4 ms·

Interesting she mentions Autism. I've definitely noticed a trend of people on the spectrum suffering from mental health problems, self-diagnosing as gender dys

Interesting she mentions Autism. I've definitely noticed a trend of people on the spectrum suffering from mental health problems, self-diagnosing as gender dysphoric and then launching themselves down a one-directional, miserable path that ends in their suicide. Being Autistic myself, and having goine through complete dysregulation as a 15-16 year old (it's way more common than you'd think, especially as most government support just stops when the kids turn 18), I completely understand the mental processes that both lead to the depression/anxiety/emotional dysregulation as well as the absolute certainty with which the epiphany of gender dysphoria is reached. Hearing the specific linguistic choices common on trans reddit/twitter/tttt, and knowing the exact state of mind that cause this language to be used just sends a shiver down my spine. All it would have taken is for me to have been born 5 years later, and I'd be a dead trans woman rather than a fulfilled husband and father of two. If there's anyone reading this who's on the spectrum themselves, or has a kid on the spectrum who's talking about gender issues, feel free to reach out and I can elaborate a bit more on exactly how this specific failure works.

hgsgm 4y ago
Can you write a blog article explaining how it works?
- AussieWog93 4y ago
  Maybe I should. Got some paternity leave coming up, so might have a bit of time to get my thoughts in order...
Pearse 4y ago
Thanks so much for taking the time to write this up. I would love to hear more about you're experiences growing up and especially the dysregulation. Is there any other things about your life you would be willing to share?
- AussieWog93 4y ago
  >I would love to hear more about you're experiences growing up and especially the dysregulation. Dysregulation[1] was Hell on Earth, in the literal sense. Very little in life works the way you think it should, and the reaction to these things constantly going wrong is extremely intense, negative, emotional unable to be controlled in any real sense. You lose the ability to reliably form even basic episodic/autobiographical memories, and with it any sense of the past or future. Entire chunks of your life go missing and you don't know what day it is, where you've been or where you're going. All you know is that you're constantly exhausted, nothing makes sense and everything just feels wrong. You don't know how long you've felt like this, and you don't know how long you'll continue to feel like this. As far as you're aware, past and future suffering will keep going on for eternity. And you will do anything, literally anything, to make it stop. For me, I was fortunate that my mum took me to a sleep specialist, who recommended getting my adenoids removed and prescribing an extremely specific sleep schedule which I followed to a T (all screens off at 9:00, in bed by 10:00, I don't remember if there was a specific constant time I needed to wake up by but I suspect that was part of it to. As an adult, I now supplement this routine with melatonin). This was enough to get me from a state of complete dysregulation to "garden-variety" depression, which eventually I overcame with the help of a supportive network of friends and parents who (semi-forcefully) steered me down a path where I could succeed. A hypothetical AussieWog98 might have convinced himself that the cause of the dysregulation was gender dysphoria, cut himself off from the people who really care and spent all his time online with other people just like himself until one day he couldn't take it any more. I really, genuinely believe that this is what is happening today, at least in the case of some people. For others (especially people who transition later in life), it really can help them be comfortable in their own skin, and this is of course where the trans "debate" gets hairy. [1] This is not technical language, but is the best and most concise word I can use to decribe it. There may be a more appropriate technical term, or a more scientific description of what is happening (seizures in the amygdala?). Feel free to comment if you have any scientific information or proper terminology, I'd love to read the literature on it.
  - syntheweave 4y ago
    My fear is not really with the misdiagnosis, but with the lack of the precise support you received being so common. It's hugely common in North America, where I am from, to adopt a "child as asset or liability" mindset that leads to parenting based solely around achieving normative goals, which accumulate with increased intensity around adolescence, and are further bolstered by today's media environment. Ours is a consumer culture, and part of that is that your identity is very product-driven. In this light, gender comes to the fore not in the sense of being "tempted" after seeing something online, but as a particular mask to wear 24/7, regardless of which one you choose; something which autistic people have long been known to struggle with. It isn't outrageous to conclude that switching masks might be a relief if the assigned one isn't working out; consider that autistic women are historically underdiagnosed, and then flip it around to the context of MTF transition: suddenly, autistic man behavior would "pass" as neurotypical woman behavior. That makes it seem like transitioning is the way to be normal! Of course, normative masks have consequences for people who lean into their assigned gender, too, creating a context for all kinds of medical interventions: steroids to look big, diet drugs and surgeries to look small, study pills to pass exams, and so on. It's a promise of purification which has gradually targeted younger and younger ages. Gender in this light isn't so unique, it's just a particularly scapegoated expression of the culture. The parents bear some responsibility because in happily going along with a diagnosis of this sort, they're most likely being all too eager to make their child be a better product on the market. Whatever the intervention was, they can go to bed that evening telling themselves "my kid will be successful now." Which in turn results in prolongment of mental health issues and ad-hoc coping mechnaisms.
kevingadd 4y ago
> I've definitely noticed a trend of people on the spectrum suffering from mental health problems, self-diagnosing as gender dysphoric and then launching themselves down a one-directional, miserable path that ends in their suicide. Are you saying that the gender dysphoria self-diagnosis was the only factor in the suicide, and without it the mental health problems and difficulties of being neurodivergent in society wouldn't have been an issue? If not, why is it the important one of the three? Every problem a person deals with will contribute to stress and influence their choices, but it feels a little weird to list 3 big challenges and then say "and the last one is why they killed themselves".
- AussieWog93 4y ago
  >Are you saying that the gender dysphoria self-diagnosis was the only factor in the suicide, and without it the mental health problems and difficulties of being neurodivergent in society wouldn't have been an issue? No, not at all. I think the real reason that so may Autistic people end up depressed, anxious and suicidal is a mix of social difficulties (leading to isolation), coupled with an inability to recognise our own emotional states (making self-care a lot more difficult). The real problem in misdiagosis of gender dysphoria amongst Autistics isn't so much the additional stress caused by transitioning (not just medical issues, but things like the discrimination that non-passing trans people experience too) but the fact that it provides a false solution to the problem of our depression/anxiety. So many young Autistics really, genuinely, believe that the solution to their problem isn't learning the hard way how to achieve a certain level of social success, or ceding some of their independence to people they trust to help manage their physical and emotional needs, but instead hormones and surgery. And once someone's gone down that path, that's it. No coming back.
  - kg 4y ago
    It may be reassuring to know that most early and mid-stage trans care interventions are fully reversible, other than surgery and some more powerful forms of HRT. Surgery is pretty late on the road and many people never get surgery. So you don't need to be worried if someone you care about starts seeing a specialist about gender concerns, since at least for quite a few months, nothing serious is going to happen. For younger people it's often preferred to use fully reversible blockers that don't even nudge someone along the transition path, which further reduces the risk of any kind of long-term regret.
iinnPP 4y ago
As a child I was diagnosed with a slurry of ADHD/ODD/ADD/OCD/many more. I came to your exact same conclusion but with a 15 year difference. I am also quite confident I would be on the spectrum instead with a 5 year difference. The medication I was put on at age 8 permanently fucked me. I went from teaching my grade 8 buddy algebra while completing his homework for fun (at age 8) to a completely fucked education from grade 5-8 and I cannot even remember grade 4 because I was in and out of hospitals for various new potions. I have a file from my family doctor at the time, Dr. Karen Lo of London Ontario. Where she stated that as an 8 year old I was manipulating/controlling my mother, teacher, and multiple other adults. That was the basis for the medication. The reality was that my Mom was so drunk off her ass that she couldn't stand up most of the time. I had to cook my own meals or starve, among other things. I recall the look of one of my "special" teachers when she asked for ways to cook french fries. I told her to fry it in a pan with a tiny bit of oil. That's how I did it after all, she fucking laughed. Laughed. You'd think you've heard the worst of it maybe but the reality is far far worse. Worse than being illegally and forcefully injected with drugs even. I would know. My heart goes out to the victims of this treatment. You certainly don't deserve it.
- FooBarBizBazz 4y ago
  > London Ontario Why do so many stories of psychotherapistic fuckery come out of Canada? There's your story here, there's the tragic story of David Reimer, there's the Montreal Experimemts by Donald Ewen Cameron... It's like something has been ideologically and institutionally wrong for a long time. It's like there's no human dignity or sovereignty, but instead people are just objects or problems to be managed. Some horrible Skinnerian-Taylorist worldview. It might just be a metaphor, but would you treat people this way if you thought they had actual souls?
  - Balgair 4y ago
    Wait until you hear about French medical laws on sham/placebo surgery. Everywhere is super messed up, to one degree or another.
  - vGPU 4y ago
Serenacula 4y ago
I will say, autism is super common among trans folk, as is ADHD. There is a high rate of comorbidity between them. Having said that, I do not believe that it is fair to assume a person who believes themselves trans to be mistaken based purely on a personal hypothetical anecdote.
- deanCommie 4y ago
  Isn't it at all possible that having a more detached view of your own brain, and a disconnection from society causes one to be more likely to be aware of the distinction between gender and biological sex. And therefore be more willing to go through transition, instead of being more concerned with the impact the process has on your social standing, your friendships, your relationships. I genuinely wonder if the incidence rate of transgenderism amongst autistic folks is actual the real incidence rate in humanity, but the rest of us (I am mostly neurotypical, just ADHD, and cis-hetero) are more likely to repress any transgender thoughts or worries.
Imtiredofpassw 4y ago
Another day of spreading misinformation on the internet

hgsgm 4y ago

Can you write a blog article explaining how it works?

AussieWog93 4y ago
Maybe I should. Got some paternity leave coming up, so might have a bit of time to get my thoughts in order...

Pearse 4y ago

Thanks so much for taking the time to write this up. I would love to hear more about you're experiences growing up and especially the dysregulation. Is there any other things about your life you would be willing to share?

AussieWog93 4y ago
>I would love to hear more about you're experiences growing up and especially the dysregulation. Dysregulation[1] was Hell on Earth, in the literal sense. Very little in life works the way you think it should, and the reaction to these things constantly going wrong is extremely intense, negative, emotional unable to be controlled in any real sense. You lose the ability to reliably form even basic episodic/autobiographical memories, and with it any sense of the past or future. Entire chunks of your life go missing and you don't know what day it is, where you've been or where you're going. All you know is that you're constantly exhausted, nothing makes sense and everything just feels wrong. You don't know how long you've felt like this, and you don't know how long you'll continue to feel like this. As far as you're aware, past and future suffering will keep going on for eternity. And you will do anything, literally anything, to make it stop. For me, I was fortunate that my mum took me to a sleep specialist, who recommended getting my adenoids removed and prescribing an extremely specific sleep schedule which I followed to a T (all screens off at 9:00, in bed by 10:00, I don't remember if there was a specific constant time I needed to wake up by but I suspect that was part of it to. As an adult, I now supplement this routine with melatonin). This was enough to get me from a state of complete dysregulation to "garden-variety" depression, which eventually I overcame with the help of a supportive network of friends and parents who (semi-forcefully) steered me down a path where I could succeed. A hypothetical AussieWog98 might have convinced himself that the cause of the dysregulation was gender dysphoria, cut himself off from the people who really care and spent all his time online with other people just like himself until one day he couldn't take it any more. I really, genuinely believe that this is what is happening today, at least in the case of some people. For others (especially people who transition later in life), it really can help them be comfortable in their own skin, and this is of course where the trans "debate" gets hairy. [1] This is not technical language, but is the best and most concise word I can use to decribe it. There may be a more appropriate technical term, or a more scientific description of what is happening (seizures in the amygdala?). Feel free to comment if you have any scientific information or proper terminology, I'd love to read the literature on it.
- syntheweave 4y ago
  My fear is not really with the misdiagnosis, but with the lack of the precise support you received being so common. It's hugely common in North America, where I am from, to adopt a "child as asset or liability" mindset that leads to parenting based solely around achieving normative goals, which accumulate with increased intensity around adolescence, and are further bolstered by today's media environment. Ours is a consumer culture, and part of that is that your identity is very product-driven. In this light, gender comes to the fore not in the sense of being "tempted" after seeing something online, but as a particular mask to wear 24/7, regardless of which one you choose; something which autistic people have long been known to struggle with. It isn't outrageous to conclude that switching masks might be a relief if the assigned one isn't working out; consider that autistic women are historically underdiagnosed, and then flip it around to the context of MTF transition: suddenly, autistic man behavior would "pass" as neurotypical woman behavior. That makes it seem like transitioning is the way to be normal! Of course, normative masks have consequences for people who lean into their assigned gender, too, creating a context for all kinds of medical interventions: steroids to look big, diet drugs and surgeries to look small, study pills to pass exams, and so on. It's a promise of purification which has gradually targeted younger and younger ages. Gender in this light isn't so unique, it's just a particularly scapegoated expression of the culture. The parents bear some responsibility because in happily going along with a diagnosis of this sort, they're most likely being all too eager to make their child be a better product on the market. Whatever the intervention was, they can go to bed that evening telling themselves "my kid will be successful now." Which in turn results in prolongment of mental health issues and ad-hoc coping mechnaisms.

kevingadd 4y ago

> I've definitely noticed a trend of people on the spectrum suffering from mental health problems, self-diagnosing as gender dysphoric and then launching themselves down a one-directional, miserable path that ends in their suicide. Are you saying that the gender dysphoria self-diagnosis was the only factor in the suicide, and without it the mental health problems and difficulties of being neurodivergent in society wouldn't have been an issue? If not, why is it the important one of the three? Every problem a person deals with will contribute to stress and influence their choices, but it feels a little weird to list 3 big challenges and then say "and the last one is why they killed themselves".

AussieWog93 4y ago
>Are you saying that the gender dysphoria self-diagnosis was the only factor in the suicide, and without it the mental health problems and difficulties of being neurodivergent in society wouldn't have been an issue? No, not at all. I think the real reason that so may Autistic people end up depressed, anxious and suicidal is a mix of social difficulties (leading to isolation), coupled with an inability to recognise our own emotional states (making self-care a lot more difficult). The real problem in misdiagosis of gender dysphoria amongst Autistics isn't so much the additional stress caused by transitioning (not just medical issues, but things like the discrimination that non-passing trans people experience too) but the fact that it provides a false solution to the problem of our depression/anxiety. So many young Autistics really, genuinely, believe that the solution to their problem isn't learning the hard way how to achieve a certain level of social success, or ceding some of their independence to people they trust to help manage their physical and emotional needs, but instead hormones and surgery. And once someone's gone down that path, that's it. No coming back.
- kg 4y ago
  It may be reassuring to know that most early and mid-stage trans care interventions are fully reversible, other than surgery and some more powerful forms of HRT. Surgery is pretty late on the road and many people never get surgery. So you don't need to be worried if someone you care about starts seeing a specialist about gender concerns, since at least for quite a few months, nothing serious is going to happen. For younger people it's often preferred to use fully reversible blockers that don't even nudge someone along the transition path, which further reduces the risk of any kind of long-term regret.

iinnPP 4y ago

As a child I was diagnosed with a slurry of ADHD/ODD/ADD/OCD/many more. I came to your exact same conclusion but with a 15 year difference. I am also quite confident I would be on the spectrum instead with a 5 year difference. The medication I was put on at age 8 permanently fucked me. I went from teaching my grade 8 buddy algebra while completing his homework for fun (at age 8) to a completely fucked education from grade 5-8 and I cannot even remember grade 4 because I was in and out of hospitals for various new potions. I have a file from my family doctor at the time, Dr. Karen Lo of London Ontario. Where she stated that as an 8 year old I was manipulating/controlling my mother, teacher, and multiple other adults. That was the basis for the medication. The reality was that my Mom was so drunk off her ass that she couldn't stand up most of the time. I had to cook my own meals or starve, among other things. I recall the look of one of my "special" teachers when she asked for ways to cook french fries. I told her to fry it in a pan with a tiny bit of oil. That's how I did it after all, she fucking laughed. Laughed. You'd think you've heard the worst of it maybe but the reality is far far worse. Worse than being illegally and forcefully injected with drugs even. I would know. My heart goes out to the victims of this treatment. You certainly don't deserve it.

FooBarBizBazz 4y ago
> London Ontario Why do so many stories of psychotherapistic fuckery come out of Canada? There's your story here, there's the tragic story of David Reimer, there's the Montreal Experimemts by Donald Ewen Cameron... It's like something has been ideologically and institutionally wrong for a long time. It's like there's no human dignity or sovereignty, but instead people are just objects or problems to be managed. Some horrible Skinnerian-Taylorist worldview. It might just be a metaphor, but would you treat people this way if you thought they had actual souls?
- Balgair 4y ago
  Wait until you hear about French medical laws on sham/placebo surgery. Everywhere is super messed up, to one degree or another.
- vGPU 4y ago

Serenacula 4y ago

I will say, autism is super common among trans folk, as is ADHD. There is a high rate of comorbidity between them. Having said that, I do not believe that it is fair to assume a person who believes themselves trans to be mistaken based purely on a personal hypothetical anecdote.

deanCommie 4y ago
Isn't it at all possible that having a more detached view of your own brain, and a disconnection from society causes one to be more likely to be aware of the distinction between gender and biological sex. And therefore be more willing to go through transition, instead of being more concerned with the impact the process has on your social standing, your friendships, your relationships. I genuinely wonder if the incidence rate of transgenderism amongst autistic folks is actual the real incidence rate in humanity, but the rest of us (I am mostly neurotypical, just ADHD, and cis-hetero) are more likely to repress any transgender thoughts or worries.

Imtiredofpassw 4y ago

Another day of spreading misinformation on the internet