[Boomer]

It must be a living hell to have the body of one sex but the mind of the other constantly at war with itself. I can’t even imagine such a thing.

Until this mental illness is viewed as true and bonafide mental illness and not something to be placated; it will never get the kind of attention it needs to develop a treatment if there is one. One cannot change the chromosomes in ones body regardless of how many disfiguring surgeries one gets any more than they can change how the thought process in the brain sees the self as a different sex than what their body is. It’s a complete disconnect.

[Mrs. Don-o]

There's a body dysmorphia disorder that makes a person feel alienated from their eyes, their ears, their limbs. People with fine sight want to be blinded, structurally normal people want a healthy leg or arm cut off.

Any surgeon who would cut off healthy organs, limbs and systems just because a depressive person requested it, ought to at least lose their license for unethical behavior, and possibly ought to face criminal charges for aggravated assault or maiming.

[buwaya]

This is not its own illness.

Mental illness follows fashion, or at least it seems that its overt manifestations do. Crazy people are influenced by the society around them, picking up on what is current, and their delusions are formed accordingly. I believe this is why the onset of transgenderism, very little seen throughout history, was so rapid. It is more a memetic illness than a mental illness, afflicting suggestible people.

In other words, you can blame the media and the internet for the hordes of people cutting off their own body parts.