Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1020 ｜ Botched： The Brutality of Trans Mastectomies ｜ Guest： Soren Aldaco

00:00:00.000 In 2021, at age 19, Sorin Aldaco underwent a double mastectomy as part of her gender 1.00

00:00:07.400 transition.

00:00:08.620 Shortly after the surgery, Sorin began to experience horrific complications, which the

00:00:13.380 clinic that performed her surgery ignored.

00:00:16.240 Now, after detransitioning, she's suing the doctors involved for gross malpractice. 0.99

00:00:22.300 There are so many nuggets of wisdom for parents within Sorin's story.

00:00:27.200 Please share this episode with every parent that you know.

00:00:32.280 Just a heads up.

00:00:33.460 It is a graphic story.

00:00:35.380 So if your kids listen to Relatable, just know that.

00:00:38.460 But the details she shares are absolutely necessary to understanding the seriousness of what occurred

00:00:46.140 and what is going on on a large scale.

00:00:49.920 This episode of Relatable is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.

00:00:52.840 Go to GoodRanchers.com.

00:00:54.060 Use code Allie at checkout. 1.00

00:00:55.140 That's GoodRanchers.com, code Allie.

00:00:57.200 Soren, thanks so much for taking the time to join us.

00:01:10.580 If you could tell everyone just who you are and what you do.

00:01:14.600 So my name is Sorin Aldaco.

00:01:16.400 I am a, first of all, a seventh generation Texan.

00:01:22.420 But beyond that, I am a fourth year humanities honors student at the University of Texas at Austin.

00:01:28.860 I'm a sister.

00:01:29.980 I'm a daughter.

00:01:31.840 And I'm also a detransitioner.

00:01:34.480 Yeah.

00:01:35.100 So, yeah.

00:01:35.960 And I first saw your story on X.

00:01:38.920 This might have even been back when it was Twitter.

00:01:41.840 It was Twitter.

00:01:42.280 Yes, yes.

00:01:43.800 And I saw your story where you talked about the complications that you endured after your double mastectomy, right?

00:01:55.140 Yeah.

00:01:55.240 And that, those complications and then the fallout after have kind of taken over a good portion of your life for the past few years, right?

00:02:04.480 Oh, yeah, absolutely.

00:02:05.980 The double mastectomy was definitely a turning point for me.

00:02:09.180 Six months after the double mastectomy, I actually detransitioned medically and ideologically.

00:02:15.160 And so it definitely has taken up a portion of my life.

00:02:18.040 I'd like to say that I'm pretty functional.

00:02:19.560 So it doesn't take up as much of my life as it once did.

00:02:23.420 But, yeah, no, it is a pretty significant thing to have happen to you at age 19.

00:02:27.220 And I'm almost 22 now as of Monday.

00:02:29.600 Wow.

00:02:30.020 Happy birthday.

00:02:30.940 Thank you.

00:02:31.320 I appreciate it.

00:02:32.100 Okay, before we get into that, let's back all the way up to your childhood.

00:02:38.400 Now that you kind of have this hindsight and you've detransitioned and you can look back to when you were little, identified as a tomboy, you can kind of see maybe the path that took you to transitioning.

00:02:53.340 So just tell us, take us back there.

00:02:56.180 Tell us kind of how this all started.

00:02:57.980 Yeah, so, wow, that's a long way to go back.

00:03:01.600 But I guess the easiest place to start is when I was born.

00:03:05.900 My mom was a single mom. 0.69

00:03:07.660 Her and my dad had some disagreements surrounding her pregnancy.

00:03:11.260 And so I was born to her May 13, 2002.

00:03:15.200 And we lived with my great-grandparents for a good period of time.

00:03:18.600 Next door to my great-grandparents were my mom's mom and her stepdad.

00:03:23.700 My mom's mom, my grandma, had my mom at age 15. 0.99

00:03:27.920 She's a type 1 diabetic.

00:03:29.380 So thank goodness she had her so young because she wouldn't have been able to have a child later on. 0.92

00:03:33.600 Wow.

00:03:35.160 But that definitely played a role being raised by a single mom and also my grandparents.

00:03:39.140 Because my mom was a pharmacy tech, so she was working all the time. 0.87

00:03:41.600 Her stepmom, my other grandmother, ran a daycare out of her home. 0.97

00:03:46.100 So she knew kids inside and out.

00:03:48.620 And I would spend the days with her and the nights with my grandparents off of Cedar Street.

00:03:53.280 And at around age 4, my mom met my stepdad online.

00:03:58.220 And after a month of dating, he became disabled.

00:04:01.880 He had a work injury.

00:04:03.620 He slipped and he broke his back.

00:04:05.500 And they became married after three months.

00:04:08.220 Wow.

00:04:08.460 Yeah, and so I was really excited to have him be my dad.

00:04:12.860 But being raised by a mom who was like chronically stressed out, depressed, had really bad postpartum depression.

00:04:20.000 And then a dad who really wanted to be there, who really loved me.

00:04:23.060 He had two kids of his own prior to this marriage.

00:04:25.560 But had a really hard time expressing that because of a spinal fusion.

00:04:29.020 He now, I think, today has a five and a half level spinal fusion.

00:04:32.280 And is still getting surgeries.

00:04:33.660 He's had like 20 minor and like five major, if I recall correctly.

00:04:37.000 Maybe six major at this point.

00:04:38.460 It was really hard.

00:04:39.960 And so I spent a good period of my time helping care for him, like doing chores for him.

00:04:45.500 And so my mom's family, unfortunately, didn't like him very much just because disability is a really hard thing.

00:04:52.000 And they had a different vision for her.

00:04:53.560 And with her mom having such a hard time raising her, they wanted something better for her, right?

00:04:57.880 And so we ended up moving in with his stepmom.

00:05:00.300 And while we were living with his stepmom.

00:05:02.200 Your stepdad's stepmom?

00:05:03.380 Yeah.

00:05:03.980 So my, no, my, sorry, my stepdad's mom.

00:05:06.060 Okay.

00:05:06.400 So while living with my stepdad's mom, I endured some pretty awful things there.

00:05:12.380 Or they were raised in a time where like physical punishment was a lot more common.

00:05:18.360 And so me being very hyperactive, having been ripped away from my grandparents who had raised me and placed into this foreign home with a foreign family. 1.00

00:05:26.760 You know, I'm just my mom there.

00:05:27.640 I was, um, I was like six years old.

00:05:30.280 Okay.

00:05:30.740 Yeah.

00:05:31.060 So like very formative years, old enough to understand that there's something going on and young enough for it really, really to affect you.

00:05:38.700 Oh yeah.

00:05:38.940 And have like, again, having to not take on the burden, but to definitely have to bear some extra weight in the family because my stepdad being disabled, like it was tough.

00:05:46.920 And I was made to do a lot of chores there.

00:05:48.580 If I misbehaved, I remember one time they put me in the shower and I got sprayed with cold water.

00:05:52.660 Um, it was really tough.

00:05:54.340 So those were punishments that you endured because you were being disobedient or you were being, as you said, too hyperactive.

00:06:02.320 Too hyperactive.

00:06:03.200 And it sort of culminated in at age seven, my, uh, step grandmother, my stepdad's mom pinning me down and backhanding me.

00:06:11.300 And so we had a CPS case open at that point, moved back in.

00:06:15.160 Uh, my mom like swooped me up when she came home and found out what happened and took me out of there as a mom does.

00:06:20.880 Right.

00:06:21.200 Yeah.

00:06:21.640 And, um, with a CPS case being open, the school found out that we had moved away from where we were zoned for my elementary school and, um, obviously got very mad.

00:06:31.180 So we moved back in town.

00:06:32.260 And I guess that period of my life was marked by taking on more responsibilities.

00:06:37.080 My parents no longer having someone in the home.

00:06:39.220 And that's a huge thing I think we're facing today is like these sort of, um, we were going from multi-generation homes to this sort of nuclear family.

00:06:45.780 And it was really tough for my mom being a working mother. 0.99

00:06:47.580 Like she'd come home from work and my, my stepdad would obviously want time with her because their husband and wife, but I was her child and I wanted time with her too.

00:06:55.920 And so it made for this really, um, sort of stilted family dynamic where I was pitted against my stepdad in many ways.

00:07:05.480 And not by any fault of ours, just, I mean, being disabled and having that happen and, you know, this sort of resentment, I guess, built over time because I didn't necessarily have that tender love and care that I think a lot of kids need.

00:07:18.660 Um, and so, uh, you were carrying a lot on your, on your shoulders and there may have been even subconsciously this feeling of guilt.

00:07:29.100 Like, am I adding a burden onto my mom?

00:07:32.800 Am I making this more complicated?

00:07:35.060 The thing was, I mean, I definitely felt that I remember around fifth or sixth grade.

00:07:39.020 Um, I stopped asking my parents for lunch money, um, and they never told me like, they never told me no, like if I asked them for lunch money, but I definitely could tell like, okay, they're really tight for cash.

00:07:49.580 And, um, I just, I stopped asking for it.

00:07:52.320 I'd, I'd get little bits of lunch for my friends.

00:07:54.420 I was getting fed, you know, but yeah, no, I could tell, I could tell that there was some extra weight just by me being there.

00:07:59.500 Um, and I wanted to alleviate that, but I think part of what I really started to, um, act out more, uh, was around fifth or sixth grade around that same time period where I was really starting to take notice what was going on the home.

00:08:13.880 I was really precocious.

00:08:14.720 I was in the gifted program growing up.

00:08:16.880 Um, and I guess to go back just a little bit, I was around the time that I faced the abuse, um, by my step-grandmother, um, I was put on ADHD medicine.

00:08:26.280 I was diagnosed with ADHD for being too hyper at school.

00:08:29.720 Um, and no one really thought like, oh, maybe this kid has PTSD from the CPS case.

00:08:34.260 It was just sort of like a one and done.

00:08:36.000 Here's a medical solution to your psychological problem.

00:08:38.980 Was it where the teachers saying, Hey, she needs to be on ADHD medication. 0.97

00:08:43.960 So it wasn't your step-grandmother.

00:08:45.920 No, it was.

00:08:46.880 Yeah.

00:08:46.940 We were not talking to my step-grandmother at this point, but I will say a few weeks after this, me being like seven years old at this point, I realized that she had forgotten to like, or she,

00:08:55.900 yeah, was off of her meds at the time.

00:08:57.920 And so I quickly forgave her and didn't really spend a lot of time with her after that.

00:09:01.680 But I sort of, you know, was like, okay, I understand the bigger picture, which is so funny because I think from an early age, I sort of had this philanthropic view of the world that it was like bigger than me and my own pain.

00:09:12.280 Yeah.

00:09:12.740 Which is so funny.

00:09:13.360 So much to carry as a, as a seven year old.

00:09:16.420 But I, I've always had those sort of, um, this sort of bigger picture view on things.

00:09:20.760 Yeah.

00:09:21.000 Um, and so I guess going back to fifth or sixth grade, um, I got my first internet connected device.

00:09:27.040 I got a DSI.

00:09:28.440 So that's the DS, but connected to the internet.

00:09:30.800 Um, and I discovered the world of online art where I could do flip notes and sort of animate.

00:09:36.100 And I, okay, this was like 2000, 2011, 2011, 2012.

00:09:43.100 Yeah.

00:09:43.240 Pretty.

00:09:43.860 Yeah.

00:09:44.280 I was probably like nine, 10, 11 years old.

00:09:45.960 Oh my goodness.

00:09:46.440 And, um, online I got into fandoms.

00:09:49.180 Like I got into like, I was really into the Phineas and Ferb fandom at the time, which is so funny because that's like a random Disney cartoon.

00:09:54.860 I'm 10 years older than you.

00:09:56.180 So some of these things I might not even know because they were like, I was like in college.

00:10:00.140 It was like Disney back when Disney was like kind of okay.

00:10:02.860 Yeah.

00:10:03.140 Um, but yeah, I was really into art and I was really into the sort of like fanfare of being into something and having this community that you're into something with.

00:10:10.480 And, um, that's where I started to get into some bad corners of the internet.

00:10:15.220 I got into, um, this web comic where I was talking to a lot of older people.

00:10:19.580 I remember the first anime convention I went to, they played spin the bottle.

00:10:22.820 Um, I was like 11.

00:10:24.680 Oh my goodness.

00:10:25.260 Yeah.

00:10:25.380 It was awful.

00:10:25.920 And I remember I was really into role-playing.

00:10:27.860 Like I was really into role-playing and it's actually a super healthy part of our development role-playing.

00:10:31.900 Um, like imagination, playing house, things like that that little kids do.

00:10:35.880 Kids play cops and robbers to learn what it's like to be brave and mischievous.

00:10:39.300 And so, um, taking on the role of others, how we create a sense of self.

00:10:43.300 And so it's really healthy, but I think it can, it's a vulnerable time.

00:10:47.600 Um, and it's a vulnerable time that is really easy to take advantage of when you're like a 38-year-old pedophile on the internet.

00:10:53.540 And so this is something that I think I share with a lot of people my age.

00:10:57.780 Um, and I've talked about this before that I think this is going to be one of the next Me Too style movements is people my age.

00:11:03.900 Um, and I'm 22 being groomed on the internet around ages 11, 12, you know, even as young as 9 or 10.

00:11:10.780 Yeah.

00:11:11.180 And so that definitely made womanhood a very scary thing for me. 0.99

00:11:15.260 And your parents, they didn't monitor at all what you were doing online.

00:11:19.840 Oh, they did.

00:11:20.360 They totally did.

00:11:21.300 My stepdad, because of his disability, um, and him knowing that he wasn't able to look after me in the way that he wanted to, he was hypervigilant.

00:11:27.960 And so it's like, I had sort of parenting myself on one hand, but being over-parented on the other hand.

00:11:33.340 And so he'd put like parental controls on everything, but I was smart.

00:11:36.140 And so I'd put parental controls on my own devices and convince my parents that they just forgot the password, like stuff like that.

00:11:41.860 And it wasn't like this big show of things.

00:11:44.320 Um, but I mean, kids my age were the first digital natives.

00:11:48.040 We know how to outsmart the millennials and the Gen X's and the boomers when it comes to tech. 0.83

00:11:52.700 And that can be a great thing when it's helping grandma navigate Facebook, right?

00:11:57.040 That can be an awful thing when you're 11 years old and you have this unfiltered access to chat rooms and social media.

00:12:05.600 Yeah.

00:12:05.860 Um, and so that was pretty awful.

00:12:07.840 I mean, I remember, I think when I finally got out of it, there are some sane adults out there.

00:12:11.760 I remember this gentleman, I was like, aren't I sexy?

00:12:14.140 And he was like, no, you're a child.

00:12:16.620 And I, this is in like a chat room.

00:12:18.520 This is in a chat room.

00:12:19.260 So having to do with like anime and role playing.

00:12:21.760 Well, it evolved from anime and role playing to just general role playing.

00:12:25.120 Cause I was just really craving that connection.

00:12:26.680 Is this like on Tumblr or?

00:12:28.220 No, this is on, this is, there's like chat room websites.

00:12:31.000 The one that this happened on is actually still active today.

00:12:34.240 Um, and I don't really know that because of the anonymity that there's really any way to hold these people accountable.

00:12:39.300 And it's awful.

00:12:40.140 But like I said, unfortunately, there's people out there who are sane who I was able to kind of listen to and have this moment of like, oh my gosh, I am 11.

00:12:47.260 Like, you're right.

00:12:48.300 I'm a child.

00:12:48.880 I'm not sexy.

00:12:49.540 And I snapped out of it.

00:12:51.000 But around that age, being in the online circles that I was on, I was starting to be exposed to ideas of like other sort of predatory ideas.

00:13:00.600 Um, around this age, I was still on the internet a lot.

00:13:03.840 I was still role playing.

00:13:04.620 And I, in part of this role play came across, um, another girl, three years older than me, who was an amazing artist.

00:13:11.520 Like I looked up to her because I was like, oh my gosh, you can draw realistically.

00:13:14.740 And it's so cute.

00:13:15.840 Are you artistic?

00:13:16.640 I am artistic.

00:13:17.440 I, not as artistic today as I once was, but definitely a little bit artistically inclined.

00:13:22.840 And I looked up to her and became friends.

00:13:25.300 And then eventually we started like, quote unquote, dating.

00:13:27.820 And it was mostly just like we FaceTime each other a lot.

00:13:30.140 Like it's like having a best friend, but through this sort of lens of LGBT, where, um, if you're attracted to anyone, uh, they're, they must be your girlfriend and they must be your boyfriend. 0.60

00:13:39.040 So at this point, because back in my day, I guess it would have been like early two thousands that I was like 10, 11, I would not have known what it meant to be gay.

00:13:52.280 I would not have known at nine, 10, 11, what LGBTQ was. 0.72

00:13:57.140 So had you been already introduced to that idea or did you just find yourself sincerely attracted to this girl?

00:14:05.340 So growing up, I was attracted to boys like pretty thoroughly.

00:14:08.280 Like I was attracted to my pediatrician.

00:14:10.520 I was attracted to a little boy who looked like him.

00:14:13.100 I had boyfriends all throughout fourth and fifth grade.

00:14:15.500 But I think after, um, that experience being groomed online, um, men were just terrifying to me.

00:14:22.020 Um, and also around that age in sixth grade, you know, the boys started getting more vulgar.

00:14:25.820 Like I had boys who threatened to rate me, um, just awful things at school.

00:14:30.460 Yeah.

00:14:30.560 And they got in trouble.

00:14:31.280 Don't get me wrong.

00:14:31.900 Like the teachers, when they found out, they were like, no, like they shut it down real quick.

00:14:34.940 But once that's happening, you have those thoughts in your head of what you're supposed to be.

00:14:38.300 And you combine them with this idea of being sexy online.

00:14:41.060 Yeah.

00:14:41.540 And like, what else are you supposed to think about yourself?

00:14:43.700 So you're going through puberty and you're not only getting groomed online and you kind of realized when you were like 11 that, oh, I am kind of being preyed upon.

00:15:05.680 This is not normal.

00:15:06.560 I'm not sexy.

00:15:07.300 People shouldn't be talking to me like this.

00:15:09.060 And then at school, you're getting basically sexually harassed.

00:15:13.200 And so I'm sure that there was a part of you that was like, oh, it is my femininity doing this.

00:15:18.360 It is my body, my figure.

00:15:20.820 It is my female identity that is causing these men to prey upon me.

00:15:25.800 And that can be a really kind of scary, uncomfortable feeling when you're just going through puberty.

00:15:31.480 Oh, it absolutely was.

00:15:32.540 And I was, I was quick to develop too.

00:15:34.540 Um, every woman in my family has big boobs and for me, um, because my family was poor, like we didn't eat well.

00:15:41.740 And so I gained weight faster than my peers and therefore started my period earlier than my peers.

00:15:46.940 And that was really scary too, is just, I didn't look like the other girls in a lot of ways.

00:15:50.940 I played softball.

00:15:51.860 I was a tomboy.

00:15:52.820 My favorite shirt growing up said tomboy on it.

00:15:54.720 And I was really proud of, um, of being my, my coach used to call me her dirt baby.

00:15:59.720 Like I, I lived in the dirt and so that was really tough, but I think online going back

00:16:05.600 to the whole flip note art thing, I would take these surveys and I've always loved talking

00:16:09.820 about myself and not like a conceited way, but in like a wisdom way, like, here's what

00:16:13.020 I know about myself.

00:16:13.900 Here's what I've learned.

00:16:14.900 Let's share kind of like what we're doing right now, right?

00:16:16.860 We're sharing information.

00:16:19.000 And, um, I used to fill out these little surveys that were just fun and games, but parts

00:16:22.060 would be like, okay, what's your name?

00:16:23.260 How old are you?

00:16:24.180 What's your sexual orientation?

00:16:25.700 I remember being so confused.

00:16:27.160 I think my first exposure to homosexuality was watching Glee when I was in third grade.

00:16:31.860 And what's funny, what's funny about this was I saw Kurt, uh, the like main, like gay 1.00

00:16:36.180 character on Glee.

00:16:37.380 And I was like, mommy, is he a girl?

00:16:39.820 You know, is that a girl? 0.99

00:16:40.900 Like, I don't understand.

00:16:41.880 Cause it's this like really effeminate person with short hair.

00:16:45.640 Um, and what I learned in a developmental psychology class recently is that kids at that age, if you

00:16:50.080 show them a Ken doll and ask them what the gender is, they're going to say it's a boy.

00:16:53.020 But if you put that Ken doll in a ballerina outfit, they're going to say it's a girl.

00:16:56.200 Cause at that age, they have no concept of sex constancy.

00:16:59.200 Their idea of boy and girl are stereotypes and that's much how I was.

00:17:03.340 And so, um, growing up, like I started to consider like, would I be attracted to girls?

00:17:07.480 And then with the whole online thing, it wasn't like a real attraction.

00:17:10.060 Like it wasn't like I was physically attracted to them, like going through the, the, the show

00:17:14.920 and the motions of puberty.

00:17:16.360 Right.

00:17:16.720 Um, it was more like, this is someone I want to be close to.

00:17:19.760 And I think that's totally normal for girls and boys at that age to feel, you know, we

00:17:24.400 only really are around people of our own sex at that point.

00:17:27.480 It's normal to feel like to want to be close to them.

00:17:30.180 So you're about 11 years old.

00:17:31.940 You start talking to this girl who you said is about three years older than you.

00:17:35.820 So she's, okay.

00:17:37.060 So she is 14, a little bit older, but still a child herself.

00:17:40.540 And then tell us how that developed and then how that kind of led into questioning, not

00:17:45.200 just your sexuality, but your gender.

00:17:47.580 Oh yeah.

00:17:47.980 So, um, like I said, we FaceTimed a lot.

00:17:50.880 We'd role play our original characters together.

00:17:53.920 And, um, all of a sudden one day she came back to me.

00:17:57.540 What's involved in, in role playing online?

00:18:00.240 Like, okay.

00:18:00.720 So there's variants of that.

00:18:03.740 Like, um, I was a part of a hunger games role play website that I actually really like.

00:18:08.080 Um, and that's like long form where you're writing like a sort of like collaborative

00:18:11.480 novel.

00:18:12.180 So that's not what this was.

00:18:13.580 Okay.

00:18:13.840 Um, you have like text based messages where you're sending like almost like a text message

00:18:17.280 back and forth.

00:18:17.860 And that's another thing.

00:18:18.620 But what we were doing was we were drawing.

00:18:20.300 So we would draw and our character would say something.

00:18:22.460 We'd kind of like create this scene and the person would reply and draw something and

00:18:26.640 create the other half of the scene.

00:18:27.920 And so it kind of goes back and forth.

00:18:28.860 I can totally see how that would be really fun.

00:18:30.460 It's so fun.

00:18:31.720 For, and maybe even addicting to a child who is artistic and has found a new friend.

00:18:38.360 But that's how I learned what kissing was.

00:18:39.900 That's how I learned about some of these more lewd concepts.

00:18:41.640 Cause I was role playing with people older than me.

00:18:43.900 Um, and some of them were only like 16 and that's not that old.

00:18:47.220 I mean, even compared to me today, like I consider 16 year olds babies.

00:18:51.160 And so.

00:18:51.800 Developmentally compared to an 11 year old.

00:18:53.340 Oh my gosh.

00:18:53.940 It's night and day.

00:18:54.580 Oh, it's night and day.

00:18:55.740 And so, um, with her, she came out as transgender to me and was like, you know, I feel more like a

00:19:00.680 boy, she remember she drew this picture where it's like a, uh, pink body, but a blue head.

00:19:06.600 And it was literally like, I have a boy's mind and a girl's body.

00:19:09.640 Like these very early concepts of feeling different, but acknowledging that your, your body's female.

00:19:15.860 Right.

00:19:16.520 And I remember thinking, oh my gosh.

00:19:18.160 Yeah.

00:19:18.300 I mean, it made sense to me in the way that I talked about that.

00:19:21.340 Like Kindle metaphor where I was like, oh yeah, like I like sports and I'm kind of like

00:19:25.860 assertive and loud.

00:19:27.060 Like these super, like they're just stereotypes essentially.

00:19:30.940 And so from that point I was like, you know, maybe I'm like non-binary, like maybe I'm like

00:19:34.440 a Demi boy was what I said, which was kind of like, I'm a boy, but I know I'm not fully

00:19:37.580 a boy.

00:19:38.380 You knew those terms.

00:19:39.240 Yeah.

00:19:39.440 Well, through meeting this person and being in this online community, then you go on Tumblr

00:19:43.440 and then you have this like, you know, no dearth of knowledge presented to you of like,

00:19:47.260 okay, here are the 50 flags, you know?

00:19:49.920 And so, I mean, I learned very quickly.

00:19:52.300 I mean, that's, that was my life story is learning quickly.

00:19:54.580 And this was no different.

00:19:56.880 I picked up this knowledge like a sponge.

00:19:58.980 I absorbed it.

00:20:00.200 And, um, pretty soon I was identifying as trans, but again, it was more like a role play 0.97

00:20:03.680 thing.

00:20:04.000 It was more like a role I was taking on.

00:20:06.160 Um, but it didn't really translate over to my real life very well, other than wanting

00:20:09.500 short hair, but I was a catcher in softball.

00:20:11.160 I wanted short hair for a different reason, you know?

00:20:13.420 Okay.

00:20:13.760 So what happened from there?

00:20:15.600 You said that it was more role playing, but when did it become public?

00:20:18.560 When did you start talking about being trans?

00:20:20.700 Yeah.

00:20:21.120 So, um, in, so my childhood school district was K through six, seven through nine and 10

00:20:27.380 through 12.

00:20:28.140 And so when I reached seventh grade, which is shortly after when I began identifying as

00:20:33.640 transgender, I was in a new school.

00:20:35.960 I actually transferred to a magnet junior high.

00:20:38.940 So I was no longer with the peers I had grown up with.

00:20:41.820 I was taking Arabic classes and I was in orchestra and I thought there's, there's this whole new

00:20:47.680 peer group.

00:20:48.660 I want to go by a different name.

00:20:50.780 So the time I went by Colin and, um, it was again, just friends calling me a different

00:20:55.940 name, trying to get teachers too.

00:20:57.580 But the teachers were kind of like, no, like we're going to go by what's on the roster.

00:21:01.060 I'm not like a mean way, but kind of like kids do silly stuff all the time.

00:21:04.720 I'm not going to call you Skippy, you know? 0.65

00:21:07.060 Um, yeah.

00:21:07.540 And at that time it was still, it just wasn't as mainstream.

00:21:11.140 It wasn't really a political issue.

00:21:13.680 And this was only 10 years ago.

00:21:14.920 Yeah.

00:21:15.100 This was only 10 years ago and it wasn't really a political issue in the same way.

00:21:18.120 Yeah.

00:21:18.820 Um, this was before Target even had pride march, by the way, like there was nothing.

00:21:22.420 And so, um, going to this new school, like friends started calling me these new names

00:21:26.380 and I played with a few different names.

00:21:27.480 But then what really happened was I, so I was going and I was, so I was interested in this

00:21:32.800 program that Duke university put on.

00:21:34.840 Um, it was the talent identification program.

00:21:37.200 You would take, uh, your SATs in seventh grade.

00:21:39.840 And if you scored well, you could take college courses over the summer or an equivalent to

00:21:44.240 a college course.

00:21:45.140 And I scored in like the 86th percentile at age 12.

00:21:49.460 And, um, I started taking classes, uh, in seventh grade.

00:21:53.100 And that was where I was able to be like a boy for three weeks.

00:21:56.520 Like they didn't really question it because it's a university.

00:21:58.580 It's more liberal.

00:21:59.500 Like a lot of these children come from liberal backgrounds.

00:22:02.720 Um, and also college is a very liberal space.

00:22:05.880 And so taking these classes, um, it was like my ability to sort of slip away for those three

00:22:11.700 weeks.

00:22:11.860 And I think there was a confounding variable there of just being able to be out of the

00:22:15.040 stress of my home.

00:22:16.180 You know, I was like, Oh, I'm, I feel so great.

00:22:18.060 I'm being accepted for my gender identity.

00:22:19.380 But in reality it was like, I feel so great.

00:22:20.800 I'm not having to make my dad Kool-Aid.

00:22:22.320 Like, you know, it was, it was that confounding variable at play.

00:22:24.980 And so I took these, uh, courses over the summer for four years from the summer between

00:22:30.860 seventh and eighth, eighth and ninth, ninth and 10th and 10th and 11th.

00:22:34.220 And so that was definitely a formative experience for me when I came back from that summer camp.

00:22:37.900 I was like, okay, guys, like I'm a boy.

00:22:39.480 Like I, I need to have this feeling.

00:22:41.600 It's like addictive.

00:22:42.160 Like I need to have this feeling at home.

00:22:43.600 I love being affirmed.

00:22:44.660 Like it makes me feel right.

00:22:46.220 You know, it's what, it just feels right.

00:22:47.800 It's like that sort of like obsessive compulsive.

00:22:49.520 Like it just feels right.

00:22:50.420 So were you dressing like a boy when you were there?

00:22:53.840 I have short hair.

00:22:55.020 Like I had short hair.

00:22:56.020 I'd wear cargo shorts. 0.97

00:22:57.600 I just looked kind of butch. 0.57

00:22:58.800 Like it wasn't, I looked like a tomboy.

00:22:59.800 You weren't like chest binding?

00:23:01.280 No, not until, um, eighth grade.

00:23:03.600 Not until eighth grade.

00:23:04.180 And a friend's mom bought me my first chest binder and I only had one and I only wore it

00:23:07.420 occasionally.

00:23:08.060 Wow.

00:23:08.080 A friend's mom.

00:23:08.400 Okay.

00:23:08.600 Yeah.

00:23:08.720 And I only really wore it, um, to summer camp.

00:23:11.600 I didn't wear it a lot.

00:23:12.520 Like unless I was cosplaying.

00:23:13.580 And this was a lot of how I got my parents to be kind of okay with it was I was like, I'm just

00:23:16.880 cosplaying mom.

00:23:17.660 Like I like cosplaying the boys.

00:23:18.660 The boys are the more interesting characters, which is still true. 0.92

00:23:20.580 Like a lot of the girls in anime are sexy and they have these big boobs and like they 1.00

00:23:24.460 wear like little to no clothing.

00:23:25.920 Whereas the boys are like leading adventures and like doing fun things and being like well-rounded

00:23:30.060 human beings.

00:23:31.520 Um, and so, I mean, I wanted to cosplay boys and that's how my mom was like, okay, like

00:23:34.940 the binders, whatever, you know, which is fine.

00:23:37.140 I mean, like if you want to cosplay a boy, like having a flat chest looks more realistic.

00:23:41.200 And, um, I think from that point on, like it just became a mixture of me becoming

00:23:48.240 more insistent on it or about it.

00:23:51.240 But then also my friends seeing how happy I was and I was coming out of my shell, but

00:23:55.080 I was also growing up.

00:23:56.120 Like I was going through puberty.

00:23:57.540 Kids find a personality during this age.

00:24:00.040 Um, and so, uh, I remember in ninth grade I buzzed my head and that was like a big point

00:24:04.820 because at that point I'd still kind of had a fringe.

00:24:07.140 Um, it was nice to just be able to self-express how I wanted to at that time.

00:24:11.000 And that's like the biggest thing was just like, if I hadn't have received so much push

00:24:15.140 back from school personnel, from my mom, for having short hair, for wanting to wear boys

00:24:19.080 clothes, quote unquote.

00:24:20.600 Um, I think it would have been a lot easier for me to envision myself as a girl doing these

00:24:24.780 things instead of having to see being a boy as a prerequisite.

00:24:28.400 Um, so you said that there was pushback.

00:24:30.560 Yeah.

00:24:30.720 Like my mom didn't want me to originally cut my hair shorter than my mid neck.

00:24:34.560 Um, my grandma bought me boys clothes cause I wouldn't shut up about it.

00:24:37.560 And she bought a lot of my clothes cause again, my family was not very well off my mom's mom.

00:24:42.760 My mom's mom.

00:24:43.340 Yeah.

00:24:43.860 Um, and she and I have always been really close, not as much in recent years cause I feel like

00:24:46.900 I put my family through the ringer with my transition, but we're getting there.

00:24:49.820 Like I'm going to see her later today, but she doesn't know yet.

00:24:51.860 So, um, but yeah.

00:24:55.120 And so around age, uh, around ninth grade when I'm transitioning to high school, like the

00:25:00.020 next year, I really started to embody this more.

00:25:02.280 Some of my teachers started calling me by the name I wanted to go by.

00:25:05.420 They started using he, him sparingly.

00:25:07.380 Some of my peers were using him.

00:25:08.620 So it was a very, very gradual thing.

00:25:10.760 And how did you feel when people would call you Colin or would people would say he, him?

00:25:15.520 Yeah.

00:25:15.880 Well, I, um, I felt like it became a sort of regular thing, I guess.

00:25:21.940 Like it was background noise.

00:25:23.420 Um, but I would notice when people used my given name or use she, her, but I like put up

00:25:27.860 with it.

00:25:28.100 Like my family used my given name, my family used she, her, and it wasn't my favorite thing

00:25:31.700 ever.

00:25:31.880 But I also like, didn't like, like my, it wasn't my favorite thing ever to interact with

00:25:35.340 my family.

00:25:36.040 Cause I'm like a 13, 14 year old and I have identity issues.

00:25:39.380 My family is sort of dysfunctional.

00:25:40.980 Like, I don't think it was just the transgender thing.

00:25:43.580 Um, but the transgender thing was sort of the mask that everything else laid under. 0.97

00:25:46.960 Okay.

00:25:47.620 Gotcha.

00:25:47.940 So at this point, was there anyone in your life?

00:25:51.800 Like, I know that you have talked about your mom and your, uh, stepdad and then your grandmother

00:25:57.460 on your mom's side.

00:25:58.720 Were there any family members who were like, yeah, this is great.

00:26:02.740 Or any friends who were like, yes, you are definitely a man and we support you.

00:26:07.920 We should keep going in this direction.

00:26:10.380 So, um, a couple of my family members were like tolerant of it.

00:26:15.100 Like they were like, if she wants to make a rainbow, um, perler bead thing at this birthday

00:26:20.780 party, sure.

00:26:22.080 Um, and I had some friends who definitely like, I had the friend whose mom bought me the binder.

00:26:26.080 I had a group of friends within that friend group who were affirmative of me, but more just

00:26:31.280 because they loved me unconditionally, not because it was like an ideological thing.

00:26:34.660 Um, but so, and to, this is an important sort of not tangent, but an important part of the

00:26:40.120 story.

00:26:40.380 I didn't, I didn't meet my dad until I was 15 years old.

00:26:43.820 Um, when I was about 15 years old, I asked my mom like, Hey, look, I know I've bugged you

00:26:48.380 about this for as long as I've been sentient of it.

00:26:50.840 But like, where's my dad?

00:26:52.480 What's up with my dad?

00:26:53.740 Um, my stepdad had showed me pictures of my dad and his family, um, previously.

00:26:58.580 And it sort of came off like, okay, well, he has his own family.

00:27:01.260 He doesn't want you.

00:27:01.980 So, but, um, after bugging her that night, you know, I was 14, 15, I was 15 at this age,

00:27:09.100 um, or at this point, she was like, okay, fine.

00:27:12.340 Here's his last name.

00:27:13.200 You know, his first name go.

00:27:14.500 And so I looked him up on Facebook.

00:27:15.600 I reached out to him and we connected, we did a paternity test and it came back positive.

00:27:20.320 And I found out I had a little sister and a step-mom and, um, it was amazing in many

00:27:24.920 ways because they were better off than my mom. 0.99

00:27:26.680 And so they were able to provide me with things.

00:27:28.640 Like I had one of my first, like, I, I hate to say this cause I had a lot of real Christmases

00:27:33.700 with like my mom and my, my grandma, especially she really made the magic happen. 0.53

00:27:38.120 But like, this was the first time where I was with like a mom and a dad and there was

00:27:41.480 a Christmas tree and there was like traditions, like Santa would drop off our PJs on Christmas

00:27:45.760 Eve night, you know?

00:27:47.280 Um, and I think.

00:27:48.740 So he kind of did, he embraced you.

00:27:50.700 He embraced me in some ways.

00:27:51.980 Um, and after a month of knowing them, uh, I got into a fight with my, my stepdad, sort

00:27:58.060 of the culmination of the tension, uh, that I felt amongst us.

00:28:02.600 And especially with him and I, as we fought for my mom's attention and I had like this huge

00:28:08.200 panic attack, like a sort of pseudo manic episode that resulted in me going to the hospital.

00:28:13.040 And in hindsight, I see this as, okay, you just met your biological father.

00:28:16.620 You have all this beef with your stepdad.

00:28:18.060 Like, obviously something has kind of come to a head, right?

00:28:22.660 But when I went inpatient, um, the focus was on my gender and not at first I met with

00:28:29.560 the psychiatrist, uh, who was named in my lawsuit, uh, Dr. Nekalapu.

00:28:33.980 And while I was seeing him and being interviewed by him, he asked me, you know, why is your name

00:28:40.100 different on your door than on your sheet, on your chart?

00:28:43.800 And I was like, it's just a nickname.

00:28:44.960 Like, it's just a nickname.

00:28:45.800 It's just what I go by.

00:28:46.620 And he was like, you know, like, are you sure?

00:28:50.220 Like, I've heard of some people and he's looking at me, right?

00:28:52.640 I have like short hair and I'm wearing like a chest binder.

00:28:55.420 And like, he's like, you know, there's some people who are uncomfortable with their gender.

00:28:58.100 Like, does that sound, you know, um, does that sound relevant?

00:29:01.820 And I was like, you know, I really want to talk about this.

00:29:03.980 And he's like, I was like, but will you tell my mom?

00:29:05.760 He's like, no, I won't tell your mom.

00:29:07.440 And so I told him like, yeah, I kind of feel like a boy.

00:29:10.940 Like, that's why I go by this name.

00:29:12.240 And, um, but I said, you promise you won't tell my mom because I don't want to talk to

00:29:15.680 her about this until I'm an adult.

00:29:16.840 And I leave.

00:29:19.780 And, um, from what I understand, he went behind my back and he told my mom, um, I remember

00:29:25.400 I was being discharged cause it was like depressing in there.

00:29:27.660 And I mean, that's the point.

00:29:28.340 It's a hospital.

00:29:28.900 It's a mental hospital, but I was very, like I said, precocious.

00:29:30.900 And like, you're 15.

00:29:32.600 I was 15.

00:29:33.260 Okay.

00:29:33.440 Yeah.

00:29:33.580 And I wanted to just like heal and move on.

00:29:36.080 And I was missing my AP classes, you know, and there was like kids like trying to suffocate

00:29:40.800 themselves with beach balls and it just wasn't a great fit.

00:29:42.700 And so I was like, I want to go home.

00:29:44.220 And so they were discharging me.

00:29:45.460 And as I was leaving, they were like, Hey, we're going to have a final meeting with your

00:29:48.180 family.

00:29:49.060 Um, is there anything you don't want to talk about?

00:29:50.760 And I said, the gender stuff, like, I don't want to talk to him about the gender stuff.

00:29:53.140 I was really adamant about that.

00:29:54.040 And the nurse said, I think they already know.

00:29:56.640 And I was like, what do you mean?

00:29:58.160 And she's like, I think they already know.

00:29:59.340 And I go to his office and I'm like, you told them?

00:30:01.220 And he's like, yeah.

00:30:01.800 And that's when I find out, like, I, my family knows I'm transgender now.

00:30:06.880 And according to, um, my dad, my stepmom, my mom kind of sat them down and was like,

00:30:12.300 Hey, look, I don't really know what's going on.

00:30:14.920 Like, I thought she was going to be a lesbian at most. 1.00

00:30:17.760 Like, I don't understand this wanting to be a boy stuff.

00:30:20.080 And so she was like, please, you know, um, that's not really like do the gender thing. 0.94

00:30:25.220 Let's not really do the new name and the new pronouns.

00:30:27.300 Like I, and she was scared.

00:30:28.200 Like she didn't really know how to deal with it.

00:30:29.440 She didn't want to confront it.

00:30:30.120 Her and I didn't talk about it for another year, but within that next year, you know,

00:30:34.540 my dad and my stepmom, they were very hesitant.

00:30:36.200 They were like, yeah, like we don't want to confuse your sister.

00:30:39.400 We, how old was your sister?

00:30:40.780 She was like six, like five or six.

00:30:43.080 So she was young.

00:30:43.900 Yeah.

00:30:44.500 Um, but she kind of picked up on it.

00:30:46.060 Like she knew that I was like gender nonconforming, that they were using they, them pronouns because

00:30:50.600 they were trying to compromise.

00:30:51.340 Like there's this new child they have in their life and they don't know anything about my history.

00:30:55.320 They didn't watch me grow up.

00:30:56.520 They didn't watch me sort of go through this period of depression.

00:30:59.280 And, you know, uh, really hard puberty.

00:31:01.620 Like they get to see me at 15 and things are at their worst, but they're also at their best

00:31:06.080 in many ways.

00:31:06.660 Like I'm not that, you know, like 11 year old cutting herself anymore.

00:31:10.220 Right.

00:31:10.680 Oh, you had been cutting yourself.

00:31:11.980 I had been self-harming as a teenager.

00:31:13.300 And a lot of that I got from like Tumblr and Instagram.

00:31:15.160 Like it wasn't my own idea of like, yeah, let me do this.

00:31:18.020 Um, it was just all part of like, I'm a part of this community.

00:31:21.800 Yeah.

00:31:21.980 I see this person doing it.

00:31:23.560 It's like, you know, you have this feeling of stress and being able to focus all the pain

00:31:27.100 into one point, I think is a lot different than having it just sort of radiate through

00:31:30.360 your person and your soul and your spirit, you know?

00:31:32.480 Um, and so, yeah, at that point, like I felt at home with my dad and my step-mom because

00:31:39.460 they were new.

00:31:40.900 Um, but I was becoming increasingly alienated from my mom and my step-dad, um, because they

00:31:46.320 just didn't get it.

00:31:47.060 They were more conservative.

00:31:48.380 They again had watched me grow up.

00:31:50.100 They just didn't get it.

00:31:51.300 And so, um, I invited my, all my family to go to this transgender support group I had found

00:31:57.500 in Fort Worth, Texas, um, about a year later and my mom went and she was bugged out by

00:32:02.540 it.

00:32:02.680 Like, she was like, this feels kind of cultish.

00:32:04.680 Like there was in this support group, three different sections.

00:32:07.600 There was a section for transgender children.

00:32:10.020 There was a section for transgender adults and there was a section for like significant

00:32:14.040 others, family, friends, and allies.

00:32:16.740 And, um, again, my mom, she just felt pressured to think a certain way.

00:32:21.920 And so she refused to go after that point.

00:32:23.800 Like, she was like, I love you.

00:32:24.800 Like I, I cornered her in a car to come out to her, to make her go to this thing.

00:32:27.980 And she still kind of pushed back and was like, I love you, but like, I don't want to

00:32:31.200 go to another one of those meetings.

00:32:32.180 Like, it's not healthy for me.

00:32:33.980 Um, but I convinced my dad, my step-mom to go and they made fast friends with the people

00:32:37.840 there.

00:32:39.000 Um, and I don't like, I don't blame them at all because they were faced with this really

00:32:43.240 difficult child and they're raising a freaking like five or six year old.

00:32:46.480 Like that's hard enough in and of itself.

00:32:49.100 Um, but to kind of be faced with this problem child and to have this solution presented, like

00:32:52.780 I have a lot of empathy for that.

00:32:54.080 Um, and in the support group, there was a, um, nurse practitioner who was named in my

00:33:01.000 lawsuit, Perry, who, um, was prescribing hormones to a lot of the people who would go to this

00:33:06.940 group.

00:33:07.280 There was a therapist who I didn't see, but who did virtually the same thing, like gave

00:33:10.880 people referrals, talk to them about gender stuff. 0.99

00:33:12.980 But in that support group, like it was, it was awful.

00:33:15.660 Like we would have in the kids group discussions over self-harm.

00:33:19.840 Um, we'd have discussions over like our relationships, our turbulent relationships.

00:33:23.860 We'd have discussions over being furries, over being anime characters.

00:33:27.300 Like our identities were a little bit of everywhere.

00:33:30.720 And this is 2017.

00:33:32.220 This is 2018, 18, 2018, 2019.

00:33:36.220 And I made a lot of friends in that group.

00:33:37.740 Like there were some sane people and I'm sure like a lot of them have grown up to be somewhat

00:33:41.460 functional adults.

00:33:42.300 Like I had been acquaintances with some of them up until recently, but it was definitely

00:33:47.500 like looking back on it, a very dark place to be because there was this sort of air of

00:33:52.640 acceptance and celebration, but also a lot of us were talking about things that had sort

00:33:58.260 of once been quarantined to the internet and we're now being spoken of in this very real

00:34:04.060 way.

00:34:04.340 And I think that that was a bridge for me, um, and it going from being this sort of imaginary

00:34:09.580 thing, having that medicalization that made it real.

00:34:13.140 And then on top of that, going to the support group that made it real.

00:34:15.840 And I having a connection to a medical professional who prescribed me hormones, like that's the

00:34:19.240 realest thing.

00:34:20.140 Yeah.

00:34:20.560 This thing that I thought I wouldn't even get till I was 18 is now being offered to me at

00:34:23.500 16 or 17 instead.

00:34:25.000 Right.

00:34:34.340 Abigail Schreier wrote the book, Bad Therapy, and she talks about how these like support

00:34:42.620 groups for young kids can very often make things worse because there's like a one-upping

00:34:50.240 environment.

00:34:50.920 There's a normalization of things that were previously rightly stigmatized.

00:34:56.080 And there is kind of this celebration of different kinds of fantasies and identities that can lead

00:35:02.920 to harmful outcomes.

00:35:04.640 And you're kind of saying that it seemed to push you in the direction of getting hormone

00:35:10.880 treatment as it's called, because you were presented with this person who would do it.

00:35:14.540 Right.

00:35:14.820 And you said that you were 16, 17 when you started testosterone.

00:35:17.500 Yeah, I was.

00:35:17.960 And this wasn't my first experience with bad therapy, um, which I think is actually the title

00:35:21.900 of her new book.

00:35:22.660 Yeah.

00:35:22.960 Um, I had been in this sort of, um, alternative charter school environment where we had an outpatient

00:35:30.720 support group at the end of every school day.

00:35:32.600 And that was where I was leading up to me being hospitalized.

00:35:35.580 And this family friend of mine who I'd grown up with, like we were, she was literally in

00:35:39.200 the hospital when I was born, we're a year and 13 days apart.

00:35:42.000 She had gone to the hospital around the same time.

00:35:43.880 And her mom kind of pointed out, like, this is a trend.

00:35:46.380 Like you both went to the hospital because it makes you look good to your classmates.

00:35:49.700 And I mean, all things considered, like it was a very real distress that I was feeling,

00:35:54.440 but it was misplaced.

00:35:55.700 Like a lot of it was because of the environment.

00:35:57.520 And I think both things can be true that it can be environmental and real.

00:36:01.140 So yeah, no, definitely difficult.

00:36:03.280 That support group was, and that's, like I said, where I met Perry and around age 17,

00:36:08.200 um, my mom, uh, I, I'd met, so backtracking a little bit at age 16, I had gone to an anime

00:36:15.520 convention and I met this girl who, um, was in the same cosplay as me.

00:36:21.260 We were cosplaying the same character and we became quick friends.

00:36:23.980 Um, she's actually my current partner.

00:36:26.040 Um, and we, um, at the time hit it off because we were both trans men and we were both, um,

00:36:33.100 we were both like at the same homeschool, but different state variations of it.

00:36:37.140 We were both in Girl Scouts.

00:36:38.420 Um, and, um, when we met and started talking online afterwards, um, it was very similar

00:36:48.160 to that support group insofar that we were feeding off of each other.

00:36:51.220 Um, I would go to visit her because we were both kind of homeschooled.

00:36:54.240 It was like an online charter.

00:36:55.560 So school at home, but not quite homeschool.

00:36:58.860 Um, we'd go to visit each other every two weeks.

00:37:01.100 I'd go to visit her and then she'd come to visit me two weeks later.

00:37:03.440 And, um, then COVID-19 happened and I, for all intents and purposes was stuck in Oklahoma.

00:37:09.620 I didn't know what was going to go on back home.

00:37:11.580 And I didn't frankly want to be stuck back home with the whole transgender tension, um, 1.00

00:37:15.940 with my mom, not being able to really leave the house cause of lockdown.

00:37:19.120 Not that Texas was very locked down, but you get what I mean.

00:37:22.160 And so this girl and I, again, both identifying as boys at the time were making cosplays and

00:37:28.660 staying up all day and getting into fights and just like, you know, everything that teenage

00:37:32.040 girls do, except again, we thought we were men.

00:37:34.720 And, um, she eventually, and she having a very bad home life, like was living with godparents

00:37:40.560 because her parents are just not great people.

00:37:42.980 Um, she convinced her family to let her start testosterone. 1.00

00:37:47.080 And, um, I became very sad by that.

00:37:51.760 I became very jealous by that.

00:37:53.500 I wanted to, to start testosterone.

00:37:55.380 And while I'd previously kind of relegated myself to, okay, I'll start it when I'm 18 and

00:37:59.420 like, I'll be fine.

00:38:00.160 And again, there was not, I think the same suicide rhetoric as there is today regarding

00:38:05.540 waiting until you're an adult to start these sort of interventions today.

00:38:08.420 It's like, kids aren't going to survive until they turn 18.

00:38:10.560 But like I being one of those kids, like I would have been okay, but because she was

00:38:14.320 starting it at 17, I wanted to start it at 17.

00:38:16.980 And so a week after she started testosterone, I guilt tripped my mom into allowing me to start

00:38:22.600 testosterone too.

00:38:23.560 And my mom at this point was terrified that she was going to lose contact with me, was

00:38:28.040 thinking, well, she's going to start it when she's 18 anyways, and just sort of wanted to

00:38:32.860 keep the peace.

00:38:34.600 And so I think that was a really, really tough decision for her.

00:38:37.460 She didn't want anyone to know for a long time.

00:38:39.000 I don't know that she really wants anyone to know today, but I don't think you can place

00:38:42.020 blame on her and the way that some of these other parents, um, I think create identities

00:38:47.060 for their kids at like ages two and four.

00:38:48.920 Like my mom had this teenager who was a troubled teenager who had run away from home with the

00:38:53.880 COVID pandemic.

00:38:55.380 And, um, you know, I started testosterone and became very distant from her.

00:39:00.080 So it kind of had the opposite effect, um, because I was affirmed more in this transgender

00:39:04.160 identity rather than challenged in it.

00:39:06.000 I want to go back to one thing that might seem kind of like a tangent, but it's just a pattern

00:39:10.680 that I see so often that very typically people who identify as transgender, either male or

00:39:18.660 female, there is in their past, some kind of heavy involvement in anime. 0.98

00:39:25.280 Is it, what, what do you think that is?

00:39:27.640 I mean, we've kind of, um, we've kind of looked at it on this show, but why do you think there

00:39:32.900 seems to be a tie there?

00:39:34.860 Well, this is a lovely question, Allie, because, uh, when I met you in person for the first time

00:39:38.840 at the ISI conference, you had a lot of things to say about pornography.

00:39:42.280 And I think that that's the tie to anime and how anime is tied to the transgender movement 0.68

00:39:47.600 is because anime is super pornographied. 0.98

00:39:50.060 Like I was saying earlier, um, the women all have huge boobs and they all wear skimpy little 1.00

00:39:54.900 outfits and the men are these like hyper-masculine, like either they're hyper-masculine or they're 0.99

00:39:59.520 boys.

00:40:00.380 Right.

00:40:01.620 And I think that's the connection here is this hyper-sexualization.

00:40:06.000 Um, and when you take that into consideration with the rest of our society, anime is a more

00:40:10.720 palatable way to interact with that.

00:40:12.660 It's the fantasy, it's the escape that a lot of these kids desire out of role-playing.

00:40:16.420 But I think also, also it's a little bit more close to some of these like sexual tropes that

00:40:24.640 we see in the real world, uh, at least compared to like regular cartoons.

00:40:28.500 Like they're a little bit more of that.

00:40:30.280 It's like you have cartoons here and you have real life here.

00:40:34.460 Anime is kind of a bridge between the two.

00:40:36.860 Okay.

00:40:37.260 Gotcha.

00:40:37.620 So you started testosterone when you were 17 and then what happened from there?

00:40:43.360 So I started, I kept going after, so after I started the testosterone, I kept going to

00:40:48.620 the support group for a period of time before lockdown ruined that.

00:40:52.260 Um, I started testosterone two months before COVID lockdown happened.

00:40:56.220 So in January and then, you know, lockdown was in March and, um, while living with my, my

00:41:02.680 girlfriend at the time, um, we were getting, I mean, I talked about us having fights before

00:41:07.840 they're more like teenage, like fights.

00:41:10.400 We were getting into like fights.

00:41:11.860 Like we were getting loud and violent.

00:41:14.620 Um, I was keeping track.

00:41:16.740 I have these videos on my phone still where I'd be like one day on tea, one week on tea,

00:41:22.360 two weeks on tea.

00:41:23.380 Like I was keeping track of my testosterone changes obsessively.

00:41:26.540 So, and that's where I think a lot of the root came down to for me was, um, a sort of obsessive

00:41:31.580 compulsive nature in 2018.

00:41:34.740 So backtracking a few years, I underwent a neuropsych evaluation.

00:41:39.160 And in addition to the ADHD that I've been diagnosed with since age seven, I was diagnosed

00:41:43.620 with autism spectrum disorder, level one, major depressive, generalized anxiety, and also,

00:41:48.180 um, a DSM code that was social exclusion and rejection, um, which is actually a diagnosis

00:41:53.680 that we've seen a lot of people who end up acting out, um, and sometimes more of the

00:41:57.560 extreme ways like school shooters, um, have.

00:42:00.300 And obviously I wasn't violent in that way, but I was like, I was lonely and I was dysfunctional

00:42:07.820 due to that loneliness and due to being that weird kid.

00:42:09.920 And I'm, I'm way more functional today.

00:42:11.300 I'd like to think like, I can look you in the eyes and I can communicate well, but, um,

00:42:15.540 I still have a lot of burnout and I, I struggle to conceptualize like social norms.

00:42:19.880 Um, so you were saying that you were getting in these fights with your girlfriend.

00:42:23.680 Y'all were both on testosterone at the time.

00:42:26.500 Do you think that the testosterone, which, you know, increases sex drive and makes people

00:42:31.420 more aggressive?

00:42:32.120 Do you think that that played into the increasing violence and the anger that you were feeling

00:42:38.040 towards each other?

00:42:38.660 Oh yeah, absolutely.

00:42:39.580 And, um, I, I do think that it contributed to all of these things.

00:42:44.500 Um, I know that for me, like I went from, I mean, because of the sexual abuse that I

00:42:49.860 endured, having like no sex drive, um, to the first time I ever had sex, like crying because

00:42:55.480 I was just so dissociated and scared and like, you know, like didn't know how to be in my

00:42:59.880 body to having sex like every day. 0.68

00:43:02.340 Um, and it was definitely this lustful thing driven by the testosterone, um, because my

00:43:07.800 girlfriend and I's relationship wasn't emotionally intimate.

00:43:10.840 Like we were, we connected over our trauma and our shared life experiences.

00:43:14.160 And that's part of what, um, part of what I think keeps us so close today, but it was

00:43:19.420 definitely the sort of dissociated interaction.

00:43:21.480 And I can say that like up until that point, I never really had anyone that close.

00:43:25.480 Like I had friends here and there, but the relationships would always end up disastrous because I couldn't

00:43:30.520 let people get close.

00:43:31.300 I didn't know how to get close.

00:43:32.720 Oftentimes the people I was attracted to, whether that be in friendship or otherwise,

00:43:36.180 couldn't let people get close, didn't know how to get close.

00:43:38.200 And so, um, yeah, the testosterone was awful.

00:43:41.500 And that's ultimately what led to us separating later that year, um, was the testosterone, uh,

00:43:48.220 induced sort of rage.

00:43:49.740 And again, you're being dissociated from your body because you're pumping your body full of 1.00

00:43:53.160 hormones that your body doesn't typically have at that level.

00:43:55.600 Yeah.

00:43:56.000 And really can't handle in a healthy way because the female body is not supposed to have that 1.00

00:43:59.800 much testosterone.

00:44:00.900 No, absolutely not.

00:44:02.200 Um, and we, I mean, we experienced that like, even today, both of us have detransitioned.

00:44:06.580 Um, we have, uh, no dearth of consequences from being on the testosterone.

00:44:10.540 Like I know she still suffers a lot with vaginal atrophy for me.

00:44:14.080 That's gotten a lot better, but I struggle with a lot of pain.

00:44:16.800 Like I had to, and this might be a little TMI, but to be more intimate with you.

00:44:20.540 Like I had to go, when I went to go get my pap smear, um, for the first time, cause I'm 21

00:44:25.200 years old.

00:44:25.760 Right. 0.93

00:44:26.240 I found out that I had like cysts on my clitoris because of the testosterone.

00:44:31.260 And that was never disclosed to me as a possible complication. 0.56

00:44:34.800 And I thought like, I was like, I was like, what, what the heck are these?

00:44:38.020 And my, my doctor at first was like, I don't really know.

00:44:40.320 And I went in and she went on forums and found out that other transgender people were getting

00:44:45.140 this complication.

00:44:45.700 I didn't even find it in medical literature.

00:44:47.460 She had to go into forums, into forums, medical forums. 0.87

00:44:51.140 Yeah.

00:44:51.380 Oh, okay.

00:44:51.940 It's like medical forums where doctors kind of share what's going on with their patients.

00:44:55.280 But I was like sitting here, like it's so common that it's on, it's discussed on a

00:44:58.500 medical forum in several spots, but not common enough for it to be disclosed in my informed

00:45:01.880 consent.

00:45:02.500 Right.

00:45:03.280 And like my informed consent was awful for the record, like informed consent.

00:45:07.100 But like, what does that mean to someone who has this sort of issue with impulsivity that

00:45:11.560 I had, who struggles with like comprehending like complex instructions like I do, really

00:45:18.800 wasn't consent at all, in my opinion.

00:45:21.080 Yeah.

00:45:33.300 And talk about your double mastectomy because you start, you started on the hormones when

00:45:37.760 you were 17.

00:45:38.300 You got your breasts removed when you were 19?

00:45:41.960 Yes. 0.69

00:45:42.300 Okay.

00:45:42.700 So tell us about that.

00:45:43.760 Why did you feel like you had to do that?

00:45:45.680 And then what was that experience like during and after?

00:45:49.840 So after I separated from my girlfriend, I was starting college and I wasn't really, I

00:46:01.400 didn't take like a gender theory class. 0.88

00:46:02.920 I know some people do.

00:46:04.160 I didn't.

00:46:04.760 Um, but I was in this environment at this point where I had had my name and my gender

00:46:10.200 marker changed or my name, my sex marker changed.

00:46:13.680 And, um, it was starting to become more real to me having been in that, in that support group,

00:46:21.660 the idea of getting a mastectomy.

00:46:23.320 Cause there was 15 year olds who had had mastectomies in that support group.

00:46:26.180 And I remember at the time feeling very envious of them just as I'd been envious of my girlfriend,

00:46:31.220 but also kind of amazed that this was a possibility.

00:46:34.500 Like it's not just some random person who's really lucky on the internet.

00:46:37.780 It's like someone that is in my community where I'm from, you know, less than 30 minutes away from me.

00:46:42.900 Um, and so, um, because of COVID-19, I was getting stipends from the school, um, that were supposed to use for living expenses, but I was living at home.

00:46:51.960 And so, um, all of a sudden I had like, you know, like 5k and it, um, became very real to me in this, the possibility of getting a surgery.

00:47:02.360 And I was also seeing a therapist at the time who, um, had a trans ex-husband.

00:47:09.120 Um, she's actually also named in my lawsuit, uh, Barbara Wood. 0.96

00:47:13.080 And she, um, I felt like affirmed me without any sort of question.

00:47:17.800 And it even seemed at times that there was this projection of her failed marriage onto me and my relationship.

00:47:25.740 Because she was a lot of who coached me and leaving my ex, um, was sort of making my ex out to be this like big, scary narcissist. 0.60

00:47:32.600 And my ex had some mental illness. 0.55

00:47:33.840 Don't get me wrong. 0.73

00:47:34.540 Like she definitely struggled because she came from a bad background, was also trans identified and had all the baggage that came with that. 1.00

00:47:40.120 But she was projecting this like 40, 50 year old man onto my 17, 18 year old female partner.

00:47:47.760 It's a totally different ballgame.

00:47:49.080 Um, and so having this sort of blind affirmation and this sort of tokenization as a transgender person, and then all this money, like all that sort of came to a head of like, okay, well, I'm going to start looking into this.

00:48:00.120 And there were some external motivators.

00:48:01.360 Like some people in my life were sort of sharing, um, forums with me of people getting top surgery.

00:48:06.740 And I was like, oh my God, look at all these people, like all these people with flat chest and me having big boobs and having bound for so long and bound my breasts for so long.

00:48:15.360 Um, it was nice to think about being able to just like go topless.

00:48:19.920 And that's something that a lot of women I've spoken to who were in this sort of fight have talked to me about where they're like, if I had known that I could just be a woman and not have to wear a bra, I would have been like, I would have been so happy with myself.

00:48:30.640 Um, so that's a pretty common, a pretty common struggle.

00:48:33.260 But, um, at that point I said a consultation, their consultation was $200, which is like insane, even within the community because so many surgeons offer free consultations, but this is Dr. Crane and Dr. Crane's clinic.

00:48:43.880 Um, and although I was seeing, uh, one of his trainees, one of the people he had trained, Dr. Ashley DeLeon, who was also named in my lawsuit, um, this was his clinic and his practices.

00:48:54.560 And we all kind of know at this point what Dr. Crane and his practice is like.

00:48:58.720 So, um, I met with Ashley DeLeon over the phone and I had talked about some of my goals.

00:49:05.620 Like I didn't want, like I wanted to have, um, more rounded scars so it would look more natural.

00:49:10.800 And I had some of these ideals, like some of these photos of young women who had gotten mastectomies that I found on the internet.

00:49:16.860 And a lot of them, it was really interesting, had flat chests, right?

00:49:19.720 But they had this, these more rounded scars and they would wear like more feminine clothing. 0.94

00:49:23.920 So in hindsight, I see them now, um, and this is a very interesting parallel as not appearing so much like a man, but appearing like a prepubescent girl or a boy.

00:49:37.420 Right. And so with what I know about my own experience with sexual trauma and that of countless people in my generation, it strikes me as very peculiar that a lot of the people who fit the category I did didn't want to get bottom surgery, but wanted flat chest and a boyish physique.

00:49:55.860 Yeah.

00:49:56.880 Yeah. Wow.

00:49:57.960 And so just trying to kind of dissociate from your femininity because you feel like your femininity has been the source of your problems, of your victimization, of your trauma.

00:50:06.620 Oh yeah. And also being able to maybe get back some of that childhood that you wish you had gotten for longer.

00:50:12.520 Like I think for me, I mean, being sort of parentified and a caregiver for my stepdad and then also being sexualized at that young age, like I didn't get the childhood that I needed until I met my dad and my stepmom.

00:50:22.980 And that's something that I'm so thankful for in them was I was able to grow up alongside my sister.

00:50:27.380 I was able to be that kid who got at Christmas, who got to play with slime, who got to like play in the yard and like, you know, film movies on my sister's iPad.

00:50:35.700 Like I really got to be that child that I wish I had gotten to be when I was younger through them.

00:50:41.080 Yeah.

00:50:41.780 Okay.

00:50:42.180 So you got the double mastectomy or you did the consultation that she said was $200 and then you got the double mastectomy.

00:50:49.400 Tell me like what that experience was like.

00:50:51.420 Yeah.

00:50:51.660 So I went down to Austin to backtrack just a little bit.

00:50:54.900 A week before my double mastectomy, I went in for my pre-op appointment and I didn't wear a binder or a bra.

00:51:00.080 I just wore like a really big, um, a really big polo shirt and I went and I actually remember I walked around Austin downtown afterwards.

00:51:07.620 I thought I was going to go straight there and straight back cause I'm not wearing anything to hide my chest, but I actually felt really comfortable.

00:51:12.340 And that's kind of where I was talking about like not having to wear that bra was sort of liberating.

00:51:16.900 But, um, so just a little side note.

00:51:19.760 Yeah.

00:51:20.120 But then when I went down to Austin for my mastectomy, everything was normal that morning.

00:51:24.500 I put on my two knee braces and my compression socks cause my legs were like torn apart from the testosterone.

00:51:30.720 It felt like, um, I didn't know that that was a, yeah, I had, I was at that point in my life and this is maybe a big thing to gloss over.

00:51:37.560 I was on like 11 different medications.

00:51:39.740 I was on some pretty serious NSAIDs.

00:51:42.000 I'd been on like three different kinds at that point.

00:51:44.340 Um, I was on, uh, medicine for my thyroid.

00:51:47.460 I was on medicine for anxiety, medicine for depression, medicine for ADHD, two different medicines for ADHD.

00:51:52.460 You had been on the medication for ADHD for a long time.

00:51:56.660 But I had stopped taking it in junior high.

00:51:58.460 So I resumed taking it in 10th grade.

00:52:00.520 And that's actually when a lot of my, I feel like my mental illness came to a head, um, was around when I started taking stimulants again, which is so funny.

00:52:07.840 That's another thing that, yeah, we've discussed some, which is controversial to talk about.

00:52:13.140 And I'm not anti-medication altogether, but yeah, medicalizing a lot of normal childhood behaviors, being precocious, being hyperactive, maybe not being able to sit still for very long.

00:52:24.680 When in fact, as you pointed out, it could have been a response to the turbulence of your childhood.

00:52:29.560 Or even just being a child.

00:52:30.920 Yeah.

00:52:31.260 Just, just being a child.

00:52:32.720 Um, that can lead.

00:52:36.980 People down this pipeline of medicalizing all kinds of emotions on the spectrum of human feeling.

00:52:44.220 And yeah, that can have some really, really adverse outcomes and does for a lot of young people.

00:52:50.420 Oh yeah.

00:52:50.760 I mean, I know that it did for me.

00:52:52.220 And so for whatever reason, maybe related to these medications, maybe not, we don't really know.

00:52:58.280 Um, I bled really badly after my surgery.

00:53:00.900 Um, a few days after my surgery, I noticed bruising around, I noticed bruising around my, um, the top of my bandages and sort of on the sides of my bandages.

00:53:12.580 And my stepmom, who was taking care of me, bless her during this time, um, and I became very concerned.

00:53:18.680 And we sent photos or we like contacted the emergency line for the clinic.

00:53:22.620 And we're like, we see some pretty bad bruising.

00:53:25.080 Um, you know, what's up with this?

00:53:26.560 And they asked to send photos.

00:53:27.800 And Dr. Santucci, who was also named in my lawsuit, called me.

00:53:31.940 And he was like, bruising is normal.

00:53:33.880 Like it's a normal side effect.

00:53:35.640 Um, and he knew that I was obsessive compulsive.

00:53:37.920 And so he was like, just keep track of how the color changes, which was actually a really great piece of advice.

00:53:43.360 Cause that's what I did.

00:53:44.460 And so when I went to my post-op appointment and they took off the bandages and they removed the bolsters that were keeping my nipples pressed onto my chest.

00:53:55.360 Um, I remember the nurse saying, I've never seen bruising like this before, but she didn't go get a doctor.

00:54:00.620 Um, and everyone was just very awkward.

00:54:05.260 Like, I don't know if the air was anxious or what.

00:54:07.460 It was definitely a swirl of emotions for me, but there was another transgender person in the room, part of the staff of the clinic.

00:54:15.780 Um, and I remember they were trying to reassure me, but they too, I could tell they were concerned.

00:54:21.840 And so we went home and, um, per the advice of Dr. Santucci, I began to keep track of my chest.

00:54:28.660 I took photos every day.

00:54:30.320 I noted how the color changed and posted some of these photos on Twitter.

00:54:35.200 Yeah.

00:54:35.800 Uh, and despite him saying they should be getting lighter, they should go from purple to, uh, green to yellow to gone.

00:54:44.220 They were getting darker.

00:54:45.320 They were going from purple to dark purple to black in some spots.

00:54:48.700 Um, and I reached out to the nurse, the nurse line again by email.

00:54:52.520 And I told them like, Hey, the bruising is getting worse.

00:54:54.820 She said it was going to be getting better.

00:54:56.460 Um, I looked up the bruising that was now appearing on my flanks that wasn't present on my post-op appointment.

00:55:00.980 And I found out it was called Gray Turner sign.

00:55:03.140 It's, um, indicative of, oh, pardon me.

00:55:06.960 That's okay.

00:55:07.500 It's indicative of abdominal bleeding.

00:55:10.740 And she said, as if she had not even read my email with a hint of care, bruising should be getting better.

00:55:19.260 Let us know if it's not.

00:55:20.380 Even though that's exactly what I had messaged her to say.

00:55:22.740 And so, um, at that point I continued taking photos and then it kind of came to a head, um, later that month when I was becoming feverish and the bruising, like I felt like I had breasts again.

00:55:35.440 The bruising was so bad and the swelling was so bad.

00:55:39.040 Yeah.

00:55:39.660 Um, and again, my sides were like plum purple, like my sides were bad.

00:55:43.540 Yeah.

00:55:43.800 And so, um, I call the helpline again.

00:55:46.320 It takes me like an hour and a half, if I recall correctly, to get ahold of anyone.

00:55:49.680 Um, at several points I felt forgotten.

00:55:53.020 Despite my sort of distress.

00:55:54.540 And when I finally got on the phone with the doctor, that same doctor who had coached me so kindly prior to my post-up appointment, Dr. Santucci, he was kind of like, what do you want?

00:56:03.420 What's wrong?

00:56:04.860 Um, and I told him like, you know, I'm immunocompromised because at the time I was having all these health issues, I was seeing a rheumatologist and we didn't really know what was wrong.

00:56:12.460 Um, I told him I'm immunocompromised and he goes, what do you mean by that?

00:56:15.240 And I said, I just have some health issues.

00:56:16.680 Like I have like a gluten intolerance and like these things that were just kind of unidentified that usually points to.

00:56:22.300 An autoimmune disorder.

00:56:23.780 And he was like, no, uh, immunocompromised means like HIV or AIDS.

00:56:30.380 And so that was his first sort of disregarding of me.

00:56:33.340 But afterwards he was like, okay, well, whatever, send me photos.

00:56:36.660 And so I sent him, I go to send him the photos and I go, what's the phone number?

00:56:40.060 And he goes, is it not right in front of you?

00:56:42.200 And there was a caller ID.

00:56:43.320 So I go, no, it's not.

00:56:45.060 Can I please have the phone number?

00:56:46.080 I send them to him and he says, and this is the most incredible thing.

00:56:51.040 I don't see what's wrong here.

00:56:53.280 What's wrong here?

00:56:55.080 And at that point I'm kind of hysterical.

00:56:57.580 Like, I'm like, what do you mean? 0.87

00:56:58.680 Like, it's, it looks like I have boobs again. 0.71

00:57:00.900 Like it's, it's, it's bad. 0.69

00:57:02.920 And I go, I want to be seen.

00:57:04.480 And he asks, what do you mean by seen?

00:57:07.240 I'm thinking he probably thinks I mean like seen and validated, but I mean, no, I want to

00:57:10.240 be seen in the clinic.

00:57:11.360 Right.

00:57:11.760 Something's wrong.

00:57:12.560 He goes, I guess I can get you in tomorrow.

00:57:14.440 Yeah.

00:57:14.720 I can get you tomorrow if you want to come down to Austin.

00:57:16.360 And I'm at this point, I'm like, I'm expecting in my ideal, like come down to the hospital.

00:57:20.040 We'll get you checked out right now.

00:57:21.700 You know, but no, I'm just kind of like an afterthought.

00:57:23.440 If he can squeeze me in, I believe is what he said.

00:57:25.560 Right.

00:57:26.040 And so I hang up, I go in to tell my mom and I'm like, again, very like hysterical at this

00:57:30.400 point, but getting more calm.

00:57:32.580 And more confident.

00:57:33.800 And I told my mom, I'm going to the hospital.

00:57:35.160 I'm going to go to UT Southwestern in Dallas.

00:57:37.940 I know they have a surgeon who performs these kinds of surgeries there and hopefully I'll

00:57:41.260 get taken care of.

00:57:42.000 And so that's where I go.

00:57:43.140 I spent eight hours in the hospital there in the ER because no one wants to take my case.

00:57:48.760 The in-house top surgeon doesn't want to take my case.

00:57:51.740 And ultimately breast oncology agrees to take my case, but not until like 6 a.m.

00:57:57.160 And so that was probably one of the best group of women or people period that I've ever

00:58:01.600 worked with.

00:58:02.000 They were so kind.

00:58:02.880 They were like baffled at how it got to this point because I had a drainless surgery.

00:58:07.480 And if anyone knows anything about mastectomies, they're not drainless.

00:58:11.120 But I believe that drainless has taken off in the transgender community specifically because

00:58:15.180 it's less real than a drain mastectomy or a mastectomy with drains.

00:58:19.260 Because with a mastectomy with drains, you have to like unscrew the blood that's pulled

00:58:23.180 and you have to dump it out.

00:58:24.080 Whereas with a drain free, ideally you're just bandaged up and then you're unbandaged

00:58:27.480 and you're good to go.

00:58:29.140 There's not a lot of fanfare.

00:58:30.900 There's not a lot of graphic.

00:58:32.780 And that's actually why my girlfriend didn't get a mastectomy herself was because she couldn't 1.00

00:58:36.340 deal with the blood.

00:58:37.280 That drove her away.

00:58:38.200 But for me, I was so dissociated from my body, it didn't faze me.

00:58:44.600 So when they eventually saw me, the breast oncologist, they cut open my scars.

00:58:50.580 They drained as much liquid as possible and they stuck a Q-tip in there.

00:58:54.940 And of course, my chest was numb, but I'm like wide awake for all of this and knocked

00:58:58.960 out all the blood clots.

00:59:00.280 And then they had me for the next week bind foam blocks to my chest and I had to go across

00:59:04.800 my chest and just push the blood out.

00:59:06.780 And so I would stand in the shower, watch the blood go down my leg.

00:59:09.580 It was pretty graphic.

00:59:10.280 Okay, this is after your ER experience, like after you go in there and the breast oncologist

00:59:16.060 team helps you out.

00:59:17.440 Yeah.

00:59:17.580 So after that is when-

00:59:18.680 They put drains in.

00:59:19.700 I was about to say.

00:59:20.820 So they were like, yeah, you need drains to get the blood out.

00:59:23.880 And it's actually, they're called Penrose drains.

00:59:25.800 They're one of the, if I recall correctly, oldest forms of drains there.

00:59:29.700 Like they're like archaic.

00:59:30.820 Yeah.

00:59:31.280 And that's all it took to get my chest flat.

00:59:33.500 Like I literally walked to the hospital and there's photos of me actually on my X thread

00:59:36.520 where I'm like smiling and my chest is like flat.

00:59:39.540 I have the drains kind of peeking out.

00:59:41.060 And the reason I'm so ecstatic is because for the first time since my surgery, my chest

00:59:44.240 is actually flat.

00:59:44.900 And it's like night and day.

00:59:46.100 Like there's no questioning that my chest was not supposed to look, well, A, supposed

00:59:49.120 to look like any of this because I should have been intact.

00:59:51.260 But B, supposed to look like how it did prior to me going to the ER.

00:59:55.860 Like again, I looked like I had boobs again. 0.98

00:59:58.000 I remember, I think the worst comment I ever got on X was someone calling me zombie tits. 0.98

01:00:02.520 So, I mean, I take them as they come, but I mean, that's kind of what they looked 0.96

01:00:06.520 like.

01:00:19.140 So, a little bit more about like your back and forth with this center.

01:00:23.840 They made you sign something.

01:00:25.560 They made you sign the settlement agreement because you asked for compensation for your

01:00:31.080 ER visit, right?

01:00:32.120 Because it was so much money and obviously it was because of their dereliction that you

01:00:38.840 had to go back in and get these drains.

01:00:41.180 And so, what was that like?

01:00:43.280 Like at the Crane Center, were they helpful at all to you or not really?

01:00:48.200 No, not at all.

01:00:49.480 It was awful actually.

01:00:50.800 So, if they had just treated me from the moment I had messaged them about my complications,

01:00:54.820 it would have just been like a $20 out of pocket fee, right?

01:00:57.820 Going to the ER though, it was thousands of dollars.

01:00:59.740 Thankfully, my insurance covered part of it, so it was only $400 out of pocket.

01:01:03.040 But yeah, I did ask them like, hey, look, I'm really disappointed by how you guys handled

01:01:07.300 this.

01:01:07.580 You've been evading me for a long time now. 1.00

01:01:10.080 And it came to this really nasty, ugly head. 0.61

01:01:13.820 And so, I did ask them to compensate me for the ER visit for my co-pay, for my, I think

01:01:19.760 my co-insurance is actually what it's called.

01:01:21.080 But anyways, to compensate me for what I had to pay out of pocket for my ER visit.

01:01:24.240 And they were trying to get me to sign a non-disparagement agreement.

01:01:27.720 So, I couldn't do like what I'm doing today and talk to you about what happened to me.

01:01:32.900 And of course, I, being smart was like, okay, whoa, whoa, whoa.

01:01:36.980 What have you done to make sure this isn't going to happen to anybody else?

01:01:40.040 Like, I want to know what you learned about, like what you learned from this situation.

01:01:44.040 And they ghosted me after that.

01:01:45.440 They did not get back to me.

01:01:46.500 I wouldn't sign their paperwork.

01:01:47.440 And I still have not, like I have not, I get emails from them occasionally inviting

01:01:52.060 me to transgender support groups, like Zoom links. 0.84

01:01:54.940 But like, otherwise, I haven't heard a damn thing. 0.91

01:01:57.480 Wow. 0.91

01:01:58.020 Oh my goodness.

01:01:58.820 So, how much was all of this?

01:02:01.520 How much was the mastectomy and then everything after?

01:02:04.960 Even the parts that were covered by insurance?

01:02:07.560 So, wow.

01:02:09.420 I think, so for me, and this is a whole nother can of worms.

01:02:12.940 I haven't even gotten the opportunity to open yet.

01:02:15.140 But initially, they wanted me to pay self-pay in order to, and pardon me if the details

01:02:21.660 are like blurry, because it's been a while since I had to think about this, but they

01:02:25.460 wanted me to pay self-pay while they fought to get an in-network exception for my mastectomy.

01:02:31.220 So, they were out of network, but they said they have like a 90% success rate, if I recall

01:02:36.160 correctly, for getting insurance to cover it like it were in-network instead.

01:02:40.720 And so, I went ahead with that.

01:02:41.760 I paid the $5,500 out-of-pocket self-pay, and they said they would reimburse me when

01:02:46.820 they got coverage.

01:02:47.680 Well, they couldn't convince my insurance, even after an appeal, even after two appeals,

01:02:51.980 if I remember correctly, to cover me in-network.

01:02:56.240 And so, ultimately, they ended up reimbursing me, I think, only like $700, even though my out-of-pocket

01:03:05.720 maximum was $4,500, and again, I paid them $5,500.

01:03:09.720 So, I should have at least gotten $1,000 back, because that was the max I was just pay out-of-pocket.

01:03:14.240 But what they ended up doing was they charged my insurance $21,000, and then deducted my co-insurance

01:03:23.660 from what I had paid self-pay.

01:03:28.200 Wow.

01:03:29.760 Insane.

01:03:30.400 There's a lot of money to be made at centers like this.

01:03:33.440 Oh, so much.

01:03:33.880 And very little financial incentive for them to follow up with you and help you or help

01:03:40.880 their patients after their surgeries were botched.

01:03:44.500 So, tell us about the lawsuit.

01:03:46.840 Yeah.

01:03:47.300 So, I am working with Campbell Miller Payne out of Dallas, Texas, the first lawsuit to be

01:03:54.840 formed to fight these cases specifically.

01:03:57.600 And it's been a really hard fight, but a really good one, like one that really, I think,

01:04:05.260 soothes the soul.

01:04:08.060 So, the lawsuit's focus is the psychiatrist from my inpatient visit, the nurse practitioner

01:04:16.100 who prescribed me hormones, the therapist who treated me during this time and authored

01:04:21.460 my mastectomy letter, and the doctors involved with the Crane Center, as well as the facilities

01:04:26.140 that each of these individuals worked for.

01:04:27.960 And the therapist who authored your letter to say that, yeah, she needs to get a mastectomy, 1.00

01:04:35.640 are you suing her for basically not doing her job thoroughly enough?

01:04:41.160 Essentially, yes.

01:04:42.660 She lied throughout the letter that she wrote for me, and that letter on which she lied is

01:04:51.500 what ultimately opened the gate for me to get the mastectomy, yes.

01:04:54.500 Mm-hmm, okay, gotcha.

01:04:56.520 And then everyone else is kind of being sued for just not doing their jobs thoroughly, right?

01:05:02.260 Yeah, I mean, that's the reason for a lawsuit like this.

01:05:04.700 Yeah, I mean, it's medical malpractice.

01:05:06.880 The hormone provider did not provide me with adequate informed consent, should not have given

01:05:11.980 me the hormones to begin with.

01:05:14.060 And the surgeons, I mean, we just talked about this in depth, like they really dropped the

01:05:18.560 ball.

01:05:18.860 Not just in giving me the surgery, but doing such an awful job with the aftercare and with

01:05:24.940 being aware of how my body was reacting to this very invasive procedure.

01:05:29.420 Yeah.

01:05:29.860 Oh my goodness.

01:05:30.760 And what's the latest in the lawsuit?

01:05:32.440 So, early on in the case, the judge ordered that everyone stop working on the case for

01:05:38.800 a period of 60 days to give one of the new defendants time to catch up.

01:05:43.000 During this period of 60 days, an important procedural deadline came and went, and one of

01:05:49.580 the defendants, Perry, the nurse practitioner, argued that because the deadline had passed,

01:05:55.140 that the case needed to be dismissed.

01:05:56.920 Now, the judge, having ordered the 60-day abatement period, didn't really know how to

01:06:03.260 rule on this, and so he dismissed the case in order to get some guidance from the appellate

01:06:08.420 court.

01:06:09.300 Now, with Wood, similar to Perry, the judge needed guidance from the appellate court on

01:06:16.500 how to calculate the statute of limitations for a novel case like mine, where the awareness

01:06:23.740 of the negligence came considerably after the negligence occurred.

01:06:28.600 So, in both situations, it's just a procedural dismissal, and as soon as we get a judgment

01:06:34.540 and some guidance passed down from the appellate court, everything should resume without a hitch.

01:06:40.720 Okay.

01:06:41.420 Gotcha.

01:06:42.060 Wow.

01:06:42.760 And what is your feeling?

01:06:44.820 Are you hopeful about this?

01:06:46.640 Yeah, I'm hopeful.

01:06:47.420 Like, I'm not in it for the money.

01:06:48.600 Like, I'm in it because I know that there are countless others like me.

01:06:53.500 I know people who are like me who either their statute of limitation has run out or they want

01:06:58.360 to stay private because of some of the backlash that I've faced.

01:07:01.180 You know, they would face the same.

01:07:03.080 And so I'm doing it for everyone but me in many ways.

01:07:06.560 Like, I already have peace in myself.

01:07:08.040 I don't need the courts to prove to me that what happened to me was wrong, but it sure

01:07:14.480 does help make the world a better place.

01:07:16.120 And I was a Girl Scout for so long.

01:07:17.320 It's like part of our promise and our law.

01:07:19.180 Well, I'm hopeful and I'm prayerful about it.

01:07:21.820 And I'm thankful for you because, you know, you didn't have to do it.

01:07:25.640 It would have been easier for you probably in a lot of ways just to say, that's, you

01:07:30.200 know, in the past.

01:07:31.520 I don't need to be involved in this anymore.

01:07:33.800 Oh, yeah.

01:07:34.100 It would have been way easier.

01:07:35.120 But I don't think that what's right is always the easy thing.

01:07:39.720 You know, the right thing isn't always the easy thing.

01:07:42.020 Right.

01:07:42.540 Yep.

01:07:42.900 That's very true.

01:07:44.120 And you mentioned the couple times that we've talked, you mentioned that you've been reading

01:07:49.220 your Bible recently, and that's kind of a more recent development, right?

01:07:53.980 Yeah.

01:07:54.260 No, it absolutely is.

01:07:55.140 I was raised non-denominational Christian, and the church was an awful place for me. 1.00

01:07:59.960 Like, it was loud and very political, and it, I think, did a good job meeting people where

01:08:07.760 they're at.

01:08:08.420 But for me, I have always been very no BS, like very spiritual more than I am religious.

01:08:15.040 And so recently, I've gotten back into prayer.

01:08:17.980 Like, I actually read Matthew recently.

01:08:19.960 Like, I was in adoration with my friend, recently committed to the Catholic Church, or that's

01:08:25.780 not the right way to say it, recently confirmed in the Catholic Church, and I read it while

01:08:31.400 I was in there, and it just, like, really touched me.

01:08:33.220 Like, I didn't, this is going to get kind of dorky.

01:08:35.180 Like, I didn't realize, like, how awful, like, Judas was.

01:08:38.860 Like, I know he's, like, bad, but I didn't, like, realize that he sold Jesus for, like,

01:08:42.940 30 silver.

01:08:43.840 Like, it's just, like, I don't know.

01:08:44.800 I get, like, I have this very, like, childlike curiosity about God, and I don't really know

01:08:48.940 where I fall in terms of the label that I want to use, but I definitely follow Jesus,

01:08:52.080 and I definitely, like, I believe in God, and I believe that what I'm doing is godly,

01:08:56.460 and I believe in, like, living a virtuous life.

01:08:58.940 Well, the cool thing is, is that we are actually called by Jesus to have a childlike faith,

01:09:04.400 and so there's definitely no shame in that.

01:09:07.140 There's, you know, that's a good thing.

01:09:09.200 That is an honorable thing to have a childlike curiosity about Scripture, and you'll see

01:09:13.700 that the more you read Scripture, the more questions you have.

01:09:16.420 Oh, yeah.

01:09:16.700 Yes, the more understanding you have, but also the more curiosity that you need to be

01:09:24.060 satiated, because, I mean, God is limitless, and His Word has so much in it, and so I'm

01:09:31.100 excited for you.

01:09:32.600 Do you have a Bible?

01:09:34.400 I do.

01:09:35.220 I have a couple of them.

01:09:36.940 I think I have a King James Version, and then I think I have an American Standard Version,

01:09:40.920 but I've been reading it on my phone lately, because then I can read it anywhere.

01:09:44.880 Yes, I love that.

01:09:45.580 That's the best thing.

01:09:46.400 I definitely have Bible apps on my phone.

01:09:48.440 I'm going to get you an ESV study Bible, because it, like, changed my life.

01:09:51.880 That's what I've been reading on my phone.

01:09:53.200 Oh, you have an ESV version.

01:09:54.640 Oh, I love that.

01:09:55.620 Okay, you've got to get the study Bible, because for me, it just answered so many questions.

01:09:59.820 I have so many questions.

01:10:00.360 I can read a verse, and I'm like, wait, what the heck does that mean?

01:10:02.700 That sounds like a really weird word choice, and then I can go down to the notes.

01:10:06.580 Yeah, that was my thing.

01:10:07.320 I was trying to figure out the ages in Genesis, and I have, like, so many theories.

01:10:11.580 Yeah.

01:10:12.220 No, it's great.

01:10:13.140 I just love the Bible so much, and I love that you're reading the Bible, and it's very

01:10:17.580 clear that the Lord is speaking to you and is using you, and your courage is contagious,

01:10:24.080 and I hope it just lights a fire that changes things for the better.

01:10:27.760 So thank you so much, and God bless you, and is there any last thing that you want to say

01:10:34.060 before we close out?

01:10:36.200 Not really.

01:10:37.020 Just thank you for having me on.

01:10:39.520 I am happy to be here, and I'm happy to be having conversations with such a diversity of

01:10:44.920 people, and, like, true diversity, like, ideological diversity, because I think that that's how the

01:10:49.240 best things happen in life is by surrounding yourself with as much knowledge as possible.

01:10:53.060 That's why I'm reading the Bible, that's why I'm reading the Bible, it's why I've, you

01:10:57.140 know, I've grown in my faith recently, is just, like, I think part of having faith is

01:11:00.980 having faith in man, like, having faith in people, and I think that's how you find faith

01:11:05.380 in God, so.

01:11:07.500 Well, is there any way that people can support you, like, and support this lawsuit?

01:11:12.800 I mean, if you see me, say hi.

01:11:15.580 Yeah.

01:11:16.000 I don't really have a social media presence.

01:11:18.000 I have a Twitter, or I have an ex, but I don't, like, I don't really use it, because

01:11:20.800 I'm not a social media girly, but I don't know, just, like, keep me in your prayers and

01:11:25.760 your thoughts, and just do the right thing, like, be open to people, like, don't be scared

01:11:29.960 of transgender people.

01:11:31.180 Talk to as many transgender people as you talk to de-transgender people, because I think 1.00

01:11:35.960 that we, like, knowledge really is power, and the more empathy you have, the more compassionate

01:11:42.620 you can be, and I think that, and I've said it before, compassion doesn't always mean

01:11:47.600 letting people walk all over you, sometimes the compassionate thing is setting firm boundaries,

01:11:52.300 so, yeah.

01:11:53.380 Well, thank you so much, Sorin.

01:11:54.900 Yeah, thank you, Ali.

01:11:55.320 I really appreciate it.

01:11:56.240 Thank you.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - June 17, 2024

Ep 1020 ｜ Botched： The Brutality of Trans Mastectomies ｜ Guest： Soren Aldaco

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