Trying this 'psychologist' thing again

After recently contacting my GP about assistance with my intersex condition and its apparently increasing list of symptoms, she not only found a new gynaecologist for me, but also offered me the opportunity to speak with a new psychologist. This latter mostly because of me having indicated that I suffer from regular bouts of suicidal (and regular) depression and with her pre-existing knowledge of my PTSD. Monday will be my first appointment with this new psychologist.

Anyone who has followed me for a while is probably quite aware of my negative - where not plain traumatic - experiences with psychologists in the past. Beyond one psychotherapist in the Netherlands, every single psychologist, psychiatrist and related I came into contact with either tried to convince me that I had to be transgender, that I was merely imagining my intersex condition, or that I was simply 'crazy', to put it into plain English. Things don't get fun yet until a psychologist tries to pass off your intersex condition as just you being delusional and merely wanting to see your own body as being female, even after her assistant's first commentary upon seeing you is: "But she really looks like a girl!".

Suffice it to say that if my scepticism regarding psychologists increased just a teensy bit more, it'd probably jump plain off any imaginable scale. That I nevertheless have agreed to this appointment with a psychologist has many reasons. The first, basic and major, point is simply that I need help with my traumas, including my PTSD. It's simply not possible to live anything resembling a normal life in between the periods of fear, terror, traumatic recollections, crying, paranoia, dissociation and plain lethargy. Still trying to pass myself off as a normal, properly functioning adult person in daily life is a terrible lie which isn't helping me either.

A second point is also the reason why I keep going to gynaecologists, even though my distrust towards physicians is already off the scale: as I am typing this I can feel a sharp, burning pain in my lower-right abdomen and a dull, burning pain in what I'd presume to be the vaginal region, symptoms I am quite certain are developing medical complications as a result of my intersex condition. In short: I need to find physicians who are willing and capable of helping me get through this problem. I need every bit of help I can get and cannot let traumas from my past guide me, as I wrote in an earlier post as well.

So, what to talk about with this psychologist with Monday's appointment? Figuring out whether she can help me at all is probably the first point, as my situation cannot possibly be easy to comprehend for anyone. As someone who is intimately familiar with said situation, I can honestly say that even to me it's still bloody confusing once you get past the pretty obvious medical points.

Much of what bothers me is simply due to traumas, much of it inflicted by physicians and psychologists over a decade, but another significant part is simply trauma from having a body which I cannot and most likely never will understand. Compared to the physical rape and sexual abuse I have suffered, this trauma is still much worse. The way I see it, that many people got their way with me is largely because of this uncertainty, of having a body and accompanying self-image that's just a blank canvas, ready for anyone to fill in. I would definitely say that it was what made me so vulnerable and easy to manipulate.

Not having a self-image or clue what I was led to this abuse, which led to me developing this incredible hatred towards anything sexuality-related, further helped by the abuse suffered at the hands of physicians and the like. I have undressed for and been fondled by more physicians than I have had sexual partners in my life so far, if that gives any indication. I really hope that there'll be a day when I won't have to feel this sickening, simmering hatred towards anything sexuality-related, including (heterosexual) couples. It's not me which hates it all, but a part of myself that I cannot reach or comprehend.

Similarly for my hatred towards my own body, which too appears to be a result of not knowing what the hell this body is, but finding myself more than able to blame having been born with this disfigured body for everything bad that has happened to me in my life so far. Even if Dutch physicians still claim that I am not intersex while other physicians disagree, I know that I have an intersex body and that I hate this fact more than anything in life.

Monday's appointment is going to be an interesting one, that's for sure...


Maya