Man who became woman wants to be
a man again

by Christine Hogan (The Sun-Herald)
August 31, 2003

Alan Finch's decision at 19 to become a woman – a decision supported by health-care professionals and his mother – took him on a journey from which he has painfully discovered there is no sure way back.

Mr Finch has spoken to ABC TV’s Australian Story in the hope that people considering gender reassignment surgery will think fully about the procedure and then proceed very, very carefully.

As an adolescent boy, Mr Finch thought he might have been gay. Then he thought, maybe not. Maybe he was “trapped“ in the wrong body.

In his 20s he had his penis and scrotum removed and a false vagina fashioned from the penile skin and inserted into his body, and he became a woman called Helen.

He got married illegally and was later in another relationship that fell apart when his male partner discovered Helen was born a boy.

Then he had a relationship with a woman, who encouraged him to become a man again.

“I knew with my whole being that was what I wanted to do,“ Mr Finch, 36, of Melbourne, said.

About five years ago, he began taking male hormones, something he says now was “a roller-coaster ride emotionally“. He was angry at himself for having been so gullible that he was sucked into the fantasy that becoming a woman would solve his identity crisis.

And he was angry with his then-girlfriend. “I blamed her for having awakened this in me, and I just pushed her away. And there was this total confusion again wondering if I could function as a man, let alone function as a man who has been mutilated to this degree.“

Like about 10 per cent of people in Australia who have the operation (about 80 a year in Sydney, Melbourne and on the Gold Coast), he was desperately unhappy with the result.

Australian Transgender Support Association Inc president Gina Mather said there were between 48,000 and 50,000 transsexuals – most of them male to female – in Australia. Not all had had surgery.

Mr Finch said: “Anatomically, I was never a woman. [The surgery] was creating a battleground within my own body. It’s just rearranging flesh, but the tissue that’s used is still male tissue. I was never able to have any orgasm or sexual pleasure. Everything was fake about it, from top to toe.“

His psychiatrist Byron Rigby said: “In the absence of much more adequate counselling than I understand he received, the test showed that he in fact – even in the presence of oestrogen treatment – was well on the masculine side of average.“

Just how did Mr Finch end up in the middle of this fiasco?

Dr Rigby said it began with the lack of a positive father figure. “[Alan] never had any positive role modelling. The whole reason that he attempted to take refuge in womanhood was that he simply couldn’t learn from his father how to be anything that he wanted to be.“

When he was 19, Mr Finch migrated to Australia with his mother and sister.

It was a chance to begin a new life – as a woman.

“My focus was to be the best-looking woman I could be. I got a job, I was getting attention from men. I felt powerful.“

The final hurdle before the surgery that would effectively castrate him was the psychiatric test.

First time around, he failed. Then he learned how to fudge the test and answer the questions to put him into the female zone. The operation got the go ahead.

Dr Rigby wants to know how that happened.

“He’s more masculine than I am, if you like,“ he said.

“I would think a great spotlight should be placed on this kind of surgery in general, and this case in particular. I think it warrants a full investigation at governmental level.“

Mr Finch is looking at the possibility of genital reconstruction to restore his penis and is hoping to find a monogamous relationship - with a woman. Alan Finch’s story, Boy Interrupted, will screen on Australian Story, ABC TV, 8pm tomorrow.