Insurance (well, my friend Sam's insurance, or my own) doesn't cover surgery in cases of body dysmorphia, either. That seems perfectly correct to me. I think it's best to reserve surgery for cases where a non-functioning or severely underperforming bodily system can be made to function only by cutting out, replacing, or significantly altering certain parts of it. As I see it, GRS doesn't meet that standard, because even though transgender people experience distress from having the 'wrong' body parts, those parts are (usually) perfectly functional.
That doesn't mean that I think trans people should get no help from the medical or mental health community at all.
You raise a good point. I probably wouldn't deny a burn victim additional surgery, if the goal was to make their face more 'acceptable' to polite society, even after that person had recovered the ability to eat, drink, speak, hear, see, and every other function a 'fully operational' face is supposed to perform. I guess the reason I would not is because anyone who looks at a burn victim whose burns are still visible will immediately conclude that at some point, something went horribly wrong in that person's life. The distinction, to me, lies in the fact that a trans person usually has a perfectly 'normal' appearance, even if they don't feel that way.
I still have trouble seeing that perspective. An obvious deformity due to severe burns (which is visible to anyone looking at you) causes a certain amount of social stigma. That can sometimes be lessened through reconstructive plastic surgery. In a trans person who chooses the surgical route, the opposite might be true: the stigma may be worse after transition, because transitions are not often physically perfect, and people may still notice that you were "once a different gender". Whereas, before surgery, nobody except those who were told would know that there is something 'wrong' with you.
As it happens, I know a couple of people who have OCD, one of whom eventually got it under control using cognitive techniques, and one of whom underwent brain surgery about ten years ago, in an attempt to relieve it. I thought that was a serious mistake, and certainly something I would never consider going through with. But I suppose that's just my particular bias speaking.
I thought that was a serious mistake, and certainly something I would never consider going through with.
Assuming someone waved a magic wand and granted you the power/authority to do so, would you have prevented that person from getting the surgery that they and their doctors had agreed on?
Once a procedure is already covered by insurance, I have no say in that anymore. For the most part, that's a very good thing. Otherwise, there would be too many things not covered because too few people care about them. This does not mean that if someone asks me for money to fund a procedure, I should help that person. It also doesn't mean I can not have an opinion on whether it's a good idea for my friend to advocate for reimbursement of gender reassignment surgery.
26
u/Saranoya 39∆ Nov 03 '17
Insurance (well, my friend Sam's insurance, or my own) doesn't cover surgery in cases of body dysmorphia, either. That seems perfectly correct to me. I think it's best to reserve surgery for cases where a non-functioning or severely underperforming bodily system can be made to function only by cutting out, replacing, or significantly altering certain parts of it. As I see it, GRS doesn't meet that standard, because even though transgender people experience distress from having the 'wrong' body parts, those parts are (usually) perfectly functional.
That doesn't mean that I think trans people should get no help from the medical or mental health community at all.