Rating: 
Summary: Although times have changed, still relevant
Review: After having read the spotlight reviews of this book, it appears to be necessary to say something in defense of the mental health profession, of which I am not a member. The fact is, the mental health community and society as a whole have come a long way since 1983 in regards to this area. More than any other segment of the population, I am sure, the social work and psychotherapeutic communities have an informed understanding and humane sympathy for those with transgender issues. In 1983 it was Daphne who was the monster; today, in the eyes of educated people everywhere, it was her treatment that was the monster. Which is not to say that her book isn't still relevant. There is certainly a vast, vast way to go. Today, an adolescent would at least be able to consider coming forth with their transgender issues; in the 60s and 70s it was unthinkable. But adolescence is still too late. Humane treatment of those who would have deviation from gender norms would begin at the very earliest time of life. All little girls of preschool age should have the opportunity to be introduced to the kinds of play more typical of boys, and all little boys should have one dress among their available clothes, which they should be presented without prejudice as an option for make-believe or play. The vast majority of little children of both sexes will prefer the conventional roles. If one child does not, then the parents have somewhat of a problem on their hands. But it is a problem with available choices for action, and a far better option than raising a tormented and poorly-adjusted adult.
Rating: 
Summary: Growing Up In Mental Hospitals
Review: After seeing Daphne Scholinski on a television program I couldn't wait to read the book. Having read the book, I now see it had very little to do with how Ms. Scholinski presented her situation on the television program. This is an autobiography of a young woman who spent most of her teenaged years in various mental health hospitals. She was discharged from the hospital at age eighteen, apparently because the insurance money had ran out--since her mental state really had not changed all that much. She did, however, seem to be slightly less angry and more communicative and socialable then when she first entered a mental hospital.. That is about all the improvement that occurs. Towards the end of the book Daphne Scholinski acknowledges her lesbianism. It would have been much more interesting if she had discussed this aspect of her experiences and personal growth in the book. Daphne also seems to have reached the conclusion that she was not and is not mentally ill. She has decided the sole reason she was placed in a mental hospital was because she was traditionally unfeminine in appearance, behavior, and mode of dress However, the book indicates the period of time where the type of treatment recommended was that she behave and dress as a traditional female--was actually of rather short duration.. Daphne's problems seemed to have been triggered by a lack of parental nuturing, love, and involvment in her life. While her younger sister, Jean, was able to overcome these negative effects, Daphne could not. Why that should be the case, is not clear. Daphne's main problem, which as far as I could tell, she never fully overcame, if she overcame it any at all---was she never gave a moment's thought to the consequences of her actions. She seemed to prefer to just live off the top of her head and go with whatever the impulse of the moment was. Frequently, she did not even think through to the finish of the impulse. Once, she and two other girls from one of the mental health centers! where she was, hitchhiked to the home of a therapist's parents. The parents weren't there at the time. Once there, they had no particular plan. Daphne just thought she'd like to smoke a cigarette in front of the therapist's parents' home. Much of her stay in various mental hospitals is somewhat repetitive, consisting primarily of various high-jinks she and her comrades pull. Frequently they seem to be able to get hold of alcohol or drugs. Daphne seems to have no interest at all in improving her situation, nor any clear understanding of how she contributes to it. This is especially true at the beginning of the book. Later, she just decides to blame the whole thing on the mental health care in this country.
Rating:
Summary: She Didn't Want To Be "Just a Girl"
Review: Ever since she had been little, Daphne Scholinski had always had a somewhat masculine appearance, causing her to suffer the embarrassing fate of being mistaken for a boy in supermarkets, kicked out of public ladies' rooms, and even skated in pairs with unwitting females. When her parents separated, when she was thirteen, and her mother left her in the care of her physically abusive father, Daphne also took on the masculine role of protector for her "girly" younger sister, Jean. As she grew older, she was sent to a therapist because she was flunking out of school, exhibiting anti-social behavior, and had joined a gang. When her behavior persisted, at the age of fifteen, she was sent to the first of a series of three mental hospitals where she would stay until she was eighteen, being treated for depression, substance abuse, an anti-social personality, and above all a mysterious Gender-Identity Disorder, costing more than one million dollars in insurance.
The book starts out with Daphne's father driving her to the first hospital in Chicago, and her casually asking him not to send her. After she arrives, the narrative is a mixture of past and present, as Daphne talks about rebelling against her father and the consequences of that (being whipped with his belt), or how she would spend time at her mother's apartment (performing sexual acts for Frank, a man with a knee-holster who said he was a hit-man.) We hear about those who helped Daphne, such as a kind psychology intern at one hospital, and her third grade teacher; and those who hurt her, such as the best friends who pinned her down and smeared her face with lipstick, and the boys who cruelly raped her during her third and final hospitalization, knowing that because of her diagnosis of a Gender-Identity Disorder, she would never report them. The point Daphne Scholinski seems to be trying to make is that how was anyone else's business whether she chose to behave as a male or a female? No matter what happened, the failing grades, the drug use, the physical abuse--the question people kept asking was "Why won't she wear a dress?" "Why doesn't she want to be a girl?" As an outsider reading about her experiences, I would have to remark, "How could she want to be a girl, given all the abuse she endured because she was female?" In the end, Daphne Scholinski has made great strides at trying to create a life for herself in spite of her traumatic past. She is an artist, has spoken at the UN conference on Women at Beijing, China, and has been on countless television programs. This book was like a techni-color version of "Girl, Interrupted", filling us in on the author's day-to-day experience in a mental hospital, and her past. It is difficult to write-off Scholinski's trials as whining or self-pitying, as she describes the abuse she endured, physically--at the hands of her father; sexually, five times--twice while she was hospitalized--and emotionally, with such restrictions as being forbidden to have even a friendship with a female patient, because the hospital feared that this might lead to homosexuality. This isn't any ordinary sort of grief. A really neat thing at the end of the book is that if you go to the back where the author's notes are, Daphne Scholinski has an AOL e-mail address where you can contact her and she will write back! Although I can't say this is a book to enjoy, it is definitely one of the more profound books I have read.
Rating: 
Summary: Transcending A Living Nightmare
Review: Having come from an abusive home, I can relate to what Daphne/Dylan must have felt and how he behaved while trying to cope with his Gender-Identity and the far-from-sympathetic world around him in the 1980's. I came out as gay in 1970 and then as Transgendered in 1993, after having wrestled with "my self-knowledge - vs - what other people tried to make me act like" for MANY years prior -- it was a rocky hellish road at times, but (despite the abuse!) my parents accepted me (grudgingly at times) for who/what I was. I have nothing but kind words for those Tansgendered friends of mine, who like Dylan, persevered through their own private torment, and who accepted me for who I was and for how I identified myself.
I applaud Dylan for having the inner strength to keep going - keep going, no matter the present torment, no matter how horrible the present situation is - keep going forward with your own goal in mind, no matter how clear-cut or nebulous it is. This book has and will inspire others out there who "think they are the only ones" going through this.
We may have come far but in too many parts of this country, children and young adults -- who are trying to reconcile their birth gender with their personal gender identity -- are still being put thru a living nightmare; parents abusing, insulting dismissing them from their households, with no nurturance, no desire to understand their own offspring; even their classmates, teachers, strangers, even friends turning against them. It takes HUGE inner strength to rise above all that and to keep going, keep going forward.
This book will shock, inspire and galvanize. I hope it also EDUCATES those who harbor any prejudices against transgendered individuals, ESPECIALLY those who treat patients with Gender Identity "Disorder".. Since the beginning of time,the spectrum of Masculine and Feminine has run through ALL genders in varying degrees, and not necessarily always corresponding to the individual's birth gender.
In today's civilized and educated society, it is abut time that young people like Dylan are raised with compassion and understanding instead of with psychodramatic brutality. It is my hope that this book also reaches out to those in Child Protective Services as well as those professionals in the fields of Therapy.
Rating:
Summary: READ. NOW.
Review: I am an 18 year old female from Virginia. I've always identified as a girl, but I've never been the girly-girl type. I also know people with trans issues, and I never really knew much about it, but I've been learning more and more and with each thing I read I'm aware of the ridiculousness of gender identities and roles. I've always been cynical about the mental health profession, and this book really opened my eyes a little bit wider to the things that go on in mental hospitals, and it's inspired me to do more. I've never been in one myself, but I am carted off to see a counselor and a psychotherapist at least once every two weeks, because I'm not "motivated" in school, and because I don't have any "practical" plans for the future. Also, I'm "depressed" and "moody". I'm supposed to take an anti-depressant, but the bottle is sitting on my desk, unopened. I don't like pills. How are they supposed to "fix" someone? This book also helped me understand a little but more about gender issues. I recently read "The Frailty Myth" by Collette Dowling, and I plan on writing a book eventually about how "masculinity" and "femininity" are labels created by a patriarchial society. I don't think that boys and girls are either of these. Sure, we have the different parts, but they're purely biological and needed for the survival of the human race, but a person is no less of a human because he/she doesn't "fit in" with their gender. The so-called roles, I believe, are created and enforced by society, not nature. Above all, I STRONGLY recommend this book...for anyone who was deemed "inappropriate", anyone who wants to elanr more about gender issues, anyone who's ever been lost and lonely, anyone who just wants a good dramatic read....hell, I'd recommend it for anyone.
Rating: 
Summary: More fiction than fact.
Review: I find the entire story to be contrived. I know of many people who work in the area of psychology, psychiatry and mental health. Personally I have a degree in Psychology and currently work in the field. There is little evidence in the book that would be a grounds for so many years in institutions! My feeling is there is more illness than is being relayed, classic Sociopathic symptoms come to mind.I fear this kind of diatribe aimed at institutions will hurt the field of mental health and I believe it will harm the gay population as well for allowing fiction to be exemplified as actual experience of a young lesbian woman as I highly doubt she was institutionalized for being a tom- boy. There are too many true and terrible stories that need to be recognized, not this false memoir.
Rating:
Summary: a must read
Review: I first heard of this book when it was reviewed by The Boston Globe, and hearing the subject matter, I simply had to obtain a copy. 3 years later, and I have now read the book several times, as well as passed it along to friends, les/bi/gay/trans & straight friends. The fact that Daphne was not able to express herself as she wanted still blows my mind. Her "actions" were harmful to NO ONE and yet she was forced to try and adopt a state of "self" that wasn't her own. I urge all to read this, even if YOU don't have a gender issue, you probably know someone who does. This tale will only help you clearly see how IMPORTANT it is for us, as human beings, to just BE OURSELVES!
Rating:
Summary: Although times have changed, still relevant
Review: i found this book excellent, and would recommend it to anyone. it's essential part for me was its criticism of the mental health field in this country, and i feel strongly that it still holds today. as i myself am a therapist and in the year 2000 worked as a social worker on an inpatient unit with some adolescents, i found her story to be wholly believable. those poor kids get shelved and pathologized because their parents are incompetent and the mental health field is too. what daphne needed was for someone to hear her story, listen to her as a person, a human being, not as a diagnosis, a pathology, a sick creature. in reality, it was obvious from the beginning that she was an intelligent, talented and very vulnerable girl. i found her an extremely likeable character. as for criticisms: i felt some of the gender stuff was played up to make the book more marketable, and while i don't doubt that daphne had/has true alternate-gender issues, i felt they weren't explored in as much depth and as succinctly as were other issues in the book (such as the cruelty and idiocy of so much of the mental health field). perhaps at the time of the book's writing daphne had not yet come to full emotional terms with her gender/gender identity/sexuality. i actually really can't blame her, considering how difficult, painful, and potentially rejecting it is in our society to be anything other than the gender norm. nevertheless, i still stand by my criticism. and one last little criticism: i found the book a little disjointed, always jumping back and forth between different time periods. it actually didn't actually fail as a technique, but it got annoying at times. this all said: this book remains WORTH READING!
Rating:
Summary: worth reading, powerful - but a few missing parts
Review: i found this book excellent, and would recommend it to anyone. it's essential part for me was its criticism of the mental health field in this country, and i feel strongly that it still holds today. as i myself am a therapist and in the year 2000 worked as a social worker on an inpatient unit with some adolescents, i found her story to be wholly believable. those poor kids get shelved and pathologized because their parents are incompetent and the mental health field is too. what daphne needed was for someone to hear her story, listen to her as a person, a human being, not as a diagnosis, a pathology, a sick creature. in reality, it was obvious from the beginning that she was an intelligent, talented and very vulnerable girl. i found her an extremely likeable character. as for criticisms: i felt some of the gender stuff was played up to make the book more marketable, and while i don't doubt that daphne had/has true alternate-gender issues, i felt they weren't explored in as much depth and as succinctly as were other issues in the book (such as the cruelty and idiocy of so much of the mental health field). perhaps at the time of the book's writing daphne had not yet come to full emotional terms with her gender/gender identity/sexuality. i actually really can't blame her, considering how difficult, painful, and potentially rejecting it is in our society to be anything other than the gender norm. nevertheless, i still stand by my criticism. and one last little criticism: i found the book a little disjointed, always jumping back and forth between different time periods. it actually didn't actually fail as a technique, but it got annoying at times. this all said: this book remains WORTH READING!
Rating:
Summary: Great Memoir
Review: I've often wanted to point out that the homosexuality diagnosis is still alive and well, despite reports of its demise over the past 30 years. Daphne Scholinski's excellent memoir of her three year commitment in psychiatric institutions, in part for "Gender Identity Disorder," is exactly what I had been looking for to make my point. I don't know why I had never heard of this book before I picked it up at a used shop recently, but I'm glad I've finally stumbled on it. No matter how one looks at the "Gender Identity Disorder" diagnosis, it is the diagnosis for homosexuality in a different guise and can help provide a convenient excuse for persecuting boys and girls who are either openly homosexual or suspected of being homosexual. Scholinski was a troubled Chicago area teen in the late '70s and early '80s with a separated father and mother who simply gave up on being parents to her. Scholinski was a tomboy with a masculine look that often confused people who saw her into believing she was a boy. She didn't dress like a girl and didn't want to cake make-up on her face. She joined a street gang, got into sex with manipulative adults and into all kinds of trouble at school. Her father had a fat insurance policy and one day in 1981, when Scholinski was 15, he dropped her off at a psychiatric institution. Three years Scholinski would spend trying her best to play the role of a girl by dressing the part and smearing make-up on her face. Scholinski's ticket out of institutionalization would be when her father's insurance ran out on her 18th birthday in the Summer of 1984. Scholinski's stay in psychiatric institutions might have been the most expensive finishing school in history at the time, as the bill her father's insurance paid out ended up costing the policy $1 million dollars. So much for all of this horse hooey about pharmacology reducing the costs of running psychiatric institutions. What I like most about memoirs like this is that they do more to strip psychiatry of its medical pretentions than any scholarly criticism could. Scholinski demonstrates in her book time and again that psychiatry not only serves a social function, but it is also a creation of the patient's often willing behavior as well. Scholinski makes it clear that part of the reason for her acting out was to get attention she wasn't receiving from her parents. During her stay at her first hospital, Michael Reese, Scholinski decides to run around the facility until she final got pounced on the guards and shot up with Thorazine by the nurse, knowing full well acting out in such a way would have such consequences. Scholinski describes how she and other Michael Reese patients would look up various diagnoses in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and try to behave in a manner in order to get the diagnosis. At an institution for teens in Minnesota Scholinski lied about the extent of her drug usage to get herself enrolled in the drug rehab program. Then she convinced the officials of the institution that she really didn't have a drug problem after she decided she didn't like the drug rehab program. After that focus of Scholinski's treatment plan become her gender identity and the suspicion of the institution's authorities that she might be harboring homosexual feelings. These suspicions were brought out the most near the end of Scholinski's commitment when she developed a crush and close friendship with a new and younger female patient. Economics would be the determining factor when it came time for Scholinski's 18th birthday and her father's insurance ran out on her. In one paragraph Scholinski describes the economics of insurance and how it creates and discharges a psychiatric patient: "Insurance money is the subtext of hospitalizations; it can make diagnoses come and go. Having a fat insurance policy can keep patients around for months, for observation. After my first six months at Michael Reese, my father's insurance company would have asked the doctors to justify keeping me. My mother thinks the doctors at Michael Reese didn't want to have their treatment plan scrutinized - particularly the Gender Identity Disorder part. I'm no so sure. I know how sneaky psychiatrists can be, how they can use words to make a person into whatever they want. Scrutiny does not intimidate them; they can finesse anything." In the end Scholinski would be a case of treatment failure who has gone on to make a living as an artist in the Bay Area. Yes, Scholinski would eventually have her first sexual relationship with a female after institutionalization so this is a story of treatment failure with a happy ending. If you strip the institution Scholinski went to in Minnesota of its doctors, nurses, counselors and all the other mental health professionals, then you would have a school. Perhaps if Scholinski had been born in 1986 rather than 1966, she would today be a troubled teen attending an alternative school, rather than an abusive psychiatric institution. In the end, what Scholinski needed more than anything was to be left alone about her gender identity and a space to learn a creative craft, as she eventually did with her art. Scholinski's treatment failure is the most endearing aspect of her wonderful memoir. It demonstrates the utter futility of the policy of meddlesome psychiatric interventionism in personal lives and the notion that medicalizing social problems will somehow solve them.
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