"Transwomen have periods"

[FairfaxAikman]

A woke bloke I know posted this on FB.
Do I call it out or should I avoid wasting my energy?
I'm so bloody angry because it's based on a false understanding of how the menstrual cycle works but some of his female friends are so out of touch with their own biology they are, in addition to calling themselves cis, saying "wow, I didn't know that ".
However not sure I can face another pile on.

That's actually putting it politely. I think it's fucked up.
Can you imagine someone saying "no don't bother getting that bleeding mole checked, it makes you look pretty"?

Thanks Lord.
Luckily I come from a medical family (though I'm in a different field) so I know the big words without looking them up 😁. I have had to check a few fact myself though (which is where my job comes in!)

Exactly, we don’t treat anorexia by prescribing diet pills & referring people to Slimming World.
Those people need treatment for their gender dysphoria not HRT & surgery.

Adjust the IUD bit - my understanding is that they prevent implantation rather than killing sperm.

I haven't read the full thread but tell me woke bloke that if a tw is bleeding monthly from their ladydick then an emergency trip to the doctors might be in order.

Spinnaret my understanding is the copper effectively kills it and also the IUD thickens cervical mucus.

Spinnaret my understanding is the copper effectively kills it and also the IUD thickens cervical mucus.

this quite misogynistic idea that being on your period is all about eating ice cream and listening to sad girly music in your Pyjamas

Yes indeed. I don’t get mood swings or ice-cream cravings or anything, or even any cramps since having babies, I just bleed. Heaven only knows how I’ve been able to work out it’s a period given bleeding is such an unimportant part of the process. Total mystery.

Great reply. Honestly, I would be very concerned if a friend of mine who was male started saying they got periods, and reckoned a bleeding rectum was the same thing. Given the hormones taken are constant, then if there are cycles and stuff, somethings going drastically wrong somewhere. of course really, its just blokes making out they have it worse in reality. Fairly sure no sane transwoman claims to get periods. Only the fetishists and those wishing to claim the oppression label.

"Medically/biologically speaking menstruation is part of the fine balance of leutenizing and follicle stimulating hormones as a result of ovaries, as well as progesterone, having a uterus and vagina, and, as there no drug on the market that can magic up any of this where and how is there blood?"

Is that bland and boring fact based unemotional information? Inoffensive?

Oh oh and oh,

None of this happens without endometrium.

IUDs work by preventing implantation i thought, so many dont bleed as no endometrial growth.

Fairly sure no sane transwoman claims to get periods.

No indeed Batshite and would surely be sensible and head to the docs with rectal bleeding, as would any sensible woman.

Correction - they also thin the lining. But copper ones definitely kill some sperm

I had chemotherapy a couple of years ago and, as the doctors predicted, i went into a temporary menopause and my periods stopped. How did I know this? Well, I had hot flushes and night sweats and put on some weight, but do you know what the biggest clue was? Yep, I stopped bleeding out of my vagina!

A few months after I stopped chemo, around the same time the hot flushes started to subside, I went to the loo one day, and when I wiped there was blood. The blood lasted a few days and since then it has happened roughly every month! Another big clue as to what was happening with my body.

The doctors had told me it was 50/50 if my periods would return. At one of my check ups, the doctor asked me if my periods had come back - what exactly was he asking me here? Was he asking me if I get a bit bloated and emotional sometimes, or was he asking me if blood was coming out of my vagina on a regular basis?

It's a headscratcher for sure.....

OrchidInTheSun

Someone asked why this is a belief. One of the TRAs I know literally believes his body developed wrongly so that his body responds in a special and different way to a man taking female hormones.

I've met someone like that too. Apparently she feels so much better taking testosterone, that's proof that her body was wrong, she must have been hormonally intersex

That's why TRAs use words like 'gender confirmation surgery' instead of sex reassignment surgery - it's just giving them their correct body, like a birth defect...

Also, if a period is just bloating and cramping and the bleeding is irrelevant, how do these people think that women know to do a pregnancy test? How do they think women throughout history ever knew they were even pregnant?!

The thing is there probably are side effects to taking the type of drugs that they do. In fact there definitely are as you get them when taking the pill. But of course using the word "period" is much nicer for them than using the word "side effect".

1. Because they don't know how to use the proper word for anything
2. Because side effect implies the result of something which unnaturally occurs in your body. Which reaffirms that the things you are doing and trying to be are not natural, and can never be fully and organically real.

Was he asking me if I get a bit bloated and emotional sometimes, or was he asking me if blood was coming out of my vagina on a regular basis?

It's a headscratcher for sure ..... Ha ha

Hope you're doing a lot better now *Eaudear

As an aside - IUSs with a hormonal component (eg the Mirena coil) do often stop any bleeding. I haven't had a period in years. I still get a bit of PMT etc because I still ovulate and my natural hormones still rise and fall in a monthly cycle. I most certainly don't get a period though (praise be).

ALittleBit I feel much better taking testosterone too, but that's because I'm a post menopausal woman, not a man or hormonally intersex . I want to know what they do about menopause, do they change their hormone regime to mimic that?

Fair enough. I'm only basing this off the experience of people I know, for whom it lightened periods but didn't stop them completely.

Watching agog for further updates...

I don't get blood coming out of my vagina anymore. I still get bloating and stomach cramps and get emotional sometimes though. Fuck - I thought I'd gone through the menopause a few years ago - silly me.

Do you still ovulate with a mirina coil? I didn't know that and I have one.

I think part of the problem here is that we know so little about how the female body works or how the things we put in them affect them.

Gosh I read the beginning post and just thought what a load of absolute bollocks. Brilliant responses Fairfax- I wish I could write so eloquently.