[continued]

Another traumatic incident I remember from med school, was when I started growing my hair in first year. One of the anatomy residents told me, ‘You study a lot, you get a gold medal, but let me tell you, if this hair is not gone you won't even pass.’

I did get a gold medal, but that’s another thing.

Then, when I entered the women's hostel with some of my friends, the guards stopped me and they body-shamed for exactly half an hour.

I didn't know what to say because honestly I faced this kind of prejudice before in my school life, all for those 11 years but this was something different. This was something where my body was made fun of, where my organs were made fun of, in front of a hell lot of people, and I didn’t know what to do.

Other than that the worst incident, or rather something that is an evolutionary process, is that when you're transitioning in med school, I think I had to be strong enough because when you live in a boy's hostel.

It's like a girl is living in a boy's hospital. It means your body's visible, your breasts are going to be visible to the men, they’re going to stare at you every time you walk inside the mess for food.

You cannot have food because you see all those white teeth in front of you. I lost a lot of weight thanks to them, which kind of worked out for me because I wanted to have a figure. But I wish I used other ways to do that, not this malnutritioning where I'm not eating food because, for me, my mental health was more important than my physical health.

That's the exact trauma that is what a trans student has, when they're in places. Oxymoron that it's a med school because I think that should be the best place where you're feeling safe. But apparently i’m India, non-medical schools are more supportive than med school.