*perches on your shoulder like a cartoon devil* write about baby butch Trinity Santos, do it. You should most definitely do it.
Trinity at the Beginning of her Becoming Butch Headcanons
Slightly nsfwish at like the talk end of each little section.
The Suit, Briefs/Boxers, Handsome, Haircut
The Suit: The first thing she does is buy a suit off of wildfang. She buys their most simple black suit with a white button up. She keeps it in the back of her closet for like a month before Yolanda tells that she and Baran were invited to one of her cousin's wedding (black tie optional). She's squirrelly about what she's wearing. The older women surprise her at her apartment and tell her they're going to help her pick one of her dresses and they brought food. When she's changing into the first dress the other women invade the closet and stumble upon the suit. As soon as she comes out she sees what they have and try to explain but they just shove it in her hand. When she comes out they literally have to restrain each other so they don't fuck up the suit.
Briefs/Boxers: Trinity starts getting rid of all her more traditionally feminine underwear. The thongs are the first to go. She hops on Woxer and Tomboyx and buys some cute sets. Again she sort of keeps them to herself for a bit. That is until Baran comes over when Trin is sick and is doing laundry and finds 5 sets and when she checks her actual girlfriend find her in another. Again Trinity tries to explain but doesn't really get the chance because it's getting ripped off while Baran settles between her legs muttering about endorphins and dopamine being good for healing. She makes her put on a fresh set after they shower and takes a picture to send to Yolanda who is at work. Yoyo arrives home at 7:17 (a new record to provide another round of healing dopamine and endorphins. She ends up buying more as well as exclusively sleeping in boxers.
Handsome: Baran had called Trinity handsome at the wedding offhandedly and then not ever really again. Maybe because since then there hasn't been a date night because Lesbian Jesus apparently hates them. But when the gala comes, Trinity decides to wear her suit loving how she felt in it. She waits on baited breath to be called handsome. She gets called gorgeous, beautiful, stunning but not handsome. She even slicks back her hair giving the illusion that it's short. It's not until Yolanda notices when she calls her pretty as they're leaving Baran's that she seems a little crestfallen by the complement. She sees the angle of her jaw and the hair and the extra jewelry that was definitely not feminine and it all clicks. She grabs Trinity by the front of her suit. "Hey have I mentioned how handsome you look?" Trinity just looks awestruck and flustered while she shakes her head no. "Well you do. My handsome girl looks so strong and sharp in her suit. It's gonna be hard to keep my hands off you in front of everyone." Baran sees the way Trinity melts under Yolanda's words and adds on. "You're so suave Baby. I think we need to take you out to get a few more. Our treat." Trinity tries to argue but gives up when Baran whispers something about how payback can be made in the form of strapping them silly with said suits still on.
Haircut: It's the thing she's been dying and dreading to do forever. She's thought about it. Dreamed about. She's more open now about her desires to be more masculine. Most of her wardrobe has flipped. Her demeanor, how she carries herself has shifted a bit. She doesn't realize it's her just being happier with her presentation, but Yolanda and Baran do, though they keep it between themselves, not wanting to push Trinity into realizing anything before she's really aware of it herself. But she talks for a month almost everyday debating with herself about cutting her hair. It's by Yolanda's count, day 37 of Trinity thinking about cutting her hair that Yolanda decides to be more direct. She realizes she's always just leaving it to Trinity and maybe she's seeking Yolanda and Baran's more direct thoughts. "Babe if you cut your hair I guarantee as soon as you walk back through the door Baran and I would fuck you senseless before even making it here to the couch. You have great bone structure so it'll suit you and you're just drop dead gorgeous in anything you wear and do with your look. If you're worried about what we'll think, you don't have to. We will be even more unhinged than the first time we saw you in your suit. I can promise that. And this time we're not worried about having to take clothing to the dry cleaner so we will not be stopping ourselves." Trinity just stares at her and then looks to Baran who just smirks and nods confirming her agreement with Yolanda. So, Trinity grabs her keys, walks to her girlfriends giving them each a kiss, and walks right out the door. Two hours later she's back with much shorter hair styled to frame her face so perfectly. She's just able to get her shoes off saying. "I think this is the thing I really needed." before Yolanda and Baran follow through on the promise Yoyo gave before she left.
But that is a story for another day if Rads wishes it to be!
As always, exists in the headcanon universe that @black-plant-leg and @blueeyesshyskies share with me. (Btw are you in @santospilled)
Trinity is 30-31, Yolanda is 36-37, and Baran is 43-44. Approximately, anyway. I don’t feel like doing more than basic math.
It’s Samira who brings it up the first time. She’s working on a toddler with a broken arm with Trinity, the early afternoon rush of new patients spilling into the colorful walls of the peds room. The mother had stepped out to use the restroom and call the father, so Trinity is holding the toddler. His tiny body is curled into her torso, dried tears streaky down his red cheeks. Trinity’s first reaction is to scoff, deny the accusation, but her therapist was working with her on not assuming that everything said to her was an accusation. Samira spoke kindly, a knowing smile on her face. It wasn’t an attack or something she’d be made fun of for. So she takes a minute to absorb the words, turns them over in her mind.
You want another one, don’t you?
Did she? Her immediate thought is that no, she doesn’t. She’d make for a lousy mother, would probably ruin the kid before it even had a chance. But that wasn’t true, at least not anymore. She’s a mother already, and she thinks that she’s pretty good at it. She’s only been doing it for a year, but Jahan loves her, tells her so. Her partners balance any failings she has.
“Yeah, another would be nice,” Trinity speaks the words with certainty, rubbing the toddler’s back. She sits him back on the bed, pulls the blanket over him. Tucks him in. “but when would I have the time? I’m a first year attending.” She shakes her head, adjusting the blanket on the little boy one last time before badging into the computer to update his chart. Samira cocks her head to the side, raises her eyebrow.
“Yeah, and you also have two girlfriends and a department full of potential babysitters.” Trinity blushes. She’s still not used to people knowing about her relationship with Baran and Yolanda, though Samira had been one of the first to find out. They’ve been together for two years now, out to their coworkers for a few months. Baran insisted on keeping it under wraps, known only to their friends and family and HR, until Trinity was out of her residency and they were all on even ground.
Trinity bites her lip and shakes her head. It’s not in the cards.
“It’s just not realistic for us. We have Jahan, that’s enough. He’s enough.” The toddler’s mother walks back into the room, and the conversation ends.
—
Yolanda brings it up the next time. It’s February now, and they’re out shopping. Jahan’s birthday is coming up. He’ll be eight, and he’s been talking about his birthday party for as many months. (Trinity might be a little jealous that he’s chosen a Star Wars themed party, but she’s mature now. She keeps it to herself.)
They’re in a toy store, and Trinity is holding a stuffed bunny. Jahan is almost certainly too old for it, the soft grey fur clearly meant for a child much younger. She rubs an ear between her fingertips. Puts the bunny back on the shelf. Shakes the weight of want from her shoulders.
“Who’s that for?” Yolanda asked, stepping beside her and picking the bunny back up. Trinity jumps. She hadn’t heard Yolanda walk over from the Lego displays. She shakes her head.
“No one. Just looked soft.” Her voice is raspier than she means for it to be. Stupid. Damn Samira for putting the thought in her head all those months ago.
Yolanda hums her agreement, placing the toy back on the shelf again.
“It might be nice to have another one, don’t you think?” Yolanda speaks casually, a soft smile saved only for her family on her lips, as though she hadn’t just tilted Trinity’s entire world on its axis.
“Yeah, maybe.” The admission is small, murmured just barely audibly into the empty aisle. Trinity doesn’t notice when Yolanda slips the bunny into the cart.
—
She herself brings it up the third time. Jahan has just become a brother, his father and his new wife welcoming a baby boy. Jahan hasn’t stopped talking about him. He’s enamored by the baby, and has taken being a big brother very seriously. Trinity is sitting on a park bench, in between Baran and Yolanda, watching Jahan zip around the playground they decided to stop at after their monthly family lunch. She’d been allowed to hold the new baby, had watched him fall asleep before handing him back to his mother. It left her feeling soft, melancholy.
“I want a baby.” It came out as a statement of fact, voice steadier than when she’d imagined having this conversation a thousand times before. Yolanda laughs, loud and boisterous, like she’d been waiting for this. Baran just smiles, takes her hand in her own.
“I do, too. With you, with Yola.” Another statement of fact. Trinity nods. Yolanda places her hand on top of their joined hands.
“Baran owes me $20,” She jokes, “and I want a baby with you both, too.” They sit like that, watching their son play, until he runs over and begs for ice cream money. Baran hands him a $20 bill, tells him to bring them all a cone. He thanks her, and Baran laughs, shakes her head.
“Thank Mama, that’s her $20.”
—
Their daughter is born the following year. She arrives on the spring solstice, and she’s named for Trinity’s best friend, the one she never got to grow up with. The one she’d promised to live for. Trinity thinks she’d be proud of the woman she’s become and holds her daughter a little closer.
garsanshimi except it’s very very secret relationship
baran doesn’t want to tell anyone until they can tell her son.
but they’re not doing that anytime soon, because of how his dad acted when she started casually dating women post-divorce.
garsanshimi secret relationship except little cracks start to show everywhere around them.
Trinity accidentally wears Baran’s scrub top to work one day.
Yolanda complains to coworkers about being kept up all night (wink wink) except wait, wasn’t Santos on night shift this week?
Abbott keeps trying to set Baran up on blind dates with his friends, and she keeps artfully dodging him. He even switches to suggesting women she go out with, figuring that was the problem with his first few proposals, but she still refuses.
Yolanda drops off a lunch in the ED break room that Baran forgot and only barely remembers to write Trinity’s name on it instead. If anyone notices that Santos has two lunches that day, or that Dr. Al-Hashimi eats one of them, they don’t say anything.
Trinity is constantly catching herself almost or accidentally saying her girlfriends’ first names. Never while work is happening— it’s easy for her brain to draw a personal/professional line there, but in the in-between moments, the gossip around the nurses station, the casual hellos and goodbyes as people are coming and going for the day.
Dennis definitely knows something is up. Trinity is never home, even on days where he knows Garcia is working, but Trinity flat out refuses to tell him what’s going on. Makes a point of scheduling takeout and tv nights with him. It doesn’t really stop his questions, but it does make him miss her a little less.
Outside of work it’s easier, though they don’t go out in public much. Partly because they’re all too busy to really have time, but mostly because Baran can never relax when they do. Head constantly on a swivel for coworkers or anyone who might know their coworkers.
There was a big fight once after a waitress had called them all friends and Yolanda had simply said “oh, we’re not friends” in reply.
When Baran’s son is around, they might as well just be friends. They spend time together whenever they can, his soccer games, movie nights, Saturday mornings at the park. But never, ever, any PDA in front of him. Never any touch or comment or story that would make him think they’re anything more than just good friends. Trinity and Yolanda never get to help Baran do any of the parenting things, no school drop off, no parent-teacher conferences, no taking sick time when he needs to stay home from school, even if it would be easier for one of them to miss work instead of her. Even if it’s clear to everyone that she’s stretched thin.
It all falls apart when Baran has to stay late at work on handoff day, frantically texts her ex that her friends Yolanda and Trinity will come meet him instead.
They’ve spent plenty of time with Baran’s son before, he’s excited to see them when they arrive at the park, they even know the code-word Baran uses with her son to let him know an adult is trusted. He’s clearly fine and okay with it.
But Baran’s ex is not okay with it. Because sure, Baran texted, and sure his son knows these two women, and sure he’s heard stories about them from the boy before. But he’s never met them, and the only other adult that’s ever been present at one of these handoffs is his nanny, and why couldn’t Baran have just called her instead? So he flat out refuses to let the boy go. Won’t hand over his backpack, won’t let Trinity and Yolanda leave with him.
It escalates until Baran is called, and she answers his call rudely, can’t believe she’s been pulled out of a trauma for this, keeps getting interrupted and talked over as she tries to explain her plan, what’s happening, that again, her job is not flexible. And it all spirals out of control until she’s snapping “Jesus Christ, they’re my girlfriends! They’re practically his step-moms, just let him go!”
He does not get to go. Goes back home with his dad, crying a little but putting on a brave face. Keeps the brave face through the weeks he’s kept from his mom (and step-moms) while his dad files an emergency change to their custody agreement. Keeps his brave face when he has to leave the too-short visitations he gets with his mom while the case is heard and everything moves through the too-slow court system. Doesn’t let his dad see him cry, though he yells and fights about not being able to go to his mom’s, about not being able to see Yoyo and T.
Doesn’t cry at all, actually, until his mom gently explains at one of their visits that he’ll get to start coming home with her again soon, but that Yoyo and T won’t be there anymore.
[It hadn’t been pretty. In all of her infinite and panicked wisdom, faced with another custody battle only a few years after the first horrible one, Baran had decided the only course of action was to break up with Trinity and Yolanda. Their heartbroken protestations of “he needs a family,” and “we can be a family,” falling on closed ears. She won’t lose him, she can’t lose him.]
It comes up during the hearing, because of course it does.
“It says here that Mr. Al-Hashimi has filed for sole custody because Dr. Al-Hashimi is alleged to be in romantic partnerships with both Dr. Yolanda Garcia and Dr. Trinity Santos,” the judge looks up from her computer screen, peering over her glasses at the people in front of her. “Is this true? Are you in relationships with both of these women?”
They speak at the same time.
“Yes, she is—“
“No, your honor, I—“
“Mr. Al-Hashimi,” the judge interrupts. “I didn’t ask you.”
He huffs angrily, but stays quiet as the judge’s gaze fixes back on Baran.
“Your honor, we were all three in a relationship that recently ended. We’re no longer together.”
“That’s disappointing, doctor.” The judge replies, turning back to the case file open in front of her.
“Disappointing?” Baran feels her heart rate pick up.
“If the relationship ended because you felt it needed to for this case to go your way, then yes, I’d say I’m disappointed. But it certainly speaks to your commitment to motherhood.” The judge leaves it at that, moving on to other details.
In the end, the custody agreement is all but unchanged from what it had been before. An amendment is added clarifying that any proxy over the age of 18 can be sent to a custody handoff, provided there is prior written communication.
Baran gets to bring her son home that afternoon, still tearing up when she pictures the delight that had taken over his face when he had seen her waiting outside his school.
He begs for updates about the hearing, and she gives them, reporting just the facts, letting him know things would go back to how they were before.
“Does that mean Yoyo and T get to come home?” he asks hopefully.
“What?” Baran makes eye contact with him in the rearview mirror. “No, love, they’re still… we’re still. I don’t know. But no.”
He kicks the seat in front of him, a rare display of frustration. “Then things aren’t the way they were before.”
When they get home, he disappears to his room. Makes it clear he wants to be left alone. Baran is barely holding it together, going through the motions; check his backpack for homework, put the laundry in the dryer, start on dinner. Her phone buzzes at five.
Yolanda: How did it go today?
Trinity: Let us know if there’s anything we can do.
Baran snaps. Calls Yolanda, knows that they’ll both answer. Half an hour later, they’re both at her door, take-out in hand. Her son comes out from his room.
Are YOU gonna let THE GOVERNMENT tell YOU what YOUR GENDER is? That doesn't sound like Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness to me! PROTECT your individual FREEDOMS and call your senator: we want the GOVERNMENT to stay OUT OF OUR PANTS! GENDER FREEDOM NOW!
Two men in your neighborhood are married... to EACH OTHER? Congratulate them for exercising their AMERICAN RIGHT to follow the footsteps of our FOUNDING FATHERS! They've got a fully AMERICAN spirit of FREEDOM and REBELLION! GOD BLESS THE USA.
Your coworker has a different RELIGION from yours? Well, that's just INTERESTING and you should talk about it on your UNION-APPROVED LUNCH BREAK. The UNITED STATES OF AMERICA was FOUNDED on Freedom of Religion and ANYONE should be allowed to seek the AMERICAN DREAM!
You think someone might be in this GREAT country ILLEGALLY? NO YOU DON'T! No one is in this country illegally! The minute anyone steps on our SOVEREIGN SOIL they're your FELLOW AMERICAN and where they come from is NO ONES BUSINESS.
the trinity santos isa briones reaction is actually the perfect demonstration of misogyny in fandom. not only is trinity santos widely regarded as a bitchy, unpleasant, unprofessional character despite clearly being portrayed as a complex, sometimes caustic, but ultimately deeply compassionate and caring character while male characters who are just as snarky and "problematic" get labelled as funny (abbot) or troubled (langdon), but the character's actor, isa briones, is repeatedly getting harassed while performing on stage, with audience members screaming "jokes" about santos at her and filling the comments of every video of her singing with similar discussions of santos being awful, while her male co-star patrick ball is able to perform on broadway with no harassment and have nothing but pleasant interactions with fans
I want to share some medical context for Al-Hashimi’s backstory in case it’s interesting or useful to anyone else in their fic writing endeavors (I have been thinking about her medical and career trajectories for fic writing purposes).
First some context about her seizure disorder and its treatment.
In 2x15 Baran mentions having temporal lobe epilepsy. She mentions having drug-resistant epilepsy (meaning continued seizures despite trials of two appropriate anti-seizure medications at appropriate doses). And she mentions that twelve years ago she had laser ablation and that her seizure focus was in her left temporal lobe.
First a mention of her having had viral meningitis at five and that her illness was severe and prolonged. This means that she likely had a fairly traumatic experience at that age involving an LP and an ICU admission. ICU means being sedated and restrained for safety very frequently. Studies show that about twenty percent of people who survive ICU admissions have PTSD following that event.
As far as what her seizures are like, we know she has focal seizures, meaning originating in one part of the brain. We see her have two focal seizures with impaired awareness which is exactly what it sounds like, a seizure beginning in one part of the brain causing the person to be unaware of their surroundings. Typically these last 30 seconds to two minutes. What they look like depends on the part of the brain they occur in and what we see from her is common for a temporal lobe seizure - behavioral arrest for about 30 seconds without awareness and maybe with some eye blinking.
Context from an interview with Moafi was that the scene before Baran calls her neurologist she had a focal aware seizure or aura. This is a seizure where someone retains awareness. For temporal lobe epilepsy this aura (which often proceeds having a focal unaware seizure) often takes the form of a feeling of deja vu, a rising feeling in the stomach, olfactory or gustatory hallucinations, though these are many other manifestations.
The third type of focal seizure is a focal seizure that then generalizes to bilateral tonic-clonic (tonic-clonic seizures being the type you commonly see depicted in media with stiffening of the body then rhythmic shaking and a prolonged period of confusion after). This is not something we see but is something that it would be reasonable to imagine might have occurred at some point in her history when her epilepsy was less well controlled.
A note on drug-resistant epilepsy. For people who have failed two anti-seizure medications the chance of having seizure freedom with a medication change is only about five percent. So it’s very telling that Baran spent decades trialing and failing many medications. That’s a long and frustrating process. And most of these medications have a lot of side effects. People often change medicines due to side effects and often people are accepting the least bad option when it comes to side effects rather than choosing a medication with no side effects.
She mentions her current medication is levetiracetam. This is a medication she might have been changed to prior to getting pregnant as it’s one of the two preferred medications in pregnancy due to its safety for the fetus. It has a lot of potential side effects including a high risk of psychiatric side effects and is not used in patients with concomitant mental health conditions. Commonly this medication can cause dizziness, fatigue, and cognitive impairment (common with most anti-seizure medications and surely something a physician would weigh strongly / worry about when changing medications). Other common side effects with this medication are nausea and loss of appetite.
For people with drug-resistant epilepsy who have a focal lesion amenable to surgery about half of people who have surgery will be seizure free after a year (though some people have later recurrence of seizures, which is what I think we’re meant to assume happened to Baran after ablation). It sounds like she has a seizure focus close to an area of the brain related to speech which made surgery a risky choice. We can think about how for this woman whose career is very dependent on cognitive ability this would be a difficult choice.
What this means is from age five to 28, Baran was having somewhat regular seizures. She says before ablation it was every few months. Likely given the repeated med changes it was much worse when she was younger and the best they got to with meds was reasonably well controlled with seizures every few months. And while that’s infrequent there are still serious limitations to how she would be able to live her life. Think of the safety of things like driving, swimming, running on a treadmill, cooking, if you might have a lapse in consciousness for two minutes. And think of the dangers of having a very young child.
Surgery became fairly standard about twenty years ago. Ablation, the procedure she did have, which is accomplished with a less invasive type of procedure, only about ten years ago. So it sounds like she probably would have had a surgical evaluation as a teen and her parents then Baran herself decided this was too risky. She ultimately decided on an ablation 12 years ago which would have been around the end of med school/ beginning of residency. Interesting to think about this too as a choice that really impacted her career and her choice to pursue an emergency medicine residency.
Thinking about her career timeline:
If she went straight through school without time off:
Graduates college at 22, med school at 26, and residency at 29 or 30 (depending on if she did a three or four year program). This would mean she chose a speciality she couldn’t practice in fully as she was still having active seizures at 26.
Alternately we can shift things to her taking time off between college and med school, graduating at 29, which would have allowed her to have seen that the ablation made her seizure free and then chose emergency medicine as her speciality. This makes more sense to me. Ablation was still a choice with risks but she pursued it possibly in part to allow her to follow a career path in medicine that was important to her.
If she did a three year residency that means she finished at 32 in 2018. MSF typically wants two years of work experience, so she worked somewhere domestically for two years. We know she was in Afghanistan in 2020, so perhaps abroad 2020-2022. She returns to the US at 36, works at the VA for four years, then taken the job at the Pitt.
We know she had a seizure a year ago. We don’t know if she had others between then and the ablation in 2014. And we can probably assume she had a child after returning to the US so her kid would be two or three. That means she’s probably fairly recently divorced.
I have a million head canons by the way about all this and the trajectory of her seizure disorder and all the thoughts she might have had around treatment, career, and pregnancy decisions. But I am going to leave this here in case it is helpful to anyone to formulate your own head canons.
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