Thank you all for the birthday greetings and for the very kind words. But, especially, thank you for the many friendships that I have made on this site. There’s a great collection of wonderful folk here on the Archive and I’ve enjoyed getting to know you – some of you in person, some by email or over the telephone, others only through your posts. I hope to spend time with many more of you in coming years.

Right now, I’m sitting in a hotel room in Oslo. The biennial conference of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health finished this afternoon. Tomorrow morning I head to Sweden for the annual meeting of the World Association for Sexual Health. From there, I fly to England to spend a few days visiting Thefraj on his home turf.

I will post detailed comments about the meetings once I return home and have a REAL keyboard to type on.

As a teaser, I spent quite a bit of time talking with Dr. Harold Reed of Florida about surgeries; I spoke with several of the staff of the Amsterdam gender clinic; I spoke with therapists and surgeons from several other countries around the world. There were several panels and workshops on revisions to the DSM. The consensus seems to be that the term “Gender Identity Disorder” should be changed ASAP to “Gender Dysphoria” and that GID-Not Otherwise Specified (where desire for castration or penectomy appears) needs to be strengthened to justify surgery, as it does not now. The presentation and the poster on voluntary eunuchs were both very well received. I stood next to the poster talking with interested folk until nearly midnight, when the hotel staff chased us out of the room to lock up for the night.

I think that progress is being made, and many of you provided the ammunition that was needed. Thank you.

Jesus, that all sounds very promising: at least some reason to hope that eventually eunuchism might eventually fall out of the "too weird to think about" category.

But huh? Senior Member visits but no Europe MOM? Doh! :-\

Matthew

Jesus, firstly many congratulations for your birthday. I'm delighted you spent it in Amsterdam. I gather there have been lots of fireworks and celebrations so they knew you were coming. If there were ever people in the medical world who will appreciate the uniqueness of choosing to be a eunuch,the understanding will certainly fan out from the Netherlands. There is an intelligence, an understanding and a wish to listen and learn there.

Some states and populations have fixed opinions and closed minds to anything they don't fully understand in 2 minutes. That's a problem across the planet and especially today where there is no time for people to think and appreciate. We get fed our news and opinions in short dollops. Thank you for all your work and I'm sure you found an understanding professional audience. I hope it contained Urologists and all interested professionals.

Here's my best wishes to you for the year ahead.

Ohh happy belated bday Jesus!

Happy Birthday Jesus! Thanks for all you have done for the site and its members.





balsmilie:balsmilie

Wishing you a happy birthday during some personal away time. It is wonderful to hear of your travels and efforts. I hope the passing year has brought you meaning and blessings.

wishing you the best, happy belated birthday

chilli-