Jungian Analyst Bob Withers joins us to discuss the differences between gay conversion therapy and gender identity conversion therapy.  We examine the possibility of misinformed therapists “transing the gay away” and suggest that perhaps the dark history of conversion therapy may not be over. Bob delves into his view of psychosomatic symptoms and draws on his background in philosophy and medical history to understand our current fixation with one’s subjective sense of identity. Bob also defines what he calls “detrans-phobic” responses to the experiences of detransitioners.

Links:

Winnicott: http://web-facstaff.sas.upenn.edu/~cavitch/pdf-library/Winnicott_PsycheSoma.pdf 

Dr Az Hakeem: 

http://www.drazhakeem.com/publications/

Vsauce Video: The Power of Suggestion: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDCcuCHOIyY&feature=emb_title

Safeguard evidence-based therapy for children struggling with gender dysphoria:  

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/582083?fbclid=IwAR39py7JJnyxPe_cqQZAIUPBRt5E3wZ4MjvoryWBOdyGjuXVp2qRq0o3YVk 

Transgender Medicalization and the attempt to evade psych distress: 

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-5922.12641  

The Seventh Penis: towards effective psychoanalytic work with pre-surgical transexuals  

https://www.thesap.org.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Withers-2015-Journal_of_Analytical_Psychology.pdf 

Cambridge Books:  

Transgender Children and Young People: Born in Your Own Body:  

https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-0398-4 

Inventing Transgender Children:  

https://cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-3638-8 

One Size Does Not Fit All: In Support of Psychotherapy for Gender Dysphoria 

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-020-01844-2 

Extended Notes

• A little bit about Bob and his work. 
• Bob met a biological man, now a woman, who wanted to detransition. He realized that becoming a woman did not solve his psychological problems. This was in 1990. 
• Bob’s work would later spark a new set of clients and now Bob sees parents and gender dysphoria teens. 
• How were the narrates about gender different back then? 
• Bob’s first detransition client was attacked and vilivided by the community. He tried to write books about it, but the only way to get the bullying to stop was to say he made up the whole thing. 
• This was the first time Bob saw de-trans phorbia. 
• We know the mind through introspection, but we actually know the body
  
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