Reshi King

[MasterK-Bob he/him]

Did the Reshi king, who has been biologically female, but was touchy about being called king and not queen, transform into a biological male after bonding a spren a being able to heal to a (male) spiritual ideal, having apparently previously been trans, or did I just imagine that? Is there another interpretation?

[Karger he/him]

12 minutes ago, MasterK-Bob said:

Did the Reshi king, who has been biologically female, but was touchy about being called king and not queen, transform into a biological male after bonding a spren a being able to heal to a (male) spiritual ideal, having apparently previously been trans, or did I just imagine that? Is there another interpretation?

Yep.  That is what happened.  Brandon confirmed this on Reddit.

[MasterK-Bob he/him]

Link? That's very interesting.

[Karger he/him]

2 hours ago, MasterK-Bob said:

Link? That's very interesting.

Quote

pelolep

So the Reshi King canonically trans, right? I was hoping so when he was first mentioned, and I know it's been asked before if a trans Radiant would "heal" towards their true gender.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. And this is what happened.

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

 

[trav]

interesting.

then you get "healed" to a version you perceive yourself as.
that would also mean that every injury, no matter how long in the past, can get healed. as long as the perception of oneself is without that injury.

[MasterK-Bob he/him]

 

11 hours ago, trav said:

interesting.

then you get "healed" to a version you perceive yourself as.
that would also mean that every injury, no matter how long in the past, can get healed. as long as the perception of oneself is without that injury.

I suspect it's even more complicated than that and different healing has different effects (I don't think gold feruchemy does this, no matter how much is stored up but Brandon said it would heal a shardblade wound). I also don't think progression healing would do this. These seem to work in different ways. I don't think there's super clear WoBs though about this.

[ScarecrowBoat716 he/him]

11 hours ago, trav said:

interesting.

then you get "healed" to a version you perceive yourself as.
that would also mean that every injury, no matter how long in the past, can get healed. as long as the perception of oneself is without that injury.

 

This is why Kaladin's slave brand doesn't heal, right? He still sees himself as a slave. If Rysn became a Radiant a few years after Dawnshard I bet she would remain paraplegic too, once it's settled in as part of her Identity. 

[Knight of Iron]

On 11/18/2020 at 6:50 AM, trav said:

interesting.

then you get "healed" to a version you perceive yourself as.
that would also mean that every injury, no matter how long in the past, can get healed. as long as the perception of oneself is without that injury.

 

17 hours ago, ScarecrowBoat716 said:

 

This is why Kaladin's slave brand doesn't heal, right? He still sees himself as a slave. If Rysn became a Radiant a few years after Dawnshard I bet she would remain paraplegic too, once it's settled in as part of her Identity. 

Correct, this is how it works. Kaladin a brands don’t heal because he sees himself as a slave, but Lopens arm does regrow even after so long because he refused to actually accept himself as the one-armed Herdazian

[Jescape]

I think progression very much would heal someone to their correct gender identity, it seems to involve showing people their ideal self.

[Necessary Eagle she/her]

19 hours ago, Jescape said:

I think progression very much would heal someone to their correct gender identity, it seems to involve showing people their ideal self.

Renarin's version did, don't know if it works that way for Edgedancers or non-corrupted Truthwatchers.

[Delightful]

Hi, trans person here. 

Biological sex is kind of a myth, its not actually binary, and (physical medical) transition isnt necessarily trying to fit one's body into a particular ideal of biological sex. We know the King was seen as a woman, has physically changed in some ways via Stormlight to better match his gender identity, and now uses he/him pronouns. That's all we know.

Also @Beef Stew cr*pple is a really offensive word, you can just say physically disabled.

Im personally super pumped to see Stormlight transition, I hope we get a lot more of that in coming books!

[+robardin he/him]

On 11/22/2020 at 0:15 AM, Jescape said:

I think progression very much would heal someone to their correct gender identity, it seems to involve showing people their ideal self.

There's a recent WoB that finally confirms that Progression, as applied to another person, is not the same nor as powerful as a Radiant "healing" themselves. The latter is equivalent to "syncing" to the Cognitive image the person has of themself, and so is capable of healing even things like Shardblade severed limbs, regenerating long-amputated body parts (Lopen's arm), or in this case, "correcting" a body/self-image gender mismatch.

But Rysn's legs not being something healable by Lift or Renarin is not because Rysn now fundamentally views herself as "not supposed to have functioning legs any more" (clearly not the case, from her POVs); if she ever gained the use of Stormlight, or tapped an unsealed gold metalmind, she could almost certainly heal from it. And the same would apply for using Progression to do other "deep sync healing" things that a Stormlight or goldmind self-healing would allow for.

Quote

Questioner

A character in The Stormlight archive who eventually was able to heal of a wound. An old wound, and normally old wounds, with Regrowth, can't be healed.

Brandon Sanderson

This is a limitation of healing someone else, versus healing yourself. Healing someone else is a weaker method, at least as it's understood by the Radiants currently. Figuring out how to make Regrowth fix older wounds is more difficult. When you are highly Invested in such a way that you have a spren bond, then you are able to kind of rewrite your Spiritual self to better match your Cognitive self. Basically, what your soul is better comes to match your perception of your soul and who you are, and who you want to be becomes more important. And because of that, the Radiant bond is able to heal things and even change physiology that normal Regrowth wouldn't be capable of doing.

Tor Instagram Livestream (Nov. 25, 2020)