How are you? It’s been years since we’ve talked. And when we talked, we always talked about me. Who I think I am, what I want to do with my life. What you think of me, what you think I should do with my life. And when we talked, you had a lot of power over me and I had no power over you, so I never found the courage to flip the questions and talk about you. Let’s talk about you now.
Here’s what you did
You put me through a process you call ‘a diagnosis for gender dysphoria’. Among transgender people, there is a different word for that process: gatekeeping. It is the process of cisgender therapists like you, who have never felt what it is like to be transgender or to transition, deciding that you are the experts on whether I am transgender and on whether I am ready to transition.
In the name of this process of gatekeeping, you and people like you create a number of barriers to the care that transgender people need, which include:
- long waiting periods
- forcing us to fit traditional gender roles
- unnecessary and intimate interrogations about our lives
- unnecessary and intimate examinations of our bodies
- obligatory coming outs at a time when we are not ready and comfortable coming out
- obligatory traditional gender representation at a time when we are not ready and comfortable presenting that gender in public
- obligatory sterilization
- obligatory transition care (hormones, surgery, etc) other than the transition care we actually want
You may not have put up all of these barriers yourself (I know you consider yourself quite progressive when it comes to gender roles), but you legitimize every one of them every time you legitimize the practice of diagnosing transgender people. Do you know that I cried many times before a visit to you? That’s how terrified I was of the things you did to me and the things that you could do to me. I couldn’t avoid you though, I needed the transition care and you were the gate keeper.
Here’s what I think of you
You are not a savior of transgender people. The salvation you offer is akin to that offered by the white pilgrims who offered heaven to black and brown kids if they serve the white man. You used the word ‘help’ to strip me of the right to control my own body and my own life. You used the word 'patient’ to stop treating me like a person. I never needed you. I knew exactly what kind of health care I needed. But you forced yourself on me. You create much of the dysphoria you claim to cure.
Here’s what I think you should do
You should quit your job today. Don’t sleep on it. Quit today. And tomorrow, start making health care for transgender people accessable on an Informed Consent basis. Give us back the power to decide who we are and what is best for our bodies and lives. Offer mental help to those who ask for it. The world is a transphobic place and there are quite a few of us who have traumas from living in it. We could use unpathological,diagnosis-free help.
Every day that you do not quit your job diagnosing us, you are part of a transphobic abusive practice. You are personally responsible for the prolonged suffering and suicide of transgender people. I hope that keeps you up a night. I hope that one day you’ll listen to me and transgender people like me. I hope that one day, you’ll have fixed so much of the damage you did that I can forgive you.
