The season is planned for 10 episode, with the first three episodes already available.

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I know the chance of upper knee amputation isn't likely, and that I've low-key accepted. But I'm always curious if they could help safely with my fingers. 

Sorry if this isn't the correct place to ask- but there's been that sliver of hope that a doctor could help in a way that also won't hurt the bank.

And if not

•  in the future do you think BID would be accepted as something treatable in a hospital setting? 
• has anyone spoken to a therapist about their BID experiences? 

Thank you! I look forward to speaking to everyone and hope everyone has a wonderful, safe, week

I'm married, thirty one years. My wife knows fragments of my story. She knows about my attraction to amputees and she knows about my cast fetish. We've had conversations about it in the past, but the door closed years ago and hasn't reopened. She doesn't know the full truth. She doesn't know about BID, the diagnosis, the research, or that I'm actively pursuing a clinical pathway to amputation.

I tried to have this conversation almost thirty years ago, but even I wasn't fully clear on what I was dealing with at the time. Without access to the internet or any community like this one, I was basically navigating blind. An astronaut in space with zero training. I didn't have the language, the diagnosis, or the research to back up what I was trying to explain. It didn't go well.

Now I have all of that. But I'm still terrified. My wife knows enough that every time I see an amputee or a cast in a movie or TV show, I panic. In public it's even worse. We had a date outing this past Thursday and we saw two attractive amputees. One was a female DAK in an electric wheelchair wearing cut off dress pants. The other was a LAK or LHD using a scooter, with her black underarm crutches propped in the empty space where her left leg would have been. It's like a mirror I can't look away from. I felt sick knowing she probably noticed me noticing. This happened on a day when I was just trying to be present for my wife. I can't believe both encounters happened in the same outing.

Has anyone here successfully told their partner the full truth? How did you approach it? How did they respond? What would you do differently?

I'm not looking for false hope. I want real experience from people who have been here.

When I think back to my first memories between 3-4 years old they center around three or four things. One, the birth of my sister. Two, an injury I had from falling into the wooden arm of a chair at my grandparents' house that split my face and lip completely from the bottom of my left nostril through my lip, leaving a very unique facial scar. Three, my grandpa's foot, which had a pretty severe wound from being shot in WWII. My entire life he had a noticeable limp.

A few years later, around 5-7 years old, he was cutting grass pushing a riding mower on a hill, slipped over the edge and into a ditch by the road. He broke his leg and ankle and was yelling for help, but I was afraid. The mower was still running and I'm sure he thought it might fall on him. He wanted me to go to the neighbor's house next door, but they had a terrifying dog. Finally, some strangers stopped and helped him out of the ditch and turned off the mower. My next memory is him in a cast.

If my grandpa thought he had something to do with my BID he would die all over again. However, this is where my brain has led me over the years. He almost never showed his foot with the gunshot wound, but when he did it was fascinating to me. My grandpa was a major part of my life. He pretty much took care of my sister and me while my parents worked, since he retired early. He never talked about WWII, but I knew he had earned medals as well as a Purple Heart. After he died my grandma told me he had shot himself in the foot. I don't know the real truth. Perhaps he did shoot himself because he was afraid of dying and wanted out. Perhaps it was an accident while cleaning a gun, which I also heard from his nephew. Perhaps he was shot in combat. He's been gone for 20+ years, so I'll never know the truth.

He was also, by the way, completely toothless. Apparently he let the army dentist pull all of his teeth. I know dental health would have been poor for someone born in 1911 and growing up during the depression, so maybe it was simply better to wear dentures. Again, this is my brain fitting pieces together to make sense of my need to be an LAK amputee. Here's another interesting detail. Before my grandma died I heard her say my grandpa wasn't that sexually interested in her until she got sick and had to use a wheelchair. Maybe he had regrets. Maybe it was an attraction. I'll never know.

This is when things really began to feel like there could be some sort of genetic link.

A few years ago, before my middle child graduated college, they told my wife and me they were non-binary. Researchers studying BID and gender incongruence have noted overlapping neurological mechanisms, suggesting the two conditions may share common ground in how the brain maps identity onto the body. Based on what we now know, transgender and non-binary identity sits close to BID in that landscape. There's a lot of speculation on my part, I know that. Maybe I'm hoping there's a link so I can put a finger on the cause. I've never felt brave enough to ask my child how they really feel. It just felt like their personal identity. We accept and love them completely, but after twenty years of knowing them as a daughter we still struggle with pronouns sometimes. They know it's not on purpose, and we keep trying. Maybe someday I can have that deeper conversation with them.

If you have similar self-made hypotheses I would love to hear them.

By the way, I did search the forum to see if there was already a topic related to this matter. I could not find anything. If I somehow missed it please let me know and I can move this post.

"No, there will never be a cure per se. The only cure is to get what one needs for their body. The ones who achieved, as you can see here, are very happy and free from dysphoria. The thing is, BID is neurological; how one's brain is wired no way to change that.

As I said in my post, most people are not looking to be cured in any case, but they want what they feel they need for their bodies. They have suffered from BID since they were young, for the most part, and it is part of them. Yes, suffering from BID is a bitch.

You ask why anyone wants to be disabled like this. Well, so I wrote this a few years ago, which you may want to read: https://www.reddit.com/r/biid/comments/130ngal/why/  One cannot say why; it is just part of them, just like GD is to a Trans person. One needs what they need.  The only cure for the dysphoria is to achieve what one's need is.

We know therapy and drugs do not help.  Many have tried this, and it does not help alleviate their need for their body.  It would only help if one is depressed, and it helps with anxiety.  One needs what they need, and that is the problem.

I am hoping one day, maybe not in my time, that the medical community will recognize our needs and give affirming surgery to people who suffer from BID. It is going to be hard for them to accept how much people suffer from BID and how much a person getting what they need for their body frees them of the dysphoria and the pain."

Most people would not want to give up this need.  They had suffered from BID for most of their lives, and it is part of them.  They have this need and really feel they should be as they feel they need to be.  Most people are not looking to be cured, but they want to achieve their needs.

Of course, coming out and telling anyone about this need is very hard.  People outside the BID community cannot understand how one suffers with BID and how much one has this need.  Why would anyone in their right mind want to be disabled?  In any case, one must accept that they suffer from BID and should not beat themselves up.

The ones who achieved their needs are very happy.  The only thing they regret is not having achieved their need sooner.  For the most it is just so desirable to get what one needs for their bodies. 

I am sure most of us go through The Wave. Some might get stuck at some point, but it is important to understand that this is all part of suffering from BID and what it is all about. In general, the intensity of one’s feelings goes up and down over time. The intensity of one's obsession with getting what one feels one needs for one's body to go through what we call “The Wave.”

Here is how I see the levels of what one goes through. Each level can last a long time or may come and go in a short time, but most do go through such changes from time to time. I guess this is so one can get some relief from the obsessive feeling at the bottom, and then it comes back, and it is all one can think about at the top.

So, this is how I define the levels that I see as part of The Wave.

• Super Top.

This is not usually talked about, but I feel that it is part of what some do experience. At the Super Top, one is obsessed with what they feel they need for their body to be. They can get so desperate to achieve their need that they may get depressed, and think of doing dangerous DIY things to get what they feel they need. Some get suicidal, which is very bad, but the intensity can get so great for some that they get to this point.

• The Top of The Wave.

This is where most people get to at times. One is totally obsessed with getting their need. There is great mental pain from not being how they feel they need to be. About half the people also feel physical pain in their affected limb(s). Their lives are affected by the constant thoughts and it affects their productivity since they can think of nothing else but their need for their body. It is very hard to deal with at this level.

• The Middle.

One’s need is more of a desire than a strong need. The obsession is not as great as the top but one still thinks about their need a lot. It is more of a want than a true need. You still want it, but it is a little easier to deal with since the obsession is not as strong.

• Bottom of The Wave.

At this point, the need becomes more of a nice-to-have than a full need. One thinks about it, but it is not as obsessive as it is at the other levels. This is the easiest level to deal with. The need is still there, but more at the back of one’s mind. So, one still thinks about it, but it is not as much of an obsession as the other levels. It is best if one can get here and stay, but it usually does not last forever. One usually does go back up again. Certainly, this level is a relief from the worst of it.

BID does cause mental harm to the sufferer, so it is wrong when the medical community says “First Do No Harm.”  One who is suffering from BID is already being harmed. Those who have achieved their need are, for the most part, relieved from the harm BID causes people. They all seem quite happy with no regrets. They accept the challenges that come with being disabled and enjoy their proper body.  The ICD-11 does describe this very well, but Dr. First did not use the term The Wave, nor was he aware of it.

I got into a fight giving this to a new person on the Remedy groups about this.  He said he was a psychological scholar and that there is no such thing as a wave.  He told me I should not give such information to a person because it does not exist as far as he is concerned.  This is thus just another thing that the medical community misses about BID.  It is important to understand how the obsessive feelings affect people who suffer from BID.  The thing that people say this is part of me, and I need to be as my brain tells me I should be.  There is no other way of getting relief for a person who suffers from BID but getting what they need for their body.

He mentioned that matters such as an amputation would have to be reviewed by ethics committees. After briefly looking through the latest studies, however, he admitted he was at a loss and explained that we were in good hands with the scientists, since he himself could not make a well-founded statement. He then asked me directly whether I wanted a leg amputation, and I showed him the exact spot.

During the examination he patiently waited until I had removed my orthosis so that the nerves could be measured again. A slight paralysis in the right lower leg and some muscle weakness still remain. I was able to leave him the studies and information about BID for reference and for a preliminary conclusion, which he was very pleased about.

Because of my persistent pain, I also hope for relief through a wheelchair, so that I can leave the house more easily. The slight paralysis in the lower leg will probably remain, but we were both very satisfied with the results so far. Perhaps multiple segmental fusions of the spine in the cervical and lumbar regions of the affected area can be avoided in the long term. We will try everything. I am now definitely supposed to involve a pain specialist.

Mild spasticity and various sensory disturbances from head to toe still persist. When all four limbs from the neck down are affected, it feels completely different – it was a terrible time. It was clearly too much and not my BID. Patience with the right medication has proven to be the right way for me, even though it still often goes along with pain and smaller limitations will probably remain.

The neurologist will now send a detailed report to my family doctor. If I receive a wheelchair, I wonder whether it could also help me with BID. If the leg were gone, I would need one anyway. We both found this thought interesting, even though I am not sure about the success and am not really enthusiastic about a wheelchair in relation to my individual BID. For me it is merely an aid for longer distances.

Once a prescription mentioning BID, a note in a report – and over the years quite a few things came together in the search for a solution and help. I no longer wanted to hide BID or gloss it over with excuses. In the long run that was the right decision for me, even though it was often painful and left me saddened for weeks. I experienced everything imaginable during that time. BID, the amputation, simply belongs to me and I still cannot explain it today. “It hurts here or there” is not true – it hurts deeply inside, because it creates a permanent felt inconsistency. Period.

To support my approach, expert opinions with official recognition proved helpful over many years. This allowed me to pursue the matter more officially. The older reports still used the abbreviation BIID, while the newer ones used BID. For me, BID is a constant. Even another or greater disability does not really dissolve BID, although concern about it sometimes overshadows it. Not always, but sometimes.

But when I had to stay in bed, BID also led to several dysphorias and to the feeling that my approaches had failed. I asked myself very often: If nothing works anymore anyway, couldn’t they just saw off the leg – then at least I would have some joy. The fact is: the danger seems to be averted for the time being, but BID remains. That’s just how it is.

I was treated very well and never felt like a curiosity during any of the examinations. It was always dignified.

In response to a disabled woman on the biid subreddit wanting to know WHY one would want to be disabled, I decided to answer that question. The simple answer to WHY is we do not know why, but we know it is not a want but a need to be as we feel we need to be, as crazy as it is to want such a thing.

The thing is, we feel we need to have the body we feel we need to have. It is a dysphoria that causes one to have obsessive thoughts and too many pain. The feeling of need goes up and down in what we call The Wave and at the top, it can become the only thing one can think about to get the body one needs to have. It can get so bad for people that they can get depressed and some even suicidal due to not having the body they need.

For the most part, people who suffer from BID are not looking to be disabled per se, though some might want that too, but they are looking to have the body they feel they need to have. They usually had these thoughts from when they were quite young, often starting somewhere around 6 to 8. People who suffer from BID are willing to take on the challenges that come with achieving their needed body.

The ones who have achieved their needs are quite happy with their new bodies, and the only regret they have is not having done it sooner. Are things more difficult? Yes, but they are willing to take on the challenges that come with it. They are relieved from the dysphoria, which, as I said it can get really bad at times. They find ways of doing things in their new body and are all right with that.  Even many years later, they are still happy with their proper body and have no regrets.

The worst part of suffering from BID is not that one wants to be “disabled” but the fact that the medical community will not recognize our need and give us the surgery we need to achieve the body we feel we need to have. People are left to do things that are dangerous to achieve their needs, but people do it since it gets so hard to deal with what their brain tells them they need to have for their bodies.

People feel that either their limbs should not be there or should not work. Or they feel they do not like their limbs and they should be removed. Others feel it would just be desirable to be as such. There is no good reason why one would want such a thing, but it is not a choice but a need.

We do not accept the ableism argument that it is the worst thing in the world to be an amputee or a para. Many people who are disabled, once they get over the grieving, find ways of doing things as even if it is harder, they manage and accept being as such. We find that we need to be as such and accept the challenges that come with it.

So that is what it is. We are not looking to disrespect the disabled or even want to be as such, but we need to have relief from the obsessive dysphoria that we suffer. To be an amputee or a para or whatever else one needs is the only way to get relief from it. It is crazy to want such a thing, and we do not know why, but that is what it is. I hope you can understand we are not delusional despite what the medical community thinks. We have no choice, as much as it is a need.