transabled.org

 

• About
• Login
• Contact
• Accessibility

Google Search:
Web transabled.org Go

 

Blog > Stories > Personal Histories > Other's Stories > Peter’s Evolution

Peter’s Evolution

Written by Peter on Wednesday, September 17, 2008

My name is Peter, I’m gay, I’m now in my 50s and this is my view on BIID and how it affects me, and others that I know.

Personally I seem to require a short paralysed left leg. I need it to be disabled like I had had Polio. This has been the case since childhood.

What I call my secondary disability concerns my left arm. I would like it amputated just above the wrist. This need is much more recent and only happened around the age of 42.

I have since discovered that I have Focal Dystonia that started around that time and has recently progressed. I am told that the area of the brain that is responsible for this condition is also in the area where the brain’s body map is located. This could explain the late development of BIID for that particular limb.

When I was younger I used to think that BIID was a sexual fetish. As a teenager I used to get aroused when I saw a guy with a Polio leg. Afterwards, when I returned home, I used to pretend with whatever items I could find to simulate a leg brace or to effectively shorten my leg.

When I started work and became financially independent I wanted to buy orthopaedic appliances and footwear so as to pretend in public and feel authentic. One day I didn’t go to work (I was working for the family business so it was OK) and I took myself off to a town where I knew there were several orthopaedic manufacturers. I spend all day visiting the companies and often finding myself inside workshops full of everything I’d ever dreamt about. But I found it impossible to ask for what I wanted and apparently didn’t medically need. Every time someone asked if they could help me, I blurted out "Sorry, I must have come to the wrong address" and left. That day when I got back home late, I said to myself "You are really sick in the head!" I picked up the phone and called a suicide line. I explained my "fetish" and how it was destroying me. To my surprise the guy on the other end told me that my "interest" was indeed unusual but that I didn’t need a psychiatrist. He instead suggested that I started by finding others like me and then go out and buy what we wanted. "They are in the business for money" he said.

So I placed a small ad in a contact magazine and I found several guys who shared my "fetish".

Together we sent out letters asking for quotes. Out of a dozen brace and boot makers we had 3 favourable responses and ordered.

Curiously I asked for the brace to be made for my right leg. This may have been because I was already disregarding the left leg and so asked for the dominant side. This didn’t work out too well as my left leg is already over one inch shorter, so I couldn’t walk in the brace, as it couldn’t swing through. Even lifting the right hip to the maximum, the boot would stub on the ground. So I had some special boots made with a build-up on the left – the non-braced side. I remember telling the orthopaedist that I’d chosen the wrong side. He said that was not necessarily the case. Apparently he had customers who required that configuration, as it was possible to have the better leg that was shorter than the paralysed one. Although I feel this situation is rare.

So I pretended often with my friends. We’d take it in turns to drive each other to towns where we were not known and pretended in turn. My friends would often say what a "buzz" they got from pretending, yet I was not getting excited by these outings, apart from the pleasure of visiting unknown places like a tourist. Something I couldn’t understand at the time. I was doing what I wanted to; I was wearing a leg brace and orthopaedic boots, yet I was not getting the excitement sexually anymore.

I was happy in their pretending world but I didn’t quite share their enjoyment in the same way. One guy used to annoy me as he looked like an able-bodied person playing. He would move his braced leg forward using his leg muscles as if walking normally, but because the leg was braced he looked just like a Russian soldier. I’d spent years studying the movements and tried to show him how to look authentic. He then laughed at me saying I looked disabled. Well wasn’t that the whole point?

Then the old self-analysis scenario came back and although I didn’t have names for the various statuses at the time I felt that I was only doing this because what I really needed was a real disabled friend (devotee-ism). So I again placed ads in contact magazines, this time to seek guys with polio legs. I met three. They were all very nice and very sexy and had all the equipment that I liked. But each meeting was a disaster. I performed very badly, probably because I felt so bad about my desires. Of course, I didn’t dare tell them why I only wanted to meet disabled guys. However, apparently I did some good for one of them, who I’m still in IM contact with today. He told me just recently that our meeting had brought him out of his shell – being actively homosexual was "out of the question" for him at the time. He went on to meet someone else and fell in love and is now very happy.

Later I had the chance to visit a fellow pretender who lived a very long way from me. I decided to take the train and to spend 3 whole days disabled. It was bliss. But the sexual aspect had totally gone even though I was functioning normally in usual sexual scenarios. When I got back from the trip and left the station and sat in my car ready to change back to able-bodied mode, I just couldn’t do it. I just had to take another walk. When I finally removed the brace, I cried.

So it was, when I returned home I knew that this was how I had to be and that it was nothing to do with leg bondage or whatever. It was the normal me. I just happen to have a leg that my brain says is too long between the knee and the ankle.

I continued to get leg braces made, this time for the correct leg – the left. This meant I could wear ordinary boots as the 1.25-inch shorter left leg could be swung through without a problem. But this situation left me with both legs looking the same length, as there was no build-up anymore. That was when I started investigating the possibility of having the left leg further shortened. The LLD (Leg Length Discrepancy) was all-important. The exact amount of shortening required was determined. It had to be 4-4.5" (11-12 cm). Why that amount I do not know.

I was prepared to accept a combination of shortening the left (above and below the knee if necessary) and lengthening the right to achieve the LLD although I didn’t really want to be taller. As for the paralysis, I realized that this was going to be difficult if not impossible to achieve for one leg only, and with sensation preserved (just like Polio). But I was prepared to carry on pretending the paralysis. After all, with full-time pretending with a leg brace there would be some muscle wasting and a resulting slight weakness.

So I’d started as a pretender, tried to ignore the feelings and then tried being a devotee. I just got nowhere. And so it was I discovered that the word for me was Wannabe. A word that didn’t exist at the time but I just knew that I had to disabled.

That was about 12 years ago. Today I have still not achieved my goal but have an even clearer picture of the future. This is in part thanks to the groups and forums I found on the Internet, that have enabled me, and others like me, to exchange thoughts and ideas. The Internet has also brought us into contact with hospitals and surgeons, who, with the right piece of paper, would be prepared to modify our bodies. Although we have no proof of this having been done yet.

It seems that most people are frightened about what their family and friends would say. Others just haven’t made their minds up and often have second thoughts as they live two lives – the second life involving a sport they like doing such as hiking.

Of course BIID can affect people in different ways and by different degrees. The most wanted disabilities are amputations – something like nine cases out of ten concerning the legs. Some people with BIID need to be paraplegic and use a wheelchair. Others need to be blind or deaf, although I’ve never come across anyone in the latter group. I don’t know any other person like me who needs one paralysed leg with sensation, plus a BE (Below Elbow) amputation.

On the subject of playing for fun, I do sometimes pretend to be hyper myopic using GOC (very thick Glasses Over suitable Contact lenses). But this has nothing to do with BIID. I wouldn’t want to be permanently like that.

Like most people with BIID, I tried to push it out of my mind but it never went away and just got worse and worse.

The onset and, above all, the progression of my Dystonia has been a great help in "excusing" my need for an amputation. I have been able to talk to friends about my desire and how my brain appears to be rejecting that arm. In fact, BIID is a reason in itself, and now that it has been discovered and designated a neurological condition by several leading neurologists, it makes talking about it to "normal" people so much easier. We are less likely to be looked upon as freaks, "weirdo’s" etc.

All that remains is for BIID to be classified officially and a procedure for surgery worked out. I imagine that this will be done in a similar way to a sex change with a visit to a psychologist and then a psychiatrist. Then the great day will come when we get to see the surgeon.

In the meantime people will continue to try DIY jobs in a very dangerous way or seek surgeons in Asia or elsewhere.

After reading literally hundreds of accounts of psychotherapies, I have not found one case where the patient has been cured of BIID. Further more, the few who have manifestly achieved their requirements, practically all report being happy and free from the constant worry and distraction that BIID gives.

I have this wonderful philosophy that has always kept me optimistic and happy. I believe that if you really want something, you will always get it. But you must know exactly what is wanted and should not have the slightest doubt. When these conditions have been fulfilled, it will happen – probably when you least expect it!

We now have living proof that couples whose marriages are on the rocks, often partly due to one of them having BIID, find themselves much happier after the required surgery. As for the neighbours and others, I will just have to disregard what they think. In any case they’ll just have to get used to the idea, and if they don’t, too bad. It’s my life – I must live it in the body that is right for me. Life is too short to waste being screwed up by this terrible illness. But I would like to proceed with professional help. Although most of the DIY jobs have been successful, the risk is enormous and one is more likely to be classed as crazy. If a surgeon does it, automatically there must "be a reason" and that will satisfy the "normals" curiosity.

What’s more, planning sensibly for the future, visiting doctors, talking about your problem, participating in the forums etc, can be fun, motivating and certainly helps people decide what’s right for them.

The day I found this web site was the day I discovered I could and would live a normal life. Just knowing that our condition has a name is relief in itself. The web sites and the people I have met in the groups haven’t made my needs any lesser or greater but they have made me very happy with my BIID and hugely optimistic for the future. If I can transmit any of that optimism to you who are reading this – then I’m even happier.

Tags: Amputation, BIID, Brace, Devotee, Disability, Dystonia, Fetish, Gay, Legbrace, Limb, Orthopaedic

Twitter Updates

Follow me on Twitter