Susie Green explores the compassionate realm of trans healthcare, reflecting on her journey and the pressing need for inclusive, medically overseen support systems that champion resilience, authenticity, and societal acceptance.
Welcome to Inclusion Bites, your sanctuaryfor bold conversations that spark change. I'm JoanneLockwood, your guide on this journey of exploration into the heartof inclusion, belonging, and societaltransformation. Ever wondered what it truly takes to createa world where everyone not only belongs butthrives? You're not alone. Join me as weuncover the unseen, challenge the status quo,and share stories that resonate deep within. Readyto dive in. Whether you're sipping your morning coffee orwinding down after a long day, let's connect, reflect,and inspire action together. Don't forget,you can be part of the conversation too. Reach out to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.ukto share your insights or to join me on the show.So adjust your earbuds and settle in. It's time toignite the spark of inclusion with Inclusion Bites.And today is episode 155with the title, Healthcare with a Heart.And I have the absolute honor and privilege to welcome SusieGreen. Susie is the cofounder and co director of AnneHealth, dedicated to providing compassionate, accessiblehealth care for trans people of all ages. And when Iasked Susie to describe her superpower, she said that it is empowering
Joanne Lockwoodhost
trans kids and their families with care, resilience,and love. Hello, Susie. Welcome to the show.
Susie Greenguest
Lovely to be here, and, good morning. Yeah. I've been looking
Joanne Lockwoodhost
forward to this. We we Chesed, I think, on LinkedIn probably 6 monthsago, then we met at the Trans of the City Awards night,back in November on, Trans Day of remembranceor no. Trans AF Wish of Visibility, wasn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.And, yeah, I'm I've I've been a huge fan of the work you've done. I'veI've come across you and your organizations in in over theyears. So it's a real honor. So you've been at theforefront, as I probably just implied, of trans health care andsupporting people for years. So what first inspired youto do this? Well, it was having a trans kid. And
Susie Greenguest
before I knew I hada trans kid, I knew nothing about transrights, trans kids, trans people in general. I was,you know, completely oblivious and knew nothing.But when my daughter told me that godhad made a mistake and and she should have been a girlat 4 years old, I had to learn, and I had tolearn quickly because I needed to be there tosupport her. And as her biggest advocate,I needed to learn what I could do and what wasout there. And I I knew nothing, absolutely nothing. Ididn't. I knew of the existence of trans people, obviously,but I certainly, I suppose, I just hadn'treally thought about the fact that trans trans adultswere trans kids. You know? They had to have been trans kids.So having a trans kid was,a bit of a wake up call for me, and ittook a lot of digging and searching andtrying to find out what I could do to best support her, including, you know,going to the GP. I found thewebsite of mermaids online and phoned the helplinenumber when when Jackie was 6 becauseby this point, I'd spent a lot of time telling her it was okay tobe a boy and like girl things, and she justkept telling me that, no, she was a girl. That's 2years of literally sort of ignoring what shewas telling me and trying to reiterate a different reality to her, and she neverwavered. So at 6, I, found themermaids website online and and called them and sort ofthat set in motion thingsthat sort of have have ended up with me here where I am now.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
So just put some context in that. Yourdaughter is now in her twenties or thereabouts?
Susie Greenguest
Early thirties. Early thirties. Wow. It's early thirties.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
So we're talking about a considerable amount 25 years ago, give or takehere. Yeah. A long time. Yeah. So we weyou can't escape but notice the the opinions andrhetoric in the world around trans people, trans children, etcetera,etcetera, etcetera. We're going back to an era hereof 2,000 ish, 9,200,021,where it was pre equality act 2010, pregender recognition act 2004. It was preFacebook, really. So how did youfind people to support you? Because in those days, it was like the wild west,I guess. There was no information. I mean, I
Susie Greenguest
found a single paragraph in a book on raising boysthat talked about girly boys and said that they were likely to begay. That was it. And then when she askedme at 4, you know, that's when that's when Ifound that paragraph in the book, saying that she shewould be gay. And I kind of was waitingfor that narrative to to switch, but she never she never stoppedsaying that this is who she was. SoI think it was, it was an Ask Jeeves search, so it waslikely So let's go back and read it. Ask Jeeves. Isn't it?Ask Jeeves. Yeah. And I think I typed in something like myson says says I want to be a girl.And Mermaids was one of, like, 3 sites that came up.And the only one that I could actually get through to there was I thinkthe Beaumont Trust was another one. They had a phone number, butnobody was answering, and Mermaids was about 3 or 4down. And I spoke to one of the founder members.I think Mermaids had been going for about 4 years by that point. And I
Susie Greenguest
spoke to one of the founder members and had a conversation. It was the firsttime I spoke to anybody who understoodwhat it felt like because the lady that I spoke to had a 70 athen 17 year old trans daughter.The relief was immense. It was just enormousto to know that somebody else was wasliving through this and had some answers for me and some direction.I think I cried for, like, probably the majority of thatconversation because it was I don'tknow. I suppose I I was expecting a different outcome. I wasafraid of verbalizing what I knew was happening,But I just got this, this huge outpouringof love and support, and I then joined the therewas a Yahoo group, online Yahoo groupthat I joined. I think there were about 30 peopleacross the UK that were on that group, and I joined that group and startedtalking to to other families,parents with with kids. AndI suppose that really was was kind of it for the nextsort of 4 to 5 years.Excuse me. They told me about the TavistockGender Identity Service, and I went back to my GP who I'dspoken to when Jackie was 4 and told me initially that that God hadmade a mistake and she was really a girl. And I went back toI went to the GP, and she said, oh, he'll grow out ofit. No signs of that happeningstill. You'd hope that at30 30 something. Yeah. At 30 something.But yeah. So that was where that's what that was where I got the theinitial support and that for, like, the first few years, I was just a memberof that parents group, I wasn't really activelydoing very much other than just seeking support and speaking to otherfamilies as I needed. Very strange. It's a long time ago.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
I know. I know. You said growing out of it. I suppose in my ownlife, I've grown into it rather than growing out of it. It's likeit's finding that comfy pair of slippers or that that I snuggly it off andgo, this this is me. It fits. And, Yeah. Yeah, there's noout. It's definitely definitely in. So, you know, alot of the rhetoric you hear today is around if we educateour children to be about transawareness and gender identity, all these genders, What that's gonna do isit's gonna persuade them it's a good idea, and they should do it. It yeah.I'm I'm obviously saying that tongue in cheek, you know. Yeah. It's Yeah. That'sthat's the rhetoric that's, that's prevalent in today's mainstreammedia and and the world, isn't it? And
Susie Greenguest
why would anybody choose this? It's really hard.Why would anybody choose this? It it's it's an alienconcept to me that that you would, as a as aperson, you would especially now with with all of theanti trans narratives taking up so much spacein media and, everywhere. Why wouldyou choose this? You just wouldn't. I speak to families day in, dayout. I speak to young people day in, day out. And if this wasn'tthe only way that they could live Right. The this theywouldn't choose this because it's hard. It's really hard. Andit's getting harder because the narrative is gettingworse and worse, and people are beingbasically, they're being made to feel ashamed of who they are, which ishorrible and really disturbing.And as, you know, as you say, it's it'sit's simply a question of being able to live authentically.Everybody else has gets to do that. Why shouldn't trans people have thesame right? It's and why does it affect anybody else? It's nobodyelse's business. Yeah. I don't know about you, but I've noticed the the kind of
Joanne Lockwoodhost
attack vector more over the last fewyears into trans people are predators.Trans people are trying to all the trans people are nowtrying to destroy the lives of young children and ruin their livesand mutilate their bodies with chemicals,chemicals, and surgery, and life changingor operations before they're even 10. Painting thispicture of this big chunky trans womanwith a knife in one hand and a bottle of pills in the other, forcingit down a trans child's throat. That's that's what keeps that's in people's heads,isn't it? We're scaring people into believing that this is somesort of bad thing to help people
Susie Greenguest
help young children. I tell you, there's a there's apicture that I saw on social media the other day because I youknow, I'm obviously a lot of people's favorite person. And,there's a picture of me and it's that it's like a a cartoonimage of me with a big grin with a big needle in myhand. It's just justreally, really stupid. It'sand it's you look at what's going on the narrativesthat are being said. These people who are pushing these narratives, thereare so many things in the world in terms ofinjustices and things that that they could be concentrating on.Instead, they choose to persecute a vulnerable minorityand make their lives so much harder than they than it they need tobe. And they're doing this with this almost overoverzealous rigor to to basically stamptrans people out of existence. Yet there are so many things thatdo actually need that level of concentrated effort to toaddress, including, you know, violence against women.And they're choosing to to go after trans kids and trans womenin particular instead. And it just I don'tknow. It I it completely baffles me. Ihave I just can't understand that. I just can'tunderstand it. Why on earth do they have sucha focus on something that is never gonna impact their ownlives? And why do they think it's okay to to goafter kids and and and to makeout that they should be ashamed of who they are and and that theirinherent being is is wrong.I just find it find it really difficult to come to terms withthat that level of venomis is being constantly addressed at atchildren and trans women in as I say in particular.Why? Why do you look look at climate change? You know, forgoodness sake, you need some concentration on things like violence against women, againstclimate change, against, you know, corruption inpolitics and and within the system. You know, we've we'vegot we've got these these very,very rich men at the center of of, you know,billionaires, nearly trillionaires, obviously, whoare basically manipulating the population. Why aren't they concentrating onwhat's being done to, you know, everyonewho isn't in those positions and highlightingthe injustices of all of those things rather than going after avulnerable minority who are simply just trying to get on and live their lives.That's all. I've got lots of of transgenderpeople in my lives as well as well as my daughter who I love verymuch, And that's all they wanna do. They just wanna get on and live. Yeah.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
I mean, I look you look at the news, they look at all theseatrocities and terrible things that are going on. And noneof them are trans people. We're talking about No. Not.Leading figures in churches and faith groups. We're talking about leadingpeople in sports organizations. We're talking about people leading people incommunities, protecting each other in the as you say, inthese groups of of of of privilege who arekind of keeping silent. And then say, well, but they're a nice person, really.Yeah. They just they just turned away to the dark side for a bit. Weneed to let them. It's in you you look at those things. And none ofthese people are trans. None of these people are pretending to be transor or using it as an excuse. And it's like, that's thefrustration. We see cisgenderwomen murdering children, babies.None of those people are trans. So that I I think that's that's the frustrationthat I as a as a trans woman and many other trans people face thinking,hang on a minute. There are other people out there doingwhat you're saying, but it's not anyone who's saying they're trans. Yeah.And that's so frustrating. So frustrating. So frustrating.
Susie Greenguest
And the narrative has has gained ground inin by the general population's head. You know? They're they'relistening and seeing this. And even the though there is no evidenceof of what is being said. I had a Iremember a conversation that I had about 6 months ago with somebody where she went,oh, it's just gone too far now. She's like, you know, they're tryingto take the word mother out of pregnancy materials.And I went, no. They're not. They're not. And she was like, what what doyou mean? I said, no. They're not. I said, they're adding inadditional stuff so so that it it supports, youknow, people who are are notfemale, who have a uterus and who may want to havebabies, but they don't will never see themselves as,you know, mother or mom because they're not.I said, so they're adding in. I said, they're not takingaway. I said, it it's just nonsense.And why why would that be something why wouldanybody want to, you know we don't get morerights at at the detriment of others. Itjust means the world is more equal for everybody. I said it's andshe actually said, you know, I feel embarrassed now because, actually, I'verealized that I've I've been taken inby the rhetoric. And Yeah. That's the headlight.How easy how easy was that? I know. You're tough. Easy was that for youto lead that in your life? Yeah. Yeah. That's the lead.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
Taking the word mother out, destroying thousands of years oflanguage and Yeah. Is it? But but the targetis still trans women. Yeah. It's me that's, yeah, that's causingthis. And I and I can't hang on a minute. I'm a woman. I'mtrans woman. I don't wanna take the word mother out. I've got no interest inin in degendering language. It's not I I'm gendered.Yeah. What we're using is is the non binary people who want to get thisrecognition. And suddenly, it's a trans woman problem asbeing part of trying to destroy society. And it's like, hang on aminute. Or Never. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Susie Greenguest
Exactly. This is not this was not the intention. This was never. It wasabout being more inclusive, not less. Andand and they just they this fake outrage. I
Joanne Lockwoodhost
know. I get blamed for gender neutral toilets. It's like, I don't want I don'tI don't care about gender toilets. I mean, yes, They'renicer. They're easier. They're more convenient. The shopping centers and car parks, thingslike this. Great. I'm happy with just a toilet. Yeah. Something I can shut thedoor. Well, I'm not banging on about this, that, and the other. Andit's again, these arguments are being conflated with sort of,like, gender outrage, trans women,and poor trans men are just going, just get letme grow my beard and get on with life. It's kind of thing. Yeah.
Susie Greenguest
Yeah. I know. It's it'sexhausting. And I can see why a lot of the community are so burntout and, you know, and and they're stepping backand why people who are in the public eye who are being attacked constantly,why they might feel, I don'tknow, not just tired tired of ofbeing blamed for something that, you know, is not theirfault. You've, you've obviously been in the
Joanne Lockwoodhost
public eye for 15, 20 years,probably, I guess quite a bit, especially through your role withinmermaids and what you're doing now, which we'll talk about in a minute.It's pretty brutal out there, isn't it? The attention you get, the thenegative attention that what people accuse you of. I
Susie Greenguest
mean, it's quite funny, really. I mean, I know thetruth. You know, that's the that's the thing for me. I speak toI speak to the young people. I speak to the families. I speak to, youknow, as I say, so many people in my life now that I love areare trans because of, obviously, the direction that,my life has taken. But I Iknow the truth. So I read this stuff and it actually just makes melaugh, really. The the the venom and the
Susie Greenguest
and the the stuff that's aimed at me,it's quite funny, because none of those things aretrue. I don't I'm I I stopped a long timeago worrying about what other people's opinions who holdthese opinions of me are becauseI know I know what I'm doing and what, you know, my, you know, whatmy co director, co founder Lizzie is doing, and I know what our team isdoing, and I know that the people that I've worked with over the years who,you know, who have with alongsideme, I, you know, been allies as well as members of thecommunity. I know what we're doing is the right thing.And those negative, conversations,they don't they don't touch me. The things that they say about me, they don'tbother me because they're not true.And, actually, I say, quite comical, some of them.I I love I love every now and again, something will come out. I thinkafter after exited Mermaids, there was a lot of jubilation about, ohmy goodness. We've managed to get her. She's gone. And thenwhen Anne Health launched, the reaction waswas hysterical. And it was like, oh my god. Susie Green. I think oneof the ones that, I screenshot and put sort of, like, on myscreen, I wish she'd just shut up. But, yeah, it'syeah. Yeah. I don't really care what they say, but I knowfor other people, you know, it it really hurts.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
Yeah. I I look at my web stats on a daily basis, and all ofa sudden, they'll they'll jump through the roof, and it's all on my biopage or the home page or something. And I go, okay. So I look atthe sources, and that would be x.com or twitter.com. It will be Mumsnet. It'llbe some other site. Okay. Okay. So I I hunt down the article to seewhat they're saying. And it's like, oh, yeah. Here we go. It's almost like playinghate bingo. Oh, yeah. You said that. You said that. Dodgywig, evil smile, staring eyes.We've got all yeah. We tick tick. Yeah. Yeah. You've shit all the Facebook groupson that one. Thank you. Yeah. We call them, MUNSNET
Susie Greenguest
is, Prosecco Stormfront. It's, like,just this quagmire of,entitled, womendiscussing things and and professing outrage, but,you know, not one of them is actually dealing or supporting a transperson in their lives at all. So they're just poking their nose intostuff that is none of their business. Well, it'll start off with
Joanne Lockwoodhost
AIBU. Am I being unreasonable? Yeah. Actually, you probably are, if youdon't mind. That's actually Yeah. Every now and again, if I want a bit of
Susie Greenguest
a giggle, I'll have a I'll I'll go put my name into mom's net andhave a look at what the what the most recent stuff is. But,hang on. I do it for a laugh sometimes and sometimes screenshot it. I when
Joanne Lockwoodhost
I'm doing keynotes and talks, all I sometimes do is is is post some ofthe latest. You know, most people put testimonials on there, so I I just donegative testimonials. Shelley, this is what people think of me.I think I was acquitted to Joseph Mengele at one point trying to destroy children.It's like right? Well, yeah. I mean, I there's there's
Susie Greenguest
there's actually some somebody did a mock up of the, child catcherfrom Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and put my face on it. That wasfunny. That was funny. I mean, the best one the the one that, like,I'm I hold most dear was whenafter Caroline Farrow and Posey Parker went after me, and Ispoke the police potentially about a harassment case, which I then dropped because I wasthought I'm giving I'm giving them, like, a platform with this. But,somebody from America posted a picture of Ursula,from The Little Mermaid up and said this is Susie Green's TrueForm.And I was doing the mermaid's, social media atthe time, and I just replied and said, but and they said, she can'tsue me because I'm in America. And I just went back withthis picture, and I just replied and said, but seriously, does mybum look big in this? And then I screenshotted it andhad it as my profile picture for years. I loved it somuch. And, you know, people, friends, family,etcetera, still buy me Ursula products just because they think it'sfun. So but then, you know, she's she's the perfect baddie,isn't she? So Well, she said she's got a bit of a cuteness
Joanne Lockwoodhost
about her as well. She's not completely evil, is she? She's she's cool. She's
Susie Greenguest
cool. Yeah. I think she's cool as well. I think, yeah, we'll she's
Joanne Lockwoodhost
probably a a fierce torture of of defense forus, for Ariel and things like that. I think she's she's there really. She's lookingafter everybody. Sorry. Yeah. We need we need really strong matriarchalcharacters in our in our pond, don't we, sometimes? Yeah. Why
Susie Greenguest
not? As I say, she was she was my profile picture for a lot ofyears. Yeah. So glad you owned it. Yeah. It's
Joanne Lockwoodhost
well, it it is. I think we've we'veanybody who's in the public eye and wherever it in in wherever micro or macroway, you've you've just gotta be used to people having an opinion on you. Iremember Brene Brown knew she'd madean impact when she got more as much hate as she got likes on herYouTube. So, see, and that's Brene Brown. So, you you know, it's it'sit's everybody gets hate. Marmite, isn't it? You love me or hateme. That's fine. I'm cool with it. Yeah. Definitely.But it it's yeah. Where are we now? We're we're last couple of daysof January 2025, and we're a few weekson from events in the US where we're seeing a lot of,EOs, executive orders coming out around transferringthe military, defunding, you know, rejecting transferringsociety, canceling driving licenses. So it's realit's a real state in the states. And that info thattravels across across the Atlantic as well to us. We we can't beimmune to what's going on over there, can we? No.
Susie Greenguest
And it's it's really disturbing to see what's going on. Ithink yesterday, I spent in, like, a fog ofdisbelief about how bad it it's got. Though, to be honest,kind of expected this to happenwhen, obviously, Trump, got back in as president.You know, he started a lot of this when he in his previous term andtried to to move things in that direction. So these executiveorders, although they're horrific, are not a massivesurprise. And, obviously, there's work beingdone in the states to to push back against them.But trans health care for trans youth particularly, obviously, isbeing affected by the executive order that came out,you know, just over a day ago. And we're seeingwithin our organization, we're seeing,families with trans kids in America reachingout and saying, can you help us? Becauseaccess to their health care for their kids looks like it's gonnabe shut down. And clinics are actingin advance of the order actually coming into law as well andturning peep you know, turning young people away from clinic appointments for blockers andstuff. So this is like Ican't imagine what it must feel like to be a family with a transkid in America right now. I really can't. I justit just I don't wanna think about it too much because it makes me feelso sad and really angry on their behalf about whatthey're they're being put through right now. It's, yeah, it's awful. And,obviously, we've got our own issues here with Westreting puttingin the permanent ban against, puberty blockers foryoung people on the flimsiest of premises.And he spoke to a room, West Street Inc,spoke to a room full of of trans kids and their parents.And I've spoken to a parent who was in that space, and she said those90 minutes were probably the most traumatic of her life because thosekids shared what the blocker ban meant to them.And he said he heard them, and he looked them in the face. He lookedthem in the eyes and said he heard them, and then he went ahead anddid it anyway. It's it's devastating.Politics has no place in health care. No place in healthcare. And this is going toat some point, this is all gonna be reversed. And this will belooked back as a particularly bleak and black stage of historyfor for trans youth and trans people in general. In
Joanne Lockwoodhost
the same way, we looked at what went on with AIDS, what we looked onwith section 28, what we looked on with racialdiscrimination, gender all the things we've we've looked back in our history and go, that'snot a proud moment in time. And I I agree, and it'swith West responding really,I don't wanna make excuses for him or anybody, from the cashreport. You know, the cash report came out, in the lastdying embers of the Tory government. Put it across the line.And on balance, it says some good things. There's some good things in the cashreport. One is that we need better support for young trans people. We need tounderstand it better. So if you look at some of the positives, there's a lotof positives. Not one place in the cash report actually say,puberty blockers were banned. Because if they did, what wouldhappen was that these these trials they're proposing or or embarkingon, how how can you embark on a trial for something you've you've declaredas being a bad thing? SoI'm hoping the government do the trials.They they take the heat out of this negative rhetoric and go,actually, here's logical clinical evidence now, whichwe never had. So as I said, at the end, don't justify the meansat all. I'm hoping that we come out with somethingreally credible at the end of this. The only problem is the trial
Susie Greenguest
itself is completely unethical to givean you know, this is this was presented at the women's select committee.Simona Giordano, who's a bioethicist, you know, hit the nail on the head. It'scompletely unethical to force people into aclinical trial by withholding access to treatment by any othermeans. It is unethical and it breaches people's humanrights. And actually, lots of principles interms of human rights are being are being trampledon by, you know, this process.And what about the controlgroup that they're saying needs to be done? Yeah. The double blind. Yeah. The double
Joanne Lockwoodhost
blinds. So That's not gonna work. They're just those kids are just gonna their their
Susie Greenguest
puberty is gonna continue on, and they're just gonna drop out of the studies.And the emotional impact on those young people thinking that they'vegone through all of this process, jumped through all of these hoops, then beingaccepted, and then their puberty progressesregardless. That emotional impact is gonna havethat. That's a huge safeguarding risk. It's completelyunethical. And it just it justhighlights the fact that actually this medication can't be that bad if they'regonna do a clinical trial on it. If it was as dangerous as they sayit is, then they couldn't they couldn't feasiblysuggest that that a clinical trial is a is a good idea. And the fact
Susie Greenguest
is is that there's lots and lots and lots of evidence on,how puberty blockers assist in gender affirming healthcare.They just chose in the CAS report to disqualify all of thosestudies because it didn't fit their narrative. And we knowthat the CAS report is a political document because Cammiebadnot stated as such that it was done deliberately, andtrans people were not part of any, of the,team. So and their their rereason for doing that, that, the reason that they said that they didn't have transpeople is because they didn't want, you know, it to be influenced.Now if you did a if you did a trial on if you did aa review on diabetes care, would having somebody withdiabetes mean that that was that was, you know, biased.If you did a trial on autism, having members of, you know, of thegroup that were doing that review, you know, would having somebodywho who actually was autistic on that, would that be biased? No, itwouldn't. It's only trans people. And it's only transkids and trans women who have been subjected to this sort ofnarrative. And, you know, it's being debunked. Thecast review is being debunked internationally, locally.There's so much evidence everyday, more comes to light in terms of looking at the method themethodology, the the conclusions that they've reached, thethe stuff that was said in there that has absolutely no basisin science or any research to back it up, that'sjust been popped in there as an opinion and has been taken asthis holy grail of what of what trans health carefor trans youth should be like. And it's a biasedpolitical document with an end game in sight, which which has come topass. And I was really hoping thatlabor would would have, you know, the,you know, the foresight to look at this and go, this smells a little bitodd. You know? This isn't quite right. This doesn't seem to be, youknow, led by the community. Nobody from the community was apart of this. Perhaps we should take this with a pinch of salt. And thefact that they're pushing the same narrative despite everything that'sbeen said about it is a real concern.Real concern. Trans youth, though, is it? I mean, we look at
Joanne Lockwoodhost
adult trans support, their gender identity clinics. The thewaiting list, they're now seeing people who are referred in2018, 2019. If you join the waiting list now, you're lookingat 6 plus years, maybe even longer for first appointment.
Susie Greenguest
Think it I don't even think it's 6 plus years. I think it was extrapolatedin, that if you join the waiting list now, you'llbe seen in 20 years because the numbers that have been seen off the waitinglist that are coming off the with waiting list and the people that are beingadded, You're looking at 20 years. How howhow You stand no chance at No. No chance. No. You
Joanne Lockwoodhost
gotta go private. You gotta you gotta that it means you have to have privilege.You have to have the the means and the wherewithal. Even private appointments aren't quickbecause the limited availability of specialists in that in that areaas well. Yeah. It it is it is horrendous. And, II know many adults who are holding their headsin their hands, going, what am I gonna do? How am I gonna handle this?There there are very few places in the with the UK perspectivesthat you can go for support these days for for free. GPs don't wanna touchyou now. I've got lots of friends who have been,deprescribed, if that's a word, from their GP, because it's like, oh, it's abit risky. I'm not sure what I should do. Everybody needs to have a license.Okay. All trans. This is this is a risky area. I'm I've gotjustification now to be out of this and say, I I'm not I'm notcomfortable. And that's the impact of these studies and the the rhetoric, isn'tit? Yeah. And I think the thing is that GPs routinely prescribe
Susie Greenguest
stuff that is, like, a 1000 times more toxic than HRTroutinely to cisgender people day in, day out. Yetthey're, you know, they go, oh, this is a specialist area. It'snot. It's really not. It's not.But All the women I spoke to about menopause support, it it's clear that
Joanne Lockwoodhost
GPs are just not comfortable talking about estrogen,progesterone, prolactin, doing bloodtests, finding out about people, let alone testosterone. Sothat there's not a lot of yeah. They always wanna palm it off onto anendocrinologist or they want someone to come and tell them that it'sokay. Yeah. People pass talk about thesehormones as if they are powerful drugs.It's it's a it's a part of the natural body. Okay. They've beensynthesized from cow urine or pig urine or bioidentical, whateverwe're talking about. But they're not drugs as such. They're not they're notchemicals we're putting in our body. They're natural occurring hormones.
Susie Greenguest
Yep. And using them to make people feel comfortable in intheir own bodies. Why why is that such a big deal? I heardthe stories, obviously, not stories. I heard the reportsof the GP surgeries whojust took all of their trans patients off their books and went, we're not we'renot supporting you anymore. Blatant discriminationas as as evidenced by the fact that itsaid it said, just to complete, we are not dealing withtrans people anymore. I hear it all thetime, people telling us about their care beingrefused, that they've been on HRT for years, andthe GP has always been, like, really supportive and not had an issue, and thensuddenly an addict comes down from the practice, you know, manageror whatever, and and they're changing the rules andsuddenly their access to to hormones is removed.1,000 are being forced into self medication. Andfor for young people who don't have the means to access privatecare and for adults who don't have to means to access private care,it means that they're starting using dangerous,access means to be able to get what they need.It's it it doesn't stop people being trans, and itdoesn't stop people seeking, to be able to feel morecomfortable with the use of, you know, HRT hormones,etcetera. What it does is it forces people down roots that actuallywill will harm them. And that's despicable.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
There's a a scene in, a hit Netflix,drama, Orange the New Black, where LaverneCox, trans character I can'tremember her character in the in the show, but Laverne Cox is suddenlydenied, HRT medication, which she goes up to the counter, and they said,no. You can't have that anymore. And the panic set in in,I'm gonna grow hair. I'm gonna this and no. It's just gonna happen. It's likeand that was in a prison scenario where you got no agency at all. Soimagine how it is like if you're in America, the judicial system, or eventhe military, or in this country lacking privilege. Thatmoment, you'll think, hang on a minute. My my life has been okay. It's beennormal. It's I'm getting all the things. Suddenly, it'sgone. Yeah. I mean, it's no different to women finding thatthere's no more estrogen gel or patches on the market. And something theirtheir their menopause symptoms are gonna come back with a vengeance.And it was there then. It's exactly the same. Yep.
Susie Greenguest
And we speak to people every day,every day who who are in that position, who aresuddenly finding themselves with with thisI don't I don't I I just I I sympathizeand empathize with them so much becausehow how must it feel to suddenly have somethingthat made you feel yourself, made you feel comfortable with yourself and enabled youto just get on with life and be suddenly taken away. And andthen as you say, that panic that panic, that feelingof, well, what am I gonna do now? And that feeling that that yourbody is gonna betray you. Like, as you say, like,menopausal treatment and care. It'sto remove that like it is is is so irresponsibleand dangerous. And the impact on people'slives is, oh, it's heartbreaking.Heartbreaking conversations that I have every day are heartbreaking.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
So this this is where your your vision and health camefrom, isn't it? Where the to create an organizationthat can enable people to safely accessthe support they need. Not just not just medication, butbut support as well. It's not it's not just handing out things. It's abouttalking to people and listening to people. So do you want to tell us abit more about what where the idea come from in your own wordsand and the problem it's solving and and how maybe some of thechallenges you're having getting it going as well? Yeah. I
Susie Greenguest
Anne Anne Health sort of in terms ofthe idea. Beingpart of Mermaids, being CEO of Mermaids, talking tofamilies, young people, seeing what was happening in the UK withregards to access to health care for young people. I've seenthousands of of families struggle,with the NHS provision, but also access to privatehealthcare because the only other provider is is genderGP. So when I leftMermaiz at the end of November 2022, I went to work for gender GP. Iknew Helen Webberly previously, whenshe started providing health care for trans people and then started to extendthat to young people. And I really respectedwho she was and what she did, and the amount ofattacks, and obviously the challenges that she faced and herhusband faced because of that. So I went to work for Gender GPand sort of quickly realized that it it wasn't for me becausewhat I saw, what I thought was waswithin Gender GP didn't come to pass, and it was clear thatthey weren't providing personalized, appropriately,medically overseen care. So whilst I was in there,Lizzie, my cofounder, co director, and Ihave known each other for years. And westarted talking about there's got to be something better than this.There's got to be something that is actually as affordable as wecan make it whilst also ensuring that there is, like, the quality ofcare with the proper medical oversight.And we wanted to get it going. And we we tried for from,like, the middle of of 2023, really up until thebeginning of 2024. And and we've kinda given up about gettinggetting it started because we needed seed money to get going.And we were so frustrated because we could see how much the communitydesperately needed an alternative, especially for transyouth who were only had, as I say, the NHS, which is broken,and even more so now. And, obviously, genderGP, and we we knew there needed to be an alternative, but we just didn'thave didn't have the means to get it going. And then we hada an amazing gift from a benefactor whosaid that they believed in what we were doing and that they wanted to helpus. So they gave us, like, a chunk of cash to get going. So that'sreally how that started. So that was that was back insort of March, April of last year. So we we did a lot ofstuff behind the scenes. We worked with some trial patients to make sure that ourprocess was was robust. We tried to get GMCdoctors involved, and and we had a a couple of GMC registereddoctors who were really, really keen, who really were supportive of the trans community, butthey got warned off from working with a private health carecompany, particularly working with with trans youngpeople. So in the end, we replicatedto a degree the model that gender GP uses in terms of EU prescribers.But unlike gender GP, everybody sees their doctor. So literally partof the process is that you see your doctor and you see them regularly,and they, and they will talk you through your careand any questions, etcetera. So, yeah, we got started atthe beginning of of 2024 with that amazing gift.Since then, it's gone from strength to strength. We came outas being, you know, to the public in July just as aas obviously, just after the puberty blocker ban had had been put intoplace. So we came out because we wantedpeople to know that there was an alternative and that, actually, we we wereworking towards providing a safe and legal route for people to be able to accesspuberty blockers so that the criminalizing of of parents,who just wanna help their kids would would, that wewould find a way to to help them to do that legally.And, yeah, it's interesting. Ithink it's probably the best word. It's interestinghow much, how much abuse, is aimed atus. But, again, like I said about me in general and andLizzie's very robust, we we don't care. We we see wesee the difference our services are making totrans people of all ages who need us, andwe're gonna you know, we're here for the duration. We believe in what we'redoing. We also are a registered, nonprofitas well. So we do also provide some subsidizedcare and are looking to expand on that. And as weas an organization continue to grow and as wehave more, surpluses and not forprofit, that will go to subsidize people's care who can'tafford it. So we wish we could provide free freeof care free of charge care for everybody. It's notpossible. It's you know, we just can't.But we will try and help people as much as wecan. That one, to simplify touching wood,
Joanne Lockwoodhost
you haven't had anyone challenging you legallyyet, have you? No. But that's we got some
Susie Greenguest
very, very, very good legal advice at the verybeginning. Sowe worked with David Locke, who is in terms of healthcare legislation legally. He's, he's sort of topof the trade. So we commissioned him and his team tolook at what we were doing, the model that we were we were doing, andand to give us, like, their legal oversight into the best waysto ensure that we were as robust as possible.And I think that advice as as,you know, been very timely, bearing in mind theblocker ban, etcetera, and also is a protective factorbecause we know what we need to do to ensure that we're falling within theletter of the law, that we're not encouraging people to todo, you know, to to do criminal activities.We are literally talking to people about the way that theycan get the support that they need, and we're doing it in a waythat is perfectly, legitimately withinwithin the scope of as a law. Yeah. Sometimes when I'm listening to people
Joanne Lockwoodhost
like West Street and other people talking about puberty blockerban, I often wonder if they're they're aiming at atgender GP primarily. It it sounds like thatwhen they're they're not saying it explicitly, but they're kind of saying, well, these offshoredoctors based on the other side of the world, we wanna stop them doing this,this, and this. And it's over that sounds like sounds likegender GP rhetoric. And It's it's so is.
Susie Greenguest
It's so is. And, unfortunately, the thethe the reports coming out of gender GP means thatsome of that concern is actually legitimate, interms of, you know, Helen Webberly has stated clearly for therecord and has done a Times interview where she talks openlyabout the fact that gender GPs run entirely on AI systems.So health care recommendations,except that it's all based on AI bots and an algorithm that she'sput in for people. You know? So it's yourhealth care is not overseen by a real person. It's a shame because our GeneralGP
Joanne Lockwoodhost
helped me out 2014, 2015 in the earlydays when you when you were probably dealing with Helen yourself on these things.Yeah. Yep. So the yeah. They theycertainly helped me self well, they took me off of real selfmed, which was, you know, Internet drugs and all those sort of things. It's allabout and then at least got me into something that was aknown source, from a UK online pharmacy. Andthen the GIC took over with a shared care agreement with GP.I was quite fortunate that I was probably before theproblem just started developing. So yeah.
Susie Greenguest
And I and I think I think AI bots don't have I mean, theyhave their place in medicine for, you know, sort of likeautomating systems, etcetera. But for health care, forrecommending health care, overseeing blood tests, etcetera, that's that's not theirplace. You know? We need real life people. Andwe we run a helpline, so 9 to 5, Monday to Friday,and a web chat option so people can get in touch with us. Andthe actual relief that people feel when they speak to areal life person is immense. And we we getit all the time. We have people calling up and going, oh my goodness. I
Susie Greenguest
didn't actually believe that I'd be able to get through to a real life person,that I'd be able to actually talk to somebody. And,you know, we offer that that support from a helpline basis interms of, like, general support as well as obviously support in terms ofthe medical process inside of it. Now one ofthe things that I experienced as a parentwhen I had to go through unconventional means to get my daughtermedication, I had to take her, which is, like, ironicnow, really. I had to take her to Boston in America to be seen bydoctor Norman Spack at the Boston Children's Hospital.And that feeling of ofbeing alone and and being isolated and doing something that's goingagainst what the NHS was telling me because I was told that she hadto go through a full now puberty to be sure that that's notwhat she wanted. And I was like, that's that's insane.That's insane. What you so you're saying that she has to go through all ofthis in terms of that emotional turmoil,torture, frankly, for her. Andyou're saying that she has to do that so that so that you canactually then acknowledge the fact that that wasn't the best thing for her.Madness. So, yeah, so we had to follow that route. But the one thing thatI had with the Boston Children's Hospital, etcetera, was I hadsomebody to talk to. I had a really responsive doctor. Norman wasamazing. And to be able to talk to somebody,to be able to get that reassurance, to be able tohave those questions that come up answered was invaluable,which is why we are really clear that what we do at ANAis we're here for you. And we won't charge you justto talk to a real life person. That's just part of the care that youget, and we want you to feel comfortable, and we want you to feel safe.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
That's what you're saying there is, like, we want your child, Jackie,to go through male puberty to prove that it's the rightdecision for her. I'm just thinking as you're saying now, I was thinking, look atall the rhetoric around trans people, I. E. Trans women. It'sit's not being around a bush here, trans women in sport.The the current IOC and other regulations, plastics,you name it, all the rugby, everyone's come out with a rule. Basically, they're saying,if you've been through male puberty or then you're ineligible.So what we're saying is, what we need to do is go through your pubertyas normal, work out when you get to the age of 15 that itwasn't right, and preclude yourself fromever being a professional sports person in any field, just incase you may be wrong. Whereas puberty blockers could havejust given you that little bit of breathing time, let your brain mature a bit.You could take over a test drive, make sure you're comfortable with it. Andthen you you haven't precluded your the rest of your lifefrom that decision because not doingsomething isn't a zero sum game either. So it it's it's it's it's It's
Susie Greenguest
not a neutral act. To deny access to medication, todeny access to care is not a neutral act. And in fact, fortrans young people, as we know from the reaction of familiesto to the blocker ban, is actually disastrous. Andthere's there's blood on West Street's hands already. There areyoung people who are not with us anymore because of what ishappening with access to care through n a through the NHS.And it's incredibly sad.Incredibly sad. And coupled with that, the empowering the
Joanne Lockwoodhost
anti trans rhetoric through this as well. So it's not it'snot just the action of blocking. It's also the enablingof the rhetoric and green lighting it in the mainstream media,in GPs, in teachers, in people in authority.It's the whole of society is now being green lighted that the transpeople are bad. Being trans is bad. Yeah. Being trans is bad. A
Susie Greenguest
cisgender outcome is a preferred outcome. And that's whatcomes through so plainly from within that, you know, the CASreview and the other rhetoric that's out there is, you know, letlet's try push for a cisgender outcome. Let's try andpush you in a direction that means that you're not trans.And that's conversion therapy. That's conversion practices.It's and that's what the these new centers are doing as well. And we've heard
Susie Greenguest
reports from families about the kind of discussions thattheir kids are being subjected to, which shows thatwhat's being practiced on them is is conversion practices. They're tryingthey're basically trying to persuade, people that theyshould be comfortable with their with their sex assigned at birth and that,you know, to be trans is a poor outcome. And and it'sand it's just, honest I itjust makes me I am I feel like I'm in aconstant state of rage at the moment.And I have to give my head a shake every now and again and sitback and go, right. Okay. You're doing everything that you can. You'reworking alongside people who really believe in this. Youknow? You're doing what you can, when youcan, and you're not giving up. So that's all I cando. Yeah. Yeah. It is. It it it is. And I
Joanne Lockwoodhost
get frustrated that people want everyone tobe normal. And whether that's antipeople, gay people, bi people, or anyone who doesn't fit thiskind of biblical version of of of who you shouldbe. Even even the bible allegedlyis 2000 years old, way before today's society wasever even conceived. So how we can reference things back to thisthese traditional values that were never really in existence anyway. They'rejust people with power and privilege trying to control the massesthrough, through rules. Yep. Yep.
Susie Greenguest
And and again, it it's about, you know,look over there. Don't look at what I'm doing. Lookover there. I blame that person over there. Don't blame me withmy stack of cash who's basicallypushing society in a in a direction that's really harmfulfor the majority of its citizens. Look over there and and pick onthat that person there rather than actually paying attentionto what I'm doing. I've got a a fair few friends around the world, and,
Joanne Lockwoodhost
I haven't managed to confer any of them to being trans. You're
Susie Greenguest
obviously not working hard enough. Yeah. I mean, I'veI've been told that, you know, I trans ed mydaughter because I didn't want a gay son.And, my gay son finds that a little bit odd,but, you know. I'm a huge fan of a of a protest singer called Grace
Joanne Lockwoodhost
Petrie. I was at one of her, I think it was a comedy show, andshe stood up in the beginning and said, she's really, really frustrated.Why hasn't the trans for grade come and come for her? Becauseshe's a butch lesbian. She's out and proud butch lesbian. She she's got, I'm anideal candidate to being converted to be trans. So why isn't anyone trying?Why isn't everyone trying to convert to be trans? Where are you? I love her
Susie Greenguest
stuff. I love her stuff. She's amazing. And, yeah, again,you know, yeah, I'm I'm I've trans my kid. We're transingkids. We're you know, I mean, what? You know,I couldn't I couldn't make my kid eat a piece, never mind makeher be trans. I mean, and my and my gay son is like, well, youclearly didn't try hard enough with me, mom. So, you know, you you know,didn't do the job right with me. If if I did, then I'd have 2trans kids, not just 1. Bizarre. I think that'sbizarre. Yeah. The other thing that frustrates me is that,
Joanne Lockwoodhost
if I came out as neurodiverse,on the spectrum, ASD, whatever it may be, it'd be, oh, you'reneurodiverse. It's fine. But I I do I kind of selfdeclare myself as as having a neurodiversity, which is my gender. It's justmy brain thinks differently. But it's the wrong type ofneurodiversity. It's not not not trendy enoughfor for for the for the, for society. But, yeah, itit's people are making judgments based on lack of knowledgeYep. Manipulation And it's not and it's
Susie Greenguest
not involved in their lives, so I don't know whether or not it'sa distraction from their day to day that they can pick on, youknow, somebody else. Or it's I mean, somebody said to methat it's not. It's just some people find trans people icky, sothey don't like it. So therefore, their reaction to it, because they don't understand itand it doesn't affect anybody that they love, theirresponse to it is is to to push in the oppositedirection. And that's a really good way of
Joanne Lockwoodhost
describing it icky. And unfortunately or fortunately,that's kind of the definition of transphobia, isn't it? It's a fear orthis ickiness, a dislike, a distaste for based on a bias.And that's that's exactly what it is. Andyeah. And I've I've I've I've got people in my lifethat maybe not use the word icky. They've just described me asas as not having enough feminine energy for them. And,yeah, that's fine. Yeah. Whatever. I mean Whatever that is. I mean, oh, wait. What
Susie Greenguest
what is that? What is that? I mean, they could say the same about,you know, a large percentage of the cisgenderwoman population. They might look at me and go, you're not feminine. You haven't gotthe feminine traits. Blah blah. What a load of absolutebullshit. It's bullshit. Bollocks. Yeah. We can use
Joanne Lockwoodhost
those words. Don't worry. Oh, that's okay then. I'm very sweary normally. I've been really
Susie Greenguest
polite. That's okay. Someone normally gets the f word in early, but,
Joanne Lockwoodhost
yeah, we we've done alright today. I think that but it's not it'snot a problem sometimes is if you look at the mediarepresentation, when you're trying to talk about trans people havingan opinion, it's become activists, lobbygroups, testers, and all the imagery is around young transpeople with banners, flags, t shirts, burning effigies, all this kindof stuff. You talk to people who have a a less than trans positive view.View. They're in suits, ties called professor or doctor or something. So we'retrying to paint trans people as anarchists and thepeople who want to put reason back in society as being thelogical, thoughtful, professional side. And that doesn't help. Youknow, the the mainstream media are pumping this asymmetry at us all the time aswell. All the time. I mean, the number of anti trans articles,
Susie Greenguest
bearing in mind the size of the public there's more articlesthat are painting trans people as, you know, we we've talkedabout this already a little bit, as as dangerous, aspredatory, as a as liars, essentially. That there's more ofthem than there are actually trans people in society. Over the lastfew years, there are more individual articles that have been published throughoutthe mainstream media than there are actual trans people, which isunbelievable. It's crazy, isn't it? It's crazy. It's absolutelycrazy. 2 each. 2 articles each. It is. And I don't knowhow many have been written about me. I'd but yeah. I think, yeah,there's, and, obviously, you've been in a similar position withwith being somebody who's openly out as atrans person. It just me as a very visibleally and transadjacent is how I con myself.Yeah. It's it's yeah. It's insane the amount ofattention we get literally just wanting to to support people and tobe able to get on and live their lives. That's all we wanna do is
Joanne Lockwoodhost
get on with our lives. Thank you, Susie. That's it. Absolutely. Fantastic.How could people get hold of you? Tell us a bit more about, thewebsite. Anything else? Details? Yeah. So all
Susie Greenguest
of, I mean, it's really simple. It's like justwww.ann.health. And if you goonto our website, it's got the number for the helpline,and it's got the web chat link so you can click on that and youcan, you know, you can make contact with a real live person, 9 to 5,Monday to Friday. You can email athello at https://anne.health. And we'vegot, you know, a team of amazing peoplewho are either all trans or transadjacent, on theteam who really care about the livesof the people that we're supporting. So if you wanna get in touch with us,please do, and you will be contacted back by a human being.
Joanne Lockwoodhost
So if you're listening to this, it's https://anne.health. Yes. It's not that dothealth is one of these newfangled domain names. It's not dotco dot health dotco.uk.It's just ann No. anne dot health. Health. That's it.Enter. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. Excellent. Susie,it's been an absolute pleasure, and thank you for your time. I appreciate it.
Susie Greenguest
It's been lovely to speak to you. And at the same timeas, like, vaguely depressing talking about all this stuff isalso nice to know that there's like minded people out there who arefighting for the right things. Yes. We are. Well,
Joanne Lockwoodhost
lots of transadjacent, lots of trans allies, lots of people out therewith lots of love, lots of support in their art. And as I keepsaying to people, we just gotta hold the rope. Hold the rope. Don't need topull anybody over. Don't need to win. Just hold the rope, and the world willkeep turning, and things will get better. Yeah. Yep. I
Susie Greenguest
agree. And just need to needto keep hoping and supporting each other. And if you see somebody,you know, who's struggling, please reach out. And sorry. It's Susie
Joanne Lockwoodhost
from Anne. Thank you. Thank you. Aswe bring this conversation to a close, I want to expressmy deepest gratitude to you, our listener, for lendingyour ear and heart to the cause of inclusion.Today's discussion struck a chord. Consider subscribing toInclusion Bites, and become part of our ever growingcommunity, driving real change. Share this journey withfriends, family, and colleagues. Let's amplify the voicesthat matter. Got thoughts, stories, or avision to share? I'm all ears. Reach out to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk,And let's make your voice heard. Until next time. Thisis Joanne Lockwood signing off with a promise to returnwith more enriching narratives that challenge, inspire,and unite us all. Here's to fostering a more inclusive world,one episode at a time. Catch you on the next bite.
In this episode of The Inclusion Bites Podcast, Joanne Lockwood engages in a thought-provoking conversation with Susie Green about the challenges and triumphs in providing compassionate healthcare for trans individuals. Susie shares her insights on the evolving landscape of trans healthcare, the societal impacts of current anti-trans rhetoric, and the pivotal role that support systems play in the lives of trans youth. Joanne and Susie also examine the damaging effects of misinformation and discrimination on trans individuals and their families, shedding light on the pressing need for informed, empathetic care. Susie Green is co-founder and co-director of Anne Health, an organisation dedicated to offering accessible and compassionate healthcare for trans people of all ages. Her journey into this crucial work began when her daughter, at the age of four, expressed her true gender identity. Susie’s firsthand experiences as a mother of a trans child fuelled her passion for advocacy and inclusive healthcare. Known for her resilience and dedication, Susie has been a prominent figure in the trans community for over two decades, previously serving as CEO of Mermaids, a charity that supports transgender youth and their families. Her expertise and personal experiences make her an invaluable advocate for trans rights and healthcare. Joanne and Susie delve into the stark realities trans individuals face, from the lack of informed healthcare professionals to the toxic narratives perpetuated by mainstream media. They discuss the critical importance of puberty blockers as a means to provide trans youth with space to explore their identities safely, countering the harmful misconceptions that often surround this treatment. Susie emphasises that denying access to such care is not a neutral act—it has severe and sometimes fatal consequences for trans youth. The episode concludes with Susie sharing the mission of Anne Health and its commitment to offering safe, personalised care for trans individuals. Despite the hate and legal challenges faced, Susie remains steadfast in her commitment to support and uplift the trans community. Joanne and Susie urge listeners to foster understanding, hold space for those struggling, and continue advocating for inclusive healthcare practices. A key takeaway from this episode is the urgent need for empathy and informed care in supporting trans individuals. Listeners will gain a deeper understanding of the systemic challenges faced by the trans community and the importance of access to safe, affirming healthcare. This episode serves as a powerful call to action to challenge the status quo and advocate for a more inclusive and compassionate society.
The views and opinions expressed by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Inclusion Bites, SEE Change Happen Ltd or Joanne Lockwood. This episode is shared for general interest and discussion; we accept no responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of any statements made.
