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I want to live, where soul meet body.
So way back when I started this blog, I mentioned that I'm starting a female-to-male trans process, and would maybe be writing about it at times. Thought that now would be as good a time as any to make good on that.
Now, since Finland is a socialist country we have a free, public health care, which covers the treatments required for a trans-process. There are two specialized transgender health programs, which treat all the trans-people of Finland, one at the Helsinki University Hospital and one at the Tampere University Hospital. Not surprisingly, that means that actually getting an appointment at either place, doesn't really happen overnight.
For one, you'll need to be referred there by a doctor, any GP will do. In theory, getting one should be easy enough, all you have to do is to go to a doctor, tell them that you identify yourself as a trans, and after asking bunch of questions, mostly related to your basic health, the doctor will write a medical statement and sent it to either policlinic, and then you get notified once they have received it. After that you just wait for them to let you know when the first appointment will be.
In theory at least, and fortunately for me personally that's pretty much how easily that part of it went (my GP said he'd written these statements before also, so he had some idea about how to go about it, even if he did ask some stupid questions), but many trans people will run into their first roadblocks at this point. For one, it's not in any way uncommon for the "patient" to be more informed than the doctor, starting with not knowing where should trans patients be referred to or where to sent the statements. There are doctors who'll try to just send trans people to a psychiatrist, claiming that they are just mentally ill. In some cases a doctor may try to refuse to do anything, which, not something they're allowed to do and would be consider malpractice, but well.. Usually pointing this out will be enough to get the statement out of even the most ignoramus of country doctors.
Point being, that when making the decision of starting the medical portion of the trans process, one really needs to be aware of what their rights are, and what can and can't the doctors ask of them. Fortunately we have a really well organized advocacy group for transgendered and intersexual people, on whose site there is a really good and simple document on all the things one should know when seeking to be referred, so the information is out there.
So now you have gotten referred. You've heard for either the Tampere University Hospital or the Helsinki University Hospital (Tampere is the likelier option for most people, as Helsinki mostly treats just people living on or near the Greater Helsinki area.) The appointment should be any day now, right?
Sadly, not quite so. Centering the care in only two places means that the waiting lists are long. So at this point, one will just have to settle down and wait. And we are talking months here. I was referred to Tampere in May, and beyond getting notified that they had received my file about two weeks after my doctors appointment, I've yet to hear so much as a peak from them. Wasn't really expecting to at least until late August either, but now I'm really getting to the point where checking the mail is a daily exercise in swallowing disappointment. I'm not the most patient person and every day that nothing happens my frustration grows and grows.
Something that at the moment isn't helped at all by two of my friends who started the process about a year earlier than I did. For most part, is really great having close friends who are going through something this huge and life altering about the same time you are, as you really can't get the same kind of support from anywhere else, but right now, with both of them having been on testosterone since spring, and the physical changes caused by that are starting to become really obvious. I just can't help the jealousy when I hear how much lower their voice has gotten or when they speak about spotting the first facial hair. And that just makes me hate my own ugly high voice and baby smooth chin all the more.
Then there's of course my body, which is about as feminine as you can get, what with having big breast and wide hips. Maybe if I could hold any kind of notion that I'd have a change of passing for a man as things are currently, the waiting might be somewhat easier. Or not. At the very least I wouldn't feel the need to start yelling every time I hear myself being spoken about as a woman. (Question for any cis-gendered person reading this, do you ever notice how much that is done. Not just using male or female pronouns, but stuff like speaking about how some one is such a funny gal or awesome guy and such?)
So that's where I am with my process currently. Waiting. The only good thing is, that my waiting really should be coming to and end sometime in the next two months. Finland has had a law since 2005 about guaranteed treatment, which states that all non-urgent medical conditions requiring specialized care, should be started within six months of being discovered. For me the deadline for that will pass in November. Hopefully I won't have to wait quite that long however. Even if it's starting to feel like any waiting is becoming too much.
And that's all for now, since I really need to be sleeping already. I'll try to get around to doing another post soon enough about what'll happen once I actually get the appointment. For now, I'm more than happy to answer any and all questions any one has so feel free to shoot them.
Now, since Finland is a socialist country we have a free, public health care, which covers the treatments required for a trans-process. There are two specialized transgender health programs, which treat all the trans-people of Finland, one at the Helsinki University Hospital and one at the Tampere University Hospital. Not surprisingly, that means that actually getting an appointment at either place, doesn't really happen overnight.
For one, you'll need to be referred there by a doctor, any GP will do. In theory, getting one should be easy enough, all you have to do is to go to a doctor, tell them that you identify yourself as a trans, and after asking bunch of questions, mostly related to your basic health, the doctor will write a medical statement and sent it to either policlinic, and then you get notified once they have received it. After that you just wait for them to let you know when the first appointment will be.
In theory at least, and fortunately for me personally that's pretty much how easily that part of it went (my GP said he'd written these statements before also, so he had some idea about how to go about it, even if he did ask some stupid questions), but many trans people will run into their first roadblocks at this point. For one, it's not in any way uncommon for the "patient" to be more informed than the doctor, starting with not knowing where should trans patients be referred to or where to sent the statements. There are doctors who'll try to just send trans people to a psychiatrist, claiming that they are just mentally ill. In some cases a doctor may try to refuse to do anything, which, not something they're allowed to do and would be consider malpractice, but well.. Usually pointing this out will be enough to get the statement out of even the most ignoramus of country doctors.
Point being, that when making the decision of starting the medical portion of the trans process, one really needs to be aware of what their rights are, and what can and can't the doctors ask of them. Fortunately we have a really well organized advocacy group for transgendered and intersexual people, on whose site there is a really good and simple document on all the things one should know when seeking to be referred, so the information is out there.
So now you have gotten referred. You've heard for either the Tampere University Hospital or the Helsinki University Hospital (Tampere is the likelier option for most people, as Helsinki mostly treats just people living on or near the Greater Helsinki area.) The appointment should be any day now, right?
Sadly, not quite so. Centering the care in only two places means that the waiting lists are long. So at this point, one will just have to settle down and wait. And we are talking months here. I was referred to Tampere in May, and beyond getting notified that they had received my file about two weeks after my doctors appointment, I've yet to hear so much as a peak from them. Wasn't really expecting to at least until late August either, but now I'm really getting to the point where checking the mail is a daily exercise in swallowing disappointment. I'm not the most patient person and every day that nothing happens my frustration grows and grows.
Something that at the moment isn't helped at all by two of my friends who started the process about a year earlier than I did. For most part, is really great having close friends who are going through something this huge and life altering about the same time you are, as you really can't get the same kind of support from anywhere else, but right now, with both of them having been on testosterone since spring, and the physical changes caused by that are starting to become really obvious. I just can't help the jealousy when I hear how much lower their voice has gotten or when they speak about spotting the first facial hair. And that just makes me hate my own ugly high voice and baby smooth chin all the more.
Then there's of course my body, which is about as feminine as you can get, what with having big breast and wide hips. Maybe if I could hold any kind of notion that I'd have a change of passing for a man as things are currently, the waiting might be somewhat easier. Or not. At the very least I wouldn't feel the need to start yelling every time I hear myself being spoken about as a woman. (Question for any cis-gendered person reading this, do you ever notice how much that is done. Not just using male or female pronouns, but stuff like speaking about how some one is such a funny gal or awesome guy and such?)
So that's where I am with my process currently. Waiting. The only good thing is, that my waiting really should be coming to and end sometime in the next two months. Finland has had a law since 2005 about guaranteed treatment, which states that all non-urgent medical conditions requiring specialized care, should be started within six months of being discovered. For me the deadline for that will pass in November. Hopefully I won't have to wait quite that long however. Even if it's starting to feel like any waiting is becoming too much.
And that's all for now, since I really need to be sleeping already. I'll try to get around to doing another post soon enough about what'll happen once I actually get the appointment. For now, I'm more than happy to answer any and all questions any one has so feel free to shoot them.