Unnamed Former Patient

So, yeah, my dad really can remember that they asked me a few times different ways if I was all sexual abused, if my dad touched me strange or my granddad or... Yeah, and he thought that was really heavy. And also that he had meetings on his own together with my mother or my mother on her own. So... Yeah, he said sometimes it felt like an investigation on us as parents.

Yeah, I thought that was very, but worth it, of course. But I think it was, yeah, around one year that we, yeah, they got, we received like the diagnostization. The diagnosis? Yeah, the diagnosis, gender dysphoria. And then it was more like, okay, we just keep in touch. Mm-hmm.

And so, as she was nearing 12 years old, I can remember we went like in the next phase of the treatment.

We talked about puberty blockers and also, again, all the questions.

It was really... Yeah, very heavy and, yeah, very big. Yeah, we felt really serious about it also.

And finally, when she was 12, she began getting monthly shots that paused her development. But it was always very clear to me when I started that if I ever thought different or changed my mind or did not feel well about it or... Yeah, you can stop whenever you want and everything will start as normal, maybe a bit later. But I always knew it was temporary.

I always knew that, yeah, till the next phase were the hormones, I could stop every moment and...

But I was so happy with it because I was very aware that I did not want anything to do with male puberty. Yeah, with wet dreams and a beard and yeah, it felt like a gift. And I was also very aware. Over the next four years, Manon kept getting her shots, going into the hospital all the time for tests.

Again, all, how are you? How are you feeling? Are you aware? Because this is the stage that, yeah, you will get like breasts or your body will change.

And very important, my fertility. Right, yeah. Yeah, and I can remember that, yeah, I got the question. I really had to literally sign a form that I'm aware that, yeah, as soon as I start that my fertility will go. And, yeah, do you want children? Someone asked me, could it be Analu or someone else? I said, yeah, I don't know. I'm 16. Yeah, because in this phase and fertility.

And I said, okay, what's the other option? Well, the option was that I then had to quit the blockers for at least six months.

Then go back to the hospital, go and I saw this room in front of me with the dirty magazines, and then I could do a thing what I never did because it made me sick even think of it. Right. Yeah. How do you call it? Yeah. Masturbate in a... Hell no. Yes. I said, hell no. So I signed. And yeah, to be honest now, do I regret that choice? No, but it does have impact on my life. I'm now 30.

Everyone around me is pregnant or has children or... Yeah. And of course, I think it's a very normal age that you think, oh, shit, I would also like kids or be a mom or anything. So do I regret the choice? Absolutely not. But it was a very big decision with impact now still on my life.

And I, We were always like, okay, when I was 12, puberty blockers, then the next phase was 16. Yes, hormones, next step. And my end point was, oh, when the operation, I'm done, finished, basta. Right. I'm a woman. I'll never tell someone again and I'll live my life and I will do everything what all my friends did when they were 12, 13, 14. I will just do it when I'm 18. Right.

Like with boys and experience and sex and all the things, I literally just put my life on pause. And yeah. So in the end, when the point came that I'm now... done, you're never done. I mean, it's not so easy then to press play and, oh, let's go and take a guy home and have the first time sex. No, that's really difficult.

I'm so scared to be hurt by someone because I built as a small child such a big wall and And literally, if someone stick a finger out, I took the whole arm and I broke it. Yeah. I did that literally once. So, yeah. And so it helped me, the defense, and made me strong. But I still have that naturally in me, the wall, the brick wall. I have to be strong. I have to be tough. I have to...

Fight for myself, for my rights, for my, yeah.

But yeah, to be honest, I do not have to tell anyone. I mean... Without being arrogant, you could not see it. You do not hear it. No one will ever, if they meet me, think, oh, she's transgender or... Yeah.

Yeah, very different because, yeah, you see it maybe or you hear it a little on her. And, yeah, she works in a restaurant. A few weeks ago, a guest asked her, are you a guy or a woman? Do I need to call you miss or him? Yeah, she totally freaks out and cries. And, yeah, I never have that. Never. That's so hurting just because people know that. Yeah, they hurt you with that.

That would be, yeah, a nightmare. I cannot even imagine. Yeah, I think maybe I did not even live. Yeah, I think I would maybe hurt myself or... Yeah, I think so. Mm-hmm. Because of our treatment that I luckily could get, I can live my life now how I live it. A normal job. I have a good background. I have, yeah, I just enjoying life. So going out for dinner, parties, festivals, traveling.

I am also a person on Friday evening after like a work week. I love to just sit here and watch a series or a movie with my cats and close the curtains. Do you guys have reality TV here? I love reality TV. I love the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Real Housewives of New Jersey. We now have Real Housewives of Amsterdam. Yeah, it's amazing. They are crazy.

So we'll just sit on the table, have just, like, a conversation, and you will... Just record it.

Yeah, when I was a kid and with the book, but later I worked with a Dutch program.

It happened that I had a new job and someone Googled me. Then I heard later that, oh, your video is going through the whole company. So that was very unsafe. That was not nice.

And I thought also I believe that if Analu speaks with you, then it's for me safe to also speak with you. Yeah, I did wonder.

I can remember it was literally Wednesday afternoon, a few hours, and they were with a few colleagues, Peggy, Annelu, and the other doctor, and I think another few. So it was all very small, and I did realize I was a, yeah, how do you call it? Yeah, we say proofkunijn, a trial... A rabbit that they test makeup. Yeah, like where they test things on. So yeah, they have to test it on someone.

Well, yeah, fine by me.

The first thing that was mentioned in all the papers was an early history of what at the time was called gender identity disorder.

Always walking in my mom's clothes, wearing towels as skirts or long hair. I wanted to play with girls' stuff. And then, yeah, she always said, yeah, but you're a boy and you have a penis. And then I said, no, I'm not a boy, I'm a girl. and the penis will fall off. I always believed that.

And I can also remember, I don't know if it's also in the USA, but like in Holland, if you don't close your zipper from your trousers, they say, ah, then it will fly away. So I always walked with my zipper open and I was so, yeah, convinced that... Yeah, something was wrong and it will get fixed. Then I came like the... Realization. Realization that it will not fall off or fly away.

Ah, shit, it's not going to fly off. And I am a boy, but I do not feel like one. And then I really did everything to be the best boy in the world. So I had like... this sharp hair and with the gel and very boy clothes. And I climbed trees and hit people and was fighting. And yeah, so my mom said, I saw that you were so struggling being a boy, literally.

So yeah, I can also remember the face that I was very... Yeah, really, really unhappy. Yeah, and that I really said that. I said, oh, I will cut it off. Then they have to help me. My parents were really scared that I would maybe hurt myself.

Well, I think they left me very free. I was really raised with everything is okay. And I think I always had a very strong intuitive connection with my mother.

That moment, I think, for my mother was, okay, we have to do something and help you. But also very open also from, okay, are you sure that this is what you want? Are you sure that you want to go outside as a girl? Do you know that you will be bullied, that people would have an opinion about you?

Oh, it gives me chill when I say it, but very open with me, nearly like an adult conversation, but I was eight years old.

In Manon's case, her parents had started to let her dress as a girl when she was in elementary school. As soon as I came out of school, curtains, clothes, and then I changed. And I think I changed every day 10, 15 times.

Yeah. And also my dad said a while ago, like, you were looking in the mirror the whole day.

And then shortly after.

I said, I want to go to my friend. Her name was Brenda. And to show the new me.

It also felt like not a nice place because it was very vulnerable there. All the kids, and kids are harsh.

And then my mom said, if you want, later I can pick you up and then we can walk together through the playground. She said, if you think about it, if you want it, call me. And I thought, yes, I want that. So my mom picked me up and she held my hand and we walked. Yeah, I was as a girl. Yeah. And then we walked outside and with my head up high and everyone was outside and watching.

And yeah, everyone was like, yeah, in shock. But you felt, oh, it was so, yeah, that finally I looked, yeah, how I felt. And also the strong hand from my mother and very protected. It was a very, very special moment. But also the moment of, OK, we're out now and we're going for it. But when Manon first got to the gender clinic... In the beginning, they were very hands-off.

Because you were so young. So young. They said, OK, don't stimulate, don't force anything.

We see a lot of children who say it and later on they make a different decision.

Yeah, and my mother, because we had such a strong interweb connection, she was like very, no, I know my child. And this is not something from yesterday. And we are not these parents who, yeah, prefer a daughter or something. No, it's not the case. So later on, we came at Honolulu.

In the beginning, it was only questions, questions, questions.

How do you feel? How are you at school?

questions but my dad really can remember very well what really made impact on him a lot of children who are sexual abused like a small girl is abused they can also have these feelings that they prefer to be a boy with the feeling that oh if i were a boy the person did not abuse me or yeah