Anita and All,
Though it is not a case "study," there was an interesting discussion
just yesterday among the 35 people at Ed Lynch's summer intensive in
Connecticut.
The question arose about the potential systemic effects of a re-
absorbed twin on the life of the one child actually born from this
dual conception. Ed mentioned that something like 22% of people are
said to start out as twins, which is a more substantial portion that I
had any idea of. Of course, some of these re-absorbed twins are
likely to be of opposite gender from the person born. So, could this
re-absorbed twin of opposite gender be related to cross-gender
tendencies in the living person, I wondered. When I asked this
question, Ed mentioned a case in which working with this dynamic had
eased the pressure to cross dress on a person.
It's my understanding that the Lakota Sioux word for a cross gendered
person is "winkte," and that this means or at least connotes something
like "twin-souled one." So I wonder if we are looking in this
instance at some reflection here of a Native American intuition that
relates to re-absorbed twins.
In Walter Williams important book, The Spirit and the Flesh, which is
a a seminal study of "LGBT" people in North America and their
eradication by invading colonists, he makes it clear that tribes had
different attitudes towards such people. However, for many tribes
such people were considered holy. Such people held the perspective
that kept the two genders from getting too far apart. They were often
creative and gifted. In many cases they were central to family life
and spiritual life. A far more comprehensive study of "LGBT" people's
roles the the spirituality of the world is Randy Conner's Blossom of
Bone. This book is encyclopedic and eye-opening.
If you look at this link for Williams book,
http://www.amazon.com/Spirit-Flesh-Diversity-American-Culture/dp/0807046159/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280058422&sr=8-1
you will see that several later books expanding on this subject have
been written.
Here is the link for Randy Conner's book.
http://www.amazon.com/Blossom-Bone-Reclaiming-Connections-Homoeroticism/dp/0062502573/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280058535&sr=1-1
In general, I am very interested in how the dynamics of family
constellation work end up applying in situations like these. It is
not at all clear to me that a person in a male body, for instance,
whose gender identification is primarily female, should be pointed in
the direction of "taking the father" in anything like the same manner
as a male-identified person in a male body.
Sincerely,
Michael
On Jul 24, 2010, at 5:15 PM, Anita wrote:
Hello everyone
As a related topic to human sexuality, I am wondering if anyone has
any experience or knowledge of case studies of transgendered
individuals doing a family constellation, and the effects of the
family system on their feeling that they were born with their
physical gender not matching their emotional/mental/psychic gender.
I have heard of people going ahead with the operations to change
gender, only to change their minds later on. I am wondering how a
constellation can help get a deeper insight into their life, before
going ahead with a sex change operation.
Anita Roy
Canada
