Skip to main content

Site Banner Ads

Site Search

Search

Up Here Publishing

Mobile Toggle

Utility navigation

  • Shop
  • Contact Us

Social Links

Facebook Twitter Instagram

Search Toggle

Search

Main navigation

  • Magazines
    • Latest Issue
    • Past Issues
    • Up Here Business
    • YK Guide
    • Move Up Here
  • Sections
    • People & Places
    • Arts & Lifestyle
    • History & Culture
    • Travel & Tourism
    • Nature & Science
    • Northern Jobs
  • Newsletters
  • Community Map
  • Contests
    • Arctic Adventure Sweepstakes
    • Sally Manning Award
  • Subscribe
    • Magazine
    • Digital Edition

Learning Together

March/April Up Here

How nurse practitioner Michelle Wolsky became the most trusted health care provider for the Yukon’s trans, non-binary and two-spirit communities.

By Lori Fox

Photo: GBP Creative

Nurse practitioner Michelle Wolsky

Breadcrumb

  1. Home
  2. Learning Together

Getting even basic medical care in the Yukon can often be a challenge, but accessing gender-affirming care has traditionally been a medical, psychological and bureaucratic gauntlet all its own.

 

No matter how well-intentioned, the people who control access to this care often lack the proper training, life experience or even empathy to be qualified to care for trans, non-binary or two-spirit folk. As a community, this can make it hard to know who to trust.

 

In the Yukon, though, there’s a name that gets passed around and recommended over and over again — Michelle Wolsky.

 

A nurse practitioner working out of the Yukon Sexual Health Clinic, Wolsky is the person you can trust to help get you the care you need and treat you like a human being.

 

She first came north in 1999 as a nursing student, when there weren’t a lot of job openings for nurses. But Wolsky was offered a term position at the Whitehorse General Hospital, where she worked in critical care before transitioning out into the communities.

 

“Like everybody else in the Yukon, the rest is history,” she says. “I didn't leave.”

 

In 2007, she went back to school and got her certification as a nurse practitioner. In 2014, Wolsky was hired as the first nurse practitioner in charge of the new Yukon Sexual Health Clinic, a job which also includes managing the Women’s MidLife Clinic. She worked by herself for a year, but demand at the clinic was “so overwhelming,” says Wolsky, that the government funded a second position within a year. After that, she kind of “just stumbled” into being a trans health care provider.

 

A seven-year-old patient had just started transitioning but their family doctor had no experience in the process. The family approached the Yukon Medical Association looking for more competent care, but there wasn’t any capacity at the time, says Wolsky. So they approached the Sexual Health Clinic and asked Wolsky if she’d be interested in taking on the case.

 

It kickstarted her learning journey, she says.

 

“That was the start of realizing [that] I don’t know what I don’t know. I needed more. I needed to learn more.”

Ever since Wolsky says she’s been continuously trying to improve her education around trans health care. She began by doing more coursework, even bringing up some specialists for extra community training, and she received her World Professional Association for Transgender Health certification in childhood, youth and adolescent care.

 

“In the beginning of my journey, I really wanted to take ownership of the idea that I don’t want my patients to be my teachers,” she says. “As [the clinic] has evolved, and there's been more complex care [my patients and I] learned together, but I felt strongly that I needed a good, solid foundation of knowledge.”

 

Historically, the person providing health care has often been a gatekeeper. There’s a power differential that can’t be ignored. Wolsky recognizes there is knowledge she has that her patients don’t. But she also recognizes there are types of knowledge her patients have that she doesn’t possess. 

 

“We can share that [knowledge],” she says, “in a way that honours where everybody's at and doesn't have to reinforce the power differential in an already vulnerable population that has had sometimes not the best experiences accessing care.”

 

Wolsky says she finds the faith the Yukon trans community places in her to be humbling, and a responsibility she takes incredibly seriously.

 

“I recognize I have a lot of privilege as a cis-gendered white woman,” she says. “I feel like I have a duty to use my privilege in a way that helps people to access care.”

 

It’s a lot of pressure. Waitlists are long, and she’s just one person. To unwind, Wolsky spends time with something else she’s deeply passionate about — horses.

 

“I have a little hobby farm with my horses and my animals,” she says. “I have a lot of animals. For me, my mental wellness and self-care involve riding horses.”

 

But she also takes inspiration from her patients.

 

“I like interesting people that are willing to live authentically in their lives and in their bodies and are willing to come and hang out and talk,” she says. “It's fun. We laugh a lot. We learn a lot.”

March/April Up Here

These isolated white patches are called aufeis.

What are those white patches on the arctic tundra?

A glacier on the tundra? No, this is aufeis.

By Page Burt

Courtesy Page Burt

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

March/April Up Here

Matthew Vukson

Bead by Bead

A Tłįcho artist’s unconventional path

By Sarah Swan

Matthew Vukson

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

Related Articles

UP HERE - SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2023

Harvesting plants at the Inuvik hockey rink

Planting Ideas

In parts of the North, food insecurity is a national health crisis and finding solutions has been a slow process. Northerners are filling in the gaps, but they can’t do it alone. 

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

UP HERE - SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2023

Inuvik to Tuk highway

Fixing The North’s Melting Highways

Can roads up here be built better? We did a deep dive to find out.

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

March/April Up Here

Metis midwife Heather Heinrich makes a home visit.

Call the Midwife

Despite the challenges that stand in the way of midwifery, advocates are determined to break through barriers and revive a practice that could change the way Northerners give birth.

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

March/April Up Here

Volunteer fire fighters learn the ropes.

What Makes A Northern Firefighter

When it’s minus 30 degrees and the alarm call comes in, they’re the ones who answer. Meet the volunteers who play a crucial role in battling fires across the territories.

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

January/February 2023

Francisca Mandeya holds a mbira.

The bridge builder

How Francisca Mandeya has challenged racial and gender inequality in Zimbabwe and the Canadian Arctic.

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023

Up Here Magazine - July/August 2023

Devon Allooloo out near the trapline.

A family’s tradition

Through trapping, Devon Allooloo passes on the joys of life outdoors and self-sustainability to the next generation.

September 22nd, 2023 September 22nd, 2023
Newsletter sign-up promo image.

Stay in Touch.

Our weekly newsletter brings all the best circumpolar stories right to your inbox.

Up Here magazine cover

Subscribe Now

Our magazine showcases award-winning writing and spectacular northern photos.

Subscribe

Footer Navigation

  • Advertise With Us
  • Work With Us
  • Write for Us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Disclaimers & Legal

Contact Information

Up Here Publishing
Box 1343
Yellowknife, NT
X1A 2N9  Canada
Phone: 867.766.6710
Email: editor@uphere.ca

Social Links

Facebook Twitter Instagram
Funded by the Government of Canada