I returned a few hours ago and I'm going to write up what I can remember! I have dyslexia/memory issues, so I recorded the lecture/seminar/workshop on a dictaphone, so if anyone wants to hear it I can see if the recording is good enough and post it for ya'll to listen to.
So first off, when I got there we were all queuing up, there was a pretty diverse set of people of all genders and ages it seemed. Whilst this is called a "workshop" it is much, much closer to a college/University seminar or lecture. We were also given free bottles of water which was nice ahaha.
So Dr. Barrett did the introduction and talked about the myths and legends of GICs and Charing Cross and how they operate. He went through a bunch of common complaints and debunked them. There was humour thrown in, probably because a lot of people in the room seemed anxious/nervous. I'd say there was about 40~50 of us? I think there was meant to be more though.
One or two of the people who were meant to speak, were not present, which was a shame. Dr. Barrett talked about the endocrine side of things, how hormones work in cisgender individuals and how hormone replacement therapy works in transgender individuals, why certain things are done and administered in certain ways, etc. He described a handful of things people on certain types of hormones can expect, some the things that will happen, won't happen, and could happen.
He also mentioned frequently if you wish to have hormones or surgery, you cannot smoke for 6 months (it was 6 months or 6 weeks) before surgery or hormones because it massively messes up the blood. There were questions that, would certain anti depressants//certain medications/etc interfere with hormones, and he responded with only smoking and certain epilepsy medication interfere with hormones (however !! the epilepsy interference has an easy work around so it's not a big deal)
Two surgeons also spoke about their work; with many photographs of before, during, and after operations. These photos were pretty gore-y, and people were advised to leave the room beforehand if they faint or were made uncomfortable by such things ( a handful of people left ), they talked about different types of surgery for the same result, the pros and cons and complications and future/long-term outcomes, etc.
There was also a voice therapist who discussed how voice therapy works, what they do and how they do it/how they help/etc, and he gave us some examples, how the sessions work and how long they go on for, things like that (I know a lot of people who were wondering about voice therapy but haven't been invited to a "workshop" yet so I'll be passing a lot of that info onto them).
Dr. Barrett also talked about things such as easy ways for people to legally change their name. All in all, I think it was informative. I'm one of those "research the heck out of things" kinds of people, so I already knew most of the things discussed (I learned one or two new things, and I honestly never pass up a trip to go to London).
All in all everyone seemed pretty friendly. I personally didn't mind Dr. Barrett. My personal opinion; he's very, very blunt and to the point, he's a non-nonsense guy but he does have a sense of humour. However his type of bluntness is one that I feel not many people can really get on with, which is why there are many "horror stories" about him, but he genuinely cares about helping transgender and non-binary individuals, and to me he seemed like a pretty cool guy, but I'm used to extremely blunt individuals.
Happy I went, would recommend if anyone else got invited and had the day free/has the money to spare. The vast majority of the information CAN be found online, but having it all in one, 2/3 hour long seminar with a Q & A at the end put a lot of things into focus (for me, personally, but then again I take in information when someone is speaking to me/audio, rather than reading it).