Let's play doctor

Erm, I mean, let's play "going to the doctor while trans." Which is what I did today.

Mostly went in to tell him I was switching GPs, but also was hoping that he would write me a letter saying that he had seen me a few times, and that yes, I was in fact trans, and had been prescribed hormones before, to avoid difficulty. He said that that wouldn't be necessary, my medical records would be transferred over, which would take 7-14 days. Later on, though, when looking through my records on the computer, he realised that they contained no reference to my testosterone at all.

I have been waiting for a year or so to see a specialist at the Edinburgh trans clinic. Someone recently mentioned that they might not even *have* a specialist in Edinburgh at the moment, which is why it's taking so long. So, I told my doctor, I would like to be referred to the Glasgow clinic instead (which is where a lot of the Edinburgh trans community go anyway). He said that he couldn't do that, it's the Edinburgh's clinic's job. I said, hmm, lots of Edinburgh doctors seem to do this anyway. And oh, by the way, could I also get a prescription renewal for testosterone. He said that no, we'd already talked about this, he can't prescribe it to me, the specialists have to do that. I said actually, he'd told me that he'd be happy to prescribe it, and that he didn't see why I needed to see a specialist after all. He said, oh.

I need to see a specialist, because there are many doctors who won't prescribe hormones without knowing that I've been seen by one. The last time I moved to Edinburgh, it was in an emergency situation, because my psychotic ex-flatmate/landlord kicked me out. Soon after, I found that I no longer had any medication left. Now, I *won't* say that she stole it to sell it, partly because that might open me up to legal trouble, and, well, it might not be true. But I found the bag it was in, the bag was empty, and I know she'd been in my room when I wasn't there because she'd left all my groceries in the middle of the floor. She was facing the prospect of being broke because I would no longer be paying her rent. Make your own conclusions.

So when I went to the local doctor in a hurry. I didn't have any proof of address, because I was staying on someone's couch. The doctor, fair enough, didn't have my medical records in front of him. But he didn't need to refuse to give me my medication by comparing it to giving me illegal drugs. I ended up having to ask a friend to give me some of his supply, which he thankfully did. Yes, this is not allowed. But it was the only way I could get the medication I need to take.

I've actually seen a specialist in the UK, by the way. I went to one in Belfast, after several months of waiting. He had his assistant go through a questionnaire, looked at it for less than five minutes, and then informed me that what I had wasn't transgenderism, probably just "some cross-dressing thing." This was, apparently, because people's genders can't fluctuate, they remain static. That is the way things are, you see. His recommendation was that I be taken off of my medication and monitored to see what happened, because apparently I would settle into some kind of single gender state. This is all terribly scientific, I'm sure.  And that is the main reason why I left Belfast.

Doctors seem to think that transpeople choose to be this way. I'm not surprised; everything in our culture says that this is not something necessary to us, it's something we do because we're difficult, because it's a sexual thing, or a PC thing, perhaps. You can't measure being trans, at least not yet; it's one of the things that interests me about being trans--that, unless you're intersex, it's an entirely internal, subjectively knowable state.

The Sun and their horrible readers think that we shouldn't be burdening the NHS with our superfluous medical problems, or should I say "demands." bit.ly/RJasMV Or maybe it's just the older ones of us who have been to jail who shouldn't expect to have our basic medical needs met? According to comments on a similar photo, the NHS doesn't have enough money to give cancer treatments to everyone who needs them. I highly doubt this, but apparently, it's not the fault of the funding bodies that are slashing badly-needed funds; it's that some of us, the ones who aren't socially desirable, are asking for too much, too frivolous. Am I deserving enough? Well, according to many of the doctors I've met, apparently not. Or perhaps we just don't deserve to exist at all.

NOTE: It's this bad in a country with (for the moment) free health care. In the US, if you don't have medical insurance, you have to pay for the months of going to see a psychologist yourself, before you even go to the doctor to get a prescription, whereupon even with insurance most companies won't cover things like hormones and surgery, so you'd be paying for it anyway.