Do not take the blue pill…
Andreas Krieger claims that steroids killed Heidi.
In 1979, 13 year old Heidi Krieger took up a place at a specialist sports school in East Berlin. She was put into a training program and onto a regime of bright blue pills and she was told they were vitamin pills.
Almost immediately, her body began to change. Her muscles expanded and her face, nose and hands started to enlarge. Her mood, too, went haywire. One moment she was afflicted with depression, then, in an instant, she would be overwhelmed with feelings of aggression.
All concerns were dismissed and excuses offered, and under the regime at the time the athletes kept quiet and took the pills.
At the heart of the story were those bright blue pills. Krieger discovered that they were not vitamin tablets but androgenic-anabolic steroids called Oral-Turinabol, powerful prescription drugs that built muscle and induced male sexual characteristics.
Ultimately Heidi underwent surgery and became Andreas. Now Andreas goes on to say:
“We did not question the pills because in GDR times you were expected to trust your coaches,” Krieger says. “Nobody thought, ‘Is this dangerous for me?’ The coaches said the pills were important to keep us fit and healthy. I did not even consider the possibility that they might be harmful. We were doing incredibly tough power training, so I thought that was the reason I was growing more muscles and strength.”
and
Although Krieger’s unease over his sexual identity pre-dated the doping programme, he says that the androgenic abuse left him with little choice but to have a sex-change operation. “I had no sympathy with my body, it had changed beyond all recognition,” he says. “It was as though they had killed Heidi. Becoming Andreas was the next logical step.”
So, would he have gone through the surgery and changed anyway? Or was it all the steroids? That is now becoming a matter for the courts as Andreas and other East German Athletes seek justice.
I’m deep in thought over the whole trans thing at the moment. I hesitate to call it an issue even, because for me it’s not. You are who you are, regardless of gender determined by chromosomes, or surgery, or anatomy. I don’t know any trans-gender people and I know I’m coming at this from a perspective of comfort in my own body and a complete lack of understanding. Same with race politics. I am a white european, a white english woman and I live in a country where I am priviledged to be able to speak out without fear of retribution. I’m not likely to get the police at my door for writing this blog!
But I’m struggling with various ideas in amongst it all. If a woman (born female with female anatomy and female chromosomes) needs help - I’m thinking of domestic violence, rape, that sort of help - then she needs to feel very very safe and that often means woman only space for her - and rightly so. But what if she’s female now but genetically male? Should she be denied that help just for her DNA? I say no, she is just as deserving of the resources as any other woman - but - and this is where I’m struggling - I can see where her presence could make a woman-born-woman (cis is the term I think?) feel very uncomfortable and unsafe. So I can get why woman born woman space is needed. But I can also see where the equivalent space is potentially needed for women born male (is that trans-women? someone please do tell me the right terms here?)
I’ve digressed from Heidi/Andreas somewhat, but reading that article got me thinking. Bear with me while I work this out - please do come and challenge my thinking and reasoning, I value input and debate but I will need to ask many many questions while I form my own opinions here.
More as I ponder more…..
