Literally was THIS CLOSE to crying at the doctors office but like only in the best way 😭💛

Advice to trans applicants to the Canadian Armed Forces

(Disclaimer: This advice is based on my personal experience as a transgender applicant to the Canadian Armed Forces. Other applicants may face more or fewer barriers. This is all my personal advice and not official advice from or endorsed by the CAF)

1.     If you have not physically transitioned do not disclose that you are transgender. They are not allowed to ask. However, in the medical screening interview, you must tell them about any medications you take and any surgeries you have had and why, so you must disclose that you are trans if you have physically transitioned to any degree. If you haven’t transitioned, wait until after joining and after basic to tell them you are transgender and wish to transition, otherwise you probably will not make it through the hiring process. If your name and gender markers are already legally as desired, and you have not and do not plan to ever physically transition, they never need to know you’re trans. Even if you don’t pass, they can’t ask, which brings me to my next point:

2.     If you don’t pass, they might ask if you’re transgender even though it’s illegal. In my occupational interview, my MCC asked. If this happens my advice is to be truthful. Don’t show offense or mention that what they asked was illegal, just say ‘yes’.

3.     There are certain medical documents they will require solely because you are trans, but likely will not tell you they require until months after your initial medical interview. For other pre-exisiting conditions, they will tell you up front in the medical interview what tests/forms/letters you need. For example, if you’re applying for an aircrew trade and wear glasses, they’ll give you some forms for your optometrist immediately. I assume the delay for trans people is because the med techs don’t know what trans applicants need to submit. They’ll send your file to Ottawa without the required info and your file will be bounced back as incomplete. So, if you are on HRT or have had gender affirming surgery, before you apply, get the following letters:

 a.      A letter of assessment from the doctor who prescribes your HRT. It should include how long you’ve been on HRT, what stage of transition you’re in, and whether any follow-ups with them are needed. The letter must indicate that you have completed transition, and that no follow-ups specifically with your doctor are needed. If you’ve started physical transition but haven’t completed it, don’t apply until after you have. (For example, if you have been on HRT for years but don’t plan to ever have any gender affirming surgeries your transition is complete.) If your doctor is confident that you can miss doses of HRT without issue, have them note that in the letter.

b.     A letter of assessment from a psychologist. I had never seen a psychologist before, but I had to get one for this application and pay for it myself. Unlike with the previously mentioned letter, they didn’t tell me what this letter should include, with the result that most psychologists had no clue what to write and quoted thousands of dollars for a full psychological assessment. If you have seen a psychologist recently, getting them to write this letter is probably your cheapest option, since they’ll have a rapport with you and might be willing to do it for the cost of a session or even for free. If you don’t, you’ll be hard pressed to find a psychologist willing to do it for under a couple grand. I ended up getting lucky and finding one who would do it for $500.

It’s best to have these letters ready and present them to the med tech during your medical, so they’ll add them to your file and your file won’t be bounced back once it gets to Ottawa.

4.     Be prepared to face discrimination without showing any anger, or even letting on that you know you’re being discriminated against. If you cry ‘discrimination’ it will probably backfire, as they will always have plausible deniability. You can try going to the detachment commander. However, if you do face discrimination it probably won’t be overt enough to pin definitively as discrimination, or to act against. For example, the med tech who oversaw my file claimed he didn’t get documents I submitted and, even when I handed them directly to him, came up with excuses not to forward them to the doctor who’d requested them in Ottawa. He also never once answered an email I sent him. Every couple months, he’d send me an email requesting more tests/letters of assessment. These requests were always too vague to act on without further information. However, he never responded to my questions. He did, however, respond to the questions of a cis friend of mine whose file he was also in charge of. I got lucky one day when I went to the recruitment centre and the med tech in charge of my file wasn’t there. I spoke to another one, simply reiterating my experience with med tech 1. He told me he didn’t think what was happening to me was right and took it upon himself to forward my documents to Ottawa when med tech 1 wouldn’t, which brings me to my next piece of advice:

5.     When you’re being roadblocked by someone in the hiring process, there’s no use trying to go through the roadblock. Go around. Find someone sympathetic. Go back to the recruitment centre another day and talk to a different person. There is more than likely going to be someone willing to help you, just as long as you don’t say or imply that you’re being discriminated against, but rather just describe what is happening as if you don’t know it’s because you’re trans and think it’s normal, but frustrating. They might think ‘this poor fool doesn’t even know they’re being discriminated against,’ and if they’re at all sympathetic to trans people they’ll try to help you.

6.     Pester them like flies on a carcass. Email, call, or go to the recruitment centre and bother them if you think you’re facing a roadblock because you’re trans. Don’t do this more than once every other week, but don’t wait months without any movement either. From my experience, going in person is your best bet. Is your file going nowhere? Recruitment centre every other week to see ‘if there’s any update’. (Sometimes there actually will be one!) Med tech won’t answer your email and it’s been a week? He’ll never answer. Recruitment centre to ask him or another med tech the same question(s) from your email.

7.     If a med tech never answers your emails but asks you to submit a document by scanning and emailing it to him, it’s a trap. He will never process it. Leave a paper trail. Submit it in person to him or the recruitment centre. Submit it by email to another person at the recruitment centre if possible. Even this doesn’t guarantee he’ll process it, but it does guarantee he can’t deny receiving it.

8.     Realize that it’s possible you’re not being discriminated against even if you feel that you are. It’s possible that I wasn’t being discriminated against at all. It’s possible that after seven months in medical limbo I just so happened to be cleared right after the CAF released a policy to counter discrimination against trans service members. It’s likely that even if all the roadblocks I faced were solely because I was trans, the people who put those roadblocks in place had nothing against trans people. Maybe med tech 1 wouldn’t tell me what the letter from the psychologist should include because he didn’t know, because the doctor in Ottawa didn’t tell him. And maybe she didn’t tell him because she didn’t know either, because she’d rarely dealt with trans applicants before and had no policy or precedent for my specific case. This ignorance is a problem too because it has the same effect as malicious prejudice: if you have two equally qualified candidates and one is trans it will be way harder and take way longer for the trans applicant to succeed. (It’s not even about the number of tests, letters, and documents they make us produce. They could mandate the same amount, but tell us about them in the medical interview, like they do for every other pre-existing condition. Then it would take days instead of months for us to complete them.) However, it means that even if you face discrimination it doesn’t mean you’re facing prejudice. Even if you are facing roadblocks solely due to being trans, it doesn’t mean anyone’s deliberately trying to sabotage you because you’re trans. If you’re facing discrimination it could just be institutional discrimination in the form of oversights, lack of policy, or ignorance disadvantaging trans applicants.

Feel free to screenshot, repost, or circulate this in any way you want so that it can reach as many trans applicants to the Canadian Armed Forces as possible.

nobody follows this account so nobody can care that I basically fell off the face of the earth when it comes to this account lol

its so weird to think about how things have been since I last posted in July 2019. we'll divide things up into my dysphoria, my crush, and any other random things

dysphoria

my dysphoria has not changed, I haven't progressed with my transition at all lol I'm still going by Cody and he/him but I can't progress further, medically or legally, for various reasons

medically, my therapist said she'd be willing to write me a letter for HRT if I worked on my anxiety with her, but then the next week (this was like December 2019 or so) she said she needed to talk to me about my dysphoria first. it makes sense I guess, but idk why she didn't just say that the first week we talked about it but eh. I find that my therapist probably isn't a good fit for me in general because I feel like there's a weird language barrier, not because we speak different languages but because we use the same words to mean different things and I have this same issue with my mom too so idk what the deal is but yeah

legally, I want to change my name, but I have to live in the state of Minnesota for 6 months before I can even file a petition for that, as well as being 18. so in June I can start that process, although idk if it'll actually go that smoothly lol

I have a plan for my transition, so I'll be fine in a couple years most likely

crush

I spent time gushing about my crush last post so I felt the need to update, though I probably won't mention him again after this. in 2019, things were great though after August we called less frequently but we still texted all the time. we had a call in September and then in December and we haven't called since (: we still texted often but he got a job in January-ish and so he started talking less, but it was okay. eventually he started disappearing for weeks at a time, which was also okay I got used to it especially after ye olde plague started work got busy for him and its fine, I understand. it only became an issue after he started being gone for months. I heard from him on September 1st, and then nothing until October 26th, and I haven't heard from him since.. it's very hard for me to admit that there's a problem, especially something like this where I'm probably being ghosted whether intentionally or not, but idk. I'm still waiting, nothing anyone says will convince me otherwise, just let me be. I'll give up eventually

random

I fell on the stairs in August 2019 and I was on crutches for 6 weeks due to injuring my knee after that incident lol

we moved! in October 2020 lol maybe it was obvious when I said I need to have lived in Minnesota for 6 months to change my name but yeah

last but not least, I'm trying to lose weight for the hundredth time in the last 3 years lol I have a hard time with food and my weight for various reasons, though it seems to tie back into my dysphoria, but I struggle to minimize my calories in a healthy manner. my brain always tells me to reduce it more and more until I'm practically starving myself. I'm aware of the issue but idk how to solve it. but I'd like to lose weight, and maybe build muscle, just to help with my dysphoria a bit as well as the fact that weighing more than I should is unhealthy. I'm not like obese but I'm overweight for sure and it bothers me

that's all, folks!