A sensitive article which tries to stay balanced, sadly some of the comments aren't. It must be very difficult treating children with gender issues. Well done the parents who do their best for their kids. I learned of one near here who's transitioned from FtM recently and his fellow pupils are supporting him. On the reverse I know of someone who is teen/early twenties who nearly went for surgery and has now apparently reverted to being a male again. It's a real minefield.
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/sep/12/transgender-c...
Comments
It is good article
but some of the comments leave a lot to desired
I notice that the article
I notice that the article quotes the claim that most cross-gender identifying children don't grow up to be trans.
I've heard that claim disputed, and since it comes from the medical profession, which has always pathologized "deviant" behavior, I'm not inclined to trust it without corroberation from a less biased source.
Disputed study
The disputed study was a Dutch one with very shaky methodology - e.g. they chose not to count children who had left the study. A more recent study, also from the Netherlands, is supportive of the emerging treatment for children with gender dysphoria. Here's a link containing info about the latter:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/11/1329035/-New-Dutch-...
...a quick search didn't turn up a citation for the first study - but it's out there.
Ron
Pain
Adult transgender transition IMHO is far too painful to be worth it. I can only speak with some knowledge about MtF folk, and I believe that FtM folk have entirely different motivations. Ideally, in the future, these conditions will be detected very early and corrected such that later on in life no one needs to know.
Gwen
And yet we transition anyway.
And yet we still transition. So far, all of the trans people I know are adult transitioners. A friend of mine (FtM) and I (MtF) are both 62, and we're planning to transition. I've got an appointment to see a doctor about hormones, my friend has to stay stealth for another year or so to protect his retirement health insurance.
As for "detected early," not all of us had any clue that we were trans when we were children. (Not that it would have done us any good back then.) Nor would "corrected such that later on in life no one needs to know" work for all of us -- some of us will never fit neatly into the "male" or the "female" box.
In my ideal world, society at large will be relaxed enough about "gender" that non-standard genders won't be a big deal, and a non-standard gender history will be about as consequential as whether you had braces or had your tonsils out as a kid.
Given the alternative
was death I think transitioning is worth it. We are damaged by waiting so long, but eventually life just isn't worth it if we have to keep pretending.