Keira Bell

[MarieIVanArkleStinks]

I'm not sure whether this issue has been debated on this board, as I haven't been posting/reading here for a few weeks. But the story is here:

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/01/22/former-transgender-patient-tells-court-sex-change-clinic-putting/

and here:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7926675/Witness-court-battle-against-gender-clinic-reveals-happened-cry-help.html

TLDR: The Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust, which runs the UK's only gender identity development service (GIDS) for children, is being sued over concerns that youngsters are being given "experimental treatment" without adequate assessments.

Keira's view as to her symptoms, and lack of warning about them:

I had symptoms similar to the menopause when a woman's hormones drop. I had hot flushes, I found it difficult to sleep, my sex drive disappeared. I was given calcium tablets because my bones weakened.

Keira claims she was not warned by the Tavistock therapists of the dreadful symptoms ahead. 'My female hormones had been flushing through my body and, suddenly, a curtain came down on them. It felt pretty bad,' she recalls.

And as to now:

'The treatment needs to change so that it does not put young people, like me, on a torturous and unnecessary path that is life-changing. I feel like I've been lied to because it did not make me feel any better.

As she struggles to return to life as a woman, she adds, with feeling: 'I don't want any more kids to suffer like me.

That poor woman. This is unconscionable, and the mere idea of the opposite side of this view even having a case to answer in court is so frightening it seems to be bordering on dystopia. In the meantime (and not directly applicable to FtoM transition) I know someone who is currently experiencing hideous, debilitating menopausal symptoms, and is unable to get HRT. There just isn't any available. Instead, her GP has prescribed her with ... Prozac.

I'm curious to know whether MtoF transitioners are experiencing the same issue.

And the drug used to ‘block puberty’ actually seem to cause depression and suicidal ideation, in natal females, at least.

oh oopster, you don't need a clinic to be feminine or masculine! Just look at Mick Jagger in his younger days. Pretty as a picture.

And if someone is having feelings of wanting to harm or mutilate a perfectly healthy body - that's why we have mental health services.

Rufflecrow, you're right, but being trans isn't simply feeling feminine or masculine, it's much more, and for some, they need the medical help that gid's can offer. For some that may just be talking therapies, but for others it's hormones and surgeries. When you have a headache, chances are it will pass given enough time, but most of us will take relevant painkillers. The same is true with gender identity issues. Sometimes you can resolve them yourself, other times you need that external intervention.

Other times the external intervention carried out by gender services solves nothing at all. It may even create a whole different set of health issues.

As with Keira Bell.

Bloody hell, puberty blockers, cross sex hormones, and surgery are not like taking an aspirin for a headache! Receiving therapy alongside watchful waiting to ease dysphoric symptoms until after puberty is maybe like treating a headache with aspirin and waiting until it passes. But what's happening now is more like someone going to the doctor with a headache and insisting the headache is actaully caused by an alien brain implant, immediately being approved for brain surgery to remove it, and then everyone pretending that they actually found something!

Like treating a headache indeed, what utter shit. They removed both her breasts because she said she was actually somehow literally male. They actually amputated healthy body parts because a child made a claim about something that's impossible. What the fuck is wrong with people?!

A child or young person insists that they are or should be the opposite sex, and shows signs of distress. Since people can't change sex, the obvious treatment for this is for them to have counselling to help them to accept their healthy body as it is. Instead of this, they are being given hormone blockers and opposite sex hormones and having their bodies mutilated in an attempt to make them look like the opposite sex.

Why are doctors doing this?

They didn't immediately do anything. I've not been through Tavistock but I have. Web through charring cross when waiting times weren't as long, and believe me, they take they're bloody time with everything. Appointments with a minimum of 5 months between was the norm. No one would have prescribed anything or performed any surgery unless they were absolutely convinced that the patient was 100% certain that it was the right thing to do, and there's no surgery at all till the patient is a legal adult able to give consent.

It's much more complex than that. Please read me previous comment which I've just posted.

Oopster she had three, one hour appointments before being prescribed puberty blockers. Drugs which the Tavistock themselves describe as cementing gender dysphoria. Her path was mapped out after 3 hours.

Nearly 100% of children, many as young as 11, go on to cross sex hormones if they are prescribed puberty blockers.

No one would have prescribed anything or performed any surgery unless they were absolutely convinced that the patient was 100% certain that it was the right thing to do,

They were 100% wrong though, weren't they.

Oopster she had three, one hour appointments before being prescribed puberty blockers. Drugs which the Tavistock themselves describe as cementing gender dysphoria. Her path was mapped out after 3 hours. Nearly 100% of children, many as young as 11, go on to cross sex hormones if they are prescribed puberty blockers

Most people have no idea that this is going on. Keira Bell will have to live with the consequences of the decisions made by medical professionals she trusted. Her bravery in bringing this to public scrutiny and judicial review is admirable. Especially since there are so many people who seem determined to defend this seriously flawed treatment of young girls.

No one would have prescribed anything or performed any surgery unless they were absolutely convinced that the patient was 100% certain that it was the right thing to do, and there's no surgery at all till the patient is a legal adult able to give consent.

How long ago was your experience with gender clinics? It's not like it was 10 or 20 years ago.

Not so long ago there were no transgender children, but now they're in almost every school. 10 years ago I'd never heard of a gender identity, now we're all supposed to have one and children are being taught in school that they should with the inevitable consequence that huge numbers of them get totally confused and end up seeking treatment to cure them of a non-illness. The clinics are just finding a way to deal with far greater numbers of children than they ever expected to have to deal with.

I worry that the absolute number of those who ‘really need’ to transition will stay much as it was when there was proper gatekeeping.

Meanwhile, there could be hundreds to thousands of people who will come to regret it - the ones who would previously have been screened out, or never persisted past puberty.

Oldcrone, I starts dating questioning my gender identity in the mid 80's, and I was too scared to tell anyone till 1997. I'd gone through years of trying to figure out why, I went through depression, suicidal thoughts, trying to "man up", but in the end I came out to a friend after a drunken night out with them.

At the end of the day, Keira was an adult when she made her decisions. She went to the clinics, she could have paused or stopped at any point, now, she wants someone to blame for her choices. I'm sorry if that sounds harsh but that's just the way it is. And she had 3 one hour appointments before going onto puberty blockers? That would would probably been over 18 months though. Gender identity services are seriously underfunded and don't have enough trained staff to offer more regular frequent appointments. Any other medical treatment that received this government backing and there'd be a national scandal.

Why are there more children presenting with gender identity issues? Because there's more knowledge now, were more open. Kids come out in school now as LGBT whereas in my day (and now I feel old), you we're too scared to come out and because of things like section 28, you couldn't talk to a teacher about it. Two of my friends from school are gay and I never knew at the time. If things had been more open at the time, we could have all possibly supported each other.

Keira was 16 when she was put on this path

That is not an adult

Yes she was 16. But do carry on with your justifications. It's most enlightening.

At the end of the day, Keira was an adult when she made her decisions. She went to the clinics, she could have paused or stopped at any point, now, she wants someone to blame for her choices.

Keira Bell was a 16 year old child when she was prescribed puberty blockers. She trusted the medical doctors who failed to suggest any other treatment for her depression At 20, her breasts were amputated. What surgeon does this? This draconian medical intervention is being performed on young girls The middle aged natal males who identify as female are not having surgery to remove body parts. Why? Blaming Keira Bell for 'her choices' when she was 16 years old? Nope. The ethics and motivation of those adult doctors promoting this damaging treatment needs to be rigorously examined.

she could have paused or stopped at any point,

She did stop. But by the time her frontal lobe had begun to develop, she’d already had her healthy breasts amputated.

Is no one going to say though that gender does not actually exist.

Humans invented gender; kids are being told they have a gender identity but we should be seeking to abolish gender completely.

Who is profiting from telling kids they have a gender identity?

Could I profit from telling kids that there is a blue eyed identity and a brown eyed identity? If you’re a blue eyed kid who feels brown eyed, get your eye colour changed to brown!

oopster

Can you explain what you mean by coming out? It's not like a sexual orientation. I wish people wouldn't conflate it.

People wishing or wanting to be the opposite sex have several different types of motivation.

In Keira's case it would appear to be based on society's intolerance for what they perceived as her gender non conformity. Very much a recurring theme with young women who identify as trans.

Society is not 'more open' at all! It's become regressive and restricting.

In Keira's case it would appear to be based on society's intolerance for what they perceived as her gender non conformity

Datun Well said. Here's Keira's comment on this. Keira has described feeling isolated from her peers and being bullied. It is an indictment of the current trend to fast track girls onto a medical pathway without exploring other therapeutic treatments.

She described her family life as difficult. She also believes if she had felt more accepted by society as she was then, she might not have wanted to changer her gender. She added that she wouldn't have wanted to listen to voices of caution when she was younger. "I feel I could say anything to my 16-year-old self and I might not necessarily listen at that time. And that's the point of this case, when you are that young you don't really want to listen."So I think it's up to these institutions, like the Tavistock, to step in and make children reconsider what they are saying, because it is a life-altering path."

Things my kids have said to me at toddler age and up:

I will bang my head on the floor if you don't allow me to only eat ice cream

I will hit myself if you don't let me have this very expensive toy

I will run away from home (i.e. hurt myself) if you won't let me skip school (for no good reason just because I feel like it)

Would I be a good parent if I give into these demands? If I DID give in to them do we think the head banging on the floor behaviour would increase or decrease? (obviously increase - if threats work then you keep using them)

Honestly, the people who give into threats from children aren't fit to be called adults. Yes, counselling support, yes, support them if they're distressed in a variety of ways but you don't give into threats because that's such a slippery slope and it's an abdication of responsibility.

Do we think that the government should give into threats made by terrorists who threaten to blow themselves up too?

Coming out is coming out whether you're lesbian, gay, bisexual or trans.

She may have been 16 when she started puberty blockers, but should would have been at least 18 before going onto testosterone or having any surgery. The doctors need your consent before any surgery, they tell you the risks before any surgery, you have to sign your consent before any surgery. If she wasn't ready or didn't feel it was the right thing for her then she shouldn't have gone through with it. There is no victim here, so I'm not victim blaming. She thought she was doing the right thing for her at the time, she later decided for whatever reason that it wasn't. Hindsight is a wonderful thing but it always comes too late.

As someone who's trans, I can understand how someone can feel being perceived as "the wrong sex / gender", and it's not something I would wish on anyone, and anyone considering transitioning, I tell them to make sure they are 100% certain it's the right thing for them, as past certain points there's no going back, but I will support them whatever their choices are as that is their right, it's their life and they have to live with the consequences of their actions, no one else.

she wants someone to blame for her choices

Oopster, what are you saying was her choice? Are you saying that she chose to be a boy
chose to be transgender
chose to fake being transgender
chose to listen to those who agreed she was transgender
chose to accept the medical advice of the day?

I'm not sure what you think should happen when a teenage girl presents to a gender clinic. What are you arguing for? Better gatekeeping? Less medication? More analysis first? Therapy instead of automatic affirmation?

I'm assuming your position isn't just 'Tough luck, kid, your own fault' -- is it?

they tell you the risks before any surgery, you have to sign your consent before any surgery.

Yet no consent form says , ‘I understand that this surgery will not make me more (insert opposite sex), because it’s not actually possible to change sex, no matter how many surgeries or hormones I have’

This German girl was the same age as Keira when she went through transition. Now she’s asking why did adults castrate her?

That’s her own choice of word, btw, not mine.

Scuse random Victorian map drawing of gasworks!

Irrelevant but not worth bothering the mods for deletion.