What can us healthcare providers do to help you all?

Thank you for taking a proactive effort in making our experiences easier in these contexts! I can say for my own experience, the main issue I encountered was an early insistence that my health provider had for announcing the legal first name in the waiting room. My legal first name was unambiguously masculine, and so I would essentially have to out myself every time I stood up to answer this call. I don’t see any reason why a preferred name, or a last name, could not be used in this context! I’m pretty sure they updated this policy, but I had already gotten my name changed by that point.

I would just like to be treated like any other man who has a medical condition. Not every trans person feels this way, but since you’re dealing with trans people in a medical setting, I think that’s a good starting point.

caveat is that I don’t pass and haven’t started yet on hormones.

they ask you your preferred pronouns but not preferred name, or only some of them ask you your preferred name.  then, that information goes into a black hole or something, because they just look at you and gender you however they want, or, if they know you’re trans and might get offended, they don’t gender you at all.

i was preparing for surgery unrelated to transitioning and had to stow my clothes, and for some reason they went through those clothes and found out i was wearing women’s underwear, and that became something one of the nurses felt they needed to slyly bring up with me, like “cross dressing is one thing but women’s underwear maybe means you’re trans”, i guess.

i went to the ER for chest pains, and they didn’t ask me anything trans or gender or preferred pronouns or preferred name related at all, in spite of the fact that part of my chest pains turned out to be because my bra was on too tight.  they ordered a chest xray and an ekg, and then asked me a lot of questions about my medical and psych history, seemingly none of which were related to gender.  i had earlier gone to the urgent care, which did have an option for MTF/trans on the intake, so i guess if it’s an emergency then the only medically relevant thing is your sex, is the message i absorbed.

the only competent medical providers when it comes to trans stuff ive been to (in the usa) is planned parenthood.  if you want trans related medical training, i would advise talking to them.

One of the biggest pet peeves I had early in my transition was when my healthcare provider would deadname or misgender me. They have the ability for me to provide my preferred name and pronouns, but there were times that I was needlessly deadnamed or misgendered.

For example, when authorization for hair removal was sent via USPS to my house, the address on the envelope explicitly said “legal name” and “preferred name” with my deadname right there next to my new name for our postal delivery person and anybody else involved in delivering it to me to see. I understand that my prescription bottles needed my legal name on them but I felt that an envelope with both names and the legal/preferred label for each was an unnecessary act of outing me to anybody who saw that envelope. I’d like to have only ever seen or heard my preferred name, except where my legal name was actually legally required. [edit: i certainly didn’t want both of them together in the same space, especially where others could see them, like in a mailing address]

Another example is when I went in for my orchiectomy and the bracelet they had prepared at intake had my AGAB on it. My medical record knew my gender is non-binary and that my pronouns are she/her and they/them, so there was really no good excuse for my bracelet to indicate M for my sex/gender. The person checking me in was receptive to feedback though and corrected the value from “M” to “O” (other) in their system and printed out a new bracelet for me. Then in the waiting room, the labels they had for me which had been printed before correction also had the wrong gender and had to be reprinted. Having patient data and labels consolidated to reflect the most recent known values would have helped avoid this mishap.

Another example is how my healthcare provider has their zoom sessions setup. Whenever I take a link to a zoom meeting from my healthcare provider’s email or website, it overrides my Zoom profile (where I have my name, picture, and pronouns set) and replaces it with my legal name and no pronouns or profile pic at all. Intentionally configuring systems to erase patients’ preferred names and pronouns is an incredibly inconsiderate decision, and results in trans patients going through awkward dysphoric rush to fix their name and add their pronouns every time they connect to Zoom. This is especially frustrating when it’s a group Zoom with other patients being exposed to our legal name.

Honestly, other than respecting my preferred name and pronouns, one of the biggest things my healthcare providers were able to do to make me feel safe and well-cared for has been treating me like any other patient with the kindness and respect that everyone hopes to experience when having to work with their healthcare professionals.

Where I am originally from, there aren’t a lot of openly transgender people either. There are in the state, but not in the town I come from.

The thing that helped me the most is being treated like I’m human and not making anything up. I was told by one doctor that some pain I was having was strictly from my hormone shots and really, I found out much later, that it was due to the stress I was having at work and in life. So if somebody comes in with something strange going on with them, don’t blame it on the hormones unless you find evidence it is. When I was first told that, I broke down and called planned parenthood, who gave me my meds at the time, if this was something they had heard of before.

I think doctors and nurses being open to how to make transgender patients comfortable is life changing. They can do so much in healthcare and you posting here with questions is amazing. Keep doing you and thank you.