It wasn't supposed to happen this way

[LizMarie]

On Monday, we completed our usual planning session for the next two weeks of work and afterwards I stopped in to talk to my boss. Along the way, he informed me that the person I know best and trusted in HR just retired. Uh-oh. That threw a spanner into my coming out plans with HR. I had planned to talk to that exact person in early April since I've had contact with her before but not openly about this specific issue. My boss saw this bothered me so asked why. Given that I do trust him and have no reason not to talk to him, I said, "Let me close the door. We probably need to chat."

So out it came. He now knows. And his reaction? "I don't see this impacting your place in this organization in the least. In fact, if it does, I will be very disappointed in whomever tries to make it an issue." He also said with my HR contact having left the company last week, he will find out who is best for me to talk to in HR so I'll either have an HR appointment later this week or probably the first week or second week after I get back from vacation. I did explain that I am aiming to complete the legal aspects of transition in the second half of this year with a soft target date of September. Once that is done, I can really be full time and start the clock towards GCS.

That also means it's all in play and live. And my boss? He congratulated me on tackling something that must be very difficult to face. He also said that I probably have enough stress from this outside the office (which is true) but he wanted to make sure the office was zero stress on this specific issue.

I work with great people, for a great company. I hope I can continue to say that going forward.

Addendum: Today I received an email from our new contact in HR. She wants to see me the first day I am back from vacation, which is Monday, the 23rd.

My boss also reiterated that if I need to speak to him at any time, his door is always open.

[Ms Grace]

That's great hon, sounds like you have a pretty ace boss there!

[LizMarie]

I really do think so and I hope the whole process goes this smoothly.

[Hayley]

Amazing. Congrats. Sounds like you have a pretty understanding boss. I hope the rest of your coming out goes as smoothly as possible.

[LizMarie]

As a followup to this, I've now spoken with HR. They had the language in place for gender identity protection but never had to actually deal with a case. My two HR reps now refer to me privately as Cara. We've agreed that I will continue to be addressed by my male name until it's legally changed. That makes things simpler for all concerned. One of the reps was checking into insurance coverage for GCS for me and said she was more frustrated with CIGNA's response than any other case she's worked. She said they didn't say yes but they didn't say no and went all wishy-washy on her. I told her that I would have letters of medical necessity from my therapist, my psychiatrist, and my doctors (endo and GP) when the time came and that I would appeal if they said no. I told her to tell them that.

She was asking if I wanted to plan that this year so I had to explain that I need to live in gender full time for close to a year (my therapist said she could refer me in the 6-9 month window since she thinks I am adapting so well so far) before we can have that surgery. She was quite curious so I explained how the medical community uses this "gatekeeper" system to try to reduce incidents of regret among those who get surgery, since reversing it is very difficult and in some cases not possible. As I explained that, her face lit up in understanding so she said she could also look at seeing if we can get the company policy changed for next year anyway.

I then asked her if our Denver office has a different health care policy than the rest of the company and she said no, why? I told her that any policy in Colorado now must cover GCS so if ours is the same, it may already be covered. She again thanked me and said she'd use that too.

She made it very clear that she's 100% on my side and is going to fight to get this covered for me. I thanked her profusely. She said to call or email any time I had benefits questions and I told her to do the same, since I am their guinea pig for developing actual procedures to cover transition and I'd help find resources if they need them.

So at this point, HR is now planning to bring in a specialist in transition issues so that when I come out to my team someone else is there to answer the detailed medical questions rather than me.

All in all, my company and supervisor have been 100% behind me thus far. I am now very optimistic that this process will go through just fine later this year when I finally do change my name and gender marker on my driver's license.

[Shantel]

Sounds like a wonderful company with great officers LizMarie, I'm happy for you dear!

My Bro-in-law manages the west coast offices of a large company, he did the same for one of his trans women employees and held an inner circle meeting of department heads and informed them that anyone holding negative attitudes about what was about to happen would not be tolerated and anyone thinking otherwise would be welcome to leave, case closed! I'm always pleased to know how some industry leaders are dealing so positively in on the job transitions.

[Jessica15]

I need a job and your company sounds like a fantastic place to work!  Where to do you work?  J/K you don't have to say.  But they sound truly amazing!

[LizMarie]

I am a software developer in the oil and gas industry and am in Houston, Texas. Honestly, despite Texas being such an arse backwards state on GLBT rights generally, many of the large and mid-size oil and gas companies are very supportive of all their GLBT employees (except Exxon - I've heard bad things about Exxon and trans employees).

Inside the beltway in Houston is a heavily progressive liberal enclave that is very active in GLBT issues as well as possessing wide religious diversity. Our mayor is a lesbian and was recently re-elected again by a clear majority. She and her cabinet have cleaned up and balanced the city budget mess that Republican predecessors made while not forcing city employees to take pay cuts or benefit cuts. I have worked with Hindu, Sikh, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and Taoist individuals over the years here in Houston and the large Fortune 500 companies definitely have been protective of religious diversity as well.

Many of these companies have a "zero tolerance" policy for workplace bigotry, so while I am sure there are bigots who are going to freak over my transition, they are going to have an HR department and CEO (I was informed that the CEO approves of me) who are on my side from the outset. I can't stop people from being bigots but so long as they cannot directly harm me or my career, then I'm fine with it. Just leave me alone and let me do my work. That;s what my boss wants and what my company wants, so I am pretty sure it's now the bigots' turn to hide in the closet.

[Bombadil]

that's really cool you have gotten such great support.