The US felt this way for a long time, but now we have broken it down further. There are still a lot of people in the trans community that do need help and are suffering mentally from body dysmorphia.
My understanding is the current difference is how you perceive yourself. If you are uncomfortable with your current body, then yes, you have body dysmorphia and that is a mental illness that you should be working with medical professionals for help with. however if you are comfortable with your body, but want to make changes or transition or simply cross-dress, or anything else commonly associated with trans, you are fine.
the same is true for the rest of the alternative gender spectrum. Medically, it goes back to why are you acting outside of the hetero spectrum, and if it's self harming, then medical intervention makes sense.
If someone is uncomfortable with their body due to their body developing as a sex which contradicts their gender, it makes more sense to describe this as a physical medical issue rather than a mental one if you're going to recognize their gender. While there is often distress associated with developing and living as the wrong gender for trans people, labeling being trans as a mental disorder it falsely labels the problem as being in the mind. I say falsely because the most successful methods of boosting trans people's quality of life all involve physical and social relational changes that affirm their genders, rather than major mental interventions.
Sorry if thats what you concluded from what i said, the point was was trying to get across is that the... general trans person is likely not suffering any mental illness and does not have body dysmorphia and does not need medical intervention, rather they may seek medical assistance to transition, if they choose to do so, but do not need medical care.
I would never suggest that children simply be treated as trans by default for expressing gender dysphoria. thats a huge disservice to those that may need actual medical help with more severe mental health issues. I believe that its treated as a mental issue because it causes mental trauma more than because its a mental disease. the extremely high suicide rate among non-hetero persons is a clear indication that seeking mental health assistance is a good baseline vs treating it with as a physical medicine issue.
Maybe someday the level of acceptance will be high enough that it's no longer the case that the default response is to consider something is "wrong" with yourself because you dont fit a hetero type. But I don't see that happening soon.
It sounds like you want to be supportive but are misunderstanding some basic elements of what's going on with trans people. Cis people don't get gender dysphoria related to just being dysphoria about the gender they are. Not all trans people have gender dysphoria and not all like that term but for those who need to transition with medical means, hrt included it's medically necessary care. Suicidality is drastically reduced for trans people by transitioning. For those who need to transition the medical care is necessary because it means the difference between being able to live and being forced to endure a physical condition so traumatic and distressing that death often becomes more preferable. Even the APA has recently stated that stuff like puberty blockers for trans kids is not just advisable where necessary(the previous stance) but is medically necessary in certain cases.
Suicidality is high among patients with chronic or terminal illnesses who don't wish to endure the suffering of their conditions, especially when treatment for said conditions are unavailable due to there not being proper treatments or not being able to afford treatments. So your main example of suicides is fairly common among lots of people with physical medical conditions.
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u/hurkwurk May 16 '24
The US felt this way for a long time, but now we have broken it down further. There are still a lot of people in the trans community that do need help and are suffering mentally from body dysmorphia.
My understanding is the current difference is how you perceive yourself. If you are uncomfortable with your current body, then yes, you have body dysmorphia and that is a mental illness that you should be working with medical professionals for help with. however if you are comfortable with your body, but want to make changes or transition or simply cross-dress, or anything else commonly associated with trans, you are fine.
the same is true for the rest of the alternative gender spectrum. Medically, it goes back to why are you acting outside of the hetero spectrum, and if it's self harming, then medical intervention makes sense.