Marianne's Facial Feminization Surgery

I met Marianne Read during our freshman year of college, and although our band, Cerebral Swelling, only rocked 2 dwellings before it became apparent that I wasn’t cut out for the hardscrabble life of playing the guitar sometimes, she’s been one of the most important people in my life for more than a decade.

Between her unfailing commitment to cracking jokes, incredible loyalty to her friends and cats, and encyclopedic knowledge of music that “will grow on you if you listen long enough, I promise,” Marianne often comes across as carefree. In reality, she developed many of her talents in efforts to cope with debilitating and treatment-resistant depression and anxiety. Fortunately, after years of mostly fruitless treatment, Marianne discovered that a root cause of her poor mental health was gender dysphoria.

As she has shed performative maleness and embraced her feminine identity, Marianne found the capacity to make big, positive life changes. She completed a graduate degree in Molecular Biology and started her career in a medical lab. Overcoming her dysphoria-related fears of dating, she began dating and married Karly, a talented illustrator and overall delightful human.

The next step in her medical transition is facial feminization surgery to subtly modify some of her features to appear more traditionally feminine, which has been shown to significantly improve quality of life for transgender women (click here for an article discussing recent research on the benefits of FFS, and here to learn more about FFS generally ). Unfortunately, because insurance companies are notorious for denying claims for so-called “elective” procedures, Marianne’s surgeon estimates that there is a 75% chance that her insurance will not cover the cost of these important procedures.

Marianne’s facial feminization surgery and recovery will likely cost about $18,000, which would wipe out her savings and leave her and Karly in debt. I hope to raise a substantial portion, and perhaps the full cost, so that Marianne doesn’t have to choose between substantial debt and ongoing dysphoria every time she sees her own face, and can instead confidently choose to take another step toward living comfortably and confidently in her body.

If Marianne is lucky and her insurance comes through or donations exceed the costs of her medical care, she will give any excess funds collected here to other GoFundMe campaigns for transgender medical care and share receipts with donors, so you can be confident that any donation you make here will go directly to the health and happiness of a trans person in need!