understanding gender dysphoria

[devoid]

not sure if this is the right subforum to post in.

 

the whole thing of gender being something more than biological is hard to grasp for me. i know that it is more, a lot more, but i just.. don't understand what it is. and of course, i don't have to understand people to respect them. but i would like to at least understand myself enough to know my own gender?

also, regarding dysphoria specifically. it seems to be that the only way to solve dysphoria about your body is to physically transition in the relevant areas. but, isn't this really a matter of identifying with your body? wouldn't a deep understanding of what you actually are solve it? (as you can see, i do not have a deep understanding either about what i am or about what gender is lol)

would love to hear others thoughts on this, especially from other trans people

[4201]

On 04/06/2021 at 6:50 AM, devoid said:

it seems to be that the only way to solve dysphoria about your body is to physically transition in the relevant areas. but, isn't this really a matter of identifying with your body? wouldn't a deep understanding of what you actually are solve it?

Yes, IMO gender dysphoria is a misconception. The idea that you are a woman in a man's body is false and vice versa. People feel bad about themselves and start imagining it's because their body have the wrong sex. Then they go to the doctor and get diagnosed, validating their misconception. No matter what your current body is (even if you already have transitionned) you can accept it the way it is and live a happy life. You can hear the thoughts of a trans person, but I'd advise hearing the thoughts of an enligthened trans person instead. 

Trans people are valid and they should have all the rights everyone else. People should be able to transition if they want to but no misconception about your true self should force you to transition. Mental illnesses like depression and gender dysphoria are construct of the mind that our current health system hasn't been designed to solve or understand. Thought can construct any number of mental illness which can be believed and through belief acted out.

Those misconceptions can sure be deep, it doesn't suffice to tell someone suffering of gender dysphoria to just "wake up" just like it doesn't suffice to tell someone seeking enlightenment to just wake up either.

[devoid]

2 hours ago, 4201 said:

Yes, IMO gender dysphoria is a misconception. The idea that you are a woman in a man's body is false and vice versa. People feel bad about themselves and start imagining it's because their body have the wrong sex. Then they go to the doctor and get diagnosed, validating their misconception. No matter what your current body is (even if you already have transitionned) you can accept it the way it is and live a happy life. You can hear the thoughts of a trans person, but I'd advise hearing the thoughts of an enligthened trans person instead. 

Trans people are valid and they should have all the rights everyone else. People should be able to transition if they want to but no misconception about your true self should force you to transition. Mental illnesses like depression and gender dysphoria are construct of the mind that our current health system hasn't been designed to solve or understand. Thought can construct any number of mental illness which can be believed and through belief acted out.

Those misconceptions can sure be deep, it doesn't suffice to tell someone suffering of gender dysphoria to just "wake up" just like it doesn't suffice to tell someone seeking enlightenment to just wake up either.

i can definiately distance myself from depression and look at it from a distance, but it seems impossible to do this with dysphoria. which i find both interesting and annoying, why can i distance myself to other feelings (maybe except for happiness/joy/awe related to just existing and how cool the world is, that one is hard not to identify with), but this one i struggle so much with? maybe i tie myself as a person very hard to this feeling? which i don't think i do. it's just a theory i haven't tested, but the mind sure likes to trick itself.
 

i also find it fascinating that therapy doesn't help solve dysphoria. it can help people with so many other things regarding their thoughts, feelings and beliefs, but on this one it just doesn't work? i wonder what makes it different and how we can help people work through it

my ego got very upset with you calling it a misconception in this part "no misconception about your true self should force you to transition", which amused me quite a bit. why get so upset if you supposedly know that it's not a misconception? why even care if you are as sure as you say you are? it's fun to be able to distance oneself and just watch what's going on in the mind. kind of feels like those videos of entitled "karens" that can be seen all over internet lol

[4201]

21 hours ago, devoid said:

i can definiately distance myself from depression and look at it from a distance, but it seems impossible to do this with dysphoria. which i find both interesting and annoying, why can i distance myself to other feelings (maybe except for happiness/joy/awe related to just existing and how cool the world is, that one is hard not to identify with), but this one i struggle so much with? maybe i tie myself as a person very hard to this feeling? which i don't think i do. it's just a theory i haven't tested, but the mind sure likes to trick itself.
 

i also find it fascinating that therapy doesn't help solve dysphoria. it can help people with so many other things regarding their thoughts, feelings and beliefs, but on this one it just doesn't work? i wonder what makes it different and how we can help people work through it

my ego got very upset with you calling it a misconception in this part "no misconception about your true self should force you to transition", which amused me quite a bit. why get so upset if you supposedly know that it's not a misconception? why even care if you are as sure as you say you are? it's fun to be able to distance oneself and just watch what's going on in the mind. kind of feels like those videos of entitled "karens" that can be seen all over internet lol

You seem to have a lot of ability to notice your own bias. I sincerely think you have great contemplation skills and you can find the truth entirely by yourself.

Of course it's easier to distance ourselves from the issues we aren't stuck on believing. It's easy for me to talk about gender dysphoria light heartedly because I'm looking at it from a totally detached state. It's a different thing to detach from the belief. Still, I do empathy with your situation as I had my own "heavy" things to deconstruct as well.

Regardless of gender disphoria having been a misconception or not you will find happiness in accepting your current body and your current situation. All identifications are "misconceptions" in a sense. For instance the idea that I am a programmer type of person and not a footballer type of person is just an identity, it's not true. I could practice football and become better at it. Does it mean I ruined my life because I believed this idea about myself when I was young and it affected what I am good at now (RIP my footballer life)? No. If you want to make past identifications/misconceptions into problems you can but this too is a misconception. The truth is that the present moment is all there is, this story about what I should have done or could have been are ridiculous. 

If you truly accept everything and are fully in touch with the present moment then there is no gender dysphoria, no depression, no psychosis, nor any regrets about past decisions. Ego doesn't like to be told gender dysphoria is a misconception because ego thinks it is a person who has gender dysphoria. Even thinking you are a person is a misconception. Your true nature is much greater than that, even if it's being hidden behing layers and layers of conditioning.

Gender dysphoria sure is quite a convenient explanation when you are lost, depressed and insecure about your body and sexuality. It's like a catch-all explanation which somehow explains everything "wrong" about yourself. No need to figure out anything anymore, I just had the wrong body! Reality is often much more nuanced than that. Traumas can be complex and intricate, they rarely are black and white like this. Traumas are unrecognized situations that led you to believe false things. Most of the time they are very specific to you rather than being a vague thing you can find others to have too.

You say it's funny therapy doesn't fix gender dysphoria but it doesn't fix the most severe cases of depression either. Those get prescribed hard drugs instead. Of course if you have just some mild depression therapy can help, but there's no mild gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is relatively new compared to depression as well and the mainstream progressive opinion seems to be going toward normalizing hormone blockers for children and generally validating the idea of gender dysphoria being an actual (physical) illness. So I wouldn't imagine psychologists trying to challenge one's opinion of gender dysphoria just yet. I think it will take much longer before they realize that identification is limitless.

Cause let's say gender dysphoria is fully validated. Now what about people who think they are the wrong species? (Furries) We would generally say those aren't valid because what they identify with isn't human. But are we going to "open up" to this idea in the future? When will we realize that one can literally identify with anything and make a problem out of it if convinced their belief is true? I imagine at some point there will be a crash but for now we haven't crashed yet so modern medicine continue to validate those identification-driven illnesses and so here we are. 

 

 

Edited June 7, 2021 by 4201

[devoid]

18 hours ago, 4201 said:

You seem to have a lot of ability to notice your own bias. I sincerely think you have great contemplation skills and you can find the truth entirely by yourself.

hm, maybe. my ego really apprechiated that comment haha. i actually joined the forum to be able to get more perspectives on things, since there are always things i won't notice. and it seems to be that everything is a matter of perspective, so the more different views on something i can get, the better i can understand it.

 

i would definiately say that my depression is "worse" than my gender dysphoria. i mean, both suck, a lot. my earliest memories are from when i am three, and i do not remember a single happy moment from my whole childhood. my depression seems to be that kind of case that the doctors and psychologists have given up on. i haven't though, i have definiately "trained" myself to at least get a handful happy moments in the last couple of years, something i have no memory of ever experiencing as a child. so i have identified with this depression literally my whole life, but gender dysphoria is kind of new for me and i have only started to experiment with gender and getting a name for it like a year or so ago. which would make me think that my depression is harder tied to my personality, but maybe not. maybe i can distance myself from depression because i am more aware of how it's a part of me and my perspective? idk

 

i don't think i have ever been 100% in the present moment. or, of course i have, i am all the time lol. but i have not consciously been 100% in the here and now. working on it though, so i will hopefully get there sooner or later.

 

i really want to find another way to "treat" dysphoria. i'm not against the idea of physical transition, but i have some issues that aren't currently possible to change with the technology we have today. my bone structure is what it is. i want to find an answer, both for my own happiness and for my general curiosity about how life works. it would be super strange if there wasn't an alternative way.

 

i can't allow myself to just accept that the only cure would be physical transition, because that means i will always have those feelings regarding those things that aren't changeable. just like i can't allow myself to accept that my depression is an impossible case. maybe it's wrong of me to not accept those things. i don't know. but i do know that the only thing that would get me to kill myself (i.e. my body) is the feeling of deep hopelessness. so giving up hope isn't an alternative. i have had some way too close calls with that. i need to choose the perspective of hope to literally survive. (maybe i'm close-minded here. if anyone think's my thinking is flawed, please let me hear your perspective on it)

 

if people identify as other species, maybe that would push society/science towards finding different solutions? i would hope so at least. that we would try to help people and not just dismiss them as being crazy or making things up for attention. it would be hard to physically change someone into another species. so if they have  species dysphoria about their physical body, an alternative way of treatment would probably be needed.

[Flowerfaeiry]

@devoid I think it's ok to identify with the body. Of course it's not the only thing, but we all have amazing bodies that we are exploring in one way or another.  You're on the right track asking questions and learning about who you are. 

 

[Leo Gura]

Life is a process of discovering who you are.

If you are confused about who you are, keep contemplating, experimenting, and digging until you sort yourself out.

We are all confused about who we are in different ways.

[mivafofa]

On 05/06/2021 at 9:29 PM, 4201 said:

Yes, IMO gender dysphoria is a misconception. The idea that you are a woman in a man's body is false and vice versa. People feel bad about themselves and start imagining it's because their body have the wrong sex. Then they go to the doctor and get diagnosed, validating their misconception.

 

On 06/06/2021 at 10:22 PM, 4201 said:

Gender dysphoria sure is quite a convenient explanation when you are lost, depressed and insecure about your body and sexuality. It's like a catch-all explanation which somehow explains everything "wrong" about yourself. No need to figure out anything anymore, I just had the wrong body! Reality is often much more nuanced than that. 

..You don't understand gender dysphoria - what it's like and how it feels like, at all. I mean by no offense, but it sounds from this that you're likely the one who has a misconception about it. 

 

On 06/06/2021 at 10:22 PM, 4201 said:

Of course it's easier to distance ourselves from the issues we aren't stuck on believing. It's easy for me to talk about gender dysphoria light heartedly because I'm looking at it from a totally detached state. It's a different thing to detach from the belief. 

You can also easily claim many things are just a "belief" when it's not your experience nor your reality. It's true your detachement from a situation can help you understand the grand picture with less biases. But your detachment without having been through it can also cause you to misunderstand it thoroughly because you haven't live it yourself. 

[4201]

5 hours ago, mivafofa said:

 

..You don't understand gender dysphoria - what it's like and how it feels like, at all. I mean by no offense, but it sounds from this that you're likely the one who has a misconception about it. 

 

You can also easily claim many things are just a "belief" when it's not your experience nor your reality. It's true your detachement from a situation can help you understand the grand picture with less biases. But your detachment without having been through it can also cause you to misunderstand it thoroughly because you haven't live it yourself. 

No I haven't lived this specific identification by myself. All I can offer is explanations based on my own experiences with total lack of identification. Nothing can really replace one's experience. But there is no problem that is beyond identification. Quite fundamentally there is no problem unless you create one, in all cases and all scenarios.

22 hours ago, devoid said:

if people identify as other species, maybe that would push society/science towards finding different solutions? i would hope so at least. that we would try to help people and not just dismiss them as being crazy or making things up for attention. it would be hard to physically change someone into another species. so if they have  species dysphoria about their physical body, an alternative way of treatment would probably be needed.

A person can totally stop identifying too and if they did that, they would feel as amazing as one can possibly feel. Of course just saying that to them is not going to make them stop identify. There's no way to force a person to stop identify, it's really only a thing you can do. You can tell whether transitioning is the best decision for you by feeling deeply into yourself. I would recommend at least waiting until you have a clear answer.

Edited June 8, 2021 by 4201

[devoid]

29 minutes ago, 4201 said:

A person can totally stop identifying too and if they did that, they would feel as amazing as one can possibly feel. Of course just saying that to them is not going to make them stop identify. There's no way to force a person to stop identify, it's really only a thing you can do. You can tell whether transitioning is the best decision for you by feeling deeply into yourself. I would recommend at least waiting until you have a clear answer.

yeah, i agree. we can't force anyone to do anything, but maybe we can find good ways to point people in the right direction, if they would wan't to change the way they identify. just like leo and other spiritual teachers do their best to help us find our own answers. and i don't mean that people shouldn't identify as animals, they can do so if they feel that it's right for them. but for many (not everyone) their identity as trans comes with a lot of dysphoria regarding how their body looks. and i think it would be great if there was a way to ease this dysphoria, a way that didn't require surgery and hormones, but a way that was just a shift in mindset and perspective. if i stopped having dysphoria, i would still identify as a non-girl. but i would be a non-girl that was totally okay with the way my female body is.

[Harlen Kelly]

On 6/5/2021 at 9:29 PM, 4201 said:

Yes, IMO gender dysphoria is a misconception. The idea that you are a woman in a man's body is false and vice versa. People feel bad about themselves and start imagining it's because their body have the wrong sex. Then they go to the doctor and get diagnosed, validating their misconception. No matter what your current body is (even if you already have transitionned) you can accept it the way it is and live a happy life. You can hear the thoughts of a trans person, but I'd advise hearing the thoughts of an enligthened trans person instead. 

Don't you think you might be dumbing down a phenomenon that the best scientist don't fully understand yet? 

[4201]

11 minutes ago, Harlen Kelly said:

Don't you think you might be dumbing down a phenomenon that the best scientist don't fully understand yet? 

The reason scientists don't understand mental illness is that they study it as if it was a physical phenomenon when it is a conceptual phenomenon. Feel free to give it the credit of a physical thing if you want, but doing this you validate it conceptually as "being a thing" which reinforces the phenomenon itself. You can't study thought with thought.

It doesn't make it "simple". Thoughts are quite tricky... if you think they are

Edited June 11, 2021 by 4201