Living in Transition

(NEWSCHANNEL 3) – In the first part of Newschannel 3's special report, Living in Transition, we introduced you to a transgendered man and woman from West Michigan.

Newschannel 3 has been working with them for several months, to better understand their lives and what they have to deal with. Both have been taking hormones and going through therapy to make their transition, but they have not had their gender reassignment surgery. It's a step they hope to eventually take.

To better understand that part of the transgender experience, Newschannel 3 traveled to Pennsylvania to meet a surgeon who specializes in gender confirmation surgery, and we met a trans man and woman who allowed us to follow them through the life changing event.

We started our trip with a visit to Dr. Christine McGinn's office in New Hope, PA.

“I knew I wanted to be a plastic surgeon,” said Dr. McGinn, “but I had no idea that I would be doing this.”

Dr. McGinn is one of a handful of doctors who perform gender confirmation surgery.

“In the United States I would estimate that the majority of gender confirmation surgery is performed by only three or four surgeons,” said Dr. McGinn.

On the day Newschannel 3 caught up with her, Dr. McGinn was completing Gwedalyn Brooke-Moscoe's physical transition from male to female at Lower Bucks Hospital.

Brooke-Moscoe says she's wanted to become a woman since she was three years old.

“The earliest memories I have of dissonance with birth sex goes back to when I was three years old,” said Brooke-Moscoe.

Dr. McGinn says emotional support is one of the biggest hurdles.

“There have been studies that show the attempted suicide rate among people who are transgender are 20 percent or greater,” said Dr. McGinn. “I'm finding that some people they come out to surgery, and they've lost everything, they've lost their family, they've lost their friends.”

Brooke-Moscoe says such difficulties are why it's taken 38 years to make the decision.

“I'd always fought it, I'd always denied myself, I always tried to find my way around it, always tried to respect my vows and my two wonderful children and not have to put them through this,” said Brooke-Moscoe. “Yvonne and I both noticed that I was increasingly unable to keep it together, I just had to get this done.”

After years of therapy, hormone treatments since January, and saying good-bye to her wife, the moment of truth is at hand, and Brooke-Moscoe will spend six hours on the operating table.

First, her chest is cut open, and breast implants inserted, then Dr. McGinn begins the long and delicate process of transforming Brooke-Moscoe's penis into a vagina.

“You live your whole life for completion, to feel whole,” said Brooke-Moscoe. “It's just the sense of feeling right.”

“It's a whole process, the surgery is just, it completes the physical part of her journey, however it's a process that continues after the surgery,” said Dr. McGinn.

Dr. McGinn will assist Brooke-Moscoe through the process, but in the meantime, the doctor has more work to do.

“Today we're doing a bilateral subcutaneous mastectomy on a female to male trans-man,” said Dr. McGinn. “What that entails is removing the breast tissue, we're going to actually remove the nipples, remove the breast tissue and then put the nipples back on as a skin graft.”

The patient is Julin Moreno, taking this step with his long-time partner.

Moreno says he's been waiting a long time for the procedure.

“I was attracted to women and I figured I was a lesbian, but there was no terms like transsexual before,” said Moreno.

After some pre-op notes, Moreno's physical transformation begins.

“This is outpatient surgery actually, they go home the same day and they'll come back and see me in a week,” said Dr. McGinn. “This is typical for trans-men, the top surgery is usually the first surgery because that's the most obvious for other people to see.”

While Moreno is in surgery, Brooke-Moscoe is just waking up from her surgery the day before.

“It really hasn't soaked in yet,” said Brooke-Moscoe. “The past year it's been like I'm really starting to get a taste of being myself. It's just, you know, looking forward to being able to go out and live my life.”

Dr. McGinn does around 100 gender confirmation surgeries annually. She says only about one percent of her patients receive insurance coverage for the surgery, which is something that she'd like to see change, not only as a surgery, but as a transgender woman herself.