Two Therapy Experiences

[Guest]

1. When I was around 60 I finally decided I just had to talk to someone about my gender dysphoria. I had been seeing a psychiatric nurse practitioner at a mental health clinic & she was prescribing antidepressants (as well as a few other med's.) The clinic (which was operated by my health insurer by the way) also had therapists on staff. And, along the way, I asked if I could see one of the therapists. But for some reason the pnp resisted. (I could never figure out why because they had the therapists there on staff anyway.) After a while I wore my pnp down though & she made arrangements for me to see one of the therapists. He was around my age & had his Ph.D. Actually he was a nice guy. And I remember telling him , at one point, that under other circumstances I thought we could have been friends. 

 

Upon learning I finally had a therapy appointment I knew I would never be able to sit down with a therapist and blurt out that all of my life there was a part of me that had always wanted to be / felt I should have been female. So it occurred to me to send him a letter he could read prior to my appointment so he'd know what I was coming in to discuss. And that's what I did. 

 

On the day of my appointment, the therapist came out into the waiting room to get me. Once seated in his office he asked why I was there. I mentioned the letter.  He thereupon rummaged through the files in his desk file drawer & pulled out my (unopened) letter. He then proceeded to open & read it while I sat there red-faced & squirming. And when he had finished reading my letter he looked up & said: "Oh, I just heard about this." (Great!)

 

I don't recall how the rest of the appointment went. I did see him perhaps 2 or 3 more times. But, at that point, I decided nothing was going to be accomplished. So, during what would be my last appointment, I told him I thought there were probably other patients who needed him more than I did. At the end of the appointment he walked me back out to the waiting room. And, as we walked, he suddenly asked: "So would you rather be a man or a woman?" Taken aback I think I said: "It wouldn't matter. I just wish I didn't feel like both." (Later on it occurred to me I should have added: "and neither at the same time." About 3 or 4 weeks later I made my second major suicide attempt.

 

2. After getting out of the hospital, following my second suicide attempt, I was able to make arrangements to see a therapist who was working with clients who had gender identity issues. (I didn't end up seeing her for that long because, after a half dozen or so sessions, I called her up the night before my next appointment and quit because I was angry about something that, as I recall, had nothing whatsoever to do with her. (As I look back over the few different therapists I've tried seeing over the years, she was actually the best... at least for me.) Anyway... I don't even recall how this came up.... but during one of our sessions I think I must have said something about people perhaps being able to sense there was something different about me (or something like that) because (whatever it was I said) she replied: "Well... you know you don't have the most masculine walk. (!) I don't recall where the conversation went from there. But I still remember that. It was, in its own way quite the compliment. ?

 

 

[Lexi C]

Hey Bear.

I been on tha GT road so many times. In the last five yrs, I had 7 GT. They all left me and for a while it took its total on my, like I was the problem. I am not sure if you used the sliding scale GT but i did and most of them where just training and once they go their hrs they would leave with just  a 2week heads up  Actually that how I found TP. I was so furious with last TG living me that I want to kill myself, start scrolling the interweb and stumbling on to TP. Vicky and Jani gave me some solid advice.  

 TP help me understand that it was not my fault...But I  really hear you though about GT. 

Be safe, BE Proud and KICK ASS

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

Thanks so much for your reply to my post Lexi. The gender therapist I saw was a middle-aged woman who had (has?) her own therapy practice. She was actually the best therapist I saw. But I quit her when I was in a rage about something completely unrelated to her. (I have a propensity to throw the baby out with the bathwater, as the saying goes.)

 

In retrospect though, I actually started off with her in the wrong way. We focused in right away on my (then current) gender dysphoria. This made sense, at the time, because I had just gotten out of the hospital after trying to delete myself as a result of my GID issues. However, looking back, I think what would have made more sense would have been to have started back in my childhood & worked my way up to where  my head was at when I tried to off myself. But then hindsight is always 20 / 20 isn't it.

 

I think, from time-to-time, about trying to see another therapist. But at my age it just seems like a waste of money. It's not like anything's going to change at this late stage of my life. I once had  an opportunity to correspond, briefly, with Dr, Anne Vitale, Ph.D. who wrote: "The Gendered Self". In the course of our communication I told her: "I know what my options are. I just don't like any of them." 

 

[Lexi C]

Hey B 

It's never to late to seek some kinda of mental of help. We all need clear mind and Big heart in this new world.

Have a great day