Transgender Emergence

Explore an ecological strength-based framework for the treatment of gender-variant clients This comprehensive book provides you with a clinical and theoretical overview of the issues facing transgendered/transsexual people and their families. Transgender Emergence: Therapeutic Guidelines for Working with Gender-Variant People and Their Families views assessment and treatment through a nonpathologizing lens that honors human diversity and acknowledges the role of oppression in the developmental process of gender identity formation. Specific sections of Transgender Emergence: Therapeutic Guidelines for Working with Gender-Variant People and Their Families address the needs of gender-variant people as well as transgender children and youth. The issues facing gender-variant populations who have not been the focus of clinical care, such as intersexed people, female-to-male transgendered people, and those who identify as bigendered, are also addressed. The book examines: - the six stages of transgender emergence - coming out transgendered as a normative process of gender identity development - thinking "outside the box" in the deconstruction of sex and gender - the difference between sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as the convergence, overlap, and integration of these parts of the self - the power of personal narrative in gender identity development - etiology and typographies of transgenderism - treatment models that emerge from various clinical perspectives - alternative treatment modalities based on gender variance as a normative lifecycle developmental process Complete with fascinating case studies, a critique of diagnostic processes, treatment recommendations, and a helpful glossary of relevant terms, this book is an essential reference for anyone who works with gender-variant people. Handy tables and figures make the information easier to access and understand. Visit the author's Web site at http://www.choicesconsulting.com

Arlene Istar Lev, Arlene Istar Lev

- Foreword - Preface: Overview of Transgender Emergence - Acknowledgments - Introduction - The Language of Gender - Gender Dysphoria and Etiological Theories - The Families of Transgendered People - The Need for Training - Part I: Theoretical Understandings of Transgenderism - Chapter 1. The Transsexual Phenomenon Meets the Transexual Menace - Compassionate and Controversial Treatment of Transsexuals - The Mental Health Professional As Gatekeeper - Clinical GuidelinesTherapeutic Standards of Care - Chapter 2. The Legacy: Gender Variance in History - The Historical Legacy - Medical Science and Gender Variance - Chapter 3. Deconstructing Sex and Gender: Thinking Outside the Box - Four Components of Identity - Deconstructing the Assumptions of Sexual Identity - Part II: Diagnosis and Assessment - Chapter 4. Etiologies: Causes and Categories - Etiological Theories: Nature and NurtureEssentially Constructed - Categorical Classifications: If the Shoe Doesn't FitForce It - Chapter 5. Diagnosis and Transgenderism: The Creation of Pathology - The Power of Diagnosis - Gender As Pathological Diagnosis - Part III: Treatment Issues - Chapter 6. Learning to Listen to Gender Narratives - Mental Health Issues and Transgenderism - Clients Seeking Therapy - Transgender Narratives - Therapist As Midwife: The Birth of Story - Chapter 7. Transgender Emergence: A Developmental Process - Coming Out - Transgender Emergence - Chapter 8. Family Emergence - Partners, Spouses, and Significant Others - Developmental Stages for Family Members - Families Coping with Transgenderism - TransParents See - Chapter 9. Transgendered Children and Youth - Treatment, Prevention, and Parental Rights - Families with Gender-Variant Children - Gender Variance and Progressive Treatments - Transgender EmergenceStep-by-Step Maturation - Chapter 10. The Treatment of Intersexed People: Time for a New Paradigm - Assigning Sex and the Modern Medical Protocols - Creating Psychosocial Emergency - Standards of Humane Treatment for Intersexed People - Appendix A. The International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision, Definition of Transsexualism - Appendix B. Common Intersexed Conditions - Appendix C. Letters of Recommendation for Hormones - Glossary - References - Index