Wait and see

[Mounds_dont (imported)]

I started down the road to getting letters from a psychologist so I can get my castration done by someone other than Dr Kimmel. I figure I can take the time and see if it really is the right thing. and if the good doctor is retired by the time I am ready, I will have options. I sure wish someone in the Northwest would step up to the plate.

I asked my counselor about chemical castration while we are doing the evaluation and they didn't freak out.

Has anyone else talked to shrinks? How did it go? How long did the process take?

I already asked mine. I am just trying to get a basis for comparison.

[transward (imported)]

Your profile lists your location as Seattle. There is a doctor outside Tacoma and another in Portland that does castrations for the TS community. I suspect that what you want could be attained by emphasizing your quest as a gender issue, emphasizing your discomfort with a male identity. Approached that way, gender therapists would be more likely to be sympathetic than just wanting castration. A good place to start is at Seattle Counseling Service for Sexual Minorities (http://www.seattlecounseling.org/) located At Pine and Melrose, just east of downtown There are a couple of groups for trans people that meet in Seattle, Ingersoll Gender Center (ttp://www.ingersollcenter.org/) and Pacific Gender Support (http://www.pacificgender.org/support/). Ingersoll is probably the one most open to gender queer (Pacific Gender is more mainline M2F) and they meet at the Seattle Counseling offices.

There is also another EA member and frequent poster who lives in the Seattle area and who was castrated at a rather young age, I believe by a local doctor. Ze is at this point questioning about where ze wants to end up on the gender spectrum. You can probably find zir by browsing the EA trans group.

Transward

[SteveS1980 (imported)]

Good information. If, after my 2nd epididimitis removal operation that testicle is as deformed and sickly as the other one I may very well want/need to have both removed, and as much as I can't imagine myself going to a psych I may need to, although I don't live in Seattle.

Just a side note regarding:

A good place to start is at Seattle Counseling Service for Sexual Minorities

Sexual Minority? Never heard that one before. Considering all the sexual problems that seem to afflict most everyone, a sexual miniority seems like that rare couple who has great sex 2 or 3 times a week and have no sexual frustrations or issues.

[mrt (imported)]

I was a tad "miffed" to be asked to see a shrink before my Uro would take care of my Orchialgia issue. I think this is first and foremost a good cover your ass plan. What they hope to avoid are people who are truly wacked out of their heads talking a doctor into doing unneeded surgery.

A good example is that UFO cult (Heavens Gate) that insisted its male members be castrated so??? I dunno what. The UFO would arrive on time or whatever. Some of these geniuses got someone to operate on them. No one of course wants to fess up as to who.

Anyway, forgetting the moral and legal reasons why it might be good from the doctors perspective there is a great reason for you (and I) to do it.

It gives an unbiased third party a chance to go over your motivations / reasons for asking for this. To talk about how and where this is going. And gives you an open invite to see them later if you have second thoughts etc. Will they try to talk your out of it? No, but they will make you think hard about what your doing and why and thats NEVER a bad idea. Consider that this is a one way thing. You can't UN-do this surgery in anyway that we know so its important you don't just run around without all the facts be they medical or ones about yourself.

I hope you will ponder this long and hard and if you still think its the thing for you "test" it with chemical castration. I suspect that you will find it much less great then you think. Its NOT just about being male and being sexual.

[Mounds_dont (imported)]

You are lucky your Uro didn't freak out and have you committed to 3 days of psych eval. That's what mine did. Of course I have no medical issues with my testicals. Call me crazy, I just want them in a jar.

Seattle Counceling is the place I am going. While they are mainly seeing M-F and F-M cases, they do get the occasional patient who just wants to be castrated. I decided not to play games with them and told them as plainly as I could articulate what my goal was and if I could expect a referral from them. Of course the answer was the usual shrink mumbo-jumbo "It all depends on you".

I so love shrinks!

Great info about the docs in the area, and when I get closer, I'll have to ask you which ones they are. Tacoma is just down the road.

[gandalf (imported)]

I guess I was "lucky", "fortunate" or some such word. My urologist did not ask me to see a therapist. We went through 7 months of testing for my testicular pain. At the end of that, he reluctantly agreed with my prognosis or rather the self evaluation that the only recourse was to remove them. He did one at a time. Last Aug. I found out that I am the only one he has ever totally castrated solely for pain issues. I am also the only one he has removed the scrotum from. I guess most men want replacements so they look more "manly". I am glad everything is gone.

[Mounds_dont (imported)]

What kind of tests did they do? I once got a uro to ultra sound my balls because he thought there must be some medical reason I wasn't telling him about, when I asked him about castration. Of course after finding nothing wrong with them, I got the psych eval.