How do SA and rape survivors cope in this climate?

[JohnnyMcGrathSaysFuckOff]

When I gave birth last Feb, the staff wanted a load of people observing me inc men. I always knew I wouldn't cope well with that but when it came to it, he strength of my feeling surprised me. I couldn't go through it.

I was told last week that that same hospital now employs a transwoman ultrasonographer in the EPU who specialises in vaginal US. The person who told me was a local GP, speaking to me in a social context. He said some of his patients had been distressed by it.

It got me thinking - how do you/ would you cope as a survivor faced with that kind of thing? For me, loos aren't so much an issue but healthcare definitely is. But we all have our specific triggers.... what do we do if we cannot avoid them?

Actually I don't being a survivor of SA and abuse find men in general massively more scary than women personally but I don't feel any more at ease around TW than men who identify as men and wouldn't expect to be assumed to because they identify as female

I tend to detach altogether in triggering healthcare situations regardless of who's treating me- male or female. I don't know if I've just been fortunate but I haven't ever found a HCP uncompassionate or understanding that some procedures I cope with by completely zoning out during them

Exactly what Upstart said.
Nothing irrational about it. It's a risk assessment based on life experiences.
I'd also completely avoid a situation where I'm not guaranteed a female healthcare provider. Even without the threat of a male there, I find the routine stuff fairly traumatic to be honest, I'm just about keeping a lid on it all till I can get out of there.
I still have an involuntary physical reaction to situations where I feel at risk, or if I feel I'm not in control of who's touching me. That's also when I'm least unable to use my voice or express myself because I feel shaky, panicky and weak.
Can't see that improving if we're forced to accept transwomen doing our personal procedures.
And I'd fearful about how to say no to that, if the situation arose, without feeling I was going to ultimately be penalised for it.

i'm a rape and SA survivor. i am also "rational".

traumatic responses don't really have much to do with being rational or not though. during a traumatic event and any trauma responses triggered as a result of said event, the rational part of one's brain - the prefrontal cortex - is not working. the amygdala is the part responsible for fight, flight or freeze responses.

treatment for trauma is actually extremely hard. just talking (rationalising?) about the event is often simply re traumatising for people. i think this is because traumatic memory fragments are stored without a narrative, due to the narrative and sense making part of the brain having literally shut down as a method of self protection during the event. this protection is needed because a key feature that leads to an event being experienced as traumatic is the actual or perceived complete loss of control over what is happening to you.

to answer your question OP, i am at a loss! i have been stitched up after birth by male surgeons and that was fine. i understood it was simply their job and i was in a complete daze and would have literally bled to death had they not done it.

but the thought of going into a room for a smear to have a person touch me intimately without my consent TERRIFIES me. i only consent for females to do this but my GP lists gender and not sex. i don't give a crap about gender (would be fine for a trans man or non binary or any type of female as long as they were professional) i am going to ask them what i should do as my smear test is due.

tbh what terrifies me even more than non consensual intimate touch in an enclosed space by an unknown male, is the deception i would feel was involved if a transwoman practitioner were not honest with me that they had been born male. i think this stems from the experience of rape and SA is of having one's boundaries utterly ignored and with such contempt for one's humanity. to feel so powerless and insignificant and reduced to just flesh. and to have been too frozen with fear to do anything about it. furthermore the SA was by a person who was masquerading as something they were not - another reason honesty is for me an important part of my ability to give informed consent.

my particular experience of rape and SA was to feel shame and responsibility for it for a long time after. the current environment of calling traumatised women and lesbians bigots for wanting to exercise bodily autonomy is pretty triggering too, tbh.

Feel safe =/= be safe
Interesting wording

And you most certainly did say that any woman who was wary of men in general was irrational.
It is entirely NORMAL for women to be wary of men. Most of us have had multiple experiences of men being dodgy starting when we are young, and society the press etc all tell us over and over that we need to "look out for ourselves" as we are, essentially, prey.

@notumbongo fwiw I agree with you. I think telling people their fear is rational can also be harmful if they've been working hard in therapy.

Sometimes the root of the fear is rational but the fear itself is irrational. One of my most traumatising rapes was the first non-family member to rape me, he had blonde hair, was short for a man and had bright blue eyes. For ages I couldn't deal with being served in a restaurant by a waiter if he looked similar. I'd just see the smile of the rapist when leant down to me. It's a rational root, as in the brain wants to protect itself, but it's an irrational dear, because not all shortish blonde men are rapists and some are literally just trying to give me food because it's their job.

Saying it's a rational fear, and that fearing all men is rational because they might be rapists, triggers my trauma issues far worse than actual men because I can work in therapy on the fear and managing it but when people say no you're fine it's all men you should be afraid of...

I start thinking, maybe I was right. Maybe therapy is just tricking me. And have to talk myself back out of that.

We're all in different places on this journey so to say you don't believe someone because they're managing their fear is intensely undermining.

Rational and irrational was probably the wrong words to use I agree and I’m sorry for that, I do find it easier to express myself in my mother language.

I’m just going based off my own personal experiences. I spent 18 months too scared to leave my own house, but I knew I had too eventually and I had to learn coping strategies in order to do so. I also chose a male dominated career, where I’m on my own with men often. I needed to get to a place that I was comfortable with that.

Oh - another one. How common are "cis" male ultrasound technicians who specialise in vaginal ultrasound? I'm assuming that male technicians are few in number as the doctor mentioned patients being distressed by the transwoman.

No idea how common male ultrasonographers are but recently I had to have a pelvic USS. Our hospital scans at the weekends too to reduce waiting lists - when I went in there was a female sonographer who was chaperoned doing my internal scan by a male sonographer. I wasn't bothered by it but I did think that was a little odd. No choice either. They were the only staff in the department. I guess if you objected you would had to have re booked.

So any man can shove his fingers up my vagina for a smear test, or come into the the women's open changing room at my gym because he 'feels' like a woman, but if I 'feel' fear or distress due to previous attacks or abuse, that is 'irrational'? I should be reeducated out of that feeling so that the man's feeling can be validated?

Keep on driving. I wonder how many points for girls getting smears or in the changing room?

Well no, not any man obviously. Someone who is trained to do so.

I feel for women who are having to make these decisions, and face these situations, especially those who have been left traumatised by SA or rape.

Since becoming GC, I now find I am in a position where I would also be bothered by a transwoman carrying out intimate procedures, because I would have no way of knowing if they were genuinely gender dysphoric, or whether they were an AGP getting their sexual kicks from it. It's just an horrendous situation, and one that the TRAs have brought about by their stupid insistence that anyone who says they are a woman is one.

No. Thats not how medical consent works. We aren't talking about feeling uncomfortable with a shop assistant.

What’s an AGP?

@rixera I think you have worded it better than I have 😩

AGP = autogynephile. Don't google it on a work computer.

I don’t think I want to google it at all!

i don't know how irrational the fear is tbh.

in conversation with a friend we added up every little threatening thing we'd experienced - from the catcalls through mugging to rape and sexual assaults. there were a lot of them, of varying degrees of seriousness. every single one committed by men. every single one committed by a person in a class that is physically stronger and able to rape and impregnate against a person in a class physically weaker, able to become pregnant from rape. the power imbalance is huge, before you even get to the structural power imbalances that exist between males and females.

my point is that our list contained a LOT of men. the aftermath of metoo should have been a mass introspection by males, an admittance of whatever part they each individually may have played in perpetrating or enabling this systemic, endemic abuse of females by males.

instead we have gender and a new way to subjugate females.

It’s not something you can always logically manage by knowing no one will hurt you.

It’s an emotional/physical response. You can try to manage it but it’s difficult. My first birth was traumatic (anaesthesia failure during section) and despite prepping and knowing no one was going to hurt me I only just held it together during the second section. I’m an extremely logical person but I only just managed.

I have such sympathy for anyone who has been through a sexually traumatic experience.

It’s so important that women know that consent is even a thing - too many women are unaware that they can actually say no to procedures, or providers. Pressure that indirect (not wanting to be rude and seen as bigoted) is a big deal.

A man who wants to present as a woman and specialises in transvaginal ultrasound? Absolutely not going to go anywhere near me. That’s my choice and I am unapologetic

I have had Male gynaecologists, and a Male med student trainee observe a TV ultrasound. I was asked for permission and I have it. The poor lad looked like he’d rather gouge his eyes out than have been there.

A patient is not there to validate anyone’s identity. Patient consent is key. Consent must be freely given and it’s an ongoing process. No health provider should be putting any patient in a position where they feel coerced into something they don’t wnt to consent to.

A transwoman has to accept that some women will not accept them doing intimate procedures, just as some women will not accept a man doing intimate procedures. A practice who are forcing patients to be in that situation are acting unethically. A HCP who insists it pushes the issue is not acting in the best interests of patient welfare.

the aftermath of metoo should have been a mass introspection by males, an admittance of whatever part they each individually may have played in perpetrating or enabling this systemic, endemic abuse of females by males.

instead we have gender and a new way to subjugate females.

^^ This is an elegant summary of what would have been a much better outcome.

There are going to be two options: particularly bearing in mind the absolute boggling stupidity of Moran and the other handmaidens in the house today busy making the Suffragettes spin in their graves.

1. Women unable to be cool/groovy/liberally virtue cookied because of actual women life issues that prevent them being able to undress or accept intimate care from male bodied people regardless of identification, will have to leave public spaces, accept being unable to take part in public life, become a subclass and live life like it's 1850 again.

2. Women are going to need a lot of information, support and validation in starting to say NO. Loudly, clearly, persistently, and refuse to partake in this charade, without worry about being 'nice'. By requesting alternative spaces, provision, alternative professionals. They can put people in these roles. It is not the job of women to protect the service providers from the reality of what happens when they do.

Stillathing

What you just said about being reduced to just flesh and being too frozen is EXACTLY it. I go into these situations now feeling hugely aggressive, like NO this time you will not get to do this to me! It feels like a re-match every time.

Option 1 is interesting because of its potential intersection with the just-announced initiative to get more women into the workplace and to concentrate efforts upon lower-paid women.

Women unable to be cool/groovy/liberally virtue cookied because of actual women life issues that prevent them being able to undress or accept intimate care from male bodied people regardless of identification, will have to leave public spaces, accept being unable to take part in public life, become a subclass and live life like it's 1850 again

Bangladeshi and BAME women's lower level of employment was highlighted as an issue to be tackled by initiatives.

Is it possible that these initiatives might include re-education for some women who are used to living within particular cultural structures? That some women will need this in order to participate in public life and go into public spaces and (indeed) private places in workspaces?

So, and I realise I am simplifying here:

Telling women to watch their drinks, not get too drunk, and all the other rape myth magical thinking that women are expected to do to 'stop men raping us' is rational, but a lifetime of sexual violence making me think that a man shoving his fingers or a metal/plastic object up my vagina is probably not what I want to be doing no matter what pretty certificates he has is irrational.

Cool. Just wanted to be sure.

Of course it's bollocks and anyone with an ounce of knowledge or understanding of trauma recovery would be able to tell you this, but what would I know? (Hint: a lot)

Yes I agreelemonjello

It isn’t the same as a male practitioner in many ways it’s worse.

In others it is - if the person is male, they’re male. But the added potential for AGP is a very unpleasant thought.