That movie was very sad and unfortunately is still accurate for many people.
I live in Australia, and the situation is different here, in a lot of areas of medical care. Our health system is nowhere near as screwed up as the US one sounds.
That said, I have never in my life seen a gynaecologist. I used to get things like that done by my GP. Other doctors I see these days who have experience dealing with trans people generally have no problems doing prostate checks on women, or pap smears/pelvic ultrasounds on guys. You still have to have breast cancer checks if you’ve had chest reconstructive surgery, because there’s usually still a bit of breast tissue there, and you’re at higher risk than most guys (who can also get breast cancer) because of the oestrogen exposure.
To be honest, I dislike and distrust doctors (unjustly, because I know most of them are actually nice people) and avoid seeing them as much as possible. If I get cancer, on my head be it.
Of course, that’s a completely different issue from someone being refused treatment… I think that would be against the law here.
Some do (Eve has answered this part), some don’t.
I was a tomboy as a child. I had no concept that it was actually possible to be a guy because I had a girl body, so I decided, with 5-year-old’s logic, that I couldn’t be a boy cos I had no penis, but I wasn’t a girl… therefore I was something else entirely. I picked the random word “tomboy” to describe my gender (“I’m not a girl, i’m a tomboy!”) I guess I sent mixed signals. I was a bit effeminate (explains why I grew up to be a big fag, perhaps?) and didn’t actually mind playing with barbies from time to time, although I was more into books. I didn’t actually have a realisation of what was actually going on until much later in life, even though the feelings were there.
The only thing I want to say, is to never assume that anyone is anything. Don’t try and force them to be something they aren’t. They’ll let you know who they are when they’re ready.
This sounds like ->me<- growing up. I didn’t like dresses. I don’t wear frills (once I got past 30 I consented to occassional lacy bits. VERY occassional). I begged to use daddy’s tools, I asked for a nice yellow Tonka truck for ages (and never got it!*) Dinosaurs. Model airplanes. Chemistry sets. Asked for an erector set multiple times (never got that, either!). My Barbies could be found building log cabins (Lincoln logs) and exploring new places. When I got the Barbie Stewardess thingy I put a Barbie-sized chair up front and pretended she was the pilot. I played tag with the boys at recess instead of hopscotch with the girls. I did weight lifting long before it was cool for a girl to do. Got in trouble for releasing snakes in the school gym - after the boys managed to convince the principal that yes, it really WAS a girl doing that. I took woodshop instead of home ec (actually had to go the school board to get an OK for that! The 1970’s were sooooo paleolithic!) I did learn to fly airplanes.
As I’ve stated in this thread, I’m very much a heterosexual girl. Happily married 14 years. Some of us tomboys really ARE het girls.
I stated multiple times in my youth “I hate being a girl!” because it always seemed that being a girl meant I couldn’t do the things I wanted to do. I caused a great outcry in second grade when, after hearing a teacher tell me umpteen times “young ladies don’t do that!” I screamed THEN I DON’T WANT TO BE A YOUNG LADY! The teacher after that insisted I be medicated. Fortunately, my parents stood their ground and that didn’t happen.
I didn’t hate my gender - I hated the limitations imposed on me because of that gender. And the more people tried to force me into frilly pink dresses the more I resisted.
I can’t tell you about your stepdaughter because I just can’t know enough from a message board posting. But being a “tomboy” doesn’t make someone transexual or homosexual or whatever**
I grew up and bought myself and nice, shiny, candy-apple red full-size pickup truck I can drive around. So there! Nyahh!
** Can’t count the number of times I’ve been accused of being a dyke, though - doesn’t have any effect, since I don’t see being a lesbian as something shameful. I don’t happen to be one, but to me it’s a little like going up to someone and saying “nyah-nyah - you know how to walk” Uh, yeah… and your point is…?
Ok, so “YOU” didnt like pink dresses, hopscotch, frills, and you instead liked pants, trucks, snakes, playing tag with the boys , power tools, weight lifting, etc. and see nothing wrong with it.
What if your son didnt like pants, trucks, snakes, playing tag with the boys, power tools, weight lifting, and instead he prefered pink dresses, playing hopscotch with the girls, and frills ?
Yes… those are society’s stereotypes, not our inbuilt desires. We are imprinted to want those things from a very young age. Hooray for a child who manages to overcome the social conditioning and do what they actually want to do.
Girl babies having a bleed when a few days old? Can and does happen sometimes. It happens when the baby has a lot of her mother’s hormones in her blood.
Society isn’t tolerant of men wearing dresses - unless it’s a Scotsman in a kilt (by the way - my husband wore kilts for many years and when we married we were both wearing a “skirt”) or some other ethnic garb.
Aside from that - men in my family sew, crochet, cook, clean house, change diapers, can braid their daughters’ hair, iron their own clothes, do their own laundry, and so forth.
I was actually sent to “charm school” because I was told in no certain terms that while the family didn’t mind me in jeans and flannel shirt there were going to be times I had to wear a dress and act as a lady, so I’d better know how. As a child, it seemed a reasonable compromise to put up with “that useless stuff” if otherwise I could do the stuff I wanted to. Likewise, when one of my nephews was being bullied for acting “sissy” his parents took him to some self-defense courses and did a litter assertiveness training. He’s not a physically agressive kid at all, but he had to learn how to handle himself because he’s a boy and society still demands that young men be able to display such a trait.
If I had a child I’d love him/her/whatever regardless - but I’d also try to prepare them for how society at large will react to them.
Rather than totally try to repress some of these traits, I think we’d all be better off if parents allowed their children a safe time and place for these unconventional traits and playthings, even if outside the circle of the family the child was encouraged (or even required in some instances) to conform more closely to societal norms and expectations.
Guinastasia, Loren’s lasted a week, and consisted of blood, blood clots, and mucus. Her doctor verified that it was coming from her cervix. How is this not a period?
It’s not menstruation for the same reason that baby boys producing fluid from their breasts shortly after birth isn’t lactation.
Yes, it’s hormonally induced, but it’s from expose to hormones outside the body, not part of being a physically mature and potentially (or actually) reproducing human being. It’s like saying that bleeding from vaginal cancer is menstruation. It’s not. There’s a superficial resemblance, that’s all.
Menstruation is part of a cycling process. These other instances of bleeding (one harmless, one dire) are not part of such a cycle.