I’ll never forget my patient, who I’ll call Erin. I saw Erin at a youth shelter that primarily serves LGBTQ youth in New York City. Erin is a 17 year old transgender male, who comes in every two weeks for his testosterone injection. He was so excited to report to me that he could already see the effects of the testosterone—his voice had changed and he was growing facial hair—all things that affirmed his gender identity. However, the next thing he really wanted to tackle was his period—it was something that he struggled with every single month and it made him feel extremely disheartened and out of control of his body.

Thanks to a grant the shelter had with a Federally Qualified Health Center, I was able to work with Erin to get the Liletta IUD (a hormonal IUD) at no cost. The IUD stopped Erin’s periods which was a huge deal in terms of affirming who he knew himself to be: a man. He felt so empowered being able to control not only his period, but also felt relieved that he had an option that he didn’t need to think about every single day or fear others discovering his medication bottle or having it stolen at the shelter. Sadly his family hadn’t approved of him upon beginning his transition and cut him off of all support.

Erin already faced discrimination in his family life, in his school life, and in his daily life, so it was so important that he could have this moment of celebration: Erin finally felt like he was heading in the right direction. Erin was proud to be able to say that he didn’t have his period anymore—and this was all because of access to the long acting reversible contraception.