaces and the changing rooms of teenage girls.

A daughter going through puberty seems like a commonly reported trigger for these men.

I remember the audience laughing approvingly when Bruce/Caitlin Jenner told an ‘hilarious’ story about him stealing and wearing his young teenage daughter’s underwear. It seemed like they’d all lost their minds.

If he’d told that story while not wearing a dress and calling himself Caitlin, I think it would have been tumbleweed

Do you have a link to Supreme Court judgement about this? I've not heard about it (unless you're referring to FWS)

Transwidow is a figure of speech.

Everyone knows that transwidows are not actually widows just like everyone knows that so called ‘transwomen’ are not actually women.

Transwidows are the women that have been dragged through hell by their husbands who develop a late onset sexual obsession with the idea of themselves as women. I think we should allow them to name themselves and their unique and often abusive experiences without criticism.

‘Transwomen’ are men who mistakenly think they know how it feels to be a woman.

Like many PPs, I too am a widow. I have no problem with the use of the term “transwidow”.

both Intersex and DSDs exist and overlap

Nope. Intersex was used in the past but people with Differences of Sexual Development which is a medical condition that creates abnormalities in male and female people felt that ‘intersex’ was misleading and othering. It is misleading in the same way ‘hermaphrodite’ implies that someone is both male and female. This is not the case, people with DSDs are either male with abnormalities for their sex or female with abnormalities.

As for the homophobia if you read through this thread you will see people going on how the children in this situation will have to call their now trans mother 'mum', and going on how this is bad for the "kids" having two mothers, this to me sounds both homophobic and tansphobic.

Criticising a man making his kids call him ‘mum’ is not homophobic.

If criticising a father making his kids call him ‘mum’ and be asking up their family in a devastating way is ‘transphobic’, well so be it. 🤷‍♀️

And my institutions comment, I'm going to ask you a question, if you don't like trans people or anyone who doesn't fit your ideal way of living as you are part of a large group on here... what do you want?

We want men to stop pushing their way into women’s spaces and demanding that their kids call them ‘mum’.

We want young traumatised or lesbian or autistic girls not to be told that the root of their distress with their body is that they are really a boy and for all young people not to have their health and fertility ruined before they are old enough to understand what they are losing.

There’s quite a further long list but that will do for starters.

For that you’ll need to define ‘gender’.

No stereotypes, no circular definitions please.

I am a lesbian autistic woman who has C-PTSD, I have been to therapy and seen many therapists during my life as a child and now as an adult not once has a professional used my trauma as a way to tell me I'm a "boy".

You keep believing bogus news articles that are set out to fear-monger the masses.

Also, why would a man want to be as opressed as women under the patriarchy as a choice? Trans people women then become a target of the patriarchy that you are holding up with these views.

Yes. And many transwidows report that far from getting sympathy from friends and family, the manipulative and deceptive husband would often gain the support and sympathy and the wife would be criticised or even ostracised for struggling with him blowing up her life and those of their children.

Many of the stories on the transwidows website are quite horrific and heartbreaking. I have seen the devastation wreaked on a family I know. Thankfully she had a bit of support around her.

I feel very sorry for Jess, she and the children should not have to be complicit in this gaslighting. How heartbreaking for her to learn that her husband was living a lie.

Gender is a social construct it is a spectrum of diversity, gender is not confined to a binary of male and female, gender is cultural and psychological of ones individual experience of gender influencing how a person perceive themselves and interact with society.

You’re lucky then.

Many girls haven’t been. I have seen this with my own eyes and it was observed and commented on by staff at the Tavistock gender clinic.

There was a ‘joke’ that there would be no lesbians left and it was also observed that some families displayed homophobia towards likely gay children and some were more keen on the idea of ‘transition’ than the kids themselves.

That’s great that you may not have been indoctrinated by trans activists in that specific way but please don’t deny the experiences of many who are not so lucky.

You keep believing bogus news articles that are set out to fear-monger the masses.

What bogus news articles are you talking about?

Also, why would a man want to be as opressed as women under the patriarchy as a choice? Trans people women then become a target of the patriarchy that you are holding up with these views.

The thing is, everyone really knows that ‘transwomen’ are not really women and they don’t treat them like women- we see that demonstrated daily by the eagerness of those in positions of authority to satisfy their demands, even to the detriment of women, children and disabled people.

Men who identify as women are exercising ultimate power by defining us as a figment of their imagination, to be put on at will like a costume. These men are not oppressed by the patriarchy - they ARE the patriarchy.

I think the children should call their dad whatever they feel comfortable with. Sorry didn't see their age? I don't think I'd like a name being imposed either way.

I’m not sure you quite understand the meaning of the word ‘definition’.

Gender is a social construct - what is a social construct?

it is a spectrum of diversity - where does this spectrum begin and end and what does the ‘diversity’ refer to?

gender is not confined to a binary of male and female - what is it confined by then? Everything has to have some framework, definition or boundaries as part of its definition otherwise it is just word salad.

gender is cultural and psychological of ones individual experience of gender influencing how a person perceive themselves and interact with society.

Eh? That is a circular definition. Can you give examples please?

The above is not a definition. I am no clearer on the meaning of ‘gender’ than before.

Please can you provide a succinct definition.

Myriam Webster dictionary defines gender as:

• the behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex

And the difference between sex and gender as:

• Among those who study gender and sexuality, a clear delineation between sexand gender is typically prescribed, with sex as the preferred term for biological forms, and gender limited to its meanings involving behavioral, cultural, and psychological traits. In this dichotomy, the terms male and female relate only to biological forms (sex), while the terms masculine/masculinity, feminine/femininity, woman/girl, and man/boy relate only to psychological and sociocultural traits (gender).

Ah. I get what you mean by my comment above.

Gender expression is how you present yourself, this can be informed by socially agreed stereotypes, I.e. woman wear dresses and men trousers in very basic crude understanding. Gender is what's between your ears, your own understanding of your self, a completely subjective experience to each own person, and can be informed by these other parts or be independent of them.

The differences are important as even though we have a stereotypical idea of what a "woman" might be or a "man" most people will not meet all on the same points on all of these, i.e a man wearing a skirt is no less of a man in a suit. A masculine woman is no Les of a woman than a feminine woman. Their experience experience is unique to them.

If you understand yourself as a woman, and that makes you happy or feel at peace with yourself then congratulations you know your gender. If it dosnt, exploring it to gain a better understanding of it will soon allow you to see for yourself what it is.

For simplicity sake I kept this to binary genders but it applies to the whole spectrum, and each of these individual points above are also spectrums. There is no singular answer that fits all, just what fits you.

They're loads of books explaining this far greater than I ever could, I recommend reading Gender Trouble by Judith Butler.

God the number of transphobic people on this site is nauseating.

yes, there is a loss with transitioning. You lose your old friend and gain a new one. Jess will need loads of love and support because she is grieving her future she has missed out on. Her husband can’t see her without remembering the difficulty of life before transitioning, repressing herself for the sake of being treated as a human. Therapy would be good for them both seperately.

In Nax* Germany the first people that were targeted weren't Jews they were Trans people, they burnd the all the progressive research books and took the trans people to the camps. not true. Yes they destroyed the Hirschfeld institute, but Hirschfeld was a Jew.

This is my last response here, if anyone sees this there is a poem from WW2 First They Came by Martin Niemöller highly recommend reading it. yes, a brilliant poem. But what's it got to do with trans people?

Oh ffs don't be ridiculous.

Men are not a kind of woman. No humans can change sex.

That has nothing to do with rightful inclusion of actual women

I have a trans nephew/ niece. I’m okay with that, my love and support hasn’t wavered. But there is something I don’t understand and maybe someone on Mumsnet can help me out. For instance, a man believes that he is really a woman in a man’s body. Sex being biological, but gender a social construct. Sexual attraction apparently beside the point. I hope I’ve got that right. So, you’re Bob. Lived your whole life as a male. At 43 years old you have an epiphany! Genitalia be damned! You’re actually a woman. You take estrogen shots, dress in conventionally feminine ways, maybe have top surgery and so on. You chose a new name for your new identity. No longer Bob, you are Antoinette. You identify as a trans woman. Here’s my question, why always the prefix “trans”? Okay Bob/ Antionette is a woman, either you are or you aren’t. The “trans” after the person has fully transitioned is superfluous. So, why? Why wouldn’t Antoinette just be a woman instead of a trans woman if that was the person’s identity all along, even if they just realized it?

Intersex people?

Are you saying intersex people are a third sex?
This is so insulting.

It’s 2026 not 2020, these old tropes using people with disorders of sexual development to prove that there are more than 2 sexes sounds absolutely ridiculous.

Explain what you mean about intersex people proving there isn’t just men and women please?

So what does the definition of gender have to do with the sex terms man and woman?