Clementine was medically transitioned at 12, after one appointment.
At 12, one appointment put Clementine on puberty blockers; at 14, surgeons removed her breasts. No one asked about the abuse—just “dead daughter or live son.” Now she’s detransitioning and may never be able to have kids.
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Clementine, now 20, was fast-tracked into medical transition at 12 after a single 30-minute appointment with Dr. Joanna Olson-Kennedy at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. She was put on puberty blockers at 12, testosterone at 13, and had a double mastectomy at 14—before completing female puberty. No clinician explored the childhood sexual abuse that fuelled her body hatred; only after trauma-focused therapy did she detransition and begin seeking reconstructive surgery, now uncertain whether she can ever bear children.
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Clementine, now 20, tells Billboard Chris that she was placed on puberty blockers at age 12 after a single appointment with Dr. Joanna Olson-Kennedy at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. At 13 she began testosterone and at 14 underwent a double mastectomy, all before she had completed female puberty. She says the initial consultation consisted of only a few superficial questions—whether she preferred the company of boys and what her interests were—and that no one ever asked about the sexual abuse she had suffered as a child. Dr. Olson-Kennedy, who runs the busiest pediatric gender clinic in the country and has received a $5.7 million NIH grant, reportedly told Clementine’s parents they faced “a dead daughter or a live son,” warning that refusal to transition would place Clementine at high risk of suicide. Clementine notes that her only suicide attempt occurred after transition had begun. Detransitioning earlier this year, Clementine has spent the past months tapering off testosterone and is now pursuing reconstructive breast surgery—coverage she says is far harder to obtain than the original mastectomy. She attributes her initial desire to transition to intense body hatred triggered by puberty and to guidance counselors who encouraged the idea that she might be transgender. Convinced that womanhood equated to pain because of prior abuse, she embraced a male identity, only to realize later that she had “built an entire persona around misogyny.” Effective therapy—specifically DBT focused on her trauma rather than on gender—helped her understand that her distress was rooted in unaddressed sexual abuse, after which she no longer wished to live as male. Clementine acknowledges she may have lost her fertility, having never undergone natural female puberty, though she is not yet certain. While she cannot publicly discuss potential legal action, she confirms she has been in contact with Campbell Miller Payne, a Texas law firm formed by attorneys who left other practices to focus on cases involving minors harmed by medical transition. Billboard Chris praises the firm’s founders—18 children among them—for choosing advocacy over more lucrative work and hints that significant lawsuits are forthcoming. He closes by thanking Clementine for her courage, emphasizing that her story will help prevent other children from undergoing similar irreversible procedures.