Mid Life Gender Crisis
Transitioning later in life is certainly a bigger deal than just going out and buying a new sports car.
Next to transgender vet ideas and information here in Cyrsti's Condo, going through a mid to late life gender change is a huge topic here too.
Many times it's not the most popular place to be in the trans community as a whole, let alone with long established family and friends.
We are called "pretenders" because we didn't transition earlier in lives or worse.
Of all places, The New York Times looked at the topic recently: "THE ETHICIST" Should I Become a Woman and Risk Causing Pain to My Wife and Children? Here's a portion of the question and answer:
"I’ve been living the life of a married man for 20 years. I have a successful career and three children. All this time, however, I have battled gender dysphoria and the deep sadness that comes from living a lie. From the earliest age, I’ve been unhappy being male. I believed I would find happiness only once I was true to myself. I recently had my self-diagnosis confirmed, and I’m initiating a transition to living as the real me. There is a cost involved: pain to my family and stress on my career. Ethically, is it right to be “true to myself” even if that authenticity ends my otherwise happy marriage and damages the emotional stability of my three children?"
And part of the answer:
" The conclusion is not as simple as the question suggests: it’s impossible to know how much damage this would actually do. Your family may already sense that something is wrong. I could argue that an honest, difficult relationship is still better than a comfortable marriage based on the unreal; it’s also possible that your children (as they mature) will understand your desires completely. It’s entirely possible that this evolution could be positive for everyone involved. This, however, is all speculation. I don’t know you or anyone in your family, and it would be idiotic of me to pretend as if there were one irrefutable response to this situation. The person you need to talk to is your wife. You need to consider what this action will do to your three children, in both the short term and the long term. When you made the decision to have children, you committed yourself to the sacrifice of significant personal freedoms for the betterment of their lives; this is a profound extension of that reality, but that’s your ethical responsibility as a parent. So the question you really need to ask yourself is this: Is your psychological damage from gender dysphoria greater than the psychological damage that its restoration will inflict upon the lives of any (or all) of your children? If the answer is yes, proceed. If the answer is no, don’t do it. Your sadness is tragic, but at least it’s confined to yourself. This advice might seem reactionary, but it’s not a position on whether transitioning is ethical in and of itself. There’s no inherent ethical problem with that decision. It’s about the possibility of improving one life at a greater cost to three others who might lack the intellectual and emotional maturity to comprehend what’s really happening.
Certainly, the person answering the question doesn't have the understanding of the depth of the problem. No where in the answer was the fact that so many transgender people consider the ultimate solution as suicide?
The final point was no better:
"It’s about the possibility of improving one life at a greater cost to three others who might lack the intellectual and emotional maturity to comprehend what’s really happening."
Oh, by the way the advice was written by a man...go figure.
Next to transgender vet ideas and information here in Cyrsti's Condo, going through a mid to late life gender change is a huge topic here too.
Many times it's not the most popular place to be in the trans community as a whole, let alone with long established family and friends.
We are called "pretenders" because we didn't transition earlier in lives or worse.
Of all places, The New York Times looked at the topic recently: "THE ETHICIST" Should I Become a Woman and Risk Causing Pain to My Wife and Children? Here's a portion of the question and answer:
"I’ve been living the life of a married man for 20 years. I have a successful career and three children. All this time, however, I have battled gender dysphoria and the deep sadness that comes from living a lie. From the earliest age, I’ve been unhappy being male. I believed I would find happiness only once I was true to myself. I recently had my self-diagnosis confirmed, and I’m initiating a transition to living as the real me. There is a cost involved: pain to my family and stress on my career. Ethically, is it right to be “true to myself” even if that authenticity ends my otherwise happy marriage and damages the emotional stability of my three children?"
And part of the answer:
" The conclusion is not as simple as the question suggests: it’s impossible to know how much damage this would actually do. Your family may already sense that something is wrong. I could argue that an honest, difficult relationship is still better than a comfortable marriage based on the unreal; it’s also possible that your children (as they mature) will understand your desires completely. It’s entirely possible that this evolution could be positive for everyone involved. This, however, is all speculation. I don’t know you or anyone in your family, and it would be idiotic of me to pretend as if there were one irrefutable response to this situation. The person you need to talk to is your wife. You need to consider what this action will do to your three children, in both the short term and the long term. When you made the decision to have children, you committed yourself to the sacrifice of significant personal freedoms for the betterment of their lives; this is a profound extension of that reality, but that’s your ethical responsibility as a parent. So the question you really need to ask yourself is this: Is your psychological damage from gender dysphoria greater than the psychological damage that its restoration will inflict upon the lives of any (or all) of your children? If the answer is yes, proceed. If the answer is no, don’t do it. Your sadness is tragic, but at least it’s confined to yourself. This advice might seem reactionary, but it’s not a position on whether transitioning is ethical in and of itself. There’s no inherent ethical problem with that decision. It’s about the possibility of improving one life at a greater cost to three others who might lack the intellectual and emotional maturity to comprehend what’s really happening.
Certainly, the person answering the question doesn't have the understanding of the depth of the problem. No where in the answer was the fact that so many transgender people consider the ultimate solution as suicide?
The final point was no better:
"It’s about the possibility of improving one life at a greater cost to three others who might lack the intellectual and emotional maturity to comprehend what’s really happening."
Oh, by the way the advice was written by a man...go figure.
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