Transgender Doctor Leaves Selma For Seattle

In some ways, I've been luckier than other trans people.  I lost relationships, but am making new friends.  And my parents have been supportive.

Folks like Jennifer Burnett don't have it so good. After announcing her intention to transition, she lost her house, spouse and job within less than 24 hours.  That, after putting off her transition for 19 years so that she could gain custody of the children she had by her first marriage.  She'd begun hormones and electrolysis when, she said, "God told" her to put her transition on hold for the sake of her children.  

Then, after her second child moved out, she met a woman who married her, knowing of her plans to transition.  But when she started, Wife #2 bailed on her.

Now she offers the kind of support she didn't have.  And, just as important, she provides something trans people to often have difficulty in finding, or never find at all:  medical care from a person who understands their needs and feelings.

That is especially powerful when you realize that she has lived and practiced in Selma, CA, a town near Fresno.  It's about halfway between San Francisco and Los Angeles, in the San Joaquin Valley (often called "The Inland Valley".)  That trans people from both metropoli would take the trip to Selma says something about her.  And the fact that she's been practicing there surely offered hope to LGBT people who were living in the area which, according to a native of the Valley, "produces more raisins and queer-bashers than anyplace else."

I'm sure that acquaintance of mine was being at least somewhat hyperbolic. Still, you have to wonder what sorts of trials Dr. Burnett have experienced.

Could that be a reason why she's leaving?  She says she's moving to Seattle to be closer to her children, which I don't doubt.  Still, it's not hard to think that she'll be in a more welcoming atmosphere than she's in now.  It's a loss for the folks in the Valley (She is also a general practitioner.) but surely a gain for trans people in Seattle.

The CDC Catches Up

If you are transitioning from male to female, you may have discovered something I've learned:  The world of medicine was created by and for males.

If you didn't already know that, you will understand it when you climb into the "stirrups" for your first vaginal examination--if you hadn't already learned it from getting a mammogram.  That machine they use is almost as tortuous as the stirrups, and both devices were invented by, ahem, men!

Still, you need to do both.  OK, I'll admit:  I'm overdue for a mammogram.  But at least I'm procrastinating because of the unpleasantness of the experience, not because I can't pay for it. Or, more precisely, I don't have to pay for it.  That makes me one of the lucky ones.  Lots of other trans women--both pre- and post-op--don't have insurance policies that cover their mammograms or access to any medical provider who does them for free.  

One reason for that lack is the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (commonly known as the CDC) provided free screenings only to those designated as females at birth.  Even those of us who have had surgery weren't provided with examinations from the CDC. And other health care providers, insurers and related organizations take their cues from the CDC.

However, last week, the CDC changed its policy after a trans woman in Colorado sued.  

One would think it shouldn't have come to that.  After all, one would expect that the folks at the CDC would be conversant in current research and literature.  According to decades' worth of investigation and practice, trans women who are taking estrogen are at a higher risk of breast cancer than they were before starting treatments, though their risk is not as great as that of "born" women.  And our risk of breast cancer increases after our surgeries.