Before you click on the link, I should warn viewers that some of this may be hard to watchPeople who switch sexes — that is ‘transition’ — risk making irreversible changes without comprehensive medical advice. And these changes truly are ‘irreversible.’ If it doesn’t work out, the road back does not take you to where you started. You will be changed forever and must live with those changes… it will not be as if it had never been.In Hannaford this week, my guests are Faith Groleau and Kellie-Lynn Pirie, both of whom made the change from female to male and have since transitioned back. The experience has been difficult, painful and a profound well of regret for both of them. .Kellie-Lynn transitioned from female to male as an adult, for reasons related to childhood abuse. She then worked for some years as a long-haul truck driver. In the show, she talks about what made her transition back to female, and some of the very difficult health problems that she will now face for the rest of her life.Faith Groleau did not have surgery but at the age of 17 did begin puberty blockers — over the strenuous objections of her parents. She then lived as a male for some years before deciding that she had made a mistake. She too is paying an ongoing cost in personal health — something she says could have been avoided if the doctor counselling her at the start had given her more complete advice.“I think if I had been warned at the start about what I have now learned the hard way, I would never have transitioned.”Hannaford airs at 7:00 pm this evening.
