A British man is planning to sue the United Kingdom’s National Health Service for granting him transgender, body-altering surgery without—in his view—considering his mental illness.
As the anesthesia from his 2018 surgery wore off, the now-35-year-old Ritchie Herron recalled immediately thinking, “Oh, God, what have I done?” He opened up about the procedure—which removed his penis and testicles—in a vulnerable interview with the Daily Mail.
Herron, who is homosexual, said he has battled depression much of his life and, as a young person, dealt with feelings of gender dysphoria. He ultimately decided, with significant prompting, that physically altering his body was the only answer to his problems. That surgery, which rendered him sterile and incontinent, was the “biggest mistake” of his life, he told the news outlet.
Many of his problems stem from two 30-minute appointments with a psychiatrist at the Northern Region Gender Dysphoria Service, a branch of the NHS. In 2014, he was diagnosed as “transsexual” and was prescribed medication to block his natural testosterone development in preparation for surgery.
Soon thereafter, Herron began dressing as a female and going by the name “Abby.”
He was actually referred for the irreversible surgery in July 2015, just mere months after he had been speedily diagnosed as “transsexual.” Unsure, Herron turned it down. He was referred for surgery again in 2017 but, once more, declined it. He was allegedly told then that if he didn’t accept the referral, he’d be discharged altogether from the NHS Newcastle gender clinic, where he’d received care since early 2015.
The therapy he’d been receiving, he said, was a “lifeline.” So the ultimatum sent him into a “tailspin” and left him feeling as if he had been painted into a corner. He even had family members urge the clinic to consider his history of mental illness, but those warnings reportedly went unheeded.
Feeling as if he had no choice, Herron yielded to the NHS clinic. He went under the knife on May 23, 2018.
“I didn’t even see the surgeon,” he told the Daily Mail. “I was very much in the mindset of, ‘I’m here now, there’s no stopping it, even if I wanted to.'”
Herron believes his harrowing story should serve as a cautionary tale, telling the news website the transgender craze is “an avalanche waiting to happen,” noting there are many more de-transitioners like him—those who regret their body-altering surgeries and treatments—waiting in the wings.
“Transition is now being sold to people on a mass scale,” Herron said, calling it “sinister.” He added, “In a few years, I’m sure we’ll have law firms asking people if they transitioned and would like to claim compensation.” {eoa}
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