As a dutch trans woman who has been on transitioning since 2015, I thought back then it was bad, 8 months was already a lot for me to wait but seeing stuff like this is infuriating... I can't imagine waiting YEARS, I'd definitely DIY very quickly. I knew the system was fucked but I didn't know it was THIS FUCKED. I really hope my dutch trans friends can get good and reliable help, we deserve it.
I started watching this video (as someone living in the Netherlands and pretty familiar with the way trans care works here) because I felt like learning of your perspective, but getting to the point of "genderhealthcare" lead by Catharina... was just too much :D I actually had her as a job coach, through the UWV for my wajong, for several months around 2019, and I got to know her by a different name at first, she changed her name while we were talking, and she was supposed to be coaching me to get back to work. She actually was quite nice in person, but she would very often talk about her spiritual beliefs, and her past life experiences, to the point where during one meeting, she told me she had found out she was actually royalty, related to the Romanovs. Absolutely wild to see her pop up in a video related to trans care here, very funny :D
My son and I are both on waiting lists, and last year I got notified that the wait time for me got longer due to issues with CZ. CZ reached their "patient ceiling" and wouldn't allow anymore start at the genderteam I'm waiting for. (Had the same issue with specialised psychologist, who was super pissed, because I'd just set my first appointment with them, and CZ forced us to cancel it, pushing me back on the waiting list) So yeah, not only is the wait time extremely long, the environment unwelcoming of non-conforming people, the staff likely to ask inappropriate questions, and the care in general not great, insurance companies try everything they can to not help you as well, unless you get the right person on the phone.
I'm glad the waiting list is shorter for children, but it's still 2 years, which makes a huge difference for a child going through the wrong puberty without access to puberty blockers (GPs should be able to prescribe it, but they're too scared too)
If you think there is any chance you can get in i recommend psytrans. They are pretty over whelmed, they open their wait-list for a few hours a month. But if you get in you'll get helped really quick. I really hope you and your kid get the through as quick as you can.
The system in Germany is highly medicalised and binary as well (I needed a psych sign-off to get hormones, I never told them I'm agender or autistic), but once you're in you have it pretty easy to get hormones. Like, we don't need to register with a GP for example, because the whole point of GPs is that you can just go to the nearest one when you need something. Just gotta find a non-transphobic one, sigh. Still waiting on that self determination law...
Sorry, I don't understand. If you are agender what are you trying to achieve by taking hormones? If this too personal please feel free to ignore my question.
yea i mean the core difference here is that we don't really have a specialised system to deal with trans ppl (at least up to hrt) so you just kind of go to a therapist (though most therapists don't treat trans people and getting a therapist when you're _not_ trans is already hard enough) and then an endocrinologist (same for those). trans healthcare is incredibly heterogeneous at least there's _technically_ no fully-segregated system for trans issues from mental health issues (still fucking shit to group those though), but in practice you're very reliant on knowing where to find doctors that do treat trans people, and then doing a whole bunch of phone/email convos until you find someone actually takes in new patients, which may be very area-dependent. that can take months, if and only if you manage to stay sane.
On the one hand : Wow what a fucking nightmare situation glad you were able to get DIY and hope things start getting better On the other : I kinda wish I’d never found out about DIY cause now I keep going on and off since I’m mentally ill and indecisive
Even through a clinic trans healthcare is bad here, not as bad as without but still... I got a referral to Radboud half a year after that clinic opened so i *only* had to wait 10 months for an intake appt (it was 4 years last time i checked). But such an intake is nothing! The first step after this is a 'diagnostic phase', I have described it as "do a little dance for the psychologist to get what you want". I was told I got through that process faster than average; I still had to wait 5 months from intake to when I could start blockers and another 4 months to start E. But it doesn't end there, my blocker is great, a GnRH agonist, no complaints there. But they started me on an E dose of 0.35 mg... I didn't notice any difference with and without E it was that low. I had daily hot flashes because of the general lack of sex hormones in my system. After 3 months of that I finally got them to increase the dose to 1 mg and a bit after to 2 mg because I threatened to do DIY it was that bad. That 2 mg is usually the lower bound of acceptable doses, while for them it was the max. They said that was the "adult dose" and my levels, the same as you showed 250 pmol, were perfect. I asked every time that I wanted a higher dose but they refused. It took me pushing a lot to get transferred to the adult team (I was 17 when I started hrt so i was in the children's team at first) and in total 8-9 months from when I first saw those bad levels (which are contradicting the wpath guidelines they claim to follow) to when my new endo agreed to increase my dose to 4 mg. She thought 250 was a good level as well, I just pushed hard enough this time to get it. We'll see what my levels are sometime soon. I am so frustrated by this whole ordeal, I am considering doing DIY just to be done with this drama. Besides I am kind of done with pills but they claim that's the only option besides patches which I don't really trust. If I want bottom surgery anytime soon I am stuck with them. After that I really don't know what I'm going to do, being tied to this clinic for the rest of my life will definitely take some years off my life. I don't care about commercial blood test and I know quite some people I trust that are happy customers of *certain DIY providers*. It would be a lot less hassle. Good luck with your endeavours!
That sounds like a fucking nightmare. I signed up for a waitlist like last week but I'm thinking of going diy rn because holy shit all of these stories and waiting times just make me feel so awful.
Same here, been waiting for 3 years and still 2 to go. But i have no clue how to get T as it is actually illegal to buy and use steroids as well in my country :(
tiny nitpick; while it's kinda true that the goal of cypro is probably to get off of cypro at some point, to my knowledge it's not _necessarily_ through orchiectomy or other surgery, but also GnRH agonists/antagonists, which are a lot better at suppressing any sex hormone production, and have nearly no side effects (apart from hypogonadism without hormone replacement), but are _very_ expensive, which is why it's only realistic to get those through health insurance, if at all
the only part of this that is funny is the absolute avalanche of chaos. How do they get Everything So Damn Wrong? (Rhetorical question. Don't spend your precious muons on me.)
@@lescobrandon9539 I agree. Zero taxpayer money or health insurance fees should be going to things that harm people. Which is why i propose we should do away with this system entirely and give trans people access to informed consent hormones. No more taxpayer money going to useless shit! Isn't that better?
You have a very one sided view of the issue, I'm trans too. Yes the waiting lists are long. Yes the VUmc fucks up sometimes, but there's good psychologists and bad psychologists there. The reason you have to speak about trauma is because detransition and trauma can be linked with each other. Also you DO NOT have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable, your psychologist at VUmc should tell you that. Also you should not use one vial for a half year. If you do please make sure that you wipe the top of the vial with alcohol every 2 weeks or so. Because if you don't, you might end up with an infection. Also you should flicker the syringe to get out potential air bubbles or just get a little bit of the estrogen out (back in to the vial) to make sure no air bubbles are left. Just looking imo is unreliable, you could easily miss it. If you get an air bubble in your blood stream you could potentially die, small chance that it does get to the heart tho.
you don't inject E intravenously so air bubbles aren't too big of an issue afaik, it's much less dangerous to accidentally inject an air bubble subcutaneously.
This video essay is an analysis of the Dutch trans care system specifically from a radical leftist perspective, so ofcourse it's going to be "one-sided"; i'm not going to defend any positions i don't personally believe in or believe will be harmful to me. If your takeaway is that i should've paid attention to the "good psychologists" at the VUmc, then honestly, i don't know what you expected. The whole point i'm trying to illustrate is the fact that any system that has psychological requirements for trans-related healthcare is deeply pathologizing and infringing on trans people's human rights and their medical and bodily autonomy. It doesn't matter that there are good psychs at the VUmc, as there should be _no psychologists in the process at all,_ since this is a sexual health condition and not a mental illness that can be detected and "cured". By requiring psychological assessments for trans care, the VUmc systemically breeds bad psychologists because it puts them in a position of authority over the patient, and this authority creates an opportunity for them to be abusive and coercive towards the patient; even if there are good psychs who do not do this, the fact that the system allows it to happen is the real issue here. You say that patients don't have to answer questions that make them uncomfortable, but most patients recognize they are in a position of powerlessness; they feel deeply pressured to answer these uncomfortable questions or even _lie_ to make their answers sound more plausible, because they realize that care can be withheld if they don't comply. The fact that there is a system that forces them to comply is the real issue here. It is pathologizing and dehumanizing towards the trans community. Trans people should be given full autonomy over their bodies and their medical decisions instead of being forced to rely on this abusive system. I've said it a few times in the video, but i'm not a medical expert! I do clean the vial with an alcohol wipe as mentioned in the video. I've received a lot of mixed information about what to do in terms of drawing air into the vial and such. Normally i would be injecting myself with the help of my polycule and friends giving me advice on what to do, but since i had to record this for the video i did it all by myself without them on a call, and it does show. I'll be writing and pinning a comment later with links to actual resources and instructions on how to perform injections since i don't want anyone to make the mistake of following this video as a guide (since it's not a guide).
@@idadeerz One psychologist does not get to decide whether someone starts hrt or not. They just get information about a patient and then afterwards there's a meeting where the case gets presented to multiple proffesionals from different fields. They as a group get to decide whether or not the patient gets a gd diagnosis or not. What I meant with you have a one sided view is that you seem to have an idea of the VUmc that is just not correct imo. They are just a gender clinic rooted in science. They try to do everything properly by just following what their patients tell them and doing research. They just got overloaded with patients which is why it has such long waiting lists. That's not their fault, but it does get radical left trans folks to become mad at them. Ngl I was too before I started treatment with them. But once your in the process there everything is handled properly. I also know that others have not had that experience, hence why I said there's good and bad psychologists.
@@littlesailor1533 I feel like you're once again missing the point of what i said. You start your reply by stating that there are multiple professionals who decide whether you get a GD diagnosis. My issue isn't whether they do their job well or not. My issue is that _they're there in the first place._ They shouldn't be! This is a sexual health issue that should be treated at your local doctor's office just like birth control, it's not something that should ever require a diagnosis. The fact that it does require a diagnosis is extremely pathologizing and dehumanizing to the trans community and infringes on our bodily and medical autonomy.
Wow bro that's such an epic for the win roast bro, it's so nuts that while all your enemies have been manipulated into believing misinformation, you have stayed rational, and logical, by only following the good guys, without bias nor agenda, and being able to see the bad guys easily
@@Amphibian42 Yes. Actually yes. Trans ideology, the way it has become over this decade, is a cult. Trying to hold on to the things that made humanity prosper instead of stagnate will never be wrong. You are on the wrong side of history.
...you do realize that most of this video has been about me _struggling to access_ mental health care, right? What do you think the waiting lists are for? And if your idea of this is accessing (conversion?) therapy as opposed to trans-affirming therapy: well, the health care system is generally so fucked that not only are there year-long waiting lists for trans-affirming therapy, there are year-long waiting lists for *every single type of mental healthcare/therapy in the country.* This is not the epic diss you think it is. The system is generally still broken for _everything._
@@EZO.FUZZ.IS.OFFLINE there is no ideology, i don't think you know what the word means, trans people are just people who feel like they'd rather act differently to how the standard cultural stereotypes would portray them, nothing else really, it doesn't do much damage they still participate in society but it's a purely social change, and if you've interacted with the real world a decent amount you would've definitely interacted with trans people and affirmed them without even knowing it, because social identity isn't an ideology it's a presentation and performance, as is the basis of all human personality
As a dutch trans woman who has been on transitioning since 2015, I thought back then it was bad, 8 months was already a lot for me to wait but seeing stuff like this is infuriating... I can't imagine waiting YEARS, I'd definitely DIY very quickly. I knew the system was fucked but I didn't know it was THIS FUCKED. I really hope my dutch trans friends can get good and reliable help, we deserve it.
ugh I'm in Texas in the USA so I have to wait 2 entire years till I'm 18 to take hrt, torture
The Netherlands should get way more shit that it get right now.
Wishing you all the best.
i personally NEED my hrt approved by the reincarnation of william the silent
I started watching this video (as someone living in the Netherlands and pretty familiar with the way trans care works here) because I felt like learning of your perspective, but getting to the point of "genderhealthcare" lead by Catharina... was just too much :D
I actually had her as a job coach, through the UWV for my wajong, for several months around 2019, and I got to know her by a different name at first, she changed her name while we were talking, and she was supposed to be coaching me to get back to work. She actually was quite nice in person, but she would very often talk about her spiritual beliefs, and her past life experiences, to the point where during one meeting, she told me she had found out she was actually royalty, related to the Romanovs.
Absolutely wild to see her pop up in a video related to trans care here, very funny :D
6:35 that is one HELL of a name. Related to the Russian Tsar, perhaps.
yeah, not only is she a reincarnation of William the Silent, she also claims to be a reincarnation of the Romanovs too :')
American nyanarchist here, I feel you. Also omg i'm wearing the same gloves. ^_^
My son and I are both on waiting lists, and last year I got notified that the wait time for me got longer due to issues with CZ.
CZ reached their "patient ceiling" and wouldn't allow anymore start at the genderteam I'm waiting for. (Had the same issue with specialised psychologist, who was super pissed, because I'd just set my first appointment with them, and CZ forced us to cancel it, pushing me back on the waiting list)
So yeah, not only is the wait time extremely long, the environment unwelcoming of non-conforming people, the staff likely to ask inappropriate questions, and the care in general not great, insurance companies try everything they can to not help you as well, unless you get the right person on the phone.
I'm glad the waiting list is shorter for children, but it's still 2 years, which makes a huge difference for a child going through the wrong puberty without access to puberty blockers (GPs should be able to prescribe it, but they're too scared too)
If you think there is any chance you can get in i recommend psytrans. They are pretty over whelmed, they open their wait-list for a few hours a month. But if you get in you'll get helped really quick.
I really hope you and your kid get the through as quick as you can.
Lmao.. your son is trans? What a coincidence.. I bet he came to that all on his own with zero influence from you.
I feel deeply sorry for him
The system in Germany is highly medicalised and binary as well (I needed a psych sign-off to get hormones, I never told them I'm agender or autistic), but once you're in you have it pretty easy to get hormones. Like, we don't need to register with a GP for example, because the whole point of GPs is that you can just go to the nearest one when you need something. Just gotta find a non-transphobic one, sigh. Still waiting on that self determination law...
Sorry, I don't understand. If you are agender what are you trying to achieve by taking hormones? If this too personal please feel free to ignore my question.
yea i mean the core difference here is that we don't really have a specialised system to deal with trans ppl (at least up to hrt) so you just kind of go to a therapist (though most therapists don't treat trans people and getting a therapist when you're _not_ trans is already hard enough) and then an endocrinologist (same for those). trans healthcare is incredibly heterogeneous
at least there's _technically_ no fully-segregated system for trans issues from mental health issues (still fucking shit to group those though), but in practice you're very reliant on knowing where to find doctors that do treat trans people, and then doing a whole bunch of phone/email convos until you find someone actually takes in new patients, which may be very area-dependent. that can take months, if and only if you manage to stay sane.
You are so real, istg this is EXACTLY what its like. I literally went through all that and totally alone. (But in Norway
On the one hand :
Wow what a fucking nightmare situation glad you were able to get DIY and hope things start getting better
On the other :
I kinda wish I’d never found out about DIY cause now I keep going on and off since I’m mentally ill and indecisive
Even through a clinic trans healthcare is bad here, not as bad as without but still... I got a referral to Radboud half a year after that clinic opened so i *only* had to wait 10 months for an intake appt (it was 4 years last time i checked). But such an intake is nothing! The first step after this is a 'diagnostic phase', I have described it as "do a little dance for the psychologist to get what you want". I was told I got through that process faster than average; I still had to wait 5 months from intake to when I could start blockers and another 4 months to start E. But it doesn't end there, my blocker is great, a GnRH agonist, no complaints there. But they started me on an E dose of 0.35 mg... I didn't notice any difference with and without E it was that low. I had daily hot flashes because of the general lack of sex hormones in my system. After 3 months of that I finally got them to increase the dose to 1 mg and a bit after to 2 mg because I threatened to do DIY it was that bad. That 2 mg is usually the lower bound of acceptable doses, while for them it was the max. They said that was the "adult dose" and my levels, the same as you showed 250 pmol, were perfect. I asked every time that I wanted a higher dose but they refused. It took me pushing a lot to get transferred to the adult team (I was 17 when I started hrt so i was in the children's team at first) and in total 8-9 months from when I first saw those bad levels (which are contradicting the wpath guidelines they claim to follow) to when my new endo agreed to increase my dose to 4 mg. She thought 250 was a good level as well, I just pushed hard enough this time to get it. We'll see what my levels are sometime soon. I am so frustrated by this whole ordeal, I am considering doing DIY just to be done with this drama. Besides I am kind of done with pills but they claim that's the only option besides patches which I don't really trust. If I want bottom surgery anytime soon I am stuck with them. After that I really don't know what I'm going to do, being tied to this clinic for the rest of my life will definitely take some years off my life. I don't care about commercial blood test and I know quite some people I trust that are happy customers of *certain DIY providers*. It would be a lot less hassle. Good luck with your endeavours!
That sounds like a fucking nightmare. I signed up for a waitlist like last week but I'm thinking of going diy rn because holy shit all of these stories and waiting times just make me feel so awful.
Same here, been waiting for 3 years and still 2 to go.
But i have no clue how to get T as it is actually illegal to buy and use steroids as well in my country :(
Big love Ida
great video
tiny nitpick; while it's kinda true that the goal of cypro is probably to get off of cypro at some point, to my knowledge it's not _necessarily_ through orchiectomy or other surgery, but also GnRH agonists/antagonists, which are a lot better at suppressing any sex hormone production, and have nearly no side effects (apart from hypogonadism without hormone replacement), but are _very_ expensive, which is why it's only realistic to get those through health insurance, if at all
the only part of this that is funny is the absolute avalanche of chaos.
How do they get Everything So Damn Wrong? (Rhetorical question. Don't spend your precious muons on me.)
5:28 lmaooooo this shi so funny but on the other hand sad that it is what trans people have to face
awawawa _detonates_
yiff?
Video background so loud it’s annoying
Nyah nyah!
Utah!
utah
Hey!
second
fourth
@@idadeerz 16th
This trans stuff is out of control. It’s fashion. We ain’t paying for that.
who the hell are you
@@GhostBrimstone I’m your daddy
@@warius1 no you are not. my father does not have such hate in his heart
Bro you're a furry 😂😂😂😂
ZERO taxpayer money should be funding this.
I'm not sure what you mean? I'm pretty sure trans healthcare is funded by health insurance here, not through the tax system.
@@idadeerz im talking and anywhere and everywhere.
@@lescobrandon9539 I agree. Zero taxpayer money or health insurance fees should be going to things that harm people. Which is why i propose we should do away with this system entirely and give trans people access to informed consent hormones. No more taxpayer money going to useless shit! Isn't that better?
@@idadeerz sounds good to me. Adults only of course. That goes without saying but these days you never know.
I hope you don’t think you can come into my washrooms or changing rooms.
You have a very one sided view of the issue, I'm trans too. Yes the waiting lists are long. Yes the VUmc fucks up sometimes, but there's good psychologists and bad psychologists there. The reason you have to speak about trauma is because detransition and trauma can be linked with each other. Also you DO NOT have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable, your psychologist at VUmc should tell you that.
Also you should not use one vial for a half year. If you do please make sure that you wipe the top of the vial with alcohol every 2 weeks or so. Because if you don't, you might end up with an infection.
Also you should flicker the syringe to get out potential air bubbles or just get a little bit of the estrogen out (back in to the vial) to make sure no air bubbles are left. Just looking imo is unreliable, you could easily miss it. If you get an air bubble in your blood stream you could potentially die, small chance that it does get to the heart tho.
you don't inject E intravenously so air bubbles aren't too big of an issue afaik, it's much less dangerous to accidentally inject an air bubble subcutaneously.
This video essay is an analysis of the Dutch trans care system specifically from a radical leftist perspective, so ofcourse it's going to be "one-sided"; i'm not going to defend any positions i don't personally believe in or believe will be harmful to me.
If your takeaway is that i should've paid attention to the "good psychologists" at the VUmc, then honestly, i don't know what you expected. The whole point i'm trying to illustrate is the fact that any system that has psychological requirements for trans-related healthcare is deeply pathologizing and infringing on trans people's human rights and their medical and bodily autonomy. It doesn't matter that there are good psychs at the VUmc, as there should be _no psychologists in the process at all,_ since this is a sexual health condition and not a mental illness that can be detected and "cured". By requiring psychological assessments for trans care, the VUmc systemically breeds bad psychologists because it puts them in a position of authority over the patient, and this authority creates an opportunity for them to be abusive and coercive towards the patient; even if there are good psychs who do not do this, the fact that the system allows it to happen is the real issue here.
You say that patients don't have to answer questions that make them uncomfortable, but most patients recognize they are in a position of powerlessness; they feel deeply pressured to answer these uncomfortable questions or even _lie_ to make their answers sound more plausible, because they realize that care can be withheld if they don't comply. The fact that there is a system that forces them to comply is the real issue here. It is pathologizing and dehumanizing towards the trans community. Trans people should be given full autonomy over their bodies and their medical decisions instead of being forced to rely on this abusive system.
I've said it a few times in the video, but i'm not a medical expert! I do clean the vial with an alcohol wipe as mentioned in the video. I've received a lot of mixed information about what to do in terms of drawing air into the vial and such. Normally i would be injecting myself with the help of my polycule and friends giving me advice on what to do, but since i had to record this for the video i did it all by myself without them on a call, and it does show. I'll be writing and pinning a comment later with links to actual resources and instructions on how to perform injections since i don't want anyone to make the mistake of following this video as a guide (since it's not a guide).
@@idadeerz One psychologist does not get to decide whether someone starts hrt or not. They just get information about a patient and then afterwards there's a meeting where the case gets presented to multiple proffesionals from different fields. They as a group get to decide whether or not the patient gets a gd diagnosis or not.
What I meant with you have a one sided view is that you seem to have an idea of the VUmc that is just not correct imo. They are just a gender clinic rooted in science. They try to do everything properly by just following what their patients tell them and doing research. They just got overloaded with patients which is why it has such long waiting lists. That's not their fault, but it does get radical left trans folks to become mad at them. Ngl I was too before I started treatment with them. But once your in the process there everything is handled properly. I also know that others have not had that experience, hence why I said there's good and bad psychologists.
@@littlesailor1533 I feel like you're once again missing the point of what i said. You start your reply by stating that there are multiple professionals who decide whether you get a GD diagnosis. My issue isn't whether they do their job well or not. My issue is that _they're there in the first place._ They shouldn't be! This is a sexual health issue that should be treated at your local doctor's office just like birth control, it's not something that should ever require a diagnosis. The fact that it does require a diagnosis is extremely pathologizing and dehumanizing to the trans community and infringes on our bodily and medical autonomy.
@@idadeerz Agreed.
Maybe you should access your countries mental health care
Wow bro that's such an epic for the win roast bro, it's so nuts that while all your enemies have been manipulated into believing misinformation, you have stayed rational, and logical, by only following the good guys, without bias nor agenda, and being able to see the bad guys easily
@@Amphibian42 Yes. Actually yes. Trans ideology, the way it has become over this decade, is a cult. Trying to hold on to the things that made humanity prosper instead of stagnate will never be wrong. You are on the wrong side of history.
...you do realize that most of this video has been about me _struggling to access_ mental health care, right? What do you think the waiting lists are for?
And if your idea of this is accessing (conversion?) therapy as opposed to trans-affirming therapy: well, the health care system is generally so fucked that not only are there year-long waiting lists for trans-affirming therapy, there are year-long waiting lists for *every single type of mental healthcare/therapy in the country.* This is not the epic diss you think it is. The system is generally still broken for _everything._
@@EZO.FUZZ.IS.OFFLINE there is no ideology, i don't think you know what the word means, trans people are just people who feel like they'd rather act differently to how the standard cultural stereotypes would portray them, nothing else really, it doesn't do much damage they still participate in society but it's a purely social change, and if you've interacted with the real world a decent amount you would've definitely interacted with trans people and affirmed them without even knowing it, because social identity isn't an ideology it's a presentation and performance, as is the basis of all human personality
@@idadeerz oh well our mental health care in the u.s is non existent so there's that. It wasn't a diss.