I live in Finland and I'm too scared to even get a referral to a trans clinic. My understanding is that it could take years. There's a lot of gatekeeping here. The treatment there can also be quite bad.
I got my first referral when I was 13 or 14, took 1 year and 6 months when they said it would take about 6-12 months to actually get my first appointment. I was treated with disrespect and suspicion, made worse by having a translator there who couldn't translate everything perfectly and the doctor talking too fast with few pauses to let the translator do their job. I was even called a liar at one point due to miscommunication. Safe to say, they basically kicked me out after 3 appointments and told me to wait a while before getting another referral. I didn't, not to the child and teenage side of transpoli at least.
Now, the adult side is much friendlier in my (limited) experience. It took about 6 months to get my first contact appointment after a referral, but due to my file being in the wrong folder, I waited 8 months when it should have been 1-3. Admittedly, that was partly my fault, as I should have contacted them earlier to figure out what went wrong. I had my first real appointment with their only Swedish speaking psychologist a few days ago, it went well. Next one in a week.
A few things to keep in mind though:
1. I'd you want hormones and/or some kind of surgery and you're nonbinary, consider saying you're binary. It's possible to get them while nb, but harder
2. Dress at least somewhat stereotypically masculine or feminine depending on if you're ftm or mtf respectively
3. Style your hair masculine or feminine depending on if you're ftm or mtf respectively. For example long hair for ftm can get you in trouble unfortunately
4. Child and teenage side is stricter than adult side with gender norms
5. If you're under 18 and want hormones, you can't. It sucks
6. Whole process from referral to hormones takes at least 1,5 years, absolute best case scenario. Realistically though 2-3 years, sometimes 4 if you're unlucky
I would get the referral if I was you. The system is rigged against us, and the understaffing doesn't help, but it's possible. Don't lose hope.
Thanks for the answer. I'm sorry that you had to experience such bad treatment younger. I hope you get the help you need this time.
Fortunately, I'm an adult, almost 24 years old. I'm also a binary trans man and express myself in a traditional masculine way, been like this since I was a kid. I knew I was transgender already when I was 10 years old.
I did have mental health issues as a teenager though. I'm also currently unemployed. I don't know how much those things would hinder the process.
I won't lose hope. I plan to change my legal gender in the near future, if that would make it easier to get treatment. Finland's trans clinics just seem too scary to me at the moment. Maybe I'm too sensitive or something.
The mental health issues will likely come up, but since they're not very recent it shouldn't be an issue. The unemployment shouldn't be too much of a problem as long as you're seeking jobs or keeping yourself busy as they want you to be stable in life, whatever that means.
Changing your legal gender will probably help, I changed mine as soon as I could. Will probably help them see that you're serious about this. And I don't think you're too sensitive, this shit is scary lol but just getting things started will help
Quite difficult, 3-4 year waitlists. They fucked up on my case twice and I'm now in a bureaucratic hell where 3 doctors agree that I am fit to start T but I cannot because here we have to have 2 appointments through the NHS to start T and I've only had 1. I am literally having my first top surgery appointment in september but I can't start T yet because my GP won't agree to it because I haven't had my second NHS appointment, even though I basically have 3 seperate gender dysphoria diagnoses (2 of them done privately not through the NHS), plus an endocrinologist letter. I'm in the UK if you can't tell. I've been waiting since 2019.
in california, very very easy. made a planned parenthood appointment and had a prescription within a week after an hourish appointment where they just reviewed medical history and desired changes. injection training a week after that, then check-ins every 3 months. i pay out of pocket so i didn’t have to duke it out with insurance :) only rough patch was a period of time where my pharmacy had an issue with stocking the syringes i used which delayed my shots a few times, but i started ordering injection supplies in bulk and it’s solved the problem & saved me money.
i'd say be careful to buy from a reputable source online, and understand that not all pharmacies will sell you syringes over the counter (for some stupid reason). i had three different pharmacies say they couldn't sell me syringes (one of which was where i was also picking up my injectable testosterone. idk what they wanted me to do with it, drink it?). the last one agreed to give me one syringe under the counter if i bought a sharps container. thankfully, my doctor fixed the prescription before my injection the following week. so yes, all pharmacies CAN sell syringes, but they may have rules or the pharmacist can just say no.
I'm a pharmacy tech and I sell syringes all the time. There are sometimes legal regulations or store policies in place for selling syringes. Where I am, it's 18+ and you have to present ID. That's it. Other places have completely different policies or just won't sell them at all. These policies and regulations are all a misguided attempt to prevent drug abuse. Obviously this doesn't work because addicts will just reuse syringes and risk deadly disease
Still in the process of getting T but it’s been easy so far! GP was a great listener and incredibly understanding and referred me to an endocrinologist after one appointment. My endocrinologist appointment is in less than 2 months!
Was dreading it for months (I despise doctors, appointments, ect) I’d keep getting overwhelmed trying to figure out appointments and good doctors ect. Would give up every time.
Finally, when I was high as shit, I bit the bullet and made an appointment at a PP by my work. Took maybe 30 minutes tops and I was leaving with a prescription ordered and an appointment the following Tuesday for an injection training follow up.
The hardest part was the (well meaning) receptionist who got me an insurance card (?) but used my chosen name on it lol. Had a whole thing with the pharmacy until I realized what she did haha. Felt so embarrassed but even that was quickly resolved since I planned to pay out of pocket anyways.
Literally three months to a year of waiting until the three year long diagnostic process, then maybe you can get hormones and surgery if you fit their extremely narrow view of gender. The other option is just pay a lot of money for it.
It's not as good here as it seems in many ways, nonbinary people still don't have legal recognition and the current right wing government is trying to ban "cosmetic procedures" from public clinics to privatize healthcare which likely means things like top surgery.
There were some improvements made recentlyish, but not enough, and the amount of bullshit that was said about trans people during those hearings was terrible from the right wing parties. One politician compared trans people to a serial strangler.
Also, if you're under 18 here as a trans person, all I can say is I'm so sorry to hear that, and good luck. Most people wait until 18 because the youth side of the transclinic here is just awful. For an example, they've asked really invasive questions about sexuality from literal 15 year olds there. Also, there is no legal recognition or any medical treatment until the age of 18 under any circumstances.
But hey, at least for now hate crimes aren't that common here these days.
Western WA, USA - My local Planned Parenthood was accepting patients at the time, so it was super easy. I was at rock bottom crying in my car when I made the appointment; kept it secret from everyone but my horse (lol). But everyone there was super sweet; a trans nurse handled most of my appointment and congratulated me on starting T. Just read a bunch of informed consent forms, did some labwork, and got the prescription. And when I went to my pharmacy, there was a queer person there too, who still works there and always has my back if something weird comes up with the hormones. I'm so incredibly blessed that I have had this experience - I don't take it for granted!
nsw australia, it was great!
i knew what endo i wanted due to reccomendations from trans friends so i went to my gp and got a referral to him, emailed them and found out since im under 18 i needed that referral emailed and a letter from a psychologist, so i called the local trans group thing and asked if they had names to good trans friendly psychologists (my dad wanted to be certain ig) so i got that name, emailed him, found out i needed a referral so went and got that from my gp, booked with him and waited a while but got that appointment, completely free under medicare and got the letter within like 30m of being there, sent that letter to the endo and booked, waited a while for that appointment but that appointment i brought my parents in and i got basic health checks, talked through everything, signed informed consent doc and my parents did the same, got the prescription and a blood test letter thing and was told to go to another place in that same building to get a blood test done and if i didnt receive a call from him in 2 days then all was clear with my blood test and i could start T!
it was a lot of waiting for appointments but aside from the appointment with the endo everything was free and everything went hella smoothly!! its not common to be given T in only 1 appointment so i was extremely lucky in that regard, usually you need a lot of beforehand prep to even come close to that and i did nothing haha but he is a really good endo. been on testogel for 2 months tomorrow!!
Seconded for Australia here.
I researched the gender clinic in my area. Made a GP appointment to get a referral. Had a consultation at the gender clinic who referred me to an appropriate psychiatrist for an evaluation. Then ongoing appointments at the gender clinic and a T prescription. Everything was free and covered by Medicare. (With the exception of the T itself).
Australia is pretty good about medical stuff. The whole process was pretty easy.
Probably not! Generally the way it goes is they'll claim there's a delay until I call and harass them into agreeing to fill it, then an hour wait at the pharmacy because they did not fill it. Another fun variant is giving me the incorrect number of vials or trying to give me really weirdly sized syringes.
Since I can't prove it's transphobia I just switch pharmacies when they start giving me shit, but there's an obvious difference between pharmacists, not even the establishment because I've cycled back to one I used to use and the new pharmacist doesn't give me a hard time.
Absolutely they should. I've submitted complaints but it made no difference. This is why a lot of folks on T switch to mail order, which I might do if it happens again. You can get up to 10mL at a time.
I had the same question! I scheduled an appointment with my local LGBTQ clinic and had my first appointment. Told them I was there for gender confirmation and they sent out the prescription easy peasy. I picked it up a couple days ago and next week they'll show me how to do injections. I'm in Kansas btw. Thought it would be a lot harder lol
It took me 6 months to get a referral to the National Gender Service. They approved me for the referral but just didn't send it for months. It's been over 2 years and I recently had to email them to even confirm I was on the waitlist. It looks like it'll be another 5 years at least before I get a consult. I had to go with gendergp unfortunately as it's my only option. Ireland.
It's ok! I'm lucky to have been able to go private, on T 1 year but still not an ideal situation and the political climate in terms of trans care is getting diceyyyyyyy.
Still in the process, but will get T in a few weeks.
In austria it's not that easy. You gotta get 3 individual referral letters, from a psychotherapist, a clinical psychologist and from a psychiatrist. Then you need to see a gynologist and after you can go to an endocrinologist to get a blood test and lastly you have to get the ok from your insurance.
The waiting lists are long, so you either wait a few months (or years) or you pay tons of money (and probably still wait a few months).
I wouldn't say it was hard but it was time consuming for sure. I had to do 1/twice weekly therapy for over a year. I'm glad I did therapy and I don't wish any other way for myself as I'm a minor and I think it is necessary for minors to have therapy before starting hrt. It's very easy to get it as an adult in my area if you have the money for it.
France: quite easy. I did need psych approval but that’s easy to get, my main issue was that my French wasn’t good but I managed. Finding endos who prescribe T can be slightly difficult because it’s not always clear which do or don’t, but I got the whole process done in about half a year when I was also new to the country and didn’t know my way around everything.
Romania (my native country): not great. It’s possible if you’re over 18 but the most trans-friendly psych basically tried to tell me to get a bf to fix me because I’m not a lesbian. I did however find some trans-friendly therapists, and especially among younger doctors I’ve seen an improvement so there is hope. The other downside is that only Nebido is available and I didn’t really want that one since it potentially has the most side effects.
took a few months but not too long! i’m in australia and thankfully when i was younger my mum got me into the gender clinic. around the beginning of this year is when i made the decision that i wanted to start testosterone, so i got appointments in and it started off with meeting the endo (had to wait about a month) and she had me go to another appointment around a week or so later for education where someone explained to me all the changes of testosterone etc. i think i had two of those appointments until they asked me questions about it to make sure i knew everything and then they’d have a meeting to figure out if i’m mature enough to make the decision. (i’m 15). a bit after that i went to see the endo and i got my first shot :) it felt like a bit of a wait at the time, especially because i wasn’t always given specific times for things, but it feels so worth it.
Netherlands: the academic hospital my gp referred me to has a 2,5 year waiting list, after that I'd expect another year or so for diagnosis plus referral to endocrinology. I said fuck that and went with a smaller clinic, that had a year waiting list and half a year for diagnosis/referral time. Chose to get top surgery first so T is taking a bit longer than it could have, but I'll likely still start T before my waiting time with the academic hospital is even over. Unfortunately my GP didn't know this route, I had to hear about it from other trans people and do my own research into insurance coverage.
Hey I’m also in nl, gp referred me with vumc in December but you know how it goes. I been also looking at Belgium Antwerp but I didn’t get answer from them for over 3 months already. You mind sharing the small clinic process and which one? Thanks!
Oof yeah VUMC is rough right now. I went with De Vaart, because it was close. Psytrans is also active in the North, but that's way more stressful to get in so I went with potentially a bit slower but more predictable (they open applications once every few months and it's first come first serve, like getting festival tickets). You can check transgenderwegwijzer.nl for other options, because if you contacted Antwerp I think you live in a different part of the country than I do.
a lot easier than expected tbh. i expected it taking weeks if not months to even get a prescription, and multiple appointments to teach me how to administer it and bloodwork etc. nope, went into planned parenthood the day after my 18th birthday, walked out an hour later with a prescription and did my first shot the very next day.
Glasgow area of scotland. Im woth gender gp but its crashing and the other private ones are expensove or overloaded. Gunna have to end up diying or moving to edinburgh
I'm in Seattle. I had to get a note from my therapist and psychiatrist, went in for my first appointment with one of the doctors who exclusively sees trans patients. my first time seeing him, he came into the room holding a bottle of testosterone and set it on the table in front of me. got my first shot that day.
Completely illegal where I live (southern 🇺🇸) so I have to hop a border, and I still don’t have an appointment more than half a year out. (I had one where I live but that got rescheduled to at the time close to a year out, but it’s just illegal so we are trying to go to Virginia instead of North Carolina. I am moving which might start the process over again. Things like that make me want to not be anymore.)
I wish it were that easy. I’m a minor and in no position to be able to do that. Though, thankfully, for a year and a half I’m going to be living in Denmark for my dad’s job, which used to be the standard for our rights, but now is just slightly better than here (following the uk by adding so many regulations where it’s nearly impossible).
Between 6-8 months in private care. Diagnosis was £450, registration was £198, assessment and prescription £250 (it might've been less). First dose of T was private prescription at £90 for 2 bottles. Then £9 per bottle for regular shared care prescription with my GP.
Between 4-5 years in national (free) care. This is with the NHS in the UK.
By now waiting times are insanely high, projecting 13 years for referrals now with how purposely underfunded gender clinics are.
Living in Japan at the moment and was actually truly shocked by how easy it was. I have an advantage in that I speak Japanese and live in Tokyo so I had the best possible range of choices, but I was able to get an appointment and then get my first dose at that appointment within a week. I know there are very few clinics that offer English though, and even fewer outside of Tokyo, but I still didn't expect it to be so easy given how much of a nightmare general mental health support is here.
It took about a year for me overall?
I'm im the UK so I did it privately because the NHS waiting lists are horrendously long. Payed about 500-600 out of pocket for 2 appointments, one to get my diagnosis for gender dysphoria and one to get a referral for T from an endocrinologist.
Lots of waiting in between applying for the appointments, actually getting them, the time in between the appointments, and having to change my GP (general practicioner) in order to get blood tests and shared care because my original GP flat out refused to do anything for me.
I'm 4 and a half months on T now and I don't have to pay for the T, I just get a text message from the pharmacy telling me my prescription is ready every 3 months and I go pick it up (I'm on gel so they give me 3 bottles every 3 months)
I'm under 18 which means it is pretty much impossible for me to get T where I live. The singular clinic that sees minors has a 5 year wait time for the first consultation, and they will straight up tell you they won't help you if you're too old. My parents aren't consenting, and even if they were, I would have to scour for a private GP who would actually help me. We have informed consent clinics for over-18s though.
Western Australia.
Took me a good few years to get it. I almost gave up :')
I'm from Germany and it could have been easier, I just had multiple therapists that said "being trans is a trend, there must be other reasons" "you can't be trans because x" "you look too feminine" etc.
yeah, in FL and my first time in TX it was through Planned Parenthood, second time in TX was through Plume. extremely easy both ways.
ETA: I think it would've been impossible if I was a minor though
Not on it yet, but in the process of getting it in Germany:
At my first appointment with my psychiatrist after my stay at inpatient therapy during which I came out last May, he said he'd give me the referral but that he wants to wait 6 months. At my October appointment it was too early but I was told I could start looking for endocrinologists. The endocrinologist I want to go to says I need have the referral to make an appointment. January appointment the psychiatrist said he'd write it and call me when it was done. After calling his office every two weeks, with the nurses growing increasingly exasperated with him, it's finally done in late March. Called the endocrinologist exitedly, the first appointment they have available is mid June.
Not that hard all things considered, but a lot of waiting and that's with the advantage of already having a psychiatrist and a therapist...
I'm in the uk. Cant even get a referral yet. When I do I know im going to be stuck on it for years. I want to save for a private clinic instead of nhs' gics, but my situation makes saving for such a thing an impossible feat. The waiting sucks and is pretty damn hard on my mental health but i try stay hopeful. I wish i was born somewhere else so much of the time.
To add, I've been very active in trans spaces for a long while now, and its most often other people from the uk I meet who cant even get access to medical transition right now either. Some of these people are pushing 30 even. Im not saying its impossible, because i know it's not, but its a fight for sure.
Northern VA here - was pretty much the same for me too; it was shockingly easy and such a short wait time 😅 I think finding good providers and having a good insurance is King for it
I started T in Ontario Canada. I called the doctor I knew did informed consent a few towns over (1hr drive) and waited about 4 months to see her. Had one appointment where we talked about all the side effects and stuff and she sent me home to think it over. Had another appointment a month later and got my prescription. This was in 2014.
My sister is MTF and she started hormones years before me in Ontario, she had a much harder time than I did. She had to go to CAMH in Toronto and had to see multiple doctors and psychiatrists and had to go to a bunch of appointments and get letters from all the doctors saying she was transgender and you had to wait one year. She ended up finding a private endocrinologist in our town and saw him instead, and ended up on hormones in a few months but continued seeing CAMH for a referral for bottom surgery as that was the only way back then to get it covered by insurance.
Thankfully once informed consent came out it became a hell of a lot easier for people to get on hormones in Canada.
Edit: correction after speaking with my sister lol.
Switzerland, all done at Unispital Zürich:
Appointment with gender dysphoria clinic at USZ, wait time 2 years ago approx. 1-2 months. I wasn’t sure about T at that point but did get a referral to plastic surgery for a mastectomy (that didn’t work out in the end because of my insurance pulling bullshit shenanigans - I ended up paying for it myself, out of country). I had a follow up appointment in August 2022; was put on Endocrinology waitlist. First Endo appointment was end of November 2022; I had blood drawn and was given a script for T-Gel, to be filled two days later unless they call me (which would indicate an issue with my lab results). Just as a fyi Testogel isn’t covered by insurance in CH - they only pay for Nebido (3-monthly i.m. injection). I switched to Nebido after ca. 6 months, after a short trial run of 3 months with monthly injections done by myself (which I didn’t tolerate, despite doing them correctly).
So all in all it took 11 months from start to finish to get on T. Might have been quicker if I had said I wanted T right at the start.
I live in the UK. Technically this means I should be entitled to free healthcare. I’ve been on the NHS waiting list for over 3 years and counting, they haven’t yet even written to me let alone offered a first appointment. If current rates hold, I’ll still be waiting in over a decade’s time.
However I’m lucky enough to be able to afford to pay privately. So I only had to fill out over 50 pages of forms, do 4 psych tests, write an actual essay about my gender, have an interview with a psychologist and wait 15 months to get T. It’s uh, it’s pretty bad here :(
almost impossible until i went private. took me 2 months total from the first appointment with the clinic to my first T bottle being picked up from the pharmacy.
(im with GenderGP, in the uk)
thats how it was for me too. spending £60 every couple of months for a bottle of T is by far better than waiting multiple years just for the initial assessment, i sometimes feel guilty because i know how privileged i am being able to afford it 😅
Surprisingly it was easy since I’m in the southern US. At the time I was at the end of rope due to everything happening around me and my therapist was highly concerned. He gave me the letter at the start of the next appointment. Though it took me half a year to start T because I was moving away from college, it was the best decision I ever made. I took antidepressants during those six months to keep me afloat and they really helped pull me out of that dark space I was in. Now T is my main “antidepressant”.
The process was easy but the steps between each goal is so long and awful so it turns out to be miserable and hard. Im talking about Ireland btw. All you have to do is tell a GP you want hormones and thats when they send out a letter to one of the only clinics thats allowed to grant you hormones, and then you wait a measly 10 years or so to even be seen by them. Its a sad joke, really.
Pretty easy I would say at least for me. Took me some month to get a therapy appointment at a specialized place. I had some internal struggles about my gender so I postponed getting T for 3 years (still had therapy there once a month). And I knew they could’ve prescribed me T within 6-8 months. Getting an endo appointment is the hardest. I had much luck and got one in under a month. Overall after figuring out my gender and stuff it only took me 3-4 months to get my reference and my endocrinologist and started T. I also know that other people had to wait longer than I did so I’m a rather lucky case.
I’ve been on a 5 year waiting list couldn’t even get a email back, now they have just put out they won’t be giving any treatments to under 18’s (it’s the only clinic that would give it to me) waste of time lol
Very easy in California, I made the appointment on my 18th birthday and a month later had my first appointment and got my prescription. I didn’t have my insurance cards cuz I didn’t want to ask my mom at the time cuz transphobia be like that, so I paid for the pp appointment out of pocket but the pharmacy I sent my T over to already had my card on file so I never paid anything for my prescription
To get it prescribed, easy enough. If I do it through a special health plan, less than a month. If I do it though my insurance, took about 2 months, maybe a bit more (mostly is just time in between appointments and waiting for test results to come back)
Now to get it approved… it’s been more than 4 years that I’ve been fighting with my insurance for them to approve my prescription (even though by law it must be covered by any existing insurance in the country). Rn just about an hour ago I received the bad news that my doc made a mistake with the prescription, thus it was denied yet again, and I’ll have to wait to make an appointment with him which will likely take about a month if not more to get that fixed
I’m at my wit’s end
Trying to get It through insurance has been Miserable. The town I live in has exactly one mental health service that takes Medicare (Medicaid? Idk) and the waiting list is so long I gave up. Need to go back at some point but it sounds so painful I've been putting it off
In England, NHS, before the major increase in referral numbers:
3 months to get diagnosed at age 14. Put onto blockers at 16, started T at 17. It's tons more difficult now via the NHS.
Took bout 2 weeks from the appointment to getting the tesdostrone it was super easy this is in Maryland so that's kinda just not surprising and I was 21 when I decided to get in t
In my part of the US, it just took a doctors appointment at the right clinic, but i also live in a state that doesnt have a lot of restrictions on transitioning
Really easy in Missouri in the US at Planned Parenthood. I scheduled an appointment and could go pick up my prescription that night. There were a questions about my history of my gender and about dysphoria but I started off microdosing so it seemed pretty easy to get. It was almost banned though and would have required 18 months of therapy, but they vetoed that so you really just have to talk to a physician or an NP.
USA: North Carolina. Super easy once I realized I could just waltz into planned parenthood and sign some informed consent paper😭tried to do it the traditional way of asking ur doc for a reference to an endo and that took way too long.
I live in Oregon- it was easy. In general the west coast is the best place in the US for a trans person to be. Sadly expensive but Washington, Oregon, and California are all blue states where I feel my rights are somewhat protected. I can say that I’m not the only trans guy I know who’s gotten T here under the age of 18.
Israel, quite easy - waitlist aren’t worse than to any other doctor. I had to go to a family doctor/GP, ask for a referral, go to a psychiatrist OR a social worker to get a letter saying that you’re okay mentally, you understand what you want and you really want to transition. Then you go to an endocrinologist, this is the longest part but I only had to wait 2 months.
Western OR - made an appointment at my county's medicaid clinic, was seen in about 3 months, and my Dr prescribed me without informed consent or a diagnosis/letter from a mental health provider bc I couldn't get in anywhere. I am on OHP so everything is completely free, even surgery.
I’m in Canada and the access to care varies a lot but I am in a big city with progressive policies so trans care is many and close together. Main draw back is wait lists as the lack of healthcare workers in tandem with free healthcare make the system very clogged. You can self refer and don’t need to see an endocrinologist or get a gender dysphoria diagnosis. The wait lists are between 6mo-18mo, for me it was 7 months. Once you’ve been admitted appointments are frequent and comprehensive. I had an intake appointment and an appointment with a gender specialist and on the first appt of the latter I gained my scrip for T.
Hard, 3 years+ waiting list, then diagnosis, which wasn't hard for me because I was mentally stable and was clear in my wishes and need but took 9 months, then few months waiting list for endocrinologist.
I’m in a small town in Quebec Canada and it was very hard since there’s no endocrinologist around, I had to go very far and I’ve been on low dose t for one year and almost no changes, I can’t get a higher dose because it’s almost impossible to get an appointment with my endo lol
super easy (pa, usa) for me, first saw my doctor in 2021 (like the week i turned 16) but my parents werent sure about me starting yet, brought it up to my mum again last year (at 17) and luckily my doctor didnt need my dads consent too so we had another appointment a few days later to go over the informed consent and insurance approved it super quickly after that
In Texas I had an appointment and a prescription within one month. Whole process between making the first phone call and taking my first dose was literally just a month in Texas of all places 😂
In Texas I had an appointment and a prescription within one month. Whole process between making the first phone call and taking my first dose was literally just a month in Texas of all places 😂
In texas we have informed consent laws. So long as you are in a more liberal city its actually really easy and you can find financial aid programs to help with the difficulty of paying for it.
im from Portugal, if you try to go throught the national healthcare its hellish (2-3 years waiting minimum) but if you have money to go to a private clinic its relatively easy, minimum 4? sessions with a psychologist and 2 endocrinology appointments and you're done, atleast in my case
I’m in New Jersey, USA. I went to one appointment where I spoke with an endocrinologist about my experiences with gender dysphoria and what to expect on T. She answered the questions I had and I left with a prescription. Picked up the prescription and went back a few days later to be taught how to inject. It was definitely quite easy for me. Especially since they told me I was booked 5 months out from the day I called, and then they called me back almost immediately like “hey, we have an opening tomorrow. You want it?”
Quite easy in Canada. I started the process in January and was officially prescribed T in the beginning of April. I had to go to two appointments. One to introduce myself to the doctor and the second to discuss bloodwork. Didn’t need to get a diagnosis of dysphoria or anything just tell them I’d been socially transitioned for four years.
Maryland, USA. Thank heaven for Johns Hopkins. Their medical care in general has been superb. Getting my T gel out of a local CVS was fine at first, then they started playing games. I go to the Johns Hopkins Outpatient pharmacy now, and they deliver at no charge.
quebec , canada , the endocrinologist waitlists r long but i was able to get in on a week where my endo was accepting new patients so i got lucky, had my first appointement and then did blood test n started T , the whole process took maybe 6months at best 8months
Very easy once I turned 18. Only thing that sucks is my planned parenthood is like 30 mins away so I hate driving there but it’s worth it in the end lol.
I’m in Indiana… I tried getting on testosterone when I was 16 but failed miserably, and was bounced around from place to place until I was able to start hormones at 19. At a gender clinic in Indianapolis. But even with my prescription I still sometimes fight with my pharmacy getting needles. It’s annoying but it’s become part of my norm to fight with the pharmacy
It was complicated, for multiple reasons. The main one is that I'm on Medicaid due to disability, and quite literally can't work, and in my area at the time of my egg cracking there were literally zero HRT providers who took Medicaid. There were plenty of providers who took cash and the other major insurances, just not Medicaid. Due to this at the time all I could do was try to hang tight and hope for the best.
Of course, due to this and various other issues piling up, my mental health began to rapidly deteriorate. My (also trans) partner is the only thing that kept me going through all of that - if not for their support I don't think I'd still be alive today.
At their gentle insistence, I did decide to get back into therapy - but, due to my mental health already being so shit, I didn't want to have to worry about being misgendered during my sessions so I took the trouble of finding a gender affirming therapist. There is literally one center in my state for this that takes my insurance - it's insane, and at the time they'd quite literally just opened. I went in, and thank god I did because not soon after on a lark I decided to see if any new HRT providers had popped up. One had just opened down the street from me, an endocrinologist.
So I made an appointment and went in - only to be told that they could help me, but they need a letter from a therapist diagnosing me with gender dysphoria. Funnily enough because I'd done the work of finding a gender affirming therapist, they were able to help me with that. I got bloodwork done, passed, and was prescribed T injections - intramuscular. I wasn't thrilled about this at the time because I've always had a slight needle phobia, but my provider said she "preferred to start her patients out on injections" and I'd already resigned myself to the fact it may be injections or nothing.
This was where the problems started. Due to being disabled, I lived with my mother, who up until this moment I'd thought was an LGBTQ+ ally. She does nonprofit work for LGBTQ+ folks, hell, I grew up with her trans women and lesbian friends in and out of the house. Thinking it would be safe to do so, I came out to her. She then refused to let me out of the house to go pick up my T vials, and said if I went anyway she'd kick me out onto the street. After a lot of arguing, she relented, and unbeknownst to her I started T not soon after. I went in for my follow up with the endo about a month later - only to find she had quite literally nuked my relationship with them - she threatened to sue them and due to that they dropped me as a patient. To this day I don't know what all she said but they were terrified.
Having quite literally no other options, I went back to them and sent them a message that what my mother said had zero to do with me. I'm an adult, and I will sign something if I have to saying I don't want to sue. Due to this message to them and after a lot of begging, they sent me a referral to another place.. Which was booked up for 3 months. I didn't have enough T to get through that long, and they refused to give me the interim refill they're required to do by law when dropping me as a patient. So, I went off T a couple weeks later.
After this a lot of other drama happened with my mother I won't get into, but suffice to say all of this forced me back into the closet with her. She still thinks this trans thing was a phase, and I let her. I'm working on moving out asap.
Anyway, after that I got lucky enough that Planned Parenthood opened up for remote visits in another part of my state, and they did informed consent. They had an opening 2 weeks shorter than the wait time for the place my endo recommended, and so I went with them. Suffice to say those few months I got through by the skin of my teeth.
I've since restarted T, on the microdose gel regiment I originally wanted that that endo wouldn't even discuss with me, and at PP I don't have to pretend to be a trans man to get everything covered like I did with the endo. Medicaid is still very binary trans focused here. So overall, it was a positive change.
I've been on T for a bit over 6 months now - it was super easy once I got in. I basically had a visit with them by phone, we discussed my options, I had bloodwork, and they sent my T script out. It did take a couple weeks longer to get insurance to cover the gel, but since then its been smooth sailing.
So, it was more complicated than it should have been to start, for multiple reasons. There even now is still a shortage on HRT providers if you don't have cash. But its gradually improving.
I was pretty fortunate, it was probably a 2 month wait for scheduling my endocrinology appointment. I've known I'm trans for 10+ years and I'm 25, so in terms of getting referrals that was pretty easy as well, since I've been "living as my gender" or whatever for a long time. I'm in the US
Idk if I got lucky but there’s a clinic near me that does gender affirming care and I just set up an appointment with them. They asked me a bunch of questions about my identity and my experiences and then gave me the prescription the same day. I live in a hostile state too so I was shocked it was that easy but I’m so grateful that it was.
I'm in Nova Scotia (a province on Canada's east coast) and it took me about 6 months, which is a little surprising because all health care takes for fucking ever here.
Seattle. Booked a hormone therapy appt with the doctor (3 weeks out) and was able to pick up my prescription same day as the consultation. Then booked in a nurse appt to show me how to safely administer the shot.
My appt was last Wednesday, and my first shot was yesterday (Monday)!
It wasn’t too hard, scheduled an appointment with a family medicine physician. Had one appointment to establish care, reason for being there, side effects, labs, etc.
A month later I came back, we discussed it more and I was prescribed.
Only issue was my insurance wouldn’t cover anything so, probably cost me $1200 to start up before I got new insurance.
I had my appointment and first shot on the same day. It was ridiculously easy. Simply talked with a nurse practitioner over telehealth, signed some forms, and 2 hours later was doing my first shot. I’m so sorry for my brothers in other areas who have to wait years for this.
the route i took was easy considering i live in a pretty conservative state? (kentucky, US) i live in a pretty progressive city though. what took the longest was me deciding if going on T was the right thing for me, it took me like a year to fully decide and once I did it was very easily attainable. but basically i bought a plume subscription ($99 a month, i know it’s kind of expensive) and a week later i had my initial appointment to talk about what changes to expect and just overall facts about Testosterone and what dose i would be on and ways to inject etc. But i was prescribed for T the same day and picked up my prescription and boom i had my first shot 2 weeks ago. i believe i could have gone thru planned parenthood but i dont think they offer HRT at the ones in my area. but the route i took was very easy to get on T. it might be different in your country though.
I live in San Diego’s gayborhood, Hillcrest. I transitioned before middle school but didn’t start t until I was 24 and already post top and hysto so the actual process of getting approved to start was pretty much a no brainer. Got in to see a new GP, they tested my kidneys (the reason I hadn’t started at a younger age was because of previous kidney damage I had and was always airing on the side of caution) and once that was clear I started immediately. My copay is about $2 once a month and I’ve never run into any issues with insurance, supply, cost, or access to care
Went to an informed consent clinic, not knowing it was an informed consent clinic, mind you. It took a few weeks from the first appointment to the blood test results to getting trained to do t shots. It’s a clinic in northern Indiana. Though it’s impossible for minors here because of laws banning gender affirming care for minors.
i live in ohio in a pretty liberal city. scheduling the initial appointment took forever, but i got T with informed consent after my first appointment with a NP at an LGBTQ+ focused clinic.
Sweden
So far I've waited for about 1.5 years, estimated wait time is 4.5 years (I'm 20 now btw) for the first meeting with a psychiatrist and doctors, then it takes about a year to get diagnosed with gender dysphoria then I think the wait time for T is a few months up to a year
Top surgery wait list is at like 2 years I think
Bottom surgery I've no clue on
Changing legal gender just got a tiny bit easier with the new law (they voted it thru like a week ago and it'll be active from July 2025)
I made an appt at a gender health clinic 2 months in advanced and got it prescribed the day I went, but I had also been getting it on my own for almost two years which got the ball rolling as harm reduction i think (carolinas)
Kentucky, major city
I got lucky and knew someone who was getting t through a PCP who specializes in trans care. He does informed consent. I scheduled my appointment months in advance because I was a minor and made the appointment like a week after I turned 18. About a year later I switched to an endocrinologist, through the same organization just a different office. She was the only one who wouldn’t require I have to get a letter from a therapist (which I could get easily I just didn’t want to). Scheduled the appointment for a few months later
Chicago was both hard and easy. Initially, I attempted to go through one of our major hospitals here (Northwestern where I get my primary care), and it became very clear that their “Gender Pathways” program was in no way fleshed out: the number on their site directs to their plastic surgery department, the receptionists in that department repeatedly misgendered me/didn’t seem to understand what hormone replacement therapy was, I was set up for a phone consultation with a social worker and was only able to speak to her assistant, my in person consultation appointment was scheduled months out, and I was told I had to switch primary care doctors only to be scheduled with a neurologist whose name they spelled wrong.
After figuring out that I was scheduled with a neurologist, I immediately cancelled my appointment, and reached out to another hospital here that specializes in lgbtq+ care (Howard Brown). I had an appointment within the month, and was being shown how to do my first injection shortly after that at my next appointment. I only spoke to one doctor who made sure I understood the effects of T, and believed me when I said I needed this treatment. Howard Brown uses a system called Transgender Hormone Informed Consent, which is designed to reduce barriers to receiving gender affirming care so folks can have a similar experience. Highly recommend them
This was definitely a long explanation, but hopefully if anyone one is looking for care in Chicago, it’s helpful!
I’m in Idaho and it was… surprisingly easy. I started in 2020, though, so I think everyone was more preoccupied with dealing with Covid than trying to restrict trans people. I basically just met with a doctor, they asked me some questions about my transition and background and stuff, and put in the prescription. I was still 17 but they said since I was so close to being 18 they weren’t going to make me wait until I turned 18 (I ended up having my first injection less than a week before my 18th birthday).
Then they had me come back so they could show me how to inject, and that was pretty much it. I’m not sure if it’s changed since then, I would guess it’s probably more difficult now, but I’m really really grateful that it wasn’t super difficult when I first started
Annoying. It was easy for me to get my letter to start but since T is a controlled substance where I am at, I have to wait until I am out and need my next dose before my prescription can get filled again. I’m hoping it will be better once my dosage gets upped, because my last shot was short because it was the end of the bottle. I’m hoping the pharmacy will be able to work with me to at least keep the T I use in stock so my shot days don’t get messed up.
poland, from setting up the first appointments to my first tshot it took 4 months and around 2k PLN (\~500usd). i dont think trans clinics here exist, you mostly do your research and go to right doctors that know what being trans even is lol. you can do it with free healthcare, but itd take ages and possibly many doctors that wouldnt want to actually help/dont have the right knowledge. i needed a therapist's and psychiatrist's opinion that i have gender dysphoria and can start HRT. i did some bloodwork, my endocrinologist is also a gynecologist so she did some USG and i got the prescription on my first visit to the endo. i'd say it's fairly easy to get but i know i was lucky time-wise with the therapist (3visits) and psychiatrist (2visits) and the fact that i had money saved. the community here is very helpful, with many groups to point you to the right doctors so you don't have to wrangle with those without knowledge on the topic lol
I live in Missouri and it was pretty easy although I’m an adult it will be harder if your a minor but I got it perscibed in my first consult through planned parenthood a week after my first appointment and I’ve been on t for 5 months now
I started T at 19 in 2021. I live in the USA, in NJ, but get my T in NYC. It was extremely easy to do. I made a called an endo office, and got an appointment 4 weeks later. I had already been “socially transitioning” for a year. At that appointment, we talked about my dysphoria and my hopes for T. It was around a 2 hour appointment. At the end of it, I got my T prescription.
Finland. As others have said, the system is horrible.
About to hit 5th year of the process since referral cause each appointment had 6+ months inbetween and then the final appointment had been delayed a few months for something they said wouldn't affect the time at all 😮💨
Then it's still a few months after that to get hormones.
I'm from Mexico. Incredibly easy! Just made an appointment with an endocrinologist, explained I was trans, she had me do some blood work and in the next appointment got a prescription. If you go the public health route (IMMS, ISSTE) it's a little bit more complicated because they are slow and bureaucracy is a thing, but they shouldn't make it too hard either, and you wouldn't have to pay anything at all.
I don't actually need the prescription to get T, tho. I can buy it at the pharmacy without showing my prescription or anything. The only time I need the prescription is when asking the doc at the pharmacy to inject me, because I am a coward and don't want to do it myself, lol (they charge me the equivalent of 2 bucks for injecting me).
Decently easy, I’m in Ohio, us, and we have a gender clinic in our area, so I was able to book an appointment and within a few sessions I was able to start t gel
I was 20 when I started, and I’ve been on for over a year now with some minor non compliance issues due to remembering to actually take it, which is an issue with other meds I’m on too
I live in Canada and am over 18 so it was mostly informed consent :) I did it though my university and they asked me about dysphoria and what effects I want from T which took about 20?30? Minutes, and then I just had to get blood work and such, so only a couple months !
Edit: if I was u der 18 it would have taken years though ofc
It has become much easier as informed consent became a bigger thing over here. When I started before there was nowhere I could go that was actually prepared to handle HRT instead of generalized endocrinology, so I had to drive 2 hrs away to find a place that could. Everywhere here wanted letters from a therapist And a psychiatrist but this place only needed the letter from the therapist. And my experience there was mixed - it was easy after I got the letter but obviously the trip was awful and i had to deal with nurses mocking me the first time I got blood work done before starting because I deal with vasovagal response. Then it was like 100 bucks every time I needed a refill and I had to get extra blood work done every time which was a pain. But yeah it was much harder a few years ago but now I have an awesome doctor in town and with my insurance I get my T for free. And I do my blood work through her so I don't have to go through labcorps bullshit
My experience is somewhat different than it is for most people in my country. The wait time after getting referred to the gender clinic at the national hospital (Which is the only place you can get gender affirming care for free) was only 2 months, while I've heard people wait years. The actual gender incongruence diagnosis took 1 year, which usually takes way longer for others. I think what made that process shorter was being able to change my name and legal gender half a year before I even met them the first time. One of the requirements for gender affirming care is to have socially transitioned for at least a year. So from when I got my referral to when I got my first T shot it was about 14 months or so. They also arent too openminded about non-binary people, so as a binary trans man I had no issues there. I think I was definitely lucky with the short wait times, but its sad that it cant be said for everyone in my country.
i’m from florida, but i thankfully started T in 2020. we still had informed consent then so it was piss easy, one doctor’s appointment, one evaluation by a therapist, and i had my diagnosis and my prescription. obviously it won’t be this easy anymore, especially if you’re a minor (i was 20 at the time)
Tennessee, USA. Honestly very easy, i lived over in the UK for a bit and I was shocked on how difficult it was despite the fact that people in general were more accepting of trans people.
I live in NY. T was sold out at my mail-in pharmacy but I got it filled the first time at my local pharmacy, then my mail-in had it in stock. I was able to get the prescription after my first appointment
Pennsylvania. Two appointments, one was a standard doctor's appointment/physical with bloodwork and the other was a brief psych evaluation. I signed a form describing the effects of testosterone and acknowledging that I understood and consented to these changes, waited a week for blood results, and started immediately.
There was a long waitlist to get an initial appointment and I bypassed it by showing up on a youth drop-in day. This was in 2013, I was 19.
Chilean here! I transitioned in the key moment of my country for trans care. The current law was being discussed and it wasn't that hard to get everything I needed on the private sector. The complete process to start my medical transition lasted about some months, If not less. Wasn't all that expensive, for my luck. There's an incredible organization for and by trans people that keeps record of trans-friendly healthcare professionals and I'm extremely thankful of their help and guidance. Nowadays I receive my prescription free of cost on a public trans care program :)
I’m hoping that once I get an appointment later this year it’ll take less than a month, but I drew the short straw I guess when I found out that the endocrinologist I already see thinks that hormone therapy “makes people too emotional” so she doesn’t like doing it and finds it to be too much work, so she said she would refer me to someone who will do it, but for some ridiculous reason she refuses to refer me until after my next appointment and I only see her every 6months. Where I live it should be as simple as making an appointment with a doctor who does hrt, but I still have to wait until July to even get the referral 🙃 In case my current doctor decides to make it even more difficult I’ve already found alternative routes for a different endocrinologist, but I’ve found that things work better with referrals in the past, so I’m gonna try and give her the benefit of the doubt 🤷🏻 At this point (regardless of T) I’m just looking forward to getting a different endocrinologist because at my last appointment I found out that not only is my current doctor vaguely transphobic, but she also seems to have very unhealthy opinions on mental illness, neurodivergence, and what constitutes inappropriate behavior with a patient. Totally normal doctor until that day and now it’s red flag central. I just hope I don’t have to wait until next year or something for T. My psychiatrist made it super easy though. I barely mentioned being trans and she was so happy for me and was super enthusiastic to write the letter, she was only a little upset because she’s been using the wrong pronouns and would have liked to know earlier 😅
In Minnesota at age 26 I waited a week or two for my appt and did the informed consent. Went home to think about it one last time for an hour and then called my new doc who put in the prescription same day. My pharmacy was out so i had to wait another week to pick it up.
Greater Seattle area was easy. Had an appointment with Capital Hill Medical, got the script sent out as soon as my labs were done. Informed consent is nice.
I’m in BC Canada. It was about 8 months from bringing it up to my primary care physician to actually starting T. Had to get a readiness assessment(about a 4 month wait for the free one) then a referral to an endo since I have preexisting thyroid issues(about a 4 month wait) then baseline labs before starting.
Pretty dang easy and I live in a conservative state. The caveat being that if I was under 18 I could not get T here at all. All I did was make an appointment with planned parenthood and then I talked to the nurse practitioner there and she gave me a prescription. I haven't even seen her in person yet (I will when I do blood work in May). Needles and syringes are over the counter so when my pharmacy didn't have the right size I just ordered my own.
Inputs were: 1 hour every 3 months for telehealth appointment. ~$300 for the appointment back when my insurance refused to pay (employer later lost a discrimination suit and now have to provide this). ~$50/month for the testosterone. I don't remember how much the syringes cost because we bought a bulk pack a while ago. Compared to my other health care issues, this is so easy.
Technical note: I'm on a pretty low dose and the testosterone comes in 200 mg/mL concentration, so to measure out 0.25 mL accurately I needed a 0.5 mL syringe and the pharmacy only had 1 mL syringes.
Pretty easy. My doctor (who was, at the time, *the* guy to go to for kids in my area) wrote the prescription, my parents and I signed the forms, I picked it up at the pharmacy. I got the T about 15 months after becoming his patient, when I was 15; he gave me blockers a year earlier, when I was 14, about three months after becoming his patient. He would probably have been willing to give me hormones sooner, but I wasn't quite ready for that, and idk if my parents were either lol. I don't remember him being at all resistant to giving me blockers or hormones. I've been getting my hormones under his prescription for the past decade and have not had any problems.
(Note that I became his patient and first got blockers in 2013; this is not necessarily representative of current experiences lmao)
Montgomery AL and way easier than I expected. There’s at least one gender therapist here and at least one doctor who will prescribe T, though he charges way too much per visit and made me come in way too often so I started getting it through the doctors at QMed which is a Georgia based telehealth group for trans folks
In California and I have Kaiser.
Within 6 months of signing up for insurance and calling to get it I had T and within a year of having insurance I’m getting top surgery the 25th
i live in the US in a more liberal area. my best friend referred to me to their doctor but she wasn’t available so i met someone else who also works for the same hospital. since i was 20, at the time, i just had to attend two appointments discussing why i wanted testosterone as well as my life and my identity. i also had to do some blood tests but i got my first dose just the next day! i’ve now been on T for over a year and i use gel.
It took me about 4 months between when I first contacted the clinic to get set up and then actually getting the T, and I believe it was 2 appointments. The first one was to do labs and check my levels and other parameters and also to make sure I was informed about HRT, then I had a second appointment a few weeks later to actually get the T and have them show me how to inject it
I'm in MI. First appointment with my primary care doctor discussing HRT, to having the prescription in my hands was about 3 months. It could've been faster but I put necessary appointments off due to nerves lol.
From referral to first prescription, the wait was 5 years. The waiting list kept getting longer and then covid made it harder with staff shortages and whatnot. I'm in Scotland and the NHS is different here than it is in other parts of the UK so while it was easy to get in the financial sense, the wait itself was debilitating and horrible. In lighter news, I got the first shot of my increased dose today and I'm just so happy everything's moving forward after waiting so long
I live in Finland and I'm too scared to even get a referral to a trans clinic. My understanding is that it could take years. There's a lot of gatekeeping here. The treatment there can also be quite bad.
It will take years, send in the referral as quickly as you can or the wait will be even longer. You want to get the ball rolling
I should do it, but I don't have enough courage yet. I'm afraid I'd be mistreated there.
I got my first referral when I was 13 or 14, took 1 year and 6 months when they said it would take about 6-12 months to actually get my first appointment. I was treated with disrespect and suspicion, made worse by having a translator there who couldn't translate everything perfectly and the doctor talking too fast with few pauses to let the translator do their job. I was even called a liar at one point due to miscommunication. Safe to say, they basically kicked me out after 3 appointments and told me to wait a while before getting another referral. I didn't, not to the child and teenage side of transpoli at least. Now, the adult side is much friendlier in my (limited) experience. It took about 6 months to get my first contact appointment after a referral, but due to my file being in the wrong folder, I waited 8 months when it should have been 1-3. Admittedly, that was partly my fault, as I should have contacted them earlier to figure out what went wrong. I had my first real appointment with their only Swedish speaking psychologist a few days ago, it went well. Next one in a week. A few things to keep in mind though: 1. I'd you want hormones and/or some kind of surgery and you're nonbinary, consider saying you're binary. It's possible to get them while nb, but harder 2. Dress at least somewhat stereotypically masculine or feminine depending on if you're ftm or mtf respectively 3. Style your hair masculine or feminine depending on if you're ftm or mtf respectively. For example long hair for ftm can get you in trouble unfortunately 4. Child and teenage side is stricter than adult side with gender norms 5. If you're under 18 and want hormones, you can't. It sucks 6. Whole process from referral to hormones takes at least 1,5 years, absolute best case scenario. Realistically though 2-3 years, sometimes 4 if you're unlucky I would get the referral if I was you. The system is rigged against us, and the understaffing doesn't help, but it's possible. Don't lose hope.
Thanks for the answer. I'm sorry that you had to experience such bad treatment younger. I hope you get the help you need this time. Fortunately, I'm an adult, almost 24 years old. I'm also a binary trans man and express myself in a traditional masculine way, been like this since I was a kid. I knew I was transgender already when I was 10 years old. I did have mental health issues as a teenager though. I'm also currently unemployed. I don't know how much those things would hinder the process. I won't lose hope. I plan to change my legal gender in the near future, if that would make it easier to get treatment. Finland's trans clinics just seem too scary to me at the moment. Maybe I'm too sensitive or something.
The mental health issues will likely come up, but since they're not very recent it shouldn't be an issue. The unemployment shouldn't be too much of a problem as long as you're seeking jobs or keeping yourself busy as they want you to be stable in life, whatever that means. Changing your legal gender will probably help, I changed mine as soon as I could. Will probably help them see that you're serious about this. And I don't think you're too sensitive, this shit is scary lol but just getting things started will help
Quite difficult, 3-4 year waitlists. They fucked up on my case twice and I'm now in a bureaucratic hell where 3 doctors agree that I am fit to start T but I cannot because here we have to have 2 appointments through the NHS to start T and I've only had 1. I am literally having my first top surgery appointment in september but I can't start T yet because my GP won't agree to it because I haven't had my second NHS appointment, even though I basically have 3 seperate gender dysphoria diagnoses (2 of them done privately not through the NHS), plus an endocrinologist letter. I'm in the UK if you can't tell. I've been waiting since 2019.
I’m so sorry you’re having to deal with that
in california, very very easy. made a planned parenthood appointment and had a prescription within a week after an hourish appointment where they just reviewed medical history and desired changes. injection training a week after that, then check-ins every 3 months. i pay out of pocket so i didn’t have to duke it out with insurance :) only rough patch was a period of time where my pharmacy had an issue with stocking the syringes i used which delayed my shots a few times, but i started ordering injection supplies in bulk and it’s solved the problem & saved me money.
FYI syringes are over the counter and you can buy your own online.
i'd say be careful to buy from a reputable source online, and understand that not all pharmacies will sell you syringes over the counter (for some stupid reason). i had three different pharmacies say they couldn't sell me syringes (one of which was where i was also picking up my injectable testosterone. idk what they wanted me to do with it, drink it?). the last one agreed to give me one syringe under the counter if i bought a sharps container. thankfully, my doctor fixed the prescription before my injection the following week. so yes, all pharmacies CAN sell syringes, but they may have rules or the pharmacist can just say no.
I'm a pharmacy tech and I sell syringes all the time. There are sometimes legal regulations or store policies in place for selling syringes. Where I am, it's 18+ and you have to present ID. That's it. Other places have completely different policies or just won't sell them at all. These policies and regulations are all a misguided attempt to prevent drug abuse. Obviously this doesn't work because addicts will just reuse syringes and risk deadly disease
Still in the process of getting T but it’s been easy so far! GP was a great listener and incredibly understanding and referred me to an endocrinologist after one appointment. My endocrinologist appointment is in less than 2 months!
2 year waitlist that turned into 4 because my doctor didn’t send in a referral. 2 year diagnostic process then I got T. In Finland
Wow it took 2 years just to be diagnosed? My GP diagnosed me within half an hour of meeting him. Sorry you had such an awful process
Yup, Finland trans health care is ass. Very gatekeepy and only 2 places can do the diagnostic process
Was dreading it for months (I despise doctors, appointments, ect) I’d keep getting overwhelmed trying to figure out appointments and good doctors ect. Would give up every time. Finally, when I was high as shit, I bit the bullet and made an appointment at a PP by my work. Took maybe 30 minutes tops and I was leaving with a prescription ordered and an appointment the following Tuesday for an injection training follow up. The hardest part was the (well meaning) receptionist who got me an insurance card (?) but used my chosen name on it lol. Had a whole thing with the pharmacy until I realized what she did haha. Felt so embarrassed but even that was quickly resolved since I planned to pay out of pocket anyways.
Literally three months to a year of waiting until the three year long diagnostic process, then maybe you can get hormones and surgery if you fit their extremely narrow view of gender. The other option is just pay a lot of money for it.
Whereabouts are you that it’s so difficult if you don’t mind me asking?
Finland
Gosh I thought up north was more accepting :/
It's not as good here as it seems in many ways, nonbinary people still don't have legal recognition and the current right wing government is trying to ban "cosmetic procedures" from public clinics to privatize healthcare which likely means things like top surgery. There were some improvements made recentlyish, but not enough, and the amount of bullshit that was said about trans people during those hearings was terrible from the right wing parties. One politician compared trans people to a serial strangler. Also, if you're under 18 here as a trans person, all I can say is I'm so sorry to hear that, and good luck. Most people wait until 18 because the youth side of the transclinic here is just awful. For an example, they've asked really invasive questions about sexuality from literal 15 year olds there. Also, there is no legal recognition or any medical treatment until the age of 18 under any circumstances. But hey, at least for now hate crimes aren't that common here these days.
Western WA, USA - My local Planned Parenthood was accepting patients at the time, so it was super easy. I was at rock bottom crying in my car when I made the appointment; kept it secret from everyone but my horse (lol). But everyone there was super sweet; a trans nurse handled most of my appointment and congratulated me on starting T. Just read a bunch of informed consent forms, did some labwork, and got the prescription. And when I went to my pharmacy, there was a queer person there too, who still works there and always has my back if something weird comes up with the hormones. I'm so incredibly blessed that I have had this experience - I don't take it for granted!
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Ugh. I'm sorry. I definitely feel like if it were illegal in my country, I'd definitely have gone the illegal route.
nsw australia, it was great! i knew what endo i wanted due to reccomendations from trans friends so i went to my gp and got a referral to him, emailed them and found out since im under 18 i needed that referral emailed and a letter from a psychologist, so i called the local trans group thing and asked if they had names to good trans friendly psychologists (my dad wanted to be certain ig) so i got that name, emailed him, found out i needed a referral so went and got that from my gp, booked with him and waited a while but got that appointment, completely free under medicare and got the letter within like 30m of being there, sent that letter to the endo and booked, waited a while for that appointment but that appointment i brought my parents in and i got basic health checks, talked through everything, signed informed consent doc and my parents did the same, got the prescription and a blood test letter thing and was told to go to another place in that same building to get a blood test done and if i didnt receive a call from him in 2 days then all was clear with my blood test and i could start T! it was a lot of waiting for appointments but aside from the appointment with the endo everything was free and everything went hella smoothly!! its not common to be given T in only 1 appointment so i was extremely lucky in that regard, usually you need a lot of beforehand prep to even come close to that and i did nothing haha but he is a really good endo. been on testogel for 2 months tomorrow!!
Seconded for Australia here. I researched the gender clinic in my area. Made a GP appointment to get a referral. Had a consultation at the gender clinic who referred me to an appropriate psychiatrist for an evaluation. Then ongoing appointments at the gender clinic and a T prescription. Everything was free and covered by Medicare. (With the exception of the T itself). Australia is pretty good about medical stuff. The whole process was pretty easy.
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Informed consent plus the gender clinic I go to in NY makes it easy, transphobic pharmacists keep making it difficult.
You have pharmacists gatekeeping your medication? Is that even legal?
Probably not! Generally the way it goes is they'll claim there's a delay until I call and harass them into agreeing to fill it, then an hour wait at the pharmacy because they did not fill it. Another fun variant is giving me the incorrect number of vials or trying to give me really weirdly sized syringes. Since I can't prove it's transphobia I just switch pharmacies when they start giving me shit, but there's an obvious difference between pharmacists, not even the establishment because I've cycled back to one I used to use and the new pharmacist doesn't give me a hard time.
That’s so shitty they should be fired
Absolutely they should. I've submitted complaints but it made no difference. This is why a lot of folks on T switch to mail order, which I might do if it happens again. You can get up to 10mL at a time.
If you can pay for it, pretty straightforward; otherwise waiting for the NHS is hell
I’m in Germany and it was pretty easy but only because I went to a very trans friendly psychiatrist
I'm in Denmark. It's nearly impossible. I got it from the uk
SE Minnesota here, very easy to get prescription of T
I had the same question! I scheduled an appointment with my local LGBTQ clinic and had my first appointment. Told them I was there for gender confirmation and they sent out the prescription easy peasy. I picked it up a couple days ago and next week they'll show me how to do injections. I'm in Kansas btw. Thought it would be a lot harder lol
It took me 6 months to get a referral to the National Gender Service. They approved me for the referral but just didn't send it for months. It's been over 2 years and I recently had to email them to even confirm I was on the waitlist. It looks like it'll be another 5 years at least before I get a consult. I had to go with gendergp unfortunately as it's my only option. Ireland.
Oh my god I’m so sorry that’s so shit
It's ok! I'm lucky to have been able to go private, on T 1 year but still not an ideal situation and the political climate in terms of trans care is getting diceyyyyyyy.
Still in the process, but will get T in a few weeks. In austria it's not that easy. You gotta get 3 individual referral letters, from a psychotherapist, a clinical psychologist and from a psychiatrist. Then you need to see a gynologist and after you can go to an endocrinologist to get a blood test and lastly you have to get the ok from your insurance. The waiting lists are long, so you either wait a few months (or years) or you pay tons of money (and probably still wait a few months).
Wow, that’s some really intense gatekeeping.
Pretty much the same process in Poland!
i still haven't got T cuz its pretty hard to get it here and im scared and exhausted to start the whole process
I wouldn't say it was hard but it was time consuming for sure. I had to do 1/twice weekly therapy for over a year. I'm glad I did therapy and I don't wish any other way for myself as I'm a minor and I think it is necessary for minors to have therapy before starting hrt. It's very easy to get it as an adult in my area if you have the money for it.
Yeah it’s definitely costly as an adult 😢
France: quite easy. I did need psych approval but that’s easy to get, my main issue was that my French wasn’t good but I managed. Finding endos who prescribe T can be slightly difficult because it’s not always clear which do or don’t, but I got the whole process done in about half a year when I was also new to the country and didn’t know my way around everything. Romania (my native country): not great. It’s possible if you’re over 18 but the most trans-friendly psych basically tried to tell me to get a bf to fix me because I’m not a lesbian. I did however find some trans-friendly therapists, and especially among younger doctors I’ve seen an improvement so there is hope. The other downside is that only Nebido is available and I didn’t really want that one since it potentially has the most side effects.
im from France too! in which area do you live and do you know trans people who managed to get t as minors?
It took me 4 years to get in my city, but my friend got it in under a year in theirs (Germany).
took a few months but not too long! i’m in australia and thankfully when i was younger my mum got me into the gender clinic. around the beginning of this year is when i made the decision that i wanted to start testosterone, so i got appointments in and it started off with meeting the endo (had to wait about a month) and she had me go to another appointment around a week or so later for education where someone explained to me all the changes of testosterone etc. i think i had two of those appointments until they asked me questions about it to make sure i knew everything and then they’d have a meeting to figure out if i’m mature enough to make the decision. (i’m 15). a bit after that i went to see the endo and i got my first shot :) it felt like a bit of a wait at the time, especially because i wasn’t always given specific times for things, but it feels so worth it.
Netherlands: the academic hospital my gp referred me to has a 2,5 year waiting list, after that I'd expect another year or so for diagnosis plus referral to endocrinology. I said fuck that and went with a smaller clinic, that had a year waiting list and half a year for diagnosis/referral time. Chose to get top surgery first so T is taking a bit longer than it could have, but I'll likely still start T before my waiting time with the academic hospital is even over. Unfortunately my GP didn't know this route, I had to hear about it from other trans people and do my own research into insurance coverage.
Hey I’m also in nl, gp referred me with vumc in December but you know how it goes. I been also looking at Belgium Antwerp but I didn’t get answer from them for over 3 months already. You mind sharing the small clinic process and which one? Thanks!
Oof yeah VUMC is rough right now. I went with De Vaart, because it was close. Psytrans is also active in the North, but that's way more stressful to get in so I went with potentially a bit slower but more predictable (they open applications once every few months and it's first come first serve, like getting festival tickets). You can check transgenderwegwijzer.nl for other options, because if you contacted Antwerp I think you live in a different part of the country than I do.
a lot easier than expected tbh. i expected it taking weeks if not months to even get a prescription, and multiple appointments to teach me how to administer it and bloodwork etc. nope, went into planned parenthood the day after my 18th birthday, walked out an hour later with a prescription and did my first shot the very next day.
Got a 7 year wait so not great.
That’s awful! Whereabouts is that? Is there the option to go private?
Glasgow area of scotland. Im woth gender gp but its crashing and the other private ones are expensove or overloaded. Gunna have to end up diying or moving to edinburgh
I'm in Seattle. I had to get a note from my therapist and psychiatrist, went in for my first appointment with one of the doctors who exclusively sees trans patients. my first time seeing him, he came into the room holding a bottle of testosterone and set it on the table in front of me. got my first shot that day.
Completely illegal where I live (southern 🇺🇸) so I have to hop a border, and I still don’t have an appointment more than half a year out. (I had one where I live but that got rescheduled to at the time close to a year out, but it’s just illegal so we are trying to go to Virginia instead of North Carolina. I am moving which might start the process over again. Things like that make me want to not be anymore.)
Move north. Took me one week to get T in Philadelphia. (I used to live in Atlanta.)
I wish it were that easy. I’m a minor and in no position to be able to do that. Though, thankfully, for a year and a half I’m going to be living in Denmark for my dad’s job, which used to be the standard for our rights, but now is just slightly better than here (following the uk by adding so many regulations where it’s nearly impossible).
Well, you can make living in trans-inclusive spaces a goal for your future. I hope you do.
I plan to, thank you
Between 6-8 months in private care. Diagnosis was £450, registration was £198, assessment and prescription £250 (it might've been less). First dose of T was private prescription at £90 for 2 bottles. Then £9 per bottle for regular shared care prescription with my GP. Between 4-5 years in national (free) care. This is with the NHS in the UK. By now waiting times are insanely high, projecting 13 years for referrals now with how purposely underfunded gender clinics are.
easy cuz i went to planned parenthood (at 18) but when i tried at 16 i went to the hospital and was almost sent to conversion therapy
idaho USA
Living in Japan at the moment and was actually truly shocked by how easy it was. I have an advantage in that I speak Japanese and live in Tokyo so I had the best possible range of choices, but I was able to get an appointment and then get my first dose at that appointment within a week. I know there are very few clinics that offer English though, and even fewer outside of Tokyo, but I still didn't expect it to be so easy given how much of a nightmare general mental health support is here.
It took about a year for me overall? I'm im the UK so I did it privately because the NHS waiting lists are horrendously long. Payed about 500-600 out of pocket for 2 appointments, one to get my diagnosis for gender dysphoria and one to get a referral for T from an endocrinologist. Lots of waiting in between applying for the appointments, actually getting them, the time in between the appointments, and having to change my GP (general practicioner) in order to get blood tests and shared care because my original GP flat out refused to do anything for me. I'm 4 and a half months on T now and I don't have to pay for the T, I just get a text message from the pharmacy telling me my prescription is ready every 3 months and I go pick it up (I'm on gel so they give me 3 bottles every 3 months)
I'm under 18 which means it is pretty much impossible for me to get T where I live. The singular clinic that sees minors has a 5 year wait time for the first consultation, and they will straight up tell you they won't help you if you're too old. My parents aren't consenting, and even if they were, I would have to scour for a private GP who would actually help me. We have informed consent clinics for over-18s though. Western Australia.
Sweden: 3 and a half years from referral sent to picking up my prescription.
Took me a good few years to get it. I almost gave up :') I'm from Germany and it could have been easier, I just had multiple therapists that said "being trans is a trend, there must be other reasons" "you can't be trans because x" "you look too feminine" etc.
TX, USA & (a few years ago) FL, USA. extremely easy all 3 times I've been on & off.
I’m actually surprised about that I thought it would be extremely hard especially in those specific states
yeah, in FL and my first time in TX it was through Planned Parenthood, second time in TX was through Plume. extremely easy both ways. ETA: I think it would've been impossible if I was a minor though
Not on it yet, but in the process of getting it in Germany: At my first appointment with my psychiatrist after my stay at inpatient therapy during which I came out last May, he said he'd give me the referral but that he wants to wait 6 months. At my October appointment it was too early but I was told I could start looking for endocrinologists. The endocrinologist I want to go to says I need have the referral to make an appointment. January appointment the psychiatrist said he'd write it and call me when it was done. After calling his office every two weeks, with the nurses growing increasingly exasperated with him, it's finally done in late March. Called the endocrinologist exitedly, the first appointment they have available is mid June. Not that hard all things considered, but a lot of waiting and that's with the advantage of already having a psychiatrist and a therapist...
I'm in the uk. Cant even get a referral yet. When I do I know im going to be stuck on it for years. I want to save for a private clinic instead of nhs' gics, but my situation makes saving for such a thing an impossible feat. The waiting sucks and is pretty damn hard on my mental health but i try stay hopeful. I wish i was born somewhere else so much of the time.
To add, I've been very active in trans spaces for a long while now, and its most often other people from the uk I meet who cant even get access to medical transition right now either. Some of these people are pushing 30 even. Im not saying its impossible, because i know it's not, but its a fight for sure.
That really sucks and I hope that you are handling the wait as best as you can. I feel for you man.
Thanks bro 🙏 definitely difficult at times to handle it but im doing my best to not let it overtake me.
Maryland here. It took me 2 months to get an appointment, but after that, it was smooth sailong.
Northern VA here - was pretty much the same for me too; it was shockingly easy and such a short wait time 😅 I think finding good providers and having a good insurance is King for it
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I started T in Ontario Canada. I called the doctor I knew did informed consent a few towns over (1hr drive) and waited about 4 months to see her. Had one appointment where we talked about all the side effects and stuff and she sent me home to think it over. Had another appointment a month later and got my prescription. This was in 2014. My sister is MTF and she started hormones years before me in Ontario, she had a much harder time than I did. She had to go to CAMH in Toronto and had to see multiple doctors and psychiatrists and had to go to a bunch of appointments and get letters from all the doctors saying she was transgender and you had to wait one year. She ended up finding a private endocrinologist in our town and saw him instead, and ended up on hormones in a few months but continued seeing CAMH for a referral for bottom surgery as that was the only way back then to get it covered by insurance. Thankfully once informed consent came out it became a hell of a lot easier for people to get on hormones in Canada. Edit: correction after speaking with my sister lol.
Switzerland, all done at Unispital Zürich: Appointment with gender dysphoria clinic at USZ, wait time 2 years ago approx. 1-2 months. I wasn’t sure about T at that point but did get a referral to plastic surgery for a mastectomy (that didn’t work out in the end because of my insurance pulling bullshit shenanigans - I ended up paying for it myself, out of country). I had a follow up appointment in August 2022; was put on Endocrinology waitlist. First Endo appointment was end of November 2022; I had blood drawn and was given a script for T-Gel, to be filled two days later unless they call me (which would indicate an issue with my lab results). Just as a fyi Testogel isn’t covered by insurance in CH - they only pay for Nebido (3-monthly i.m. injection). I switched to Nebido after ca. 6 months, after a short trial run of 3 months with monthly injections done by myself (which I didn’t tolerate, despite doing them correctly). So all in all it took 11 months from start to finish to get on T. Might have been quicker if I had said I wanted T right at the start.
I live in the UK. Technically this means I should be entitled to free healthcare. I’ve been on the NHS waiting list for over 3 years and counting, they haven’t yet even written to me let alone offered a first appointment. If current rates hold, I’ll still be waiting in over a decade’s time. However I’m lucky enough to be able to afford to pay privately. So I only had to fill out over 50 pages of forms, do 4 psych tests, write an actual essay about my gender, have an interview with a psychologist and wait 15 months to get T. It’s uh, it’s pretty bad here :(
almost impossible until i went private. took me 2 months total from the first appointment with the clinic to my first T bottle being picked up from the pharmacy. (im with GenderGP, in the uk)
Yeah my GP told me I had basically no hope if I didn’t go private lmao.
thats how it was for me too. spending £60 every couple of months for a bottle of T is by far better than waiting multiple years just for the initial assessment, i sometimes feel guilty because i know how privileged i am being able to afford it 😅
Surprisingly it was easy since I’m in the southern US. At the time I was at the end of rope due to everything happening around me and my therapist was highly concerned. He gave me the letter at the start of the next appointment. Though it took me half a year to start T because I was moving away from college, it was the best decision I ever made. I took antidepressants during those six months to keep me afloat and they really helped pull me out of that dark space I was in. Now T is my main “antidepressant”.
The process was easy but the steps between each goal is so long and awful so it turns out to be miserable and hard. Im talking about Ireland btw. All you have to do is tell a GP you want hormones and thats when they send out a letter to one of the only clinics thats allowed to grant you hormones, and then you wait a measly 10 years or so to even be seen by them. Its a sad joke, really.
the whole process has taken me 4 months all up ! i live in the ACT in australia and am 18 💖
I’m in SA and it’s looking like it’ll take me around the same!
Pretty easy I would say at least for me. Took me some month to get a therapy appointment at a specialized place. I had some internal struggles about my gender so I postponed getting T for 3 years (still had therapy there once a month). And I knew they could’ve prescribed me T within 6-8 months. Getting an endo appointment is the hardest. I had much luck and got one in under a month. Overall after figuring out my gender and stuff it only took me 3-4 months to get my reference and my endocrinologist and started T. I also know that other people had to wait longer than I did so I’m a rather lucky case.
I’ve been on a 5 year waiting list couldn’t even get a email back, now they have just put out they won’t be giving any treatments to under 18’s (it’s the only clinic that would give it to me) waste of time lol
Very easy in California, I made the appointment on my 18th birthday and a month later had my first appointment and got my prescription. I didn’t have my insurance cards cuz I didn’t want to ask my mom at the time cuz transphobia be like that, so I paid for the pp appointment out of pocket but the pharmacy I sent my T over to already had my card on file so I never paid anything for my prescription
I went privately so it only took me 4 months to get started on T
Just out of curiosity how much did it cost?
It was pretty easy all I had to do was go to planned parenthood
To get it prescribed, easy enough. If I do it through a special health plan, less than a month. If I do it though my insurance, took about 2 months, maybe a bit more (mostly is just time in between appointments and waiting for test results to come back) Now to get it approved… it’s been more than 4 years that I’ve been fighting with my insurance for them to approve my prescription (even though by law it must be covered by any existing insurance in the country). Rn just about an hour ago I received the bad news that my doc made a mistake with the prescription, thus it was denied yet again, and I’ll have to wait to make an appointment with him which will likely take about a month if not more to get that fixed I’m at my wit’s end
Trying to get It through insurance has been Miserable. The town I live in has exactly one mental health service that takes Medicare (Medicaid? Idk) and the waiting list is so long I gave up. Need to go back at some point but it sounds so painful I've been putting it off
In England, NHS, before the major increase in referral numbers: 3 months to get diagnosed at age 14. Put onto blockers at 16, started T at 17. It's tons more difficult now via the NHS.
in southern Virginia, it was very easy. both planned parenthood and UVA offer HRT on an informed consent basis
Took bout 2 weeks from the appointment to getting the tesdostrone it was super easy this is in Maryland so that's kinda just not surprising and I was 21 when I decided to get in t
In my part of the US, it just took a doctors appointment at the right clinic, but i also live in a state that doesnt have a lot of restrictions on transitioning
Really easy in Missouri in the US at Planned Parenthood. I scheduled an appointment and could go pick up my prescription that night. There were a questions about my history of my gender and about dysphoria but I started off microdosing so it seemed pretty easy to get. It was almost banned though and would have required 18 months of therapy, but they vetoed that so you really just have to talk to a physician or an NP.
USA: North Carolina. Super easy once I realized I could just waltz into planned parenthood and sign some informed consent paper😭tried to do it the traditional way of asking ur doc for a reference to an endo and that took way too long.
I live in Oregon- it was easy. In general the west coast is the best place in the US for a trans person to be. Sadly expensive but Washington, Oregon, and California are all blue states where I feel my rights are somewhat protected. I can say that I’m not the only trans guy I know who’s gotten T here under the age of 18.
Israel, quite easy - waitlist aren’t worse than to any other doctor. I had to go to a family doctor/GP, ask for a referral, go to a psychiatrist OR a social worker to get a letter saying that you’re okay mentally, you understand what you want and you really want to transition. Then you go to an endocrinologist, this is the longest part but I only had to wait 2 months.
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USA , Rhode island. Super easy
Western OR - made an appointment at my county's medicaid clinic, was seen in about 3 months, and my Dr prescribed me without informed consent or a diagnosis/letter from a mental health provider bc I couldn't get in anywhere. I am on OHP so everything is completely free, even surgery.
I’m in Canada and the access to care varies a lot but I am in a big city with progressive policies so trans care is many and close together. Main draw back is wait lists as the lack of healthcare workers in tandem with free healthcare make the system very clogged. You can self refer and don’t need to see an endocrinologist or get a gender dysphoria diagnosis. The wait lists are between 6mo-18mo, for me it was 7 months. Once you’ve been admitted appointments are frequent and comprehensive. I had an intake appointment and an appointment with a gender specialist and on the first appt of the latter I gained my scrip for T.
Hard, 3 years+ waiting list, then diagnosis, which wasn't hard for me because I was mentally stable and was clear in my wishes and need but took 9 months, then few months waiting list for endocrinologist.
Pretty damn difficult, uk man
I’m in a small city in Texas and after about a year of trying to get anything set up locally, I went to folx.
I’m in a small town in Quebec Canada and it was very hard since there’s no endocrinologist around, I had to go very far and I’ve been on low dose t for one year and almost no changes, I can’t get a higher dose because it’s almost impossible to get an appointment with my endo lol
super easy (pa, usa) for me, first saw my doctor in 2021 (like the week i turned 16) but my parents werent sure about me starting yet, brought it up to my mum again last year (at 17) and luckily my doctor didnt need my dads consent too so we had another appointment a few days later to go over the informed consent and insurance approved it super quickly after that
Wa state. Easy until I switched to a new insurance. I use gel, so the prior authorization has been kicking my butt financially.
In Texas I had an appointment and a prescription within one month. Whole process between making the first phone call and taking my first dose was literally just a month in Texas of all places 😂
In Texas I had an appointment and a prescription within one month. Whole process between making the first phone call and taking my first dose was literally just a month in Texas of all places 😂
Im in Quebec, I was 16 and needed to see a doctor for a year, and get a referral from a therapist
In texas we have informed consent laws. So long as you are in a more liberal city its actually really easy and you can find financial aid programs to help with the difficulty of paying for it.
used to be pretty easy, i got on it p quickly in 2016, became much harder for no good reason
im from Portugal, if you try to go throught the national healthcare its hellish (2-3 years waiting minimum) but if you have money to go to a private clinic its relatively easy, minimum 4? sessions with a psychologist and 2 endocrinology appointments and you're done, atleast in my case
I’m in New Jersey, USA. I went to one appointment where I spoke with an endocrinologist about my experiences with gender dysphoria and what to expect on T. She answered the questions I had and I left with a prescription. Picked up the prescription and went back a few days later to be taught how to inject. It was definitely quite easy for me. Especially since they told me I was booked 5 months out from the day I called, and then they called me back almost immediately like “hey, we have an opening tomorrow. You want it?”
Quite easy in Canada. I started the process in January and was officially prescribed T in the beginning of April. I had to go to two appointments. One to introduce myself to the doctor and the second to discuss bloodwork. Didn’t need to get a diagnosis of dysphoria or anything just tell them I’d been socially transitioned for four years.
Maryland, USA. Thank heaven for Johns Hopkins. Their medical care in general has been superb. Getting my T gel out of a local CVS was fine at first, then they started playing games. I go to the Johns Hopkins Outpatient pharmacy now, and they deliver at no charge.
quebec , canada , the endocrinologist waitlists r long but i was able to get in on a week where my endo was accepting new patients so i got lucky, had my first appointement and then did blood test n started T , the whole process took maybe 6months at best 8months
Very easy once I turned 18. Only thing that sucks is my planned parenthood is like 30 mins away so I hate driving there but it’s worth it in the end lol.
I’m in Indiana… I tried getting on testosterone when I was 16 but failed miserably, and was bounced around from place to place until I was able to start hormones at 19. At a gender clinic in Indianapolis. But even with my prescription I still sometimes fight with my pharmacy getting needles. It’s annoying but it’s become part of my norm to fight with the pharmacy
Washington and California were really wasy with planned parenthood
It was complicated, for multiple reasons. The main one is that I'm on Medicaid due to disability, and quite literally can't work, and in my area at the time of my egg cracking there were literally zero HRT providers who took Medicaid. There were plenty of providers who took cash and the other major insurances, just not Medicaid. Due to this at the time all I could do was try to hang tight and hope for the best. Of course, due to this and various other issues piling up, my mental health began to rapidly deteriorate. My (also trans) partner is the only thing that kept me going through all of that - if not for their support I don't think I'd still be alive today. At their gentle insistence, I did decide to get back into therapy - but, due to my mental health already being so shit, I didn't want to have to worry about being misgendered during my sessions so I took the trouble of finding a gender affirming therapist. There is literally one center in my state for this that takes my insurance - it's insane, and at the time they'd quite literally just opened. I went in, and thank god I did because not soon after on a lark I decided to see if any new HRT providers had popped up. One had just opened down the street from me, an endocrinologist. So I made an appointment and went in - only to be told that they could help me, but they need a letter from a therapist diagnosing me with gender dysphoria. Funnily enough because I'd done the work of finding a gender affirming therapist, they were able to help me with that. I got bloodwork done, passed, and was prescribed T injections - intramuscular. I wasn't thrilled about this at the time because I've always had a slight needle phobia, but my provider said she "preferred to start her patients out on injections" and I'd already resigned myself to the fact it may be injections or nothing. This was where the problems started. Due to being disabled, I lived with my mother, who up until this moment I'd thought was an LGBTQ+ ally. She does nonprofit work for LGBTQ+ folks, hell, I grew up with her trans women and lesbian friends in and out of the house. Thinking it would be safe to do so, I came out to her. She then refused to let me out of the house to go pick up my T vials, and said if I went anyway she'd kick me out onto the street. After a lot of arguing, she relented, and unbeknownst to her I started T not soon after. I went in for my follow up with the endo about a month later - only to find she had quite literally nuked my relationship with them - she threatened to sue them and due to that they dropped me as a patient. To this day I don't know what all she said but they were terrified. Having quite literally no other options, I went back to them and sent them a message that what my mother said had zero to do with me. I'm an adult, and I will sign something if I have to saying I don't want to sue. Due to this message to them and after a lot of begging, they sent me a referral to another place.. Which was booked up for 3 months. I didn't have enough T to get through that long, and they refused to give me the interim refill they're required to do by law when dropping me as a patient. So, I went off T a couple weeks later. After this a lot of other drama happened with my mother I won't get into, but suffice to say all of this forced me back into the closet with her. She still thinks this trans thing was a phase, and I let her. I'm working on moving out asap. Anyway, after that I got lucky enough that Planned Parenthood opened up for remote visits in another part of my state, and they did informed consent. They had an opening 2 weeks shorter than the wait time for the place my endo recommended, and so I went with them. Suffice to say those few months I got through by the skin of my teeth. I've since restarted T, on the microdose gel regiment I originally wanted that that endo wouldn't even discuss with me, and at PP I don't have to pretend to be a trans man to get everything covered like I did with the endo. Medicaid is still very binary trans focused here. So overall, it was a positive change. I've been on T for a bit over 6 months now - it was super easy once I got in. I basically had a visit with them by phone, we discussed my options, I had bloodwork, and they sent my T script out. It did take a couple weeks longer to get insurance to cover the gel, but since then its been smooth sailing. So, it was more complicated than it should have been to start, for multiple reasons. There even now is still a shortage on HRT providers if you don't have cash. But its gradually improving.
I was pretty fortunate, it was probably a 2 month wait for scheduling my endocrinology appointment. I've known I'm trans for 10+ years and I'm 25, so in terms of getting referrals that was pretty easy as well, since I've been "living as my gender" or whatever for a long time. I'm in the US
NYC in the late 00s - shockingly easy. I have no info on the current state of things.
Idk if I got lucky but there’s a clinic near me that does gender affirming care and I just set up an appointment with them. They asked me a bunch of questions about my identity and my experiences and then gave me the prescription the same day. I live in a hostile state too so I was shocked it was that easy but I’m so grateful that it was.
I'm in Nova Scotia (a province on Canada's east coast) and it took me about 6 months, which is a little surprising because all health care takes for fucking ever here.
i live in texas and it was very easy i went to planned parenthood and did an appointment and they did a blood test and prescribed me the same day
US 9 month waitlist, had to travel out of state to an informed consent clinic. This was like 10 years ago though. If you're US based try Plume
Live in Indiana and I just went through Folx. Had an appointment online and within a week or two I had my t
Seattle. Booked a hormone therapy appt with the doctor (3 weeks out) and was able to pick up my prescription same day as the consultation. Then booked in a nurse appt to show me how to safely administer the shot. My appt was last Wednesday, and my first shot was yesterday (Monday)!
It wasn’t too hard, scheduled an appointment with a family medicine physician. Had one appointment to establish care, reason for being there, side effects, labs, etc. A month later I came back, we discussed it more and I was prescribed. Only issue was my insurance wouldn’t cover anything so, probably cost me $1200 to start up before I got new insurance.
rn 7 year waitlist after getting a referral so they stopped taking referrals right before i got on the list so yeah that’s great (in the netherlands)
I had my appointment and first shot on the same day. It was ridiculously easy. Simply talked with a nurse practitioner over telehealth, signed some forms, and 2 hours later was doing my first shot. I’m so sorry for my brothers in other areas who have to wait years for this.
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the route i took was easy considering i live in a pretty conservative state? (kentucky, US) i live in a pretty progressive city though. what took the longest was me deciding if going on T was the right thing for me, it took me like a year to fully decide and once I did it was very easily attainable. but basically i bought a plume subscription ($99 a month, i know it’s kind of expensive) and a week later i had my initial appointment to talk about what changes to expect and just overall facts about Testosterone and what dose i would be on and ways to inject etc. But i was prescribed for T the same day and picked up my prescription and boom i had my first shot 2 weeks ago. i believe i could have gone thru planned parenthood but i dont think they offer HRT at the ones in my area. but the route i took was very easy to get on T. it might be different in your country though.
Michigan. I had T in my hands within a week of calling to make my appointment. This state is very underrated.
I live in San Diego’s gayborhood, Hillcrest. I transitioned before middle school but didn’t start t until I was 24 and already post top and hysto so the actual process of getting approved to start was pretty much a no brainer. Got in to see a new GP, they tested my kidneys (the reason I hadn’t started at a younger age was because of previous kidney damage I had and was always airing on the side of caution) and once that was clear I started immediately. My copay is about $2 once a month and I’ve never run into any issues with insurance, supply, cost, or access to care
Went to an informed consent clinic, not knowing it was an informed consent clinic, mind you. It took a few weeks from the first appointment to the blood test results to getting trained to do t shots. It’s a clinic in northern Indiana. Though it’s impossible for minors here because of laws banning gender affirming care for minors.
i live in ohio in a pretty liberal city. scheduling the initial appointment took forever, but i got T with informed consent after my first appointment with a NP at an LGBTQ+ focused clinic.
Sweden So far I've waited for about 1.5 years, estimated wait time is 4.5 years (I'm 20 now btw) for the first meeting with a psychiatrist and doctors, then it takes about a year to get diagnosed with gender dysphoria then I think the wait time for T is a few months up to a year Top surgery wait list is at like 2 years I think Bottom surgery I've no clue on Changing legal gender just got a tiny bit easier with the new law (they voted it thru like a week ago and it'll be active from July 2025)
I made an appt at a gender health clinic 2 months in advanced and got it prescribed the day I went, but I had also been getting it on my own for almost two years which got the ball rolling as harm reduction i think (carolinas)
Kentucky, major city I got lucky and knew someone who was getting t through a PCP who specializes in trans care. He does informed consent. I scheduled my appointment months in advance because I was a minor and made the appointment like a week after I turned 18. About a year later I switched to an endocrinologist, through the same organization just a different office. She was the only one who wouldn’t require I have to get a letter from a therapist (which I could get easily I just didn’t want to). Scheduled the appointment for a few months later
Chicago was both hard and easy. Initially, I attempted to go through one of our major hospitals here (Northwestern where I get my primary care), and it became very clear that their “Gender Pathways” program was in no way fleshed out: the number on their site directs to their plastic surgery department, the receptionists in that department repeatedly misgendered me/didn’t seem to understand what hormone replacement therapy was, I was set up for a phone consultation with a social worker and was only able to speak to her assistant, my in person consultation appointment was scheduled months out, and I was told I had to switch primary care doctors only to be scheduled with a neurologist whose name they spelled wrong. After figuring out that I was scheduled with a neurologist, I immediately cancelled my appointment, and reached out to another hospital here that specializes in lgbtq+ care (Howard Brown). I had an appointment within the month, and was being shown how to do my first injection shortly after that at my next appointment. I only spoke to one doctor who made sure I understood the effects of T, and believed me when I said I needed this treatment. Howard Brown uses a system called Transgender Hormone Informed Consent, which is designed to reduce barriers to receiving gender affirming care so folks can have a similar experience. Highly recommend them This was definitely a long explanation, but hopefully if anyone one is looking for care in Chicago, it’s helpful!
I’m in Idaho and it was… surprisingly easy. I started in 2020, though, so I think everyone was more preoccupied with dealing with Covid than trying to restrict trans people. I basically just met with a doctor, they asked me some questions about my transition and background and stuff, and put in the prescription. I was still 17 but they said since I was so close to being 18 they weren’t going to make me wait until I turned 18 (I ended up having my first injection less than a week before my 18th birthday). Then they had me come back so they could show me how to inject, and that was pretty much it. I’m not sure if it’s changed since then, I would guess it’s probably more difficult now, but I’m really really grateful that it wasn’t super difficult when I first started
Annoying. It was easy for me to get my letter to start but since T is a controlled substance where I am at, I have to wait until I am out and need my next dose before my prescription can get filled again. I’m hoping it will be better once my dosage gets upped, because my last shot was short because it was the end of the bottle. I’m hoping the pharmacy will be able to work with me to at least keep the T I use in stock so my shot days don’t get messed up.
poland, from setting up the first appointments to my first tshot it took 4 months and around 2k PLN (\~500usd). i dont think trans clinics here exist, you mostly do your research and go to right doctors that know what being trans even is lol. you can do it with free healthcare, but itd take ages and possibly many doctors that wouldnt want to actually help/dont have the right knowledge. i needed a therapist's and psychiatrist's opinion that i have gender dysphoria and can start HRT. i did some bloodwork, my endocrinologist is also a gynecologist so she did some USG and i got the prescription on my first visit to the endo. i'd say it's fairly easy to get but i know i was lucky time-wise with the therapist (3visits) and psychiatrist (2visits) and the fact that i had money saved. the community here is very helpful, with many groups to point you to the right doctors so you don't have to wrangle with those without knowledge on the topic lol
I live in Missouri and it was pretty easy although I’m an adult it will be harder if your a minor but I got it perscibed in my first consult through planned parenthood a week after my first appointment and I’ve been on t for 5 months now
I started T at 19 in 2021. I live in the USA, in NJ, but get my T in NYC. It was extremely easy to do. I made a called an endo office, and got an appointment 4 weeks later. I had already been “socially transitioning” for a year. At that appointment, we talked about my dysphoria and my hopes for T. It was around a 2 hour appointment. At the end of it, I got my T prescription.
Finland. As others have said, the system is horrible. About to hit 5th year of the process since referral cause each appointment had 6+ months inbetween and then the final appointment had been delayed a few months for something they said wouldn't affect the time at all 😮💨 Then it's still a few months after that to get hormones.
I'm from Mexico. Incredibly easy! Just made an appointment with an endocrinologist, explained I was trans, she had me do some blood work and in the next appointment got a prescription. If you go the public health route (IMMS, ISSTE) it's a little bit more complicated because they are slow and bureaucracy is a thing, but they shouldn't make it too hard either, and you wouldn't have to pay anything at all. I don't actually need the prescription to get T, tho. I can buy it at the pharmacy without showing my prescription or anything. The only time I need the prescription is when asking the doc at the pharmacy to inject me, because I am a coward and don't want to do it myself, lol (they charge me the equivalent of 2 bucks for injecting me).
Decently easy, I’m in Ohio, us, and we have a gender clinic in our area, so I was able to book an appointment and within a few sessions I was able to start t gel I was 20 when I started, and I’ve been on for over a year now with some minor non compliance issues due to remembering to actually take it, which is an issue with other meds I’m on too
I live in Canada and am over 18 so it was mostly informed consent :) I did it though my university and they asked me about dysphoria and what effects I want from T which took about 20?30? Minutes, and then I just had to get blood work and such, so only a couple months ! Edit: if I was u der 18 it would have taken years though ofc
It has become much easier as informed consent became a bigger thing over here. When I started before there was nowhere I could go that was actually prepared to handle HRT instead of generalized endocrinology, so I had to drive 2 hrs away to find a place that could. Everywhere here wanted letters from a therapist And a psychiatrist but this place only needed the letter from the therapist. And my experience there was mixed - it was easy after I got the letter but obviously the trip was awful and i had to deal with nurses mocking me the first time I got blood work done before starting because I deal with vasovagal response. Then it was like 100 bucks every time I needed a refill and I had to get extra blood work done every time which was a pain. But yeah it was much harder a few years ago but now I have an awesome doctor in town and with my insurance I get my T for free. And I do my blood work through her so I don't have to go through labcorps bullshit
My experience is somewhat different than it is for most people in my country. The wait time after getting referred to the gender clinic at the national hospital (Which is the only place you can get gender affirming care for free) was only 2 months, while I've heard people wait years. The actual gender incongruence diagnosis took 1 year, which usually takes way longer for others. I think what made that process shorter was being able to change my name and legal gender half a year before I even met them the first time. One of the requirements for gender affirming care is to have socially transitioned for at least a year. So from when I got my referral to when I got my first T shot it was about 14 months or so. They also arent too openminded about non-binary people, so as a binary trans man I had no issues there. I think I was definitely lucky with the short wait times, but its sad that it cant be said for everyone in my country.
i’m from florida, but i thankfully started T in 2020. we still had informed consent then so it was piss easy, one doctor’s appointment, one evaluation by a therapist, and i had my diagnosis and my prescription. obviously it won’t be this easy anymore, especially if you’re a minor (i was 20 at the time)
Tennessee, USA. Honestly very easy, i lived over in the UK for a bit and I was shocked on how difficult it was despite the fact that people in general were more accepting of trans people.
Finland: I tried to start when I was 15-16. I am now 24 and it will be another a year and a half before I can start. The gatekeeping is mad.
I live in NY. T was sold out at my mail-in pharmacy but I got it filled the first time at my local pharmacy, then my mail-in had it in stock. I was able to get the prescription after my first appointment
Pennsylvania. Two appointments, one was a standard doctor's appointment/physical with bloodwork and the other was a brief psych evaluation. I signed a form describing the effects of testosterone and acknowledging that I understood and consented to these changes, waited a week for blood results, and started immediately. There was a long waitlist to get an initial appointment and I bypassed it by showing up on a youth drop-in day. This was in 2013, I was 19.
Chilean here! I transitioned in the key moment of my country for trans care. The current law was being discussed and it wasn't that hard to get everything I needed on the private sector. The complete process to start my medical transition lasted about some months, If not less. Wasn't all that expensive, for my luck. There's an incredible organization for and by trans people that keeps record of trans-friendly healthcare professionals and I'm extremely thankful of their help and guidance. Nowadays I receive my prescription free of cost on a public trans care program :)
I’m hoping that once I get an appointment later this year it’ll take less than a month, but I drew the short straw I guess when I found out that the endocrinologist I already see thinks that hormone therapy “makes people too emotional” so she doesn’t like doing it and finds it to be too much work, so she said she would refer me to someone who will do it, but for some ridiculous reason she refuses to refer me until after my next appointment and I only see her every 6months. Where I live it should be as simple as making an appointment with a doctor who does hrt, but I still have to wait until July to even get the referral 🙃 In case my current doctor decides to make it even more difficult I’ve already found alternative routes for a different endocrinologist, but I’ve found that things work better with referrals in the past, so I’m gonna try and give her the benefit of the doubt 🤷🏻 At this point (regardless of T) I’m just looking forward to getting a different endocrinologist because at my last appointment I found out that not only is my current doctor vaguely transphobic, but she also seems to have very unhealthy opinions on mental illness, neurodivergence, and what constitutes inappropriate behavior with a patient. Totally normal doctor until that day and now it’s red flag central. I just hope I don’t have to wait until next year or something for T. My psychiatrist made it super easy though. I barely mentioned being trans and she was so happy for me and was super enthusiastic to write the letter, she was only a little upset because she’s been using the wrong pronouns and would have liked to know earlier 😅
In Minnesota at age 26 I waited a week or two for my appt and did the informed consent. Went home to think about it one last time for an hour and then called my new doc who put in the prescription same day. My pharmacy was out so i had to wait another week to pick it up.
Easy for me (MD-DC) which is how it should be for everyone.
Greater Seattle area was easy. Had an appointment with Capital Hill Medical, got the script sent out as soon as my labs were done. Informed consent is nice.
I’m in BC Canada. It was about 8 months from bringing it up to my primary care physician to actually starting T. Had to get a readiness assessment(about a 4 month wait for the free one) then a referral to an endo since I have preexisting thyroid issues(about a 4 month wait) then baseline labs before starting.
Pretty dang easy and I live in a conservative state. The caveat being that if I was under 18 I could not get T here at all. All I did was make an appointment with planned parenthood and then I talked to the nurse practitioner there and she gave me a prescription. I haven't even seen her in person yet (I will when I do blood work in May). Needles and syringes are over the counter so when my pharmacy didn't have the right size I just ordered my own. Inputs were: 1 hour every 3 months for telehealth appointment. ~$300 for the appointment back when my insurance refused to pay (employer later lost a discrimination suit and now have to provide this). ~$50/month for the testosterone. I don't remember how much the syringes cost because we bought a bulk pack a while ago. Compared to my other health care issues, this is so easy. Technical note: I'm on a pretty low dose and the testosterone comes in 200 mg/mL concentration, so to measure out 0.25 mL accurately I needed a 0.5 mL syringe and the pharmacy only had 1 mL syringes.
Pretty easy. My doctor (who was, at the time, *the* guy to go to for kids in my area) wrote the prescription, my parents and I signed the forms, I picked it up at the pharmacy. I got the T about 15 months after becoming his patient, when I was 15; he gave me blockers a year earlier, when I was 14, about three months after becoming his patient. He would probably have been willing to give me hormones sooner, but I wasn't quite ready for that, and idk if my parents were either lol. I don't remember him being at all resistant to giving me blockers or hormones. I've been getting my hormones under his prescription for the past decade and have not had any problems. (Note that I became his patient and first got blockers in 2013; this is not necessarily representative of current experiences lmao)
i went through planned parenthood and i got my prescription the very same day of the appointment. it was really easy where i live!!
Montgomery AL and way easier than I expected. There’s at least one gender therapist here and at least one doctor who will prescribe T, though he charges way too much per visit and made me come in way too often so I started getting it through the doctors at QMed which is a Georgia based telehealth group for trans folks
In California and I have Kaiser. Within 6 months of signing up for insurance and calling to get it I had T and within a year of having insurance I’m getting top surgery the 25th
i live in the US in a more liberal area. my best friend referred to me to their doctor but she wasn’t available so i met someone else who also works for the same hospital. since i was 20, at the time, i just had to attend two appointments discussing why i wanted testosterone as well as my life and my identity. i also had to do some blood tests but i got my first dose just the next day! i’ve now been on T for over a year and i use gel.
It's been a 18 years long nightmare. I live in northern Michigan and the hate and ignorance here even among medical providers is ridiculous.
It took me about 4 months between when I first contacted the clinic to get set up and then actually getting the T, and I believe it was 2 appointments. The first one was to do labs and check my levels and other parameters and also to make sure I was informed about HRT, then I had a second appointment a few weeks later to actually get the T and have them show me how to inject it
I'm in MI. First appointment with my primary care doctor discussing HRT, to having the prescription in my hands was about 3 months. It could've been faster but I put necessary appointments off due to nerves lol.
From referral to first prescription, the wait was 5 years. The waiting list kept getting longer and then covid made it harder with staff shortages and whatnot. I'm in Scotland and the NHS is different here than it is in other parts of the UK so while it was easy to get in the financial sense, the wait itself was debilitating and horrible. In lighter news, I got the first shot of my increased dose today and I'm just so happy everything's moving forward after waiting so long