Autism and Gender - Transgender Issues

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I think anything "masculine" or "feminine" about the brain has been programmed in by the culture after birth. Women aren't supposed to be good at math or science: only problem is, lots of us are, either raised by parents who didn't bother with the programming, or it didn't take.

I admit that testosterone levels do have some effect on personality, but that's also a kind of post-birth programming. Probably nothing to be done about it by adulthood, but I like myself the way I am, even if I'm not very "feminine". If I were, I'd be miserable.

@n3rdgir1 And there was me spending an enjoyable couple of hours earlier reading up on chromosomes and SRY and all that precisely to come back to this thread properly prepared. *chuckles*

This thread is a very interesting one. I will post more here later on, going out....

So, what happens if the androgen receptor is switched off after birth? :p

It appears to be an awfully irredundant - if that's the right term - system.

I agree.

I was a tomboy untill I was about eighteen but after that I started to dress as feminine, I grew my hair and I even started to wear
make up. Clothes and cosmetics have actually become one of my obessions. I don´t always think as a female and I find it difficult to interact with other woman in complex social situations but I certainly don´t want to become a man.

I have nothing but admiration for transgenders because I think that it takes a really strong person to go through a process like that but I have never had any gender issues myself.

A lot of people with autism are probably a bit androgynous but becoming a transgender is a completely different matter.

It's okay to reject the gender binary altogether. Many people just don't fit. Actually, most people don't fit--it's just that for most people, they fit well enough that it doesn't matter particularly much for the small parts of themselves that aren't quite feminine or masculine enough. It's only a problem you don't fit to such a degree that you keep getting annoyed because people are trying to squeeze you into one category or the other--or when you fit strongly into one category and people keep trying to push you into the other.

I don't mind people using feminine pronouns for me, but I kind of wish there were a third gender, or a group of non-gendered people, that I could fit into. I mean, they exist, of course; but they aren't widely accepted as a third gender in the society I live in; so I'd have to explain to every single person over and over again. In some cultures, that sort of thing is available, but not here. Oh, well--I'm okay with being known as a "stereotype-breaking female" rather than an androgyne.

I'm laying claim to Ceres' symbol. Sure, it may be a goddesses, but it's not Aphrodites or Hermes...

With most people, this is what I do, but there are some circles (mostly including trans and genderqueer people) where I make it clear otherwise.

I just don't have the capacity to explain it to everyone.

It sounds to me like you are both. But it is very plausible to me that autistic traits are even more stigmatized when they appear in females than in males.

I think the interaction between autism, gender, and sexuality is absolutely fascinating and I wish there was more out there on it.

That's sorta like me. I identify with female pronouns, but am offended if someone suggests I'm feminine because I'm female. I don't care enough about gender to want gender-neutral pronouns (I have issues understand the societal concept of gender), but am very strict that happening to use female ones does not mean that I'm feminine. If someone tries talking about female meaning feminine, or calling me feminine, I'll explain very clearly that no, that's not me.

If it wasn't for the fact that I want children eventually, and thus want to be a mother, I'd likely identify as gender neutral. Instead I identify as "well I guess I'm female, but don't you dare try to say that means I'm feminine". Rather than being a person who is female, I am a person who happens to be female.

I'd say that fathers can be nurturing, too, and want to have children; and if that's so, then so can people who aren't quite male or female, but something in-between or off the scale altogether. I think that wanting to raise a child is not something exclusive to females. I'll admit that people with the typical female biology have an advantage; but that's only because they've got a built-in way to make a baby to begin with. Bonding with a child, raising a child, is something anyone might want--whatever their gender.

I had to think about this for myself too; I have some very strongly feminine characteristics, however in-between I am. I enjoy doing crochet. I love cats. I don't like to get violent, and am slow to enter any sort of conflict. I love the way a young child learns and experiences the world.

I had to think about that for a while. But--I have non-feminine traits like loving math and computer games and having short hair and hating make-up; and it's okay for me to have those. If that's okay, then feminine traits are okay, too. If I spent a lot of energy just rejecting feminine stuff on the principle of the thing, then I'd be letting myself be defined by male-versus-female just as surely as if I thought I had to be the stereotypical woman.

Ideally, I'd just forget about gender entirely and just be who I was, and forget about what's expected of women or men or anyone else. It can be irritating, though, because wherever you go, those expectations and assumptions are always there, and you can't help but notice that you're not acting quite in line with them.

Yeah, this is definitely true. There was definitely a noticeable amount of time where my boyfriend wanted children far more than I did. For me the defining characteristic in that which makes me associate with female is the growing inside of me part. If I wanted to adopt, then it wouldn't matter what I am because not only females want children.. Because I'm interested in having a child via a pregnancy of mine, and then breastfeeding and such, its really hard for me to not have that strongly associated with female.



This is basically where I am. I'll use female pronouns because I happen to be female, but to me I don't think of the gender at all, only the sex. I've actually not faced much in the way of expectations yet, but think that's because of where I went to college - the only major associated with females was biology because it was an engineering school. My majors had very few females in them, but the entire school was primarily male.

I really tend to describe it as I will be supportive of transgendered people, but I really don't understand the concept of gender and thus can't really understand why they feel they need to identify with a different gender. I happen to have a body that is female, that doesn't say anything about me other than the biological differences between the sexes. So what if I spent my "free" time in high school in a machine shop, and so what if I regularly work with yarn, I'm not defined by a gender, or even well described, I'm just a Tuttle who happens to be female because I happen to have been born with ovaries. If I had been born a male, like my parents were expecting, I'd be in a drastically different place in my life, but the only actual thing that would have caused the differences is the fact that my boyfriend is heterosexual.

I have family members who have been diagnosed as being on the spectrum, and I used to be a boy but transitioned after I finished school and have been living pretty much stealth as a woman for the last 10 years. I definitely have some spectrum characteristics, but have never been diagnosed.

It interesting to read that a lot of transmen seem to be more comfortable socializing as men. I actually have found that I am now way more social and talkative than I used to be. I used to work really hard in school so that I would be too busy to think about gender issues. I had some friends, but did not particularly like social activities. After I transitioned, I found that I now really enjoy talking to people and love social events. I do not know if it is because of the estrogen, self-confidence, age, being myself, or something else, but it is definitely has been a change for me.

I have also noticed that there seem to be more people with gender issues on the spectrum than in the general population. Maybe it has to do with all of those endocrine disruptors and hormones in our food and environment?

(Thread moved from Autism discussion to LGBT)

This thread has been interesting reading. I am also transgender (female to male, transitioned around eight years ago, and generally live "stealth" though I hate that term). I completely understand those who said they found socialising more comfortable after transition but no less difficult. I am now less anxious and upset by social interaction and able to go ahead and do it when necessary, and I have found that I now seem to register lower on the weirdness scale in the perceptions of others, which I suspect may be because AS behaviours are found more socially acceptable in males than in females (for example, silent men are perceived as less weird than silent females). However, I still don't understand the way others think and behave and it's still a great effort to try to "perform" to social expectations.

I recently read the Tony Attwood book and noted the part about transgender individuals and his reasoning for gender issues being more common in ASD cases. If anyone wants to read the full section I can find it again and post it. I agree with whoever said earlier in the thread that his conclusions are incorrect and demonstrate a lack of knowledge about transgenderism, though I don't dispute his expertise about autism. His suggestion is essentially that the transgender feelings are caused by the social/environmental factors of growing up with an ASD, which has been disproven by studies into physical brain differences in transgender individuals. However, he is correct to note that transitioning does not significantly improve social difficulties (because they are caused by the ASD, not the transgenderism).

I would love to know if anyone who has been on HRT has found it affects their autism symptoms in any way. I sometimes wonder if being on testosterone has made my symptoms worse, though I'm unable to say with any certainty because of all the other changes going on in my life at that time which may have made them more noticeable, the possibility of it being ADD rather than ASD symptoms which were affected, etc.

Yeah, I disagree with Attwood on that one: I think that simply not absorbing so much of the dominant culture just leaves us free to acknowledge that we're trans or androgynous or gay or genderqueer, or whatever. We don't feel the social pressure pushing us into traditional male/female categories--so what we identify as is closer to our biology than it otherwise would be. Attwood seems to be saying that it's the Aspies whose gender-atypical traits are caused by social influence... but, since AS itself decreases your ability to absorb the culture around you, I think it's much more likely that it's the NTs who are subtly pushed in one direction or another as youngsters, and the Aspies who are less influenced.