A negative thing finally happened
People have been AMAZING to me. Seriously. My friends, my family, my partner, my bosses, my coworkers...not a single one of them have given me shit. I am very lucky. But I knew, I knew something eventually had to happen specifically regarding the whole trans thing.
Last night, my partner and I had a very long, serious talk about HRT (hormone replacement therapy.) He is a straight male, and I identify as a genderless forest goblin with masculine tenancies. i.e., I know I would be happier if I were born male, or at the very least had more androgynous/passing features. Neither of us are entirely certain the extent to which we’d be comfortable with regarding transitioning. I’m happy that we can openly talk about it. The consensus is: he wants me to do it. He wants to marry me. <3
So today, I called Planned Parenthood to see where I could set up an appointment. A woman answered the phone and I said, “Hi, I would like to schedule an initial consultation for HRT.”
She said, “Sorry?”
Dude. She had no idea what HRT was.
If you - yeah, you, reading this - don’t know about Hormone Replacement Therapy, that’s okay! It’s just the hormones people take to transition. So in my case, it would be testosterone. But the fact that the person at Planned Parenthood didn’t know what HRT was...like holy shit.
So I, incredibly embarrassed, was like, “Hormone replacement...?”
And she was like, “Ohhhh, okay. And is this your first appointment?”
WOMAN THAT’S WHAT INITIAL MEANS INNIT?!
It was super humiliating. I would like to think I’m way more comfortable than I am in my own skin but after today, I realize I really am not.
I wasn’t unkind to her over the phone but I was screaming internally. I think the majority of the population doesn’t know what HRT is and that’s perfectly okay, we as a community have resources available to the public and LGBTQ+ knowledge will become more commonplace. It’s already happening. But like, if you work at a clinic that helps trans folk, yikes...
And to top it all off, the clinic in my area doesn’t even touch that subject. I’mma have to travel at least an hour and a half out of town. Ugh. Guess I’ll be taking a day trip, eventually.
