Gender GP and wait times

I’ll probably delete this soon as I dont really want them seeing it.

Honestly this didn’t bode well for Gender GP in my view. I still haven’t been reviewed by the medical team and I’d put it down to negligence/laziness.

Diane who did my pathway didn’t pass me over to the medical team as I expected but instead to a patient coordinator to handle all that stuff. Fine if that’s their workflow, although I wish that’s what she’d said rather than “I’ll pass you to the medical team as soon as I’ve done my report” because that lead to me being completely mislead and unaware I’d been inadvertently put in a holding pattern. The coordinator sent a couple emails, one was a link to some counselling. The link was incorrect and was for a doctor, there were no slots until early may and it would cost me £90 for 30mins. Honestly I saw it and thought i just paid about £500 getting on to GGP and I’d wait till payday before forking out another unexpected £90.

The coordinator just ignored my case until after three nail biting weeks of waiting to hear from the medical team... I cracked and sent a flurry of emails to shake the tree and find out what was taking so long.
She said, sorry it wasn’t mandatory. You just didn’t reply so I waited. I’ve passed your details on to the medical team now, you should hear from them in around two weeks.

I’m seriously unimpressed, every day living with my dysphoria is torture. Since coming out and starting to transition, my dysphoria is off the frigging scale. I want to be out of transition ASAFP Im a human being going through some serious shit at the moment, my life fell apart and I’m trying to rebuild and transition and could do with the people I’m having to pay to help me, treating me as such and not just an email to sit in a box and ignore for weeks after telling me my details HAD ALREADY BEEN PASSED ON.

But these are the people holding the key to my medication. If I kick off and make a big fuss I’m scared I’ll be known as a tricky customer and be met with bureaucracy and resistance the same as anywhere else. So have to smile and say thank you when really I want to scream and and make them accountable. “Sorry but I’ve passed you on now” doesn’t cut it for me.
I haven’t even received my first prescription yet and I’ll guarantee they’ll be quick to take payment in a couple of days.

It’s great private GIC’s exist, without them most of us would be dead by the time we got our first NHS appointment. But let’s not forget they aren’t charities, they may have been established for the right reasons but they’re evolved into businesses that require someone’s suffering in order to exist.
So they literally get by, by taking money off sick people who need them and are scared of being denied treatment by them. They didn’t offer reparation by fast tracking for their fuck up.
To say that experience made me feel like a meal ticket would be putting it politely. Still, Diane was lovely.

I have the NHS rout coming, I’ll probably just switch to NHS as soon as I can.

If private GIC is your rout, go for it. But don’t make the mistake I did and think they’re a bunch of benevolent people wanting to help.
They’re just people doing a 9 to 5 and I may as well have been buying a lottery ticket or a house.

/r/transgenderUK Thread Parent