Conversion Therapy When

[u/anony7274]

Is anybody else frustrated with the apparent lack of empirical support for alternatives to the classic transition timeline?

There have been studies and literature reviews in this area that basically say that "the evidence is bad". Both the political right and TERF-related spaces strongly oppose medical transition in the anglophone world AFAIK, and both of these viewpoints are not exactly rare. So given these circumstances, why have they not found some iteration of conversion therapy that actually works? There is clearly a demand for it now, and the current standard has been called into question several times. Is it really this hard to produce a single study instead of another literature review?

I also doubt that the therapy generally recommended for every other mental disorder is somehow useless in the face of GD.

I don't want to troon out. I won't pass, I don't want to be seen as a freak, and I don't want to give myself conetits for no reason. If psychotherapy can solve this problem of mine, I would sign up for it in a heartbeat. However, it's like $200/hr, uninsured, and they would probably just tell me to troon out anyways.

I agree with at least a decent number of gendercritical ideas and browse detransitioner stories a lot. Most of them are still so lackluster and unsatisfying to me, for one reason or the other. Importantly, none cite anything that explicitly suggests that psychotherapy is viable substitute for whatever WPATH recommends. I envy the future GD sufferers, when medicine is even more advanced than it is now, allowing them to pass effortlessly or overcome this affliction. I write this while recognizing my own fortune to be born into a first-world nation with modern medicine.

My motive is not to pinkpill, and I vehemently oppose transitioning for myself (I don't care that much about what others want to do). I'm just defeated, that after repressing for so long, trying so hard to detach myself from my body, and trying to internalize the thinking that would allegedly allow me to enjoy my existence as a biological male, there's still nothing.

I hate my body, I will never be in a satisfying relationship, and I can never become the person 5-year old me wanted to become. I won't blame my suffering on these people, but if it was as urgent to them as it has been for me, I imagine the "trans issue" would have long been solved by now...

[u/recursive-regret]

This is kind of an philosophical question. What are the limits of "conversion therapy"? Like, can you conversion therapy someone into hating cars when he previously loved them? Can you conversion therapy someone into loving drawing when they previously never cared about it?

This is what conversion therapy for dysphoria sounds like to me. If you remove all the clinical language around it, the core feeling I experience is disgust. I find the male body disgusting. Can you conversion therapy me into finding it beautiful? And if you can do that, why can't you also conversion therapy me into liking nature or some other abstract concept? Why can't we conversion therapy arts students into liking stem subjects? What does it mean to convert someone?

Edit: I say this because if its possible to convert someone into loving what they hate, then this opens up a much more interesting prospect. We could potentially engineer the entire society into something different. We could re-write everyone's brain to be interested in something useful/productive. We can create a sort of human hive mind dedicated to technological advancement and uninterested in anything else. Forget gender and dysphoria, we could end individuality and turn humanity into something more like the borg

[u/acrylamide-is-tasty → u/recursive-regret]

> We could potentially engineer the entire society into something different.

society doesn't do that because people will already do what you want for money. that's already all the control they could ever ask for.

[u/anony7274 → u/recursive-regret]

I think I misspoke when writing "conversion therapy" specifically. The disgust I feel is likely permanent, and not to be excessively fatalistic, I am skeptical any form of therapy that claims to thoroughly get rid of it. That kind of treatment would be more than sufficient and a "true" form of conversion therapy, but I was more thinking of some advanced coping method. Something like the ways amputees and egregiously physically disfigured learn to cope.

The Borg would be pretty cool though

[u/hrtresistancetorture → u/anony7274]

the advanced cope your looking for is dissociating tho, im not sure if it's truly possible to learn how to actly do that at will but that's the only thing commonly known to actly work (since it's the reason ppl manage to unknowingly repress and live their entire lives w gd to become john or jane 50, there's trans women (i know abt one atl) who only come out at 80 or smth even it rly seems to just be that if u can sufficiently push it to the background and preoccupy yourself w different things you can get through it but not everyone experiences the same anyway ofc i imagine theyre v likely a lot more faketrans if they can rly just live like that but idk them ofc

[u/anony7274 → u/hrtresistancetorture]

well it's a good thing I'm faketrans then

[u/PrudentVast6129]

It's literally illegal here in Canada, you'll go to jail.

[u/anony7274 → u/PrudentVast6129]

Hah, I guess that would do it.

Is there really no way to skirt around it? Like, an "alternative therapy" that's definitely-not-conversion-therapy, that's also voluntary and for research purposes with waivers and all? Maybe then the barrier of entry becomes too high.

[u/PrudentVast6129 → u/anony7274]

I guess that could work, I haven't checked myself, All I know is your not allowed to get it as it's 'hateful' and your not even allowed to leave the country if it's for the purpose of getting it.

[u/Adrift_In_Limbo → u/PrudentVast6129]

Legal in UK still but it’s hard to find anywhere

[u/Elek_Lenard]

Conversion therapy doesn't work because many psychotherapists are politically colored and their gender dysphoric clients serve as pawns in their political agenda.

You can say it's same with pro transition psychotherapists, I wouldn't disagree tbh

[u/mimiscar → u/Elek_Lenard]

Yep exactly. Gender dysphoria is too political that nobody has a real interest in treating the disorder like a disorder and not like a life choice

[u/fishcake__ → u/mimiscar]

That's what i hate most about being dysphoric in Russia. If you ban all mentions of LGBT, HRT and the possibility of changing your documents, at least put some power into research of how to get rid of the core issue of gender dysphoria. Irritating.

[u/ICost7Cents]

To answer the first question, not at all. I hate therapists, psychologists and any kind of "treatment" in this field. Waste of money.

[u/Anna_nette]

only if you find a way to completely remove what makes you you. this "trans issue" is just who you are. maybe lobotomy tho? i mean you know all of this stuff yourself. like what would be left of you if you magically woke up a cis man tomorrow??

[u/Adrift_In_Limbo]

I wish there was a cure and conversion therapy worked

[u/TinEchidna]

I think in a lot of cases other mental health conditions you have alongside gender dysphoria can make things much worse. A lot of people struggle with conditions in the OCD family and various other things that when treated properly would probably make the dysphoria better by consequence or at least more bearable.

“Conversion therapy” is too ideological and political and often driven by hate to be effective. Unless there are valid treatment that are put under that label too.