Michelle’s Case
By: California Sunday
Tags: LGBTQ, Features, Transgender, Prison

On the morning of August 12, 2015, Michelle stepped out of the Reception and Release Center onto a gravel path. She held a clear tub of her belongings with both hands: underwear, court documents, medical records, and $200 of “gate money.” Missing were her hormones. Every California parolee is promised a 30-day supply of medications, but Michelle’s release happened too quickly, she says.

A silver SUV idled at the end of the gravel path. Inside sat three of Michelle’s attorneys. (Michelle’s family, whom she hadn’t heard from in two decades, had moved to Tennessee.) Her attorneys had brought her the pantsuit she’d asked for — slacks and a matching blazer — and drove her to a strip-mall diner for her first breakfast. She ate a plate of scrambled eggs and ham. She threw up in the restaurant bathroom.

Even though Michelle was out, her legal team was still at work, gathering evidence to prove the prison had released her to avoid the surgery. In the meantime, her lawyers had represented another trans woman, Shiloh Quine, who sued for reassignment surgery just four months after Michelle. The same week that the CDCR paroled Michelle, it came to a settlement with Quine. In the agreement, however, Quine would be the only inmate to receive surgery; there would be no precedent set. Michelle’s case was different: If her lawyers could prove that the prison had deliberately paroled her to avoid the surgery, the precedent would stand.

After breakfast, the attorneys took Michelle to a transitional house, where she would stay for at least the next six months — the first place Michelle would live with women as a woman. The director showed her to a small room on the third floor, with a twin bed pushed against the wall. Michelle hesitated at the door and stepped slowly onto the linoleum floor. On the bed, on top of a bag of sheets, were bottles of shampoo and conditioner, a bar of soap, and deodorant. She picked up the Lady Speed Stick and rolled it over in her hand. This is awesome, she thought. She’d never had women’s deodorant before.

Things that are awesome about coming home after nearly 30 years: tuna melts, Google, the best coffee you have ever tasted at Starbucks. An old lady selling neon popsicles out of a refrigerated cart in the park. Opening a bank account.

Not awesome: having $43 in that account. Filling out Medi-Cal paperwork after your coverage was canceled. Having to complete HIPAA forms without a computer or any idea what HIPAA is. Attaching your prison résumé to job applications. Knowing your housing could run out in months.

At 52, Michelle is older than most of her 60-some housemates. The dining hall is on the first floor, and the girls yell and reach over Michelle’s plate as she eats. She has to get permission to leave the house. She goes to Fisherman’s Wharf to watch the seals, or to see the doctor. A form Michelle filled out at the doctor’s recently:

“Over the last two weeks how often were you:

Feeling bad about yourself or that you are a failure? Nearly every day.

Not being able to stop worrying? Every day.

Feeling afraid as if something awful is going to happen? Every day.

Describe your social contact, social support, friends, family, colleagues: None to note.”

In one appointment, a specialist told her the hormones have left her with severe fibrosis of the liver. In another, a nurse showed her to a room with an exam table with stirrups, the kind used for gynecological exams. Just take off your clothes and put on this gown, the nurse told her. Michelle explained that there had been a mistake. She doesn’t have a vagina, at least not yet.

Michelle lives in a state whose Medicaid theoretically covers gender-reassignment surgery, and she has already accomplished Medi-Cal’s checklist of requirements: live for a year as a transgender person (she has 22 years under her belt), see a therapist for at least 12 months (22 years as well), and have recommendations from two independent psychologists (she has five). But the process of signing up for coverage, finding a surgeon willing to accept Medi-Cal’s low reimbursement rate, submitting her materials for approval, and waiting to hear has taken months.

Finally, eight months after Michelle’s release, a surgeon — the same one who approved her surgery while incarcerated — called to talk her through the procedure. The surgeon starts by removing the scrotum, a sensitive swath of skin that becomes the lips of the labia and the back wall of the new vaginal canal. But there’s a problem: the hair. Before surgery, electrolysis will remove most of Michelle’s pubic hair, but a good surgeon will scrape every follicle off the scrotal skin that becomes the vagina. It’s a thing Michelle worries about. Like, what if he misses two?

The surgeon then unwraps the skin of the penis, preserving the tip, careful not to sever too many blood vessels, those precious nerves. The head will become the clitoris, the body inverted into the walls of the vagina. In the best-case scenario, the surgeon told her, Michelle will be able to have clitoral orgasms. Once insurance is squared away, she’ll be able to make the appointment. Shouldn’t take more than two weeks.