Human dignity is inviolable? 2016-06-17

I previously wrote about my name change process that I am undergoing. I went to 2 psychologist as ordered by the court. And one of them made me problems.

The ancient law regarding trans-people to change their name and gender requires the person to “have the urge to live as the other gender [as gender of birth] for longer than 3 years”. While one of the psychologists stated that I have it longer, the other one wrote no and took the date where I outed myself, which started in late October 2014.

Last Tuesday I got a letter from the court, saying that the process will be paused until October 2017. I have to pay almost 1400€ for the two psychologist letters and I have the possiblity to as to see a third psychologist, out of my own pocket.

Health impacts

After I read the letter, I had a very long panic attack. My therapist called me eventually, which helped a bit. But this decision has put me into a bad state of depression. Two days later I still struggle with motivation problems, self-esteem problems, self-harm thoughts, lack of energy. I have troubles sleeping, I cry a lot, randomly panicing, eventually take benzodiazepines to calm me down.

It feels like I have no (legal) identity and if feels like they have denied my chosen identity. My therapist says: “They didn’t deny it, it’s just a formality in which you unfortunately got into”. This is technically true, but it doesn’t hurt it less. I’m waiting on my name change to happen to get my new passport, access to sex reassignment surgery, access to updated school reports and much more. It has a huge impact on my life, on my job situation and on my mental health.

Having the legal name change completed would finally stop discrimination by using my old gender and name of a lot of places, including bank, health insurance and every authority.

But no. If it had passed as I hoped, I would have that freedom by next month. Now I have at least 3-4 more month on what feels as “open prison”.

Article 1, sentence 1: “Human dignity is inviolable”.

Germany’s Basic Law states that human dignity is inviolable. Transitioning taught me a very important lesson: Human dignity is violable in Germany for certain groups or certain individuals.

A place to relax! 2016-05-05

I visited the Volksgarten in our town the other day and made some nice pictures

Scanner Personality 2016-04-15

I’m a scanner personality and I just noticed it as a friend pointed this out to me while we were visiting the new coworking space in town.

Of course I needed to lookup the definition, come to a few sites describing it. For example this one in English. I’ll quote from the site:

You have creative ideas all the time, whether it’s for a book, a TV show, an art project, a website, a business, starting a movement, creating a brand, or writing a bestseller

Yes! In fact I need to stop myself often from being too creative so I don’t have another project I cannot afford or never be able to finish.

You love to learn about new subjects and ideas and then quickly move on to something else

Yes! A German source also lists learning autodidactic, which is one of my natural talents.

You have loads of seemingly unrelated interests

Yes!

Stuck 2016-04-05

My [name change process] is proceeding way slower than I'd like it to be. The court ordered me to go to two psychiatrists, one of which I am going to this Saturday, the other one in mid of May. I want to become self-employed again. As soon as possible, but after the name change. Anything that uses my old name disencourages me from doing things. I don't know who this person is anymore that still shows up on my passport... With unknown delays for the psychiatrists, the delay at court, and the new passports, I can most certainly not do this before July, more likely in August or even September. I am keeping myself busy right now with a job that has a certain urgency for a client. It sucks badly that I have to wait for the money for likely a quarter year while having lots of other things i need to spend money on but can't. Since beginning of the year, I managed to save enough money to pay the court costs. I should have this covered by now, but now I need to put the money away for my car, which needs inspection/service next month. I don't know if I can manage to pay it off next month on my own though.. I'm working but I am listed as unemployed. And this will not change until the name change process has completed. Doing almost full time work while being not paid feels worse than I expected it would be: I am doing productive things, but I am highly restricted in what I can do. [name change process]: /posts/misc/2016-01-30-discrimination-by-law/

Krankenkasse verweigert mein Bild 2016-02-12

Vor ca. zwei Wochen war ich persönlich bei meiner Krankenkasse (DAK) und habe die Bitte geäußert, das Bild auf meiner Elektronischen Gesundheitskarte zu erneuern. Ich lege diese Karte immer mit der Rückseite auf den Tresen bei Ärzten, da das Bild meiner ehemaligen Geschlechterrolle nicht mehr meinem Aussehen entspricht, und ich damit das Gefühl habe, dass das nicht meine Versicherungskarte ist.

Nachdem die Mitarbeiterin vor Ort meine Ausweise (inkl. dem dgti-Ausweis) kopiert hatte, hab ich Zugangsdaten erhalten, um mein Bild online hochzuladen.

Brief von der Krankenkasse

“Sehr geehrter Herr Glauche,”

(Eines meiner Probleme beim Schriftverkehr mit der Krankenkasse ist die falsche Anrede, können die das nicht wenigstens eine geschlechtsneutrale Anrede verwenden?)

Vielen Dank für Ihr Bild. Auf Grund gesetzlichen Vorgaben können wir es nicht für die neue Gesundheitskarte verwenden. Den Grund haben wir angekreuzt:

[X] Sonstiges: (z.B. Personalien und Abbildung stimmen nicht überein, das Bild ist nicht aktuell usw.)

Ich kann annehmen, dass der Grund ausschließlich aus “Personalien und Abbildung stimmen nicht überein” besteht. Meine Krankenkasse verwendet, solang meine Vornamensänderung noch nicht per Gericht durch ist, noch meinen alten Namen und Personenstand. Sie ist aber durchaus über meine Situation informiert, sowohl mit Anträgen auf Bartepilation und Geschlechts-OP, als auch mit meinem Ergänzungsausweis.

Ich sehe die Verweigerung des Bildes als Diskriminierung an, da das hochgeladene Lichtbild mich so zeigt, wie ich mich in meinem Alltag in der Umwelt präsentiere.