The statute of limitations has emerged as a significant obstacle for lawsuits like Soren Aldaco’s.
The Texas Supreme Court is weighing whether a young woman can still sue a psychologist who approved her breast removal surgery.
Soren Aldaco, the woman at the center of the case, was only 19 when she had the surgery, and suggested to The Epoch Times that regret from such acts might not come for years.
“If you’re a 13-year-old on puberty blockers, you might not realize you’re infertile until you’re 26 and you just got married and you’re trying to have kids,” she told The Epoch Times on Feb. 26.
Aldaco’s story is like those of many others who spent years “transitioning” as a teenager, only to change their minds later in life.
The issue is garnering national attention due to the growing number of lawsuits filed against health care practitioners who have performed such procedures. Aldaco’s case came before the court only weeks after a jury in New York awarded $2 million to Fox Varian, a young woman who sued her former surgeon and psychologist under similar circumstances. Following that verdict, two major medical groups said they would no longer endorse so-called gender surgeries for minors.
Jonathan Hullihan, general counsel at Remnant Law Firm in The Woodlands, Texas, told The Epoch Times that while the New York verdict was a “watershed moment,” the statute of limitations remained a significant obstacle.
The Arguments
Aldaco has alleged that her therapist, Barbara Rose Wood, committed fraud and negligence when she signed off on a referral letter in February 2021 approving a double mastectomy, also known as “top surgery.” Like others in her situation, Aldaco ran up against a statute of limitations that could invalidate her lawsuit depending on how the court interprets state law.
The court’s upcoming decision depends on when the nine justices think the statute of limitations—which is two years in Texas—started running. State law holds that claims must be “filed within two years from the occurrence of” the alleged wrongdoing, or from when a medical treatment at issue is completed.
During oral arguments on Feb. 11, Aldaco’s attorney, John Ramer, told the justices the countdown for that two years should begin from the date of the surgery in June 2021, or from her last therapy session with Wood, around May of the same year.
Wood’s attorney, William Newman, said the court should start from February, when the referral letter was given to Aldaco.
“I think the case law is clear, that the statute would run from the date of the negligent advice, not from the date of the subsequent surgery,” he told the court.
Justice J. Brett Busby seemed skeptical of that defense.
“Well, I can’t sue somebody just because they’ve lied to me,” he told Williams. “I can’t bring a medical malpractice claim against somebody who gave me bad advice that I never took, right?”
The court’s eventual decision, along with others, could offer hope for individuals like Aldaco, as lawmakers at the state and federal levels work to change the statute of limitations.
Another detransitioner, Prisha Mosley, announced on X that she had appealed the dismissal of her lawsuit following North Carolina’s decision to extend the statute of limitations to 10 years.
A similar measure was backed by Attorney General Pam Bondi, who said the department “heard from far too many families who have been devastated by mutilative medical procedures that fly in the face of basic biology.” Estimates of regret have varied, and the Department of Health and Human Services said in 2025 that the “true rate of regret is not known and better data collection is needed.”
Some have criticized attempts to penalize physicians through measures such as extending the statute of limitations.
“The targeting of physicians through these legal penalties impedes them from practicing evidence-based medicine and blocks patients from accessing standard of care treatments,” Madeline G. Chin, then a research fellow at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, said in 2023.
