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  • Home
  • Blog
  • Consulting-Emotional Help
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  • Other resources
    • Trans stuff
    • Architecture
    • Vegan stuff
  • About Me
  • Contact
  • Donation
  • Savęs pažinimo kelias LT

Path of Self Discovery

Blog

Psychiatric diagnosis and possible cure

22/1/2017

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 I decided to write about how you can heal for real, when you have got psychiatric diagnosis.


First of all I would like to mention that my work doesn't rely on any of such diagnosis, and I see no need to see them seriously. If someone of you were researching the topic, diagnose are issued according to the symptoms and that means: no one will investigate your brain changes and classify these "diseases" in physiological and neurological nature. The seriousness and the necessity of reading and sorting out someone's symptoms for me is more like reading the palm or the stars. I understand, maybe it sounds very rough and careless, as if seeing human problems as not important or relevant, but I'm targeting more the prominence and bloating of psychiatry it-self, it's severity, reality of the diagnose and so on.
So, while going back to discussion on the diagnosis, I do not consider them more real than the fortune-telling. However, sad as it may be, in many cases, it's even tragic, according to this method of sorting out people's problems doctors are prescribing some drugs that have a major impact on the human body, and, of course, on the brain. Changes are strong and long lasting enough, it is very difficult to stop these medications, because most of them causes the addiction to them and so on. Historically, these drugs do not have serious confirmation for their effectiveness; the chemical imbalance in the brain was only one of the theories, which was quickly caught by pharmaceutical companies, while currently this theory is often no longer appreciated in the scientific world (e.g.:
here) but it is still very vital within the public still and it distorts reality. There are set of public stories, how some pharmaceutical companies provide unrealistic data on the efficacy and side effects of medicines, in addition to that for long time in the history mentally unwell people weren't provided with any medication, but just bled while with the refreshing blood they would feel some ease about their state and etc. If someone of you took those drugs and red it's leaflets, some side effects can be found on the list, really appalling things: such as anti-psychotic drugs can lead to stroke and coma, etc., of course, it's a very small statistical percentage. Perhaps it's not so important to pay so much attention into it, when such drugs actually greatly improves the quality of life, but there are plenty stories of the same patients, people, who are taking these drugs and telling that their condition deteriorated from medication, there are people who before medicines consumption did not have suicidal thoughts, and then the following episodes (schematic summary of the possible antidepressant effects - here). It is also a fact that these drugs are very often sold on the black market as hallucinogens or any kind of materials used for cocktail parties. It says something, we probably do not want to know, even though there is plenty info on it, at least in online readings. Due to the fact that many of these drugs, especially stronger, are addictive, it becomes very difficult to stop and reduce their consumption. Like any addictive substance, these drugs work the same way: the more you consume, the more and more diverse need you have, to get the same effect (no doubt this is true for many, but not all people). In some more advanced countries there are groups created with some professionals and people, who want to stop the use. With mutual assistance among them-selves and some help from the professionals, people succeed to stop the usage in the long run (here - work of the support group). There are also a lot of statistics, which often is tried to hide from the public (for financial reasons), that in countries where patients are not treated with these medications, recovery percentage is significantly higher (such as India, in this film you can find information about it - film)
So, summing up: after a very subjective diagnosis people are issued drugs that severely affects activity of the brain and often exaggerates the problem into worse; moreover you become like a chemically "preserved" in your critical state, instead of leading out it. So, in my eyes, psychiatric treatment is certainly not comparable to the common medical treatment and it's based on the chemical imbalance again, that will be (most probably) never measured for you... and this is the most recognised treatment and according of it's explanations, patients supposedly probably will never heal, that medicines are being prescribed not to heal the causes of the disease, but only the symptoms. So logical assumption here appears: the actual cure is independent from such treatment, - either you get well or not and the results is more likely negative, because then the medication should be not very strong, so that the body could cope with the scourge without extra (chemical) load. It is also widely recognised that the reason of such a suffering is not actually known and it's still believed widely that it is a genetically inherited, although those genes are not found as well. What I want to say with this text is, that psychiatry doesn't actually know much about these diseases and their treatment, However, it is probably the most effective way to get rid of such a kind human and his/her problems and have client for a pharmacy and psychiatry industry for the rest of his/her life. Well in other words, instead of real assistance, a person is converted into a vegetable and all can finally relax about it. That kind a healing it is.
Are there other options when you feel psychologically unwell and life becomes disordered, and it is difficult to cope with all the necessary responsibilities? From the twenty-first century a treatment is known, that is called healing through a conversation or psychotherapy. True is that in the beginning this method was used more on patients affected with the hypnosis. Students of a father-initiator (Jean-Martin Charcot): Pierre Zane, Sigmund Freud and others picked up this method, developed it and didn't use hypnosis to that extent no more. Freud achieved the most in this area while working with hysterical and distressed patients (who often were women), he began to understand that the most common reason for patients with a serious condition was severe, inhuman experiences in their childhood, brutal physical and sexual exploitation, which usually occurred in their families. Of course, as it's already known at these times, people who might have to do with small children are usually not strangers but close relatives: fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, grandparents, brothers, sisters, cousins. Some of Freud's patients were from more known families and so on. With further understanding of nature of mental distractions Freud obviously realized that he is kicking the very basic family concept, tradition, integrity and it was not only new knowledge but not acceptable at all at that time (and at this time as well, of course). Later, while fleeing from the professional condemnation, he created the famous Oedipus complex and similar theories that were both strange and bizarre and just perfect to divert attention and to convince the audience in its reality. Thus, psychotherapy just stuck in time even more and was distorted into some sort of sexual fantasies of the kids and in this way they themselves have become guilty of inhumane treatment upon them. Everything came back to „normal" track again. Of course, psychotherapy it-self wasn't forgotten. There are various branches of it known currently, among which you can find so called primal therapy, which focuses on a young age incurred traumas, you can find cognitive therapy, IFS (Inner family system) method, which works through the discussions with certain parts of humans psyche to restore the previously held events to allow yourself feel and say, what you couldn't say back then, also there are programs, which allow you to be both: child-self and adult-real-time-self and in this way to transmit messages (to yourself), that you wouldn't knew otherwise or simply it would psychologically pushed away or forgotten, if it already has become a regular habit. That's for brief historical outline. (The material was taken from Judith Lewis Herman's book „Trauma and healing" 7-33 p.).
So how is current situation with a the treatment of mental illness, is there any healthier alternative to the usual methods of psychiatry? A former psychotherapist American Daniel Mackler has created several films on healing psyche themes. The focus is on healing of psychosis, as is popularly believed that this is the most difficult form of mental illness. Often people who are psychotic often receive the diagnosis of schizophrenia, which probably scares everyone. Films have a multitude of sources and examples how psychosis is treatable without using drugs or this usage is very limited at the very beginning, when it is necessary to calm the body down until the point when a person can eat and sleep, just to rest up so that it would be possible to hold a conversation. As the author tells in other videos, he doesn't avoid to take some sleeping pills in a long air-plane in a long journey etc. So as it appears in the normal psychiatry complete healing is considered more as a possible coincidence, as in the psychotherapy professionals are not hostile to the use the drugs, but they just don't hold usage of the drugs as the only possible tool to improve patient's life. (Lithuanian movies with subtitles can be found here - filmai).
So, how this psychotherapy actually goes on(counselling, couching)? People gather in the room or at the computer screens in a video call and they chat then, and that's that, nothing more happens. There are no additional meetings, referrals to classes, prescriptions of drugs, medical diagnoses, sending to other doctors, nothing, just a chat over and over and over. Of course, we can say that that kind a conversations we have every day with many various people, especially with friends, life partners, children, relatives. So what is different? In communication between the therapist and the client there are several aspects that can not be compromised to maintain effective treatment: the therapist can't have his/her own needs in the sessions, the therapist must keep being ally to a customer in any case, even if it would manifest it-self in maintaining healthy personal boundaries, when the customer requires to ignore them, and so on. In this way it is different from the relationship with partners and friends. It also differs from the parent/child relationship, although it is closest to this one. The customer is no longer a child, and therefore he/she must pay for the other adult's ability to temporarily give up their needs to create a full client-oriented environment in spite of client's behaviour. Client must offer something for creating this kind an environment, usually there is some amount of money agreed. So, it is the client's commitment: to provide payment for consultations and to attend them in agreed time, otherwise fee for the session will be taken as another way to stimulate the responsibility for their own actions as well as to stimulate to calculate accidental loss that happens. Since this relationship is similar to the caregiver/child relationship, the therapist's role and influence is very high. Thanks to safe environment and unconditional trust client finally can be fully open to someone, it does not matter whether you are 18 to 85, this experience can't come too late, but it is brilliant, if it comes at all. People are not used to relax and say what they might be hiding even from them-self, and unfortunately, parents usually don't provide this opportunity for their children as well. So the customer can open up, discuss their problems, he finally can be him-self. The customer can gradually regain confidence, to begin strengthening him-self and so on. In this relation opinions can differ, discussions and arguments can appear, but it can't get out of the healthy personality boundaries, which are required to maintain by the therapist for all times as a model for client. If the client's threatens to injure the therapist, then the therapy can be interrupted. Everything else should be acceptable, even if totally intrusive or scary or strange. Thus, a client pays for this service: supportive, confidential environment that enables to open his/her psychological wounds and gradually allow him/her to heal and to find ways how to do it in best way. Therefore, this kind a relationship becomes equally rewarded. About how this relationship is different from other relationships between people in greater detail can be found here.
So... there is possibility for choice. I discussed 1 of them, which can help more and it helped me personally the most. People also prefer more physical alternatives: diet, exercises, meditation, different beliefs. People who are more fortunate, and they themselves can find ways to learn how to self-heal, and to find like-minded, with whom it is possible to effectively understand their problems and with time to solve them, they of course could choose that way; although sometimes those people also can try more professional support just out of curiosity. If it is effective, why not? If it is effective to use prescribed psychiatric drugs, why not? If you feel that drugs are more likely to be a run-away and hiding from the actual problems, then you could try described healing method. The message that I wanted to point here, is that the diagnosis is not forever. O if to put it in other way, like I recently heard in the TV series "Sense 8" is that, if you have a problem, there are two options: either live with it or fix it. Here I state one of the possible options for it. If you appeared interested in it, here are my contacts -
 my contacts
That's that folks, and I wish you to find your own unique way to heal your heart/mind. 




Resources on this theme in English:

Films about healing with psychotherapy, without or with less medications
Films
Videos made in theme about psichiatric medication by Daniel Mackler on youtube:
About medication

Video series by Stefan Molyneux about roots of most common mental problems among adult people:
Bomb in the brain 
​
​And some fun stuff on it.
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Why people can fear to admit, they're transgender. Long- and short-term prospects. (resume)

12/9/2016

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Raising a child from the birth with this belief, that gender must comply with sex, leads to fragmentation of personality, when you have to play someone you are not until the degree, when you believe this is who you are or just have to be. You don't have to avoid to assume your child's gender but rather listen, if he/she says it is not so. All men can play women, can behave feminine just as women – to behave masculine. But if you are forced to live in this state constantly: to play a role constantly and live your life while doing that, to live like everyone around does - solve various real life problems, etc., that causes exhaustion not understandable for others, cause they usually don't have it. Beside forced personality fragmentation you have an additional fatigue and you usually see people around you, who can express them-selves more as well, and that creates an impression, that you are doomed and defected. This injustice enables only one thing - self-hatred, grieving because of such behaviour with you, self-isolation and so on. All these are psychological problems, which leads to less efficient human behaviour in society, so not only transgender person suffers but also people around him/her. And all - because of wrong parenting. But those wounds can heal and person can change and he/she can find understanding and courage to take off this armour and finally be, who he/she is, was and will be, to become someone, you always thought you can be.
Absence of comprehensive, science-based, unified, clear classified results indicating knowledge/research on this case in society makes it difficult to be certain of your personal understanding/insights/knowledge. Moreover when traditions can't hardly recognise the diverse nature of human sexuality.
Society in general doesn't accept people, who know them-selves on a deeper level, who know more about their inner worlds and thoughts. Because this learning leads to "evil", "wrong" behaviour, behaviour that actually reflects more our-selves and our inside rather than needs and customs of the surroundings, and for such behaviour we all were punished for a long part of our life until we internalised it. However, this doesn't mean that the knowledge and learning, which frees, doesn't bring fruits of it, and I wish to each and everyone to find a way out of your cells or furnish them lavishly for times, when you would have a need to disconnect from people :)

Of course, you can choose not to change the body, to live a life of false gender, false self and so on. But most of people I met, who are living such a life consciously and (mostly) unconsciously, usually have variety of problems. And of course, who doesn’t have them, right? But I would say, that maybe most important is the degree of happiness and the understanding, understanding that after finally opening way to the truth – naming your true-self as your-self and false self and not your-self, it is possible to take care of more fundamental things for us, to get more inner peace.
In recognition of who you are you free yourself from significant part of an unnecessary load. Of course, there is a different load fast finding it's place for your attention, but then you can weight, when you are happier – with old loads or new ones. I would never push agenda, that everyone should and must open up right now and be brave right now, and must never fall and so on. But simply, there is a limit to everything and everything has it's own value, and we can afford to choose more comfortable and pleasant limits and values, even if people around us will be struggling to get and accept them.. Ironically, through discovery of something really important you will know, how many people remained blind and sleeping, so it is difficult to walk alone and lonely… But then you are finding other groups, other hearts that will confirm your significantly growth and your need for a relevant company. Of course this requires time, that may seem endless :) you can feel like climbing walls and so on.
Aaand final wish of best luck in your discoveries.


Laurynas Sadzevičius


P.S.: there is lot of research related to human sexuality done, but they didn't give unified results.

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Why people can fear to admit, they're transgender. Long- and short-term prospects. (IV part)

8/9/2016

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The third obstacle - dysphoria and access to medical treatment. In addition to all the earlier  listed obstacles this one is important as well. And this one is quite pragmatic, if you understand what dysphoria is. By my words dysphoria is like inability to accept your body with most part of our mind. And because in our minds none of us has solid and complete 1 gender, sort of: my much more greater part of a personality is a men but of course, I am also a woman and a child and a grandma. Therefore my body shape/map doesn't fit my mental understanding/feeling of the shape/map and especially during more difficult times, this discrepancy causes strong desire to ignore or push away some of the mind constructs, that are ok with female shape/map of the body, and that is causing internal conflicts. There is also the desire “not to be“ in your own body. It is a painful psychologically and sometimes even physically, it can cause panic, instability, absent-mindedness, as well as impatience, exhaustion, disorientation, depression, weakness, reluctance to move, be among the people and so on. It's like working in a toxic workplace. This is not fatal, and you have enough money to live on and you are glad to find small joys in it, but your life, well-being, or even finances can improve really strongly, if you would just change this workplace. So it is possible to live and enjoy, just it is even more better to make some changes. It happens so as well, that after long-term resisting your current situation and actively reaching for the changes, you can get tired until the level, where you decide that maybe changes are not needed, or that you will just stop for some time, because suffering while trying to change the situation is unbearable and fatigue becomes too high. Usually after such a period people come back on track again, although it can be highly frightening, when you temporary lose strength to continue. This is normal and doesn't happen only for transgender people, sometimes we just loose our-selves until recovery again. I think cisgender people can also experience dysphoria, but it is significantly weaker, mind's constructs that don't fit body's shape/map are balanced in such a smaller scale that cause insignificant impact if any, and thus, doesn't cause problems and isn't notice. I do not say that they skipped those problems. People dream about the androgynous body, or at least partially containing the body of another sex characteristics, which is completely understandable. Women cut their hair short, have intense physical activity, men are lacquering nails, weave their hair into "bulk", etc. Still, if anything is consciously noticeable for cis people regarding body issue, then it's body dysmorphia and that is completely different thing. Transgenders are feeling dysphoria at some degree all the time, but often it is subconscious to hold it from interfering with other things in life, or interfere as little as possible. During heavier times or during major changes or long lasting boredom you feel it quite strongly. It is also very difficult with sexual life with others and with yourself. It is difficult to shower, mirrors, voice timbre and more things that are worrying. Sometimes dysphoria can be too high. Set of people like to be socially playful, consciously knowing or not (often unconsciously) that there isn't one solid peace of gender in the mind, so you can be called in feminine way, if you're a guy, and in manly way, if you're a girl. Thus, it's worth to stop sometimes and to figure out, where you want to draw the limit of what is invalidating your gender and what is just reminding you, that you are a person as well, no matter what gender issues. In addition I just want to mention that many jobs, activities are universal/unisex just as some men have a soprano voice for example.
Treatment availability: another obstacle. In various countries there are various obstacles. In Lithuania – there isn't any official treatment procedure, documents can be changed only after the complete transition and that sounds like "bring me the sun, then I will marry you"... meah... Elsewhere, e.g.: in UK you have to wait in queues until you will get an appointment with doctors and will get medicine and required surgeries eventually, also you may also take the initiative to get treatment in private clinics. Documents are changed after doctor's approve, that you are trans. Transsexualism is considered more as sexual disorder in UK while mental one in Lithuania. Anyhow, we have to admit that it is - the disorder and that treatment is not cosmetic. What also popular among transgender persons: announce that they are healthy, but the treatment is necessary and serious.. Fully unrealistic, irrational statement. However I don't want to say that we have to read ourselves as sick all the time, just when you understand that you are sick and you need treatment, it becomes so much more convenient because you don't torture your mind with 2 complete opposite truths. World is full of people, who suffer from allergies and often use drugs, of course, diabetics and more folks with other health states, that I don't remember now or don't know, and all those people need help every day. Not everyone gets lucky enough to be born in such a way that doesn't demand any medical support/adjustment. I won't write how medical care is provided for trans people in other countries, you can find it on Internet.

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Why people can fear to admit, they're transgender. Long- and short-term prospects. (III part)

5/9/2016

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What obstacles could be there for a transgender person to admit that he/she is transgender? 
2) The second obstacle: immature society. Despite the fact that there are more and more stories and research on the case, people still see transgenders as, well …, as delusional people. I experienced that so many time by now: this idea that I am transgender man just because I want to get men's "privileges" - very popular thought of feminists. After tremendous achievements of feminism, when you can see more injustice remained towards men in Western culture rather than towards women, I want to have the "privilege" … Privileges such as - work like insane, like a horse, to ensure my family's welfare or simply because to remain to be attractive for potential romantic/sexual partners, or a privilege to remain strong, even, if I would have someone trimming a stone on to my head, otherwise I wouldn't be called a man. To die early because of increasingly inadequate financial and strength status, you just can't reach ok status ever also because plowing up to deadly tiredness. In case of divorce, I would be paying for the livelihood of my ex-wife and children .. well, stunning privileges. Not to mention: being unable to complain, if you are experiencing violence from women at home, would it be the mother, partner or someone else. But let me go back to the topic, the same feminists answer to the question “why there are transgender women as well then?” that this is because those people like feminine things ... Why transgender men exist because they want men's "privileges" and not because they like manly things? Because manly things do not exist, those things are universal? And transgender women do not want women's "privileges", because there are no such privileges? Such as the same alimony after divorce, role of an eternal victim or voice of a justice formed by feminism it-self. Which means that the greater part of the responsibility goes on to men and they themselves are to blame, which means that they can't speak up, because they do not understand equality between the sexes, because they are not the voice of justice, etc. - closed circle. Well, no women's privileges anywhere... And even when viewed from the feminist position, are trans women so well devoid of seriousness that they choose transsexualism simply because they like feminine things.
But again, back to topic. These examples show how much misunderstanding about sexuality there is among people: people can't accept that the gender is determined by further formation of the embryo, and despite that most of the existing research seem to agree on this, popular opinion still roams the air, that this health condition is learn but not brought with a birth. That something happened very early in your life, what prompted you to refuse your real self and take the opposite option, of who you are. And then as the result ... you have set of a crowd that wants to facilitate your suffering and to bring you back to the truth :))) without any possibly reachable realisation they just jumped into the same, life long aching wound and they wave their hands in demanding recognition of their good will, if you push them away... I understand that someone, who isn't educated enough on the case, can't see, how and what was happening through your life and such a person could be in a rush to help you instead of trying to understand. Faithful people often want to save non-believers ... Sworn democrats often are trying to show that even anarchists are conservative and so on. However .... I guess, best way is to admit that sometimes you just have to either withdraw your-self from the similar discussion or to withstand it, depending on priorities. Of course, it's pity that science still has no real answer/s, how is it with human sexuality and what are best ways to deal with it. Still, I would like to briefly mention the toilets, bullying, documents and other aspects, as well as the so-called misgendering.
Maybe I'll take misgendering at the start, since it causes very painful psychological reaction. In general it seems that nothing serious happens: you are walking down the street, you come to the store, the seller doesn't use pronouns fitting to your natural and finally discovered gender while addressing to you. It seems that it wouldn't matter, how wrong the person is calling you in one or another way, you still know who you are, and it shouldn't really work in such a way. I don't know, how to explain it better, why it is so painful. I think there probably few things in it:
1) It activates dysphoria, because you realise that your body is deceiving others. (About dysphoria - in the next text)
2) It triggers trauma (provokes memories of the incorrect and unfair behaviour with you in the past – your trauma). Unconsciously you can go back to the memories, and although the specific person who stands before you hasn't done nothing wrong to you in the past, you can project parents, children you played with, teachers and other people, who traumatised you on him/her. After realizing this thing, it may become easier to remain conscious and therefore calm while experiencing misgendering. Personally, I have tried a variety of tactics to work on pain caused by misgendering, however, it seems without any significant results so far. Every time I felt pain and after longer time - desire to disappear and go back home. However it is not fatal, and therefore possible to endure as well.

Toilets: when you are not guaranteed about, how you will be perceived, and while misgendering openly says that you can't be perceived for your gender so very well, it's hard to remain calm and not constantly scanning the environment. Anyhow, when choosing your gender mirroring toilet, it feels better. Well, of course not without efforts to appear properly, even, if not completely accurate at the start.
Verbal abuse: I know from experience that, if you are in an environment where you experience it really intense, patience and remaining to be your true-self even with some compromises, eventually brings good results. People regarding their own peace and comfort want to have nice relations with everyone, and if they understand how to have that, they will try to use this knowledge, at least when they are near you.
Documents: well, some countries do it in normal way - changes gender mark in documents only after the diagnosis, some require a partial or complete transition. I think it's not a big news. It is worth mentioning that this division into two categories by sex according to the body/face/voice's characteristics is not very convenient. It would be more convenient that addressing to people could be more neutral or person would be asked about their identification before addressing or after noting not very joyful reaction. As well as it is decent to ask about person's allergies, diabetes, left-handedness, so on. This may not cause swelling of the body, but it causes panic and insecurity and rougher behaviour with people around you afterwards.
I would like to mention a wide range of human sexuality in terms of identification as well: lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, all kinds of-sexual and transgender, inter-sexual, fluid-gender, non-binary, and all sorts of gender variation. In my eyes attraction to one or another gender is determined by you being a person of the opposite gender your-self, I believe that attraction for both genders is determined of you being a person with sort a both genders equally, like being inter-gender person., depending on how their brain works. All my texts are just my personal opinion based on personal experience, self-knowledge, discussions with others and information I found in various sources. I'm not a scientist, so I can not present his knowledge as objective truth. As I am mentioning in the following text, in my opinion all of us are not homogeneous in our mind, so I would say it is question of percentage. Intersexualism can't be denied as well. Most often I take left-handedness' analogy for comparison with gender-mind balance: there are people who are better with their left hand, there are people, who are better with their left eye but also with their right hand, so on, depending on how their brain works. This is the same with a gender, in my opinion, everyone has spectrum of the both: woman and man, and how much of each you have is up to your-self to know; perhaps later on there will be ways for discovering, how to explore and measure it in more sufficient details. Of course it is much more easier to understand and measure the body's sex. It is up to each and any person him-self/her-self, how they identifies them-selves, how they treat their body and what gender/sex people they prefer as romantic/sexual partners.

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Why people can fear to admit, they're transgender. Long- and short-term prospects. (II part)

14/7/2016

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What obstacles might be for a person to admit that he/she is transgender:
1) The most important obstacle is person's/child's identity, that is being hit from very early age, starting just after the birth. However, according to studies the child begins to understand his body a little later, from 7-9 months (one of the possible article as a source - Ages and Stages) and see themselves as a separate individual (as well as understand their own sexuality) from 2- 3 years. If you look at transgender people stories, usually they mention similar - 2-4 years age, when they clearly realised that something is wrong and what gender they have in their own understanding and feelings.
In a world I find increasing stories, when the child's voice starts to be taken very seriously at the early age, if not at 3 years age, then later on. While the kid is continuously suffering pushed stereotypes (body sex necessarily have to conform with the mind gender), parents finally begin to doubt their righteousness and eventually are accepting child's knowledge of the truth. It pleases, not many parents are both conscious and educated to seriously pay attention to the little ones. Of course, there are only a few of the parents who took it really easy and quickly. I think here are working both mechanisms: societal immaturity plus parents' traumas that were never healed and those prevent them to realise that the child owe nothing to them, and they have assumed full responsibility to give absolutely everything possible to their child.
It i soften said that parents fear for transgender child, as if he lived in a very large surrounding dissent ... And it is truth, the public is not ready, but! Public is not ready for large numbers of things that a child can learn in safe and secure home: think independently, to understand that his emotional world is unique and undisputed, learn to choose, to enhance his own self, learn empathy, learn to play and play and play, to understand personal boundaries, learn non-aggressive communication and so on, not to mention taking responsibility, philosophy, healthy diet, the same evaluation of both gender, and similar ideas/constructs. Society will condemn such a child - growing human, but at the same time he/she will be stronger than outside obstacles because such a child will be a strong within, more resistant on his/her own and he/she will have a strong backing at home. How do you think: if a child, transgender or not, does not have support at home, and even, if in the school is somewhat better for him, will he be able to withstand bullying and violence? Will he be an easy target for bullies: other aggressive children and adults? Often we do not have support and understanding at home as we grow and we search for it in the outside world, but since we didn't have a good example, so we choose similar types of people as in our household, and we pay for it. 
But if going back to the idea of transgender man: such a person usually, according to current statistics suffers from natural identity rejection and breakage from the very young age and because of the need to be protected and loved, he/she must learn to avoid the show, talk and otherwise express them-selves, their true selves. This person must learn to dress and act by opposite gender stereotypes attributed to people. Such a person is very often punished for what he/she simply is, if they say it openly or suggest it in other ways: not wishing to wear particular clothes, to play particular games, interact with certain people in certain ways and loads of everything else. They are penalised for being them-selves and awarded for the absence of it. Over time, this mechanism becomes more complex, the child begins to understand that this will not change, he begins to live in his own world, to behave more aggressively and begins to be closed in other ways in order to resist against environmental injustice and try to keep his true-self. When you are small and can not survive alone, and others are repressing you for being your-self in many ways, it creates very high extra load and suffering. Undoubtedly frequently misunderstood transgender child may have a set of problems in school, among peers, and so on. However, what I would like to say and to emphasise to all those, who have grown and known their identity, that you were/are heroes that weathered everything as you grew, and you are still here alive :) This is really incredible.
Another thing I would like to mention, that from my own experience and observations of other people, I can say that the self-defence mechanisms can get so strong that you can learn to vary and manage your mind/feelings and everything else in a way that would help you to push out conscious understanding, sense of own identity. Or maybe to hide it, I do not know for sure, it's like trying to avoid it, to assume that this is sort of bad thing; maybe not the worst thing that can happen, but seriously major bad thing. Low, scurvy, just bad, false, incorrect, etc., you may feel that you will die, if you will be yourself. Even if you already have accepted, who you are, this doesn't mean you will not have those thoughts, that you are evil just because, you are, who you are. All this is merely an echo of the voices that were assuring you of these thought for a long time. But now it's different, now you are an adult and can tell those voices to go to hell or not pay attention to it. No one is born bad, that's a fact.
Another short note: that kind of parenting (refusing to take your child realistically) causes fragmentation of the personality for him. You have to play that you are someone, someone else, some roll, some fragment of your mind that is less significant and strong in you. I.E.: all men can play women, behave feminine, just as women  can play men. But in this situation you are forced to live in this state constantly: forced to be an actor for live while living your life as well - solving various real life problems as everyone else around. So: 1) you must always remain not being you, your-self, 2) have an additional burden on an ongoing basis. You can't possibly avoid psychological problems in this state.
​More about the mind gender construct in the next texts.

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Why people can fear to admit, they're transgender. Long- and short-term prospects. (I part)

26/6/2016

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The sense of healing is either in resisting and/or exciting ways to afford to find the most comfortable decisions in your life. I write about the healing process in general and in details in many other texts. But if we talk about picked topic, sense of a healing - finding the most convenient solutions for life, it may seem strange, when I say this while being trans-gender. How convenient it can be to accept an understanding that you - trans? In a short-term perspective, it is absolutely inconvenient: you lose your usual identity, must resist older deep rooted beliefs and self-protection mechanisms and additionally some phenomenon is brought to the surface - some kind of interpersonal war in medicine called "dysphoria"; also it is completely inconvenient caused by understanding, how you were traumatised simply because of ignorance and violence of the surroundings. This is a painful experience and it's really not convenient. Often while being transgender, we hear from people: is it not easier just to be lesbian/gay? And well, it is just as easier as not to brush your teeth daily: saves time and money and energy. Easier. So, where is that comfort I mention, if you accept your-self? It's in the long run:
 You choose to be who you are the most. Just as it is convenient to be an artist, if you have a stronger innate/acquired creative ability. Even, if at the same time you have a tendency to, say, to solve logical jigsaw puzzles, when you find them appealing to you. Point is, that creativity in your work is determining more than half of your tasks: you are looking for new solutions, quite quickly finding them, then you trace that the issue was already found by other people, you analyse their solutions and their underlying concepts and you can vary and look for alternatives even here. Also you can not sit still though even a week without playing, sculpturing, drawing, dancing and so on. And you like logic puzzles as well but only, when they are made in certain specificity, you can safely leave them unresolved for a longer period of time, can pick up another jigsaw puzzle, while left not finished first one, in one word: you are not so much concerned about it, and it requires greater effort and longer time, certain mood and work conditions to become productive. So ... Of course, it can happen, that you will take a logic demanding job, but it does not mean that creativity feature will turn weaker than ability for logical judgement. In the long run you may regret missed opportunities to work with your strongest feature. Reasons to refuse to reveal our strongest sides can be different: it might have been more convenient to pick up a logical job simply by chance or due to the fear that you will have to reveal your real strength, so you choose option, which had less capacity and so on. Eventually, after all you will have disappointment that feels like a partial fulfilment.
So why is not easier and more convenient to be lesbian/gay, but to recognise that you are transgender and continue to go this way? Because ... in the long run you will be disappointed with your-own life on this issue, consciously or subconsciously. It may be that you will be effectively accepted by others, you will have intense sex life and relationships, you will have excellent romantic partner or you will be accepted publicly, climbing up your career ladder, but you would feel frustrated and know that something is wrong ... Maybe this will occur as so called depression, maybe as some other psychological/physical illness or addictions, or disabilities to be able to achieve your desired career, maybe loneliness, perhaps poverty - endless set of options. People who can not unbutton their too tight jackets and get rid of it, often involuntarily take more and more stringent forms of self-repression, so that the far too small jacket would still seem as fit. And it seems, why would it be necessary for someone to torture them-selves so much? In my eyes, there are several obstacles that affect person's inability to reach the turn/shift in their minds. (Will be continuing in the next text.)

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Virtue over the norm

8/3/2016

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Norm doesn't exist. There are over 7,000,000,000 of us and no-one knows, what norm is, any more. We are led more by virtue and not norm, unless we choose otherwise. Of course norms can help us to understand particular group of people but that's it. If you leave a particular group, you will find another group with another norms and you will need to understand those norms, to learn them, if you want to understand that group, and so on. We can choose groups and their maintaining norms only, if we can afford to understand, learn and live them. And even then we can take only those, which are closer to our virtues or most probably even our own norms, that we have learned from very young age – childhood, teenage. Those norms can be: cultural norms of a country, we were born in; norms that are held in family, we were born in; time – age, we were born in and so on. Moral virtues are universal and the principle of moral virtue is very simple – follow the objective truth, yet no one can afford to be led by them purely. One reason of it can be the fact, that we hold so many objectively truthful facts and concepts, that as well as with the norms, we just can't do a simple jigsaw any more. I mean, jigsaw where one piece goes in it's own place and it can't be correctly put in any other place. This is different, we can put this one piece in few places and they all would be correct, just as this piece it-self can be changed by the small differences we making on it. And that all will be just as truthful and objective as other variants. Also, tribal nature of human is a fact. It is sad, it really is, that we all follow a tribe, even, if tribe is wrong in a big and destructive ways, we all follow and believe in it. And this happens because:
1) we are raised in this way – unconditional believing in some „usual“ way or/and
2) we consciously or unconsciously understand, what can happen, if we would really see for our-selves for the facts and not mass believes, norms.
It is hard to understand this all, but, what I am trying to say is, that the „way we used to do, think, believe, talk“ is a norm…. But not necessary the truth, or even, if it is a truth, it is not the truth that we need at this time, since it doesn't work good no more and something else is needed, or this is the metaphor of the truth underneath it and we need to understand whole thing first of all before running into conclusions. So…. Every norm must be examined and checked, until you will have your own conclusion, which obviously sometimes will fit in to mass believes around you, sometimes not. It is a hard way to live and be… It is hard because, it is hardest thing to oppose the tribe, oppose your friends, loose your friends, be not liked by your flat-mates, people at work. Or ignored or belittled… not trusted, not respected, or just be seen as weak, confused, unstable, messy, without peace in mind, insane, not capable to manage your life, loner, alien, pushed off.. ostracised, forgotten, unwelcome, ugly, freak, creep, obscene, non existent, unheard, dead, non-lifer, laughable so on. So, if you are at the stage, where you start to examine those norms (norms as  „the way we used to see, because the other way is evil and we know it because blahblahblah“)… And you understand you can be pushed off of your usual tribe, it can seem hard, painful, it can seem as loosing your ground and for a while being in completely weightless air… with nothing to grasp on. Eventually, if you follow the virtue and not the norm, you will win. If not sudden, so with a time. But this period of change is challenging and demands strength and patience.
So once again – back to way of virtue. Moral virtues are universal, still no one can afford to be led by them 100% because they choose to do that, they are not forced to do that. This must be known!! And this must be observed and showed, not covered with denial, lies, threatening! We all suppose to go through the healing of our young age traumas and we all do mistakes but this can't be an excuse to stop or not to start even. And again that, if we agree to understand and at some level to follow norms of the group, we choose to affiliate ourselves with, (country, club, website, forum, team, family so on) it's because we have our needs. We suppose to have food, a shelter, money, electricity, ability to travel and socialisation, family, friends and so on; that is a choice we make for our everyday. We do it all until we are able to step for a change we need, and it is totally OK and normal for any human organism to take a time before bigger change to be reassured, you will survive and cover your at least basic needs to go on. All things, especially bigger things need time and yeah, it's pretty messy to understand and predict right timing for every change you need, as we all, also whole nature is not so strict in it's order rather than organic and hardly clearly understandable but more felt intuitively.
But off course at the end one thing is clear: the more we are close to our virtue, the more happiness and peace we gain...


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    ​Author - Laurynas Sadzevicius

    This is my blog about self-knowledge, self-work, emotional healing, growth, psychology, philosophy in general and other related themes.

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