[bryony]

You mention cost vs risk which is something that I left out of the equation: Yes cost can be a huge factor involved in any GRS/SRS, but even if I had the money and had a 100% that nothing would go wrong, I still wouldn't put myself through full transition.

Sorry, what I meant by cost/benefit analysis didn't mean financial, (though of course that is a factor). What I meant was gain in terms of increased quality of life from an orchiectomy, when you have a lot of feminisation and an active heterosexual sex life, as set against potential losses in terms of decreased quality of life , or even life itself, if you have to start using pharma hormones rather than herbal. Once you get the medical team involved, I feel it is a slippery slope from then on.

From what I see, pharmaceuticals entail all sorts of risks, which warrant serious and deep study and advice from unvested interests (which excludes most medical professionals); you would need to contact people who've had orchiectomies and find out not only the success stories, but the tragedies, and try to gauge the risks you would be taking.

Then, feed that risk into the cost/benefit analysis that I referred to above.

Hope this wasn't a TLDR!

B.x

Found this useful guide - it speaks of some of the risks of pharmaceutical hormones.

Hormones

B.