The four stages of transition explained plainly
Dr Helen Webberley on Triggernometry: the trans debate, with Konstantin Kisin, Triggernometry
Transition is one single thing, usually surgery, and it either happens or it doesn't. People picture an operation, or a dramatic before-and-after, and assume that's the whole story.
What I was trying to lay out there is that transition is actually four distinct things, and most people only ever do some of them. Social transition, changing your name, your pronouns, your hair, the way you move through the world, is often the first and sometimes the only step someone needs. Medical transition is about aligning the body's hormones with who the person is. Surgical transition is available for those who want it, and legal transition is the paperwork: passport, driving licence, birth certificate. You can do one, two, all four, or none in any particular order. There is no single correct version of this.
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