My CAP partner, Sylvie, and I walked into the learning lab nervously. As we started the meeting, we saw Paul’s face on our screen. When we realized that the Zoom meeting’s audio and video were barely working, we had to log onto a different computer and restart the interview. Once we finally got started, the interview went fairly smoothly. Paul shared about his experiences with clients, his work, and how he uses his privilege as a therapist to help transgender people.

When we started to ask more questions about the recent election, he explained that some of his clients who live out-of-state need to travel to other states to get the proper healthcare that they need. He referred to these people as “gender refugees.” He also explained that some of these gender refugees were being tracked on organized lists made by the state government of people who went to gender affirming clinics. This is a form of profiling, which is illegal in the United States. This is extremely important, especially since it relates to the differences between Republican and Democratic states. Paul mentioned that Republicans like to push a narrative that states a lot of people regret transitioning, but in reality, only 1% of people who medically transition regret transitioning. Almost all life-altering surgeries have a much higher regret rate, some even being higher than 40%. The information gained while interviewing Paul was some of the most helpful information we have, and Sylvie and I secured a lot of good details and statistics in this interview.