trans* inclusive healthcare at NU, well we need it
I had a not so great experience going to get tested yesterday. The doctor asked me if I slept with “girls or boys.” When I responded telling him that my partners were mainly female-bodied, he assumed I was talking only about women. He did acknowledge that he phrased his question using condescending language and that he should have said “women or men.”
He also seemed a little awkward discussing barrier methods. He told me to choose the right partners and that people interested in having sex on the first date probably weren’t the types of people I should choose. At this point, I really didn’t appreciate hearing this from him. The whole situation made me a bit anxious, but I wish I had fired a few questions back his way to get him thinking.
When the lab tech asked about my insurance they realized there was a discrepancy between my listed, preferred name and my legal name attached to my insurance. They asked me to go back to the Registrar to change it back. I had to explain to her that I was trans* and that I wasn’t going to do such. She wasn’t sure of how to handle the situation because she didn’t want me to get billed as though I didn’t have insurance. And adding to all of this, the lab tech assumed my pronouns. The staff was cordial throughout, but obviously super unaware of trans* friendly sexual health.
I politely challenged a few of these issues directly with the staff, but it’s really not my place to be informing medical professionals of how to be more queer friendly. So it looks like this is the fire underneath my backside encouraging me to get more trans* inclusive and queer aware healthcare at NU. Let’s make it happen.
