HHS report details allegations of deceptive billing practices and fraud in so-called transgender medicine
I was just 11 years old when I decided I hated my body - my whole identity, really.
My struggles had begun years earlier. I started therapy in first grade after developing what I can only describe as all-consuming thoughts about death. Then puberty came earlier for me than for most of my classmates. As school kids do, they bullied me for it. I was consumed by thoughts of suicide.
o I turned to the internet for comfort. I scrolled through countless forums, including Tumblr, Instagram, and everything in between, to find an outlet for my insecurities. That's how I stumbled upon Tumblr posts about LGBT identities.
Because of my ongoing struggle, I found it helped to try on this new persona of being a boy. At this time, I was 12 years old. I confided in my therapist, who affirmed my so-called gender identity and never told my parents. Before I knew it, I was fast-tracked to "transition." When I was 13, I was put on testosterone, and a surgeon removed my healthy breasts.
More than a decade later, the Department of Health and Human Services is exposing the medical system that allowed stories like mine to unfold. Its new report, "Wolves in White Coats: How Doctors and Hospitals Pushed and Profited From the Fraud of 'Gender Medicine,'" details allegations of deceptive billing practices, questionable diagnoses, and financial incentives surrounding medical interventions on gender-distressed children. What happened to me was intensely personal, but the report makes clear why the questions raised by my experience are much larger than one patient or one doctor.
.......................emotional blackmail is bolstered by medical fraud. Medical language is carefully curated to ensure insurance coverage. Providers are coached on how to frame distress in ways that unlock access to these irreversible interventions. Then those providers coach their patients on how to make sure their insurance believes them.
................After doing some research on my own, I came across one of my doctors who had treated me at the "Proud Clinic" in Oakland, California. She had a one-star review with a comment: "Terrible doctor. Being sued by Chloe Cole."
My curiosity helped me that day, as I found the law firm representing Cole, the first public child detransitioner. I resonated so deeply with her story that, shortly after, I met with the firm to pursue legal action.