Sex Change Audit

What happens when you undergo gender reassignment surgery and claim a tax deduction?

Initially you get a refund of overpaid taxes.

Then the IRS reconsiders . . .

After years of painful soul searching, Rhiannon O'Donnabhain -- a former construction engineer from a devout Irish Catholic family in Boston -- decided to surgically change his sex to female in 2001. The struggle was equally tough financially -- hormone treatments and medical procedures set her back $25,000, a burden she felt could be partially offset by taking a $5,000 tax deduction for medical costs.

When she sent in her tax claims after the surgery, the Internal Revenue Service initially issued the 64-year-old former Coast Guard reservist a refund check for $5,000. But soon after, she was audited and ordered to return the refund because the IRS had determined that her surgery had been merely "cosmetic" -- and therefore not tax deductible.

Merely cosmetic.

I think I should stop here . . .