Mr Toad's Wild Transgendered Ride

Ask a Tranny, Volume 1

2010-03-12T21:49:00.005-05:00

Oftentimes, I get questions from people who are transitioning or thinking of transitioning, and I'm always happy to try to help when I can. Some of these questions are general enough that they might be worth sharing here.

And so, here's the first installment of my soon-to-be popular new segment... Ask a Tranny

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Your skin looks unbelievable. Can you give me any advice on how you got it that way? I realize it wasn't an overnight thing, but I'm really struggling to improve my skin texture, even with the effects of hormones.

- A reader from South Africa

In most of my photos, I'm wearing makeup, but yes, my skin has gotten remarkably smoother and softer. Pre-transition, I did not have any sort of skin-care regimen. As a kid and a young adult, I loathed sunblock, and I would often get far too much sun. My skin was not horrible, but I was not taking good care of it.

Here's my new routine, which I've been following for close to three years:

- Eat relatively healthy and stay active. Lots of fresh fruits and vegetables, lots of cardio. Good skin starts on the inside.
- No soap on my face, ever. I have facial cleanser and makeup-removal wipes.
- Wash and moisturize nightly before bed. I vary the nighttime moisturizer between anti-wrinkle cream (with Retin A - this is the only stuff conclusively proven to prevent wrinkles, I think) and olive oil with a few drops of lavendar oil (for scent).
- Moisturize every morning with an SPF 15 moisturizer. I tried several until I found one I liked for my skin. I almost always also wear liquid foundation with SPF 20.
- Minimize time spent in direct sunlight.
- Exfoliate with a gentle scrub and/or clay mask at least once a week (more in the winter)

As for products, I've read that moisturizers and cleansers from big cosmetic companies are generally best, because they have loads to spend on research. I personally like Neutrogena's foaming cleanser and nighttime anti-wrinkle cream, and Olay complete moisturizer with SPF 15. All drugstore brands.

Hormones definitely helped, too, but all changes were very gradual. I do like my skin now. Clearing the beard hair also made a huge difference in how smooth my face looks and feels, too.

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u r nuts

- J. O. (a guy who went to high school with, but who I did not know, who later found out I was trans in an alumni message board)

You raise an interesting point, J.O. No doubt you are referring to the current practice of classifying "gender identity disorder" (GID) as a mental disorder. As you probably know, that's a point of much controversy within the trans community and the medical community as well. Did you know that homosexuality was also classified as a mental disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) until 1973?

As I'm sure you're aware, J.O., there has been lots of talk recently about how GID will be redefined in the yet-to-be-released DSM-V. The latest wording seems to be "gender incongruence", but I think "gender dysphoria" was also proposed as the new term. Anything they call it and any way they classify it, having this condition included as a mental disorder is bound to bother many trans people and trans advocates.

I'm not sure where I stand on this, honestly. On the one hand, I am somewhat bothered by the idea that transsexualism is considered a "mental" disorder, and yet I think there's some validity to that idea. From the gist of your letter, I gather that you also see this as the case, too, J.O. Let's explore this further.

My mind and body were, in some sense, out of sync. To say this is a problem of the mind is just as valid as that it is a problem of the body, or indeed a problem of both. I have corrected my physical self to allow me to live in a way that fixes the incongruity. But whether we consider the underlying issue to be one of the mind or the body is somewhat immaterial, because either way, the only known effective treatment for the condition is to do what I've done, and change the way I live.

I can attest that (so far, knock on wood) this is a very effective treatment for me. I no longer feel like I have a disorder at all. Any problems I have now are primarily how others see me (a point you also raise very succinctly within the subtext of your comment -- thanks for that), which is neither a physical nor a mental disorder, but a social issue.

The same sorts of social issues exist for homosexuals as well, but being homosexual is not in any sense a "disorder"; it is a normal variation on sexual preference that occurs in humans and other species. There's no cure for homosexuality (nor one needed, nor in most cases desired), but there is an effective treatment for transsexuality. I think I'm probably okay with calling gender dysphoria a "disorder", and to me it doesn't really matter whether we call it a mental or a physical disorder, or both. There is, of course, a stigma that goes with the idea of having a mental condition, but maybe there shouldn't be. Why do physical conditions deserve our sympathy while mental conditions deserve our contempt? We could do a whole paper on this, or several papers, even, J.O.

Thank you for your nuanced letter. I only wish I had gotten to know you better (or at all) in high school. With you as my friend, maybe I'd have had the courage to come out back then, but for some strange reason, I thought my peers would ostracize, taunt, bully, and otherwise torment me. People like you who are not afraid to ask the tough questions foster the kind of open dialogue we so desperately need around these issues.

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Thanks for the good questions this week. If you have any others, feel free to write me at suzanne.clayton@yahoo.com. Put "Ask a Tranny" in the subject line if you like.

Video Me

2010-03-11T20:01:00.002-05:00

Here's a video of a talk I gave at my old college a couple of weeks ago:

I haven't watched it, myself, but here's what the critics are saying so far:

"You look like you just want attention and are an autogynephiic (sic)." - Fieldofaware

"She looks very nervous. Too much pacing and prancing even spinning ..." - HoustonTxLiLy

"... she is acting all effeminate and queeny!" - Fieldofaware (again)

So, yeah, rave reviews, pretty much.

Well, a lot of the kids at my college seemed to really enjoy it. I wasn't all that nervous, but I did pace a lot. I don't have all that much experience with public speaking.

At the time, I thought it went well, anyway. I guess I was wrong, according to the internets, so feel free to mock and pick apart my mediocre presentation skills, if you like.

Mea Culpa

2010-03-06T00:44:00.002-05:00

I realize now that in my effort to drive traffic to my site, I said some pretty hurtful things yesterday. I'd like to take them all back, because it didn't actually do a damn thing for increasing my hit count, as it turned out. Do global warming deniers and homophobic people not use Google? What's up with that?

Anyway, I shouldn't have said the things I said about vlogs being big, unwatchable piles of video crap (or whatever I said -- it had to be something along those lines). I haven't actually given them a fair shake at all, really. I actually have one friend whose vlog looks very interesting, even though I've only watched bits of two of her 80+ entries, and I was mostly just watching them to give her my opinion of her voice. She's recorded herself through her entire transition, which I think is amazingly bold of her, and her transformation has been amazing, so it's fascinating at least to watch her metamorphosis before your eyes. You can watch it yourself here, if you like. I couldn't have recorded myself early on, let alone had the courage to put it up for the world to see. Pretty cool.

I did keep this blog, of course, and I didn't exactly hold back a lot in the early days, but it was actually pretty anonymous for the first few months at least. Still, I suppose putting this stuff up here was brave in a way, and maybe some of it's useful to others. I hope so.

I concluded a long time ago that pretty much every trans woman has a blog, and although I used to follow several, and still occasionally check in on a few, I find most of them a bit tedious after a while. Mine has been useful to me, and I'm glad to read about others with similar experiences, but most trans blogs are too familiar to really hold my attention. I don't go back on my own entries too often, either, but I'm sometimes glad they're there, to remind me. The whole transition itself is already fading away like a distant memory.

I don't feel like I really have anything much more to work through or document here, but I do plan to still occasionally post something. Don't expect a lot of soul-baring going forward, and don't expect a whole lot of political commentary. No need for the former, and the latter is done to death already. So I'll probably just post whatever I feel like, when I feel like it, and if people want to read it, cool. If not, I'll stop.

But so far my little experiment with making money as a professional writer is paying off. 26 cents in ad revenues in the first day! At this rate, I might make as much as almost $100 this year. Okay, I better get more interesting if I'm gonna quit my regular job for this (note: I'm not), and it looks like stirring up controversy doesn't work as well for me as for, say, Rush Limbaugh.

Sorry for that.

But the stuff I said about not letting transgender people use the bathroom, I do not apologize for. Creeps me out, sorry.

Global Warming is God's Punishment for Homosexuality

2010-03-04T22:03:00.007-05:00

I think that's an argument that kind of makes itself, really.

I made a chart, showing the amount of homosexuality in the world, the average global temperature, and the number of SUVs, all since the early 1900s, but trying to embed it here, I couldn't get it to be very readable. It was very convincing, since I just drew the lines based on my gut feeling of these things, and the correlation between homosexuality and global warming was pretty much undeniable (and SUVs were clearly not the problem, holding at a steady pace of zero through most of the 20th century, so take that, environmentalists!). But let's throw it in here, anyway because people seem to like pictures:

Okay, sure. I've probably got you convinced, or possibly angered, or more likely confused. But why is that the topic of this post? One word: controversy. Another two words: ad revenue.

I've taken the advice of some friends and decided to monetize my efforts here, by allowing Google to put ads on the site. Maybe if I can generate more traffic, I'll make a little money. And if I know the internet, then people love to read outrageous claims without actual facts to back those claims up.

Next up for me, something I've been meaning to do for a while. I'll be trying my hand at making some videos. Not vlogging -- god, no -- here's my impersonation of every* single vlog out there: "hi, it's me again... um... I know I haven't made a video in a while, ... well... um, I guess I don't have much to update you about, but I'll talk for five minutes anyway..." -- no, I won't be doing that.

I used to run a voice support group online, and people told me they got something out of my explanations for different techniques I learned and practiced to feminize my voice. I'll probably put a series of videos up on the YouTubes, and since people like pictures more than words, I expect I'll get more hits there and maybe make a tiny bit of ad money in the deal. I'm not really doing it to try to make money, but if Google wants to send me a check for $10 a year or something, I'll cash it.

Meanwhile, I'll try to stir up more hits on this site by making more outrageous claims. Feel free to start flame wars in the comments section. I think that's good for traffic. I'll leave you with this closing thought, then:

Transsexuals should NEVER EVER be allowed to use the bathroom, because that's just an invitation for CHILD MOLESTORS to kidnap YOUR CHILDREN. Do I need to spell that one out for you? I didn't think so.

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* Note: if you have a vlog, I'm sure it's really, really good, and I don't mean your vlog. I mean everyone else's vlog.

55% Enemy

2010-01-01T19:44:00.008-05:00

I don't really know why I keep my OkCupid profile, let alone why I felt the need to update my profile pic with my new hair color. I've never met anyone very interesting on that site, and the two guys I've gone on dates with that I met online were complete flops.

Plus, I have to wade through a sea of semi-literate instant message popups every time I want to do anything. I'm getting better at weeding out the assholes and idiots, though, by assuming that anyone who thinks that IMing me out of the blue as an introduction is either an idiot or an asshole, or both. So far, so good on that methodology.

Here's a typical exchange. "MasterFckr99" (not his real screen name) IMed me several times before I finally replied:

MasterFckr99: hey
SuzanneC: what?
MasterFckr99: what?
MasterFckr99: lol
MasterFckr99: ur hot mamacita
SuzanneC: I know. I own a mirror.
SuzanneC: So what of it?
MasterFckr99: I have 7 dick
SuzanneC: that's way too many.
SuzanneC: I know a doctor who can help you with that
MasterFckr99: I like it rough lol
SuzanneC: why is that funny?
MasterFckr99: I can handle 2 girls at same time i cango for hour of hard core
SuzanneC: I'm sure you can
SuzanneC: I'm glad you're proud of that. it's good to feel good about yourself
MasterFckr99: I know I can Ill love that
MasterFckr99: what do think why you so quiet
SuzanneC: I'm... um... speechless, I guess
MasterFckr99: tell me I waiting
SuzanneC: but you have me convinced. yes, let's get together for some rough sex. absolutely
SuzanneC: sounds simply divine
MasterFckr99: dont be speech less
SuzanneC: where shall we meet? motel someplace?
MasterFckr99: yes
MasterFckr99: Im master fucker
MasterFckr99: real rough
SuzanneC: you do know that I'm fucking with you, right?
SuzanneC: I mean there's no way in hell I'm having sex with you
MasterFckr99: but you want it I know
SuzanneC: but I do enjoy our little conversations
MasterFckr99: well fine
MasterFckr99: you know you will get your ass spank some day
MasterFckr99: lol that day youwill call me master
SuzanneC: only if I get to dress up like Jeanie from "I Dream of Jeanie"
SuzanneC: I did always want to be her when I was growing up
MasterFckr99: I let you be Jeany for a minute
MasterFckr99: only
MasterFckr99: ok Jeany whats up?
MasterFckr99: tell me some Jeany
MasterFckr99: what you got?
SuzanneC: what, are we roleplaying now?
SuzanneC: sorry, I was busy chatting with another guy over here on the left part of my screen
SuzanneC: I only logged in to write an email. kinda hard to do with guys IMing me all the time
MasterFckr99: send me a picture dressed as Jeany at my yahoo at ********@yahoo.com
SuzanneC: you think I have a genie costume just lying around?
MasterFckr99: Ill spank your butt I dont like that
MasterFckr99: yes go and getit Im demanding
MasterFckr99: do it bad girl
SuzanneC: let's see... tell you what, you make a wish and then I'll screw it up and you'll end up with an elephant in your living room just as your boss is coming over for dinner
SuzanneC: that's how Jeanie used to do it
MasterFckr99: this is your masters command
MasterFckr99: I want you to get naked Jeany is my command
MasterFckr99: send me a pic at *********@yahoo.com now
MasterFckr99: Im not playing
SuzanneC: you know, I wonder why Major Nelson never wished for that
MasterFckr99: he was dumb
MasterFckr99: a dork
MasterFckr99: cold bitch
SuzanneC: I think he was kind of a dork, now that you mention it
MasterFckr99: he was not macho enogh like you Master
SuzanneC: I guess if he hadn't been such a dork, the show wouldn't have much comedic fodder, though, huh?
MasterFckr99: he dint have a hard dick like me
SuzanneC: maybe he did, but he liked that little guy Roger Healey
SuzanneC: yeah, definitely. it all makes sense now. you were smart to figure that out.
MasterFckr99: he was quir
SuzanneC: hey, who isn't these days? am I right?
MasterFckr99: Im macho
SuzanneC: you've had a little fun with the boys, haven't you?
MasterFckr99: yes you are right
MasterFckr99: yes
SuzanneC: well, it's the 2010s now. anything goes
MasterFckr99: not for 2 girl go for me
SuzanneC: beg pardon?
MasterFckr99: thats what I want 2 mamis
MasterFckr99: what do you think?
MasterFckr99: say some
SuzanneC: you want two mamis? I don't really follow you
MasterFckr99: text me at (202)xxxxxxx I want bad girls at the same time thats my number text me Ill brb
MasterFckr99: your Master has to go for now ok be good Ill spank you later by for now
MasterFckr99: Imgoing to the strip join
SuzanneC: I shall be counting the hours
MasterFckr99: I tell you when
MasterFckr99: text me
MasterFckr99: Im incommand Ill tell what from now on
SuzanneC: definitely count on it. that's so going to happen, the me texting you thing
SuzanneC: except, only, whoops -- I just lost my phone
MasterFckr99: ok bs I dont want to hearthat bs
MasterFckr99: send a yahoo mail ok
SuzanneC: you mean an internet mail?
SuzanneC: I don't know how to do those
MasterFckr99: I want to see thatJeany naked
SuzanneC: I'm Pennsylvania Dutch. Amish. We don't have computers
MasterFckr99: find a way
MasterFckr99: stop bsing
MasterFckr99: stop bsing
SuzanneC: you can count on it

Bilerico Fiasco Part 2: Fiascortunity

2009-12-12T13:28:00.004-05:00

Well, as many have pointed out, Mr. Gold's original post has now been taken down, thanks to the flame war that erupted in its wake. You can still (for now, anyway) read it here:

http://community.livejournal.com/ontd_political/4811873.html

I think that this could have been a chance to open up a dialogue about society's role in the definition of gender and also a chance to educate gay people on what being transgender is really about.

Instead, because of the incindiary nature of the original post and because this is, after all, the world wide internets, it became an opportunity to send a nice old man (who did not understand our perspective) down in flames. Kudos to us for that.

For my part, I did have some nice things to say about Gold's article, even though I first rattled off a rebuttal of his erroneous conclusions and didn't get a chance to get to those. The thing I think he was really trying to get at (in his way) is that in an ideal world where everyone is free to express themselves any way they like without judgment, people wouldn't have to feel like their physical body is "wrong" or out of line with their internal sense of self.

At its heart, that's a very accepting and tollerant notion, but it's still (I think) not quite right. I don't know why it's not quite right, but that's something I've pondered myself, because I do feel like expressing my true inner self is the most important thing in transitioning, and I don't really understand why the rest of it is so important to me. Why couldn't I be happy being the person I was on the outside, but still acting like I feel on the inside? Society's expectation of me has some role in that, and yet I think there's also something deeper.

I posed that same question to my therapist once, asking her why do I have to feel like my percieved gender (to others) matters so much. She answered basically that it just does. She's right. It does matter. I don't need to know why it matters to know that it does, either. I wouldn't be satisfied being a man who is free to act as feminine as he feels. It wouldn't feel right.

And yet, I'm sure to many people who are not transgender, that concept is very hard to grasp. It's not hard for me to grasp, but it is hard for me to explain or understand.

I hope that in the future, people won't be so quick to question the motives of an article like that one. I don't know that Mr. Gold's piece should have been printed in the first place (it was pretty misguided), but I think I understand why The Bilerico Project thought it could foster discussion. Unfortunately, it hit a nerve (with me, too -- my first reaction was certainly to tear down his argument), but I think it should have also given us "T"s a chance to educate our "LGB" bretheren on what we're really about.

Instead, we sent Mr. Gold running with his tail between his legs. I am sorry for my part in that. It was certainly not the intention of my rebuttal.

Bilerico Fiasco

2009-12-11T18:59:00.002-05:00

I was very happy that Bil Browning of The Bilerico Project was excited to publish my response to a rather controversial take on transsexualism that was (is) making many in the trans community upset.

The original post is here:

'No' to the notion of transgender

And my rebuttal is here:

'Yes' to the reality of transgender

I actually think that Ronald Gold raises some interesting points on things that I have thought quite a bit about myself. Unfortunately, he wraps those in a rather inflammatory and misguided take on what it is to be transsexual.

Anyway, for now, I'll leave this at providing the links and later I'll expand on this, because I do have some kinder, gentler thoughts on Mr. Gold's post. For now, though, I've got a date. It is Friday night and all.

Giving Thanks

2009-11-26T11:02:00.003-05:00

I'll forgive myself a bit of glurge this morning, because I know that it won't be too long before I find something new to feel down about myself for, and today's just a happy-to-be-me day. Enjoy it while it lasts, kiddo.

Things I'm thankful for (in a very particular order):

I'm thankful to the boy I used to be, for having the courage, recklessness and stupidity to go forward with something that should have seemed impossible.

I'm thankful that I had the means to do everything I felt like I needed to do without driving myself into debt (still woulda been worth it if I had).

I'm thankful that I live in a society that pretty much accepts me for who I am, even if it doesn't always understand.

I'm thankful that I can go out looking like a complete mess and without makeup, and still get called "ma'am" by everyone.

I'm thankful that I barely even notice the quizzical stares anymore, mostly because they so rarely happen anymore.

I'm thankful that I get to see the world from the perspective of both genders. That's something you can't get any other way, I'm pretty sure.

I'm thankful for the great work of Drs. Christine McGinn and Jeffrey Speigel, whose results I am enjoying on a daily basis.

I'm thankful that being transgender no longer feels like the focus of my existence, at least when I feel like getting away from it for a while.

I'm thankful for all the love and support I've received since deciding to transition, from new friends and old, family and strangers.

I'm thankful to all the girls and boys who have broken my heart along the way.

I'm thankful for all the years I have left to live the life I always wanted, however many there are.

Today I'm thankful for who I am and that I'm no longer who I was. Because this is better in almost every conceivable way.

I Feel Pretty

2009-11-15T23:00:00.003-05:00

I was going to chronicle the whole facial feminization surgery experience, as I did for my sex reassignment surgery and most of my trips to E3000 for electrolysis, but I've decided against it for several reasons:

1) I didn't have any bone work done. I think my experiences are pretty different (read as: easier) from what most people undergo when they talk about FFS. My diary wouldn't be of much use, I'm afraid.

2) The nose job was the thing that was the most uncomfortable about it, and really it wasn't all that bad. The scalp advance and lip lift were nothing compared to the nose for discomfort, and that's pretty routine stuff.

3) Really, the pictures say it all for this one. I'm building a set on Flickr, here.

Here's my summary, though: compared to my "bottom surgery", this was a breeze. I was blind for the first couple of days from the swelling around my eyes, but I felt fine. Even in the hospital, I was only asking for Tylenol, because I just felt like I had been punched in the nose and had a headache. Dr. Spiegel was great. Healing was fast and easy. I'm really starting to love the results, now that the swelling and bruising are clearing up. I especially like my new profile. My nose is starting to look really cute.

That really says it all for me. I'm extremely happy with my choice of procedures and my choice of surgeons. I wasn't expecting to like the way I looked this soon after surgery.

I think I got exactly what I wanted out of this.

Not Just Another Pretty Face

2009-11-09T20:09:00.002-05:00

I guess I'm not really a big planner. I've always been inclined to focus on something that I want and just work (at times obsessively) towards it, without really giving a lot of thought to the overall plan. I make things up as I go. I don't always need to know or even want to know what the next hurdle is going to be -- I just focus on the next thing. I suppose that's my nature, and it's always served me pretty well. I don't believe you can really know how things are going to come out, and overplanning is usually just setting yourself up for disappointment. General Patton once said, "no battle plan survives contact with the enemy." I'm with him. I like to be prepared for anything, but plan things as they come.

Having cosmetic surgery was the last big physical change I had to decide on, and now that's done as of four days ago, thanks to Dr. Spiegel. I kind of rushed into it once I had decided on what I wanted to do. I had moments of doubt and worry leading up to my surgery date. I started noticing a lot of attractive women who didn't have what I'd call conventionally beautiful features, which made me wonder if I wasn't making a mistake. I suppose some people think my nose was pretty the way it was. But I'd have never been totally happy with it. I know that. This was the right choice for me.

Facial Feminization Surgery (FFS) was something I used to think I'd absolutely need to be "passable" (I'm starting to hate that term, and so is the trans community at large), but now it's just something I feel like I wanted, to make myself more attractive. My friend Jessica likes to point out that if you look at the majority of women out there, most of them "need" FFS too, regardless of whether they're trans or not. She's right, too. I didn't really need FFS any more than an average woman. I was okay with my face, generally. Nobody looked at me funny even when I was not wearing makeup. I blended in already.

Still, there were things about my face that I decided I didn't like, and if cosmetic surgery can make me like my face better, I'm all for it. Mostly I didn't like the more masculine aspects of it, like my nose, because those were reminders of a person I used to think I was, but don't feel like I am anymore. I still don't know exactly how this is all going to look, but I think it will be good, and I think I'll feel prettier. If it's not, and I end up hating it, then I'll deal with that then. But so far, I'm happy with the results I can see a few days after surgery.

A little over two years ago when I started this little adventure of mine, I had no clue what was in store or even where I was going. I just knew I had to do something, and to explore the possibilities that were out there. Now I'm at the end of one phase of this project of mine: the transformational part. The rest of the project will be living my life as a woman, and dealing with whatever comes my way, but I'm feeling like I'm getting pretty close to being done with trying to change myself. From here on, I just get to be myself, although I bet that's going to come with its own set of challenges, too.

I liked myself before I started on this journey. I like myself even more now. I'm happy with who I've become and who I'm becoming. I think this new face is going to go well with the next phase of my life. I'm glad I did this.

Experiments in Dating

2009-10-20T19:04:00.003-04:00

I suppose I'll take it as a positive sign that Scotti asked me out again, even though our third date didn't go all that well. I wasn't really surprised he wanted to see me again. I sort of expected he might be curious about what it would be like to be with a girl like me. I thought he'd probably sleep with me, and then make an excuse for why he couldn't deal with this long-term. Which would've been okay with me, honestly.

The not-so-veiled salacious promises of our pre-date text messages were never realized, however. Scotti got cold feet sometime before I invited him in for "coffee or something" at the end of the evening. When I coaxed him to come over closer to me on the couch and kiss me, well ... yeah, I thought he seemed a little weirded out at dinner and in the movie. I told him it was okay, but I don't think Scotti's going to call me again. He was trying to be cool about all of this, but he can't handle it. He was definitely keeping me at arm's length at our next softball game.

Guys see you differently once they know. Some guys, at least. This makes me want to push the boundary on when I tell a guy, so maybe he's a little more invested first. Tell them too soon, and it can scare them off. Tell them too late, and well...

My friend Aida asked me why I have to tell a guy at all. What difference does it make? Well, for one thing, I could get killed. "Oh, yeah" -- Aida is cisgender (i.e. not trans), so I guess this part wasn't obvious to her. For another thing, the longer you wait the more you risk them finding out on their own, which could make them think you're trying to deceive them. Finally, I won't have sex with someone without telling them first (see reason #1), and, well, I'm not going out with these guys just for their sparkling conversational skills. The first reason was enough for Aida. For me, too.

It feels bad to be rejected just because you're transgender, and to know that's what it was. In retrospect, though, I made too much of a big deal of it. If I were doing it over, I'd tell Scotti on date 4 or 5, ideally, and drop the whole part where I told him I had a secret I wasn't ready to share. Aida was half right. It's not that I don't need to tell them, it's just that I shouldn't act like it's some big thing. It's not, and if I don't treat it like it is, maybe they won't see it as a huge issue either. It's a part of me that I accept and am not ashamed of, and it's also something that I don't tell people unless there's some reason I think they should know it. I can hold out for a few dates without bringing this up.

The next guy I go out with gets to see a more prudish side of Suzanne, because I won't sleep with him before I tell him and I won't tell him until I think he's ready. And if he Googles me and finds this blog or any of the other things out there that reveal that I'm trans, well, congratulations mister internet detective -- now you may as well fess up that you know, because I bet I can read you like a book. And I won't apologize for not telling you before you found out my "secret", because there's nothing to apologize for and it's not a secret.

Live and learn. Try not to get beat up or killed. I'll get the hang of this, with a little more practice. Piece of cake.

It's in his kiss

2009-10-12T23:12:00.002-04:00

I think I just played the absolute worst two games of softball I've played since joining this slow-pitch league. Oddly enough, we won our first two games of the season, and are now 2-8 overall. It sure wasn't my hitting or fielding that did it. I was distracted as hell. I really couldn't get my mind in the game at all. I knew exactly why.

I had told Scotti I was going to tell him my secret after the game. We decided to go out for a burger. For me, a bacon cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato, grilled onions, mushrooms, jalapeno peppers and mayo. I needed it. I made sure to get a hug in there, too. Partly because I needed one, and partly because I wanted to see if there was a difference between the pre- and post-revelation hugs.

There was.

If there's a downside to blending in as a woman, it's this: people don't see it coming at all when you eventually have to tell them you're transgender (and you will). This can make things awkward as hell. Scotti didn't even really know what to ask me or what to say. He was totally flustered, just like I had been all night up until I told him. At least I felt like a load had been lifted off me, but I hadn't gotten rid of it; I just shifted it over onto him.

I told him to take some time to digest it and see how he feels about dating a trans girl. He might come around, but my guess right now is no. The trans thing's in the way now and it will probably stay in the way. It sure wasn't the same after I told him. He kissed me goodnight, but it was a pretty non-committal, nervous kiss. Not nervous like he was on our first date, either -- a very different kind of nervous.

Funny, but both kisses seemed to be asking, "what do I do now?", but in completely different ways. I guess we'll see.

Small Manipulations

2009-10-10T11:56:00.007-04:00

I've set a date with Dr. Spiegel in Boston. Rhinoplasty, scalp advance, lip lift, and I think I'm going to try cheek injections. He recommended cheek implants, but I'm generally opposed to having things implanted in me, except for the government-mandated microchips, of course (hey, we gotta keep track of the transgenders, right?).

I'm going to keep the changes subtle. I know I'm okay already. I know this because...

I don't have a lot of experience dating boys. I've had sex with guys since my surgery, but I wouldn't call what we did "dating" in any real sense. I've dated a lot lately, though -- both guys and girls. I had a nice date with a guy who plays on my new coed softball team last night. I think it was the first date I've ever gotten through without the trans thing entering into the picture.

Scotti (I know -- girl name, but no, I checked and he's not) played with us for the first time two weeks ago. He's a good player, super skinny and very cute. He plays shortstop and I usually play 3rd. I was teasing him about his hitting whenever he made an out. Boys like it when you tease them and then get pouty if they tease you back. I could tell straight away that he liked me. I've had enough guys flirt with me to know when they're interested. I thought he was going to ask me out after that first game. I sure as hell gave him plenty of opportunity and signals, but he was shy and he's a boy, so he's generally pretty clueless about when a girl's giving him clear signs that she's interested back. I told him, "well, I'll see you next week then?" and he told me he works 'til 11 pm usually (he's a cop), so no, probably not. "Okay, well I'm sure I'll see you again, anyway."

Scotti showed up for this week's game anyway, and I knew right away that he was there because of me. Our team is 0-8. The team got moved up 3 divisions from where they were last season for reasons that aren't really clear. We're totally getting crushed in this new division. You don't go out of your way to come to a game because you really want to get slaughtered, you do it to flirt with the cute 3rd basewoman you were too shy to ask out after last week's game. Someone else mentioned that Scotti had taken the whole day off. Yeah, I know what that means. I gave him my number after the game, as he was walking me to my car. He finally got the hint.

Any uncertainty about whether people on my team know I'm trans are gone. They don't know. They can't tell. Guys can't tell, and some of them think I'm cute, and not because I'm trans (some guys do like that, you know). This is literally a dream come true, and it makes me question my desire for cosmetic surgery again, because clearly I blend in fine already and some people find me attractive, even without surgery. So I'll go ahead with my appointment in Boston, but keep the changes subtle. Spiegel's good at that, which is why I chose him.

I've said before that I'm not interested in going "stealth". I'm still not. I do like it if I can go out with someone without my date figuring out I'm trans, and without my having to bring it up. I'm still fretting over when's the right time to tell someone. This new guy, this guy who's a cop with access to background checks and stuff like that, could find out easily enough. Also, I won't have sex with anyone without disclosing first. That's for safety and also out of a sense of obligation -- if it might matter to a guy (or girl for that matter), I think I owe it to him to be upfront. If he's gotten to know me a bit first, I think it will go smoother, but the longer I wait, the more likely it is that he finds out on his own.

It would have been really easy to tell if Scotti had Googled my name or done a check on me. I think I'd have known if he had any suspicion even that I am transgender. But just to be sure, I suggested we play a game where we take turns asking each other questions, and we each have to answer honestly. He only got to the fact that I'm bisexual from my asking him if he'd ever kissed a guy ("no"). I found I could lead him to the questions I wanted him to ask me easily enough with my questions, and deflect anything that might get him to details about my past that I don't want him to know yet. I'm clever that way. I did make occasional obscure references to my former self, referring to him as my "worse half" who is "no longer with us". I added that I didn't really want to talk about "him", but no we were never married and yes I'm totally over him now (all true). And I inherited all of his stuff, like that pool table you saw in my living room when you picked me up. I didn't lie, but I definitely omitted details I didn't want to share. He knows I have a big secret, but that I don't want to tell him yet. He definitely would not guess what the secret is. He's going to be very shocked next date.

When he dropped me back home I decided to let Scotti kiss me, even though I'm a little wary of what that could mean to him later. He said he'd been wanting to kiss me all night. I know. I saw your face when you showed up and I opened the door. I saw how nervous you were with me until I put you at ease with the little Q&A game. Boys are really easy to figure out. Girls are more mysterious. Some, even more than others.

FFS, but for real this time (i.e. not virtual)

2009-09-28T22:54:00.004-04:00

This past weekend, I drove down to Atlanta with some friends for the Southern Comfort Conference. My first ever transgender conference. There have been things here in DC, and I've never attended. Southern Comfort is pretty big though, I guess. Big tranny party and all that. I had a lot of fun, in a crazy, sleep-deprived, drama-filled way. I'm not going to write about the drama or the craziness. That's private. I had fun and made a lot of friends. That's all you need to know, and that's all you get to know, sorry. If you see pictures of me doing anything at SCC that is less than totally wholesome, those pictures are lying to you. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

I'm never one to miss a chance to party with a bunch of my awesome transgender friends, but mainly I went down to Atlanta to consult with experts in facial feminization surgery (FFS) on what they'd recommend for me. I am well aware that I'm asking people who stand to make a lot of money off me if I have surgery. But they're also experts in their field. I've seen a lot of very good results and a few less good results that range from a little off-putting to downright scary. I have a healthy amount of fear about rearranging my (perfectly good, I know) face. I figured it still doesn't hurt to hear them out.

I attended four surgeons' seminars at the conference and consulted with three of them. I brought my good friend Jessica along for the consultations. Jessica is awesome and is the sort of friend who's likely to tell me that I don't need any work done, not because she wants to stroke my ego, but because she believes it. Jessica says (and she's right) that by the standards of beauty society wants to impose on us, most women need FFS. I wanted her opinion in there too, before I went and let someone break all the bones in my head and rearrange them. Because I've heard it's painful, and I kind of like my face most of the time, besides.

Dr. Z

My first seminar was with Dr. Zukowski, a well-respected (these surgeons are all well-respected, mind you, but I'm about to trash the guy, so I'm putting that in there so as not to offend his fans*) surgeon whose office happens to be walking distance from where I grew up. I'd seen Dr. Z's work researching FFS surgeons. He's had some good results, but overall I was not all that impressed. I'd already ruled him out, really. I think his view of beauty and mine are not on the same plane.

Sleazy. That's how I'd describe him. Like a used car salesman. A lot of his seminar seemed to be him defending himself from other surgeons who were trashing him. I didn't know they trashed him before his seminar, but I definitely got that sense from the way he talked.

I wouldn't care if the guy's the biggest douche in the universe, frankly, but I didn't like his work. He'd want to make me look like Barbie. I don't want to be Barbie. Her car is made of plastic, and she can't even stand up in the bedroom in her own dream home. You have to bend her legs to get her in there, and they don't even bend at the knees.

So no thanks, and I didn't schedule a consultation with Dr. Z. I did go to his party, though. Hey, free booze. Also, I wanted to see all the "Z-Girls" (yes, he calls them that and yes, they call themselves that) lined up together. Some of them are, well, really really hot. None of them are what I really want to be, I don't think.

Dr. O

Dr. Ousterhaut is a pioneer in the field of facial feminization surgery. Probably the best in the business for craniofacial recombobulation or whatever it is they call it when they saw your whole forehead and jaw apart and grind it all up and reconstruct it on you with wires and putty or whatever. This is the painful and complicated FFS stuff. This stuff scares me, as it should. Anyway, Dr. O is pretty amazing at that. His work is definitely impressive. I don't often use the word "genius" to describe people, but I will make an exception to say this about him: Dr. O's probably not a genius, but he does strike me as a bit of an egomaniac and a control freak.

My main problem is my nose. Dr. O's reconstructed noses all look pretty much the same to me. It's a nice nose, but wouldn't work on my face. I also found it somewhat unnerving that I saw two or three other women at the conference that looked at a glance like my SRS surgeon, Dr. McGinn. Dr. McGinn is absolutely gorgeous. It's still weird seeing someone else whose face reminds me so much of hers. I guess that's a minor problem except when hanging around other Dr. O patients, though. Not a huge deal to have some semi-identical twins out there.

Dr. O also has a reputation for telling everyone they need "the works". He's an artist, your face is Dr. O's canvas, and he wants to start with a blank canvas. He wants to demolish everything and start over, making you as close to his very specific standards of beauty as he can. I'm not saying he's wrong about what makes a face appear feminine; I'm just saying that I mostly like my face already. I blend in fine. If I didn't, sure I'd love to have him tear me apart and start over, but I do okay already, so I'm not sure I want to scrap what I've got.

My consultation with Dr. O was unsurprising. I need the works, it turns out. My brow is that of a caveman, same as everyone else's. Gonna have to rip that off and grind it up. He did say (I believe this is verbatim) that he "wouldn't be upset if I decided to leave my chin and jawline alone for now". He definitely added "for now", and despite this minor concession to my unmasculineness, he recommended grinding down my jawbone and also maybe doing something to get rid of some muscle in there, too. Jessica mostly rolled her eyes during the Dr. O consult. She says people once sent an attractive non-transgender woman to consult with Dr. O, posing as a trans woman, and he told her she'd need lots of bone work. The works, in fact.

Anyway, I took his opinions into consideration. He's a very talented surgeon and his results are generally very good. Dr. O says he could make me "stunning" for $43,000. I'm sure he could, but as I said, I kind of like my face mostly the way it is. And what would I achieve to gain beauty and lose my identity, anyway?

Dr. O is a "no", I think.

Dr. Spiegel

Dr. Spiegel is probably the second most popular surgeon for FFS in the U.S. I was warned by my friend Sharon that his presentation was less than impressive. I have to disagree with Sharon on this. Spiegel's seminar was the most impressive one by far. It was low-key for sure. No videos of slightly plastic-looking women singing his praises or before/after combinations where the "after" part is heavy on the makeup and with better lighting, but his results were, well, impressive as hell.

Spiegel spent a good bit of time in his talk trashing Dr. Z, which I found very amusing, and I guess explains the defensiveness of Dr. Z's presentation. Anyway, Spiegel is more into subtle changes, and a natural look that fits with what I want. His noses were, in my opinion, the best I've seen. Rhinoplasty is the one procedure I'm sure I'll get. It's important to me that I get someone who's good with noses for that. Spiegel's noses looked very good to me. They seemed to fit people's faces. Definitely not a cookie-cutter approach.

The worst part of Spiegel's presentation was when he mentioned he was married. There went my dreams of becoming a doctor's wife. Oh well. Aside from that, the presentation was great.

My consultation with Spiegel was also very good. He told me I look great, and I don't need any bone work. He seemed to agree that I was already fine as I am, but that my nose is my least feminine feature. If I want other procedures that will make me more attractive/feminine besides rhinoplasty, I could do a scalp advance, cheek implants and a lip lift. Total for all that would be $22k, and this would be outpatient stuff.

I'll definitely consider his recommendation, and him as a surgeon. I liked him. I liked his work. I agree with his assessment, especially the part where he said I look good already.

Dr. Leis

Dr. Leis is (I think) a less well known surgeon than these others, who works out of the same hospital outside Philadelphia where I went for my SRS in March. I hadn't come across his name in my initial research about a year ago. Jessica's good friends with him. We went to the tail end of his seminar, and did a private consultation right then and there, where he walked me through his presentation and did an evaluation.

Leis basically agreed with Spiegel on the main points. I don't need any bone work. I'm already very feminine and attractive. If I want to do some things, I could do any or all of his recommended procedures, which include rhinoplasty, scalp advance, and a chin implant. Leis said I didn't need the lip lift. He didn't mention the cheeks, I don't think. Anyway, about $15k for those things. Outpatient stuff. Hang around Philly for another week and then I'm unbandaged and back at work.

Leis was very charming and nice. His work looked very good to me. I'm still thinking I liked Spiegel's noses better, but I'll have to look again closer before choosing a surgeon. Spiegel's prices were slightly lower, too, but I'm not trying to bargain shop on these things, so I'm considering the end result far more than the cost.

Summary

I'm not going to rush into any decisions. Two years ago, I was fairly certain I was going to go with the works. Nowadays, my penchant for cosmetic surgery varies with how I feel about myself. I'm scared of messing up something that looks pretty good already. I'm scared of complications and what plastic surgery might look like 10 years from now.

I'd be interested in people's comments on the subject, honestly. I was going to do a poll and let the internet help me decide what, if any, procedures to have. Then I decided that would be a really stupid thing to do. But that's my take on the subject today, and that's my face up in the upper righthand corner of the blog, and pretty soon I'll probably make a decision on this stuff (like in the next month or so).

So weigh in if you'd like. All opinions are welcome, especially the ones that start by telling me how beautiful I am already. I'll agree with at least half of what you say if you preface your actual opinion with that.

-----

* Oh, and don't read that parenthetical comment if you're a fan of Dr. Zukowski, please, I guess.

Never blend in.

2009-08-23T19:44:00.003-04:00

Being transgender is still a big focus of my life. A lot of my friends and activities revolve around trans-related stuff. If you ever want to get read as transsexual by everyone who sees you, just hang around with a dozen or so other transsexuals. Individually, most of us blend in to an extent. In large groups, we really start to stand out. At the supermarket this morning, I was just some woman buying groceries. At the club last night, I was part of that group of trannies dancing over there. Nobody ever comes up to me at the Safeway to tell me that I look "just like a woman". No, nobody would say that to someone they thought actually was a woman. It's still my favorite back-handed compliment.

I can see how to some people, the comments and stares would be annoying reminders that they don't blend in. On Friday, for the first time in I don't know how many months, a waiter called me "sir" -- harmlessly, since he seemed genuinely confused about the gender identity of people in our party and seemed to think that was the polite way to address us all. On Saturday night, a drunken guy on the street called a gathering I was a part of a "beautiful group of men-women". I shrugged off that first comment, and laughed at the second.

For some, those reminders that they don't blend in are enough to make them distance themselves from the trans community. Especially post-op, having your gender openly questioned or challenged can be an awkward thing. It's not as if that bulge in the front of your pants was ever your biggest impediment to passability, but once you've had it removed, you want people to see you as genuine -- as genuine as you, yourself, feel. Avoiding other transpeople is a way to avoid some of that.

For me, at least for now, I don't see it that way. I don't want people to know I'm transsexual just by looking at me, but I don't care if something gives me away. I'm not trying to hide who I am, but I'm not trying to advertise it, either. A funny look when I'm out running errands or a rude comment on the street when I'm out jogging would bother the hell out of me. A drunken remark in a gay nightclub when I'm out with a half a dozen other trans girls is nothing, though. Fortunately, these days I get only the latter and none of the former.

Not to brag, but I could probably go stealth if I wanted to. At 5'6", I'm average height for a woman. My voice is very passable. I look more female than male even without makeup these days. I don't get clocked when I'm on my own. I don't get stared at much at all.

Going stealth, though, means removing yourself from all things transgender, and dropping out of a community that I've gotten a lot out of and still get a lot out of. Yes, there are days I'd like not to be reminded about this. Yes, I get tired of talking about it sometimes. But if I were actively hiding it, I'd have to worry about those situations where I'm hanging out with my trans friends. Or someone who knows saying the wrong thing. Or someone who doesn't know doing a Google search on my name and finding this blog or my photos or whatever else is out there. I don't want that. Definitely not.

I really like being able to blend in as a woman, but I hope I'm never ashamed that I'm trans. When I'm out with a group of trans people, we're all "out", but we're usually having fun with it.

... this being anywhere close to over

2009-08-02T20:36:00.002-04:00

I feel better about myself today. Maybe I'm not as pretty as I wish I were, but when I look in the mirror, I still like what I see. My friend Ashley sent me a link to a video she took of me over a year and a half ago, right at the start of this journey, of one of my first times out of the house as Suzanne. It was shocking to see how far I've come. Is that really what I looked like? Is that how I sounded?!? It's good to see progress. I can forgive a lot about inadequacies in where I am now as long as I feel like I'm getting to where I need to be.

I am hypercritical of myself, yes, and especially when it comes to my appearance. Superficial, sure, but the image that I project to the world is a big part of my transition. I don't know how I could have let the person I was inside out without focusing a good bit on the external. Going into this transition, I fully expected to get facial feminization surgery. I was not blessed with a pretty face. Handsome, maybe, but not pretty.

In my early teens, I'd often dress as a girl and admire myself in the mirror. Some days, I thought I looked really good. Once, I took some pictures of myself with a Polaroid and they all came out horrible. I burned those photos. It was always in the back of my mind when I thought about transitioning. I didn't want to look like that person I saw in those pictures. If I had thought I'd end up pretty instead of homely, I could have talked myself into doing this at 17.

I talked with Jani about the newspaper article. She agrees it's not a good photo of me, and knows I was oversensitive about that since it's so public. As usual, Jani's also trying to talk me into doing as much cosmetic work as I can afford, not because she doesn't think I look good, but just because she thinks every bit helps. She's planning the same for herself. I'm still on the fence. I really don't like way it looks when people have too much cosmetic surgery. Then again, there are some procedures that might make a big difference for me. I'll probably consult some professionals and get their opinion.

Procedures I thought I was pretty well decided against are back on the table. Jaw and chin recontouring, scalp advance, and lip lift are real possibilities. Rhinoplasty was always in my future. Breast augmentation is still probably a no-go. I don't particularly want fake boobs. Small boobs are fine.

Diet and exercise, I've been pretty good about all along, but I can do better. I've gained a few pounds since my surgery, but I thought maybe it would help the hormones redistribute fat if there's a some fat to work with. I'm in good shape right now, but I can definitely get skinnier. It's just a matter of denying myself everything I enjoy eating and doing more exercise. That's easy.

At some point, I'm going to stop being so concerned with my appearance and grow old gracefully, though. I have a feeling Jani will be riding the cosmetic surgery train all the way through middle age and beyond, but I'm getting off in a few more stops for sure.

I hope.

Delusions of...

2009-07-30T17:28:00.002-04:00

I gave an interview to the Washington City Paper for an article about transgender medical procedures and resources. I thought the article came out pretty good. It's here.

I think I came across okay in the story, but I really don't like the photo that goes with it. I'd much rather I had sounded like a total idiot but it had been a really great photo of me. I know I'm oversensitive about my appearance, but, well, I think it's the least flattering photo of me I've seen in a long time. I'm squinting and making a weird face and I just look generally awful. To me, this belies everything I said in that article about not wanting to always be in the state of chasing the next cosmetic procedure that will finally make me feel happy with myself. I look at that photo and suddenly I've changed my mind and now I want every procedure they've got. Fix me. Now.

I spent the entire afternoon at work taking pictures of myself and deleting them, until my cell phone battery finally gave out. When I'm in this state of mind, every new photograph of me is awful. Every photo I used to think I looked pretty good in is now filled with flaws I couldn't see before.

I look in the mirror and I think I look okay. I don't look like that. I take a picture, and -- fuck! -- there it is again. I look horrid. Is that me? Is that what people see when they look at me?

Nobody tells you you look ugly if you look ugly. They tell you you look great. Beautiful, even. If you're actually beautiful and someone takes a really horrible picture of you where you look bad, people agree with you that the picture looks bad. If you're actually ugly, people tell you the photo looks good and you look great. I showed my friend Aida the photo from the news story and she said she thought I looked good. She liked it. It was about that time I had to leave for the day, not because it was time to leave, but just because.

To me, that photo looks like someone pasted a guy's face on a picture of a woman. If it's a good photo of me, then that means that's what I look like to people all the time. People who tell me I look pretty. And I'm not stupid; I know the people who tell me my photos up on Flickr are beautiful are interested in me in the first place because I'm transgender. But I still figured I looked okay, despite being trans. Maybe I was even getting to a point where I thought I looked pretty good for a girl instead of just pretty good as a girl. Now, I don't know what to think anymore.

I have a lot of my self-esteem tied up in my appearance. Maybe I shouldn't, but I do. I was talking with another trans girl online last night, advising her to seek help for her anorexia. As I was telling her how dangerous it is and how bad it is for her health, in the back of my mind I was jealous that she was 2 inches taller than me and weighed 117 lbs. I was 130 at my lowest point, which now I feel like I need to get back down to, or maybe even below that.

The irony is that when I gave that interview, I genuinely meant it when I said felt like I was getting to a point where I'm happy with myself. Now, because of the interview, I'm not.

This feeling will probably pass. I'll make some change that makes me feel like I'm attractive again, and go back to my delusional state of liking what I see in the mirror. Then maybe I'll just stop letting people photograph me. It's too risky.

Joie de Vivre

2009-06-17T21:13:00.003-04:00

Transitioning is a funny thing. If you're like me, you spend a lot of time fantasizing about what it might be like -- years, in fact -- with very little realization of what it will actually be like to live as the person you always wished you could be on a day-to-day basis. The initial excitement wears off after a while. Things become mundane, ordinary. There aren't any highs to be had from conquering a fear, because there are no fears anymore. You get used to it.

Transforming yourself from male to female once used to be a small taste of what could be, and it was like taking a step into a new and thrilling world. Now that you're immersed in that world all the time, it's not new anymore. Hiding your vestigial masculinity becomes a chore. The thrill is gone, and you're left with an obsession over the things you wish you could change about yourself. If only...

I've grown a bit tired of this being the central focus of my life. Transgender is a thing that I am. I'm proud of myself for accepting this about myself. I'm happy with who I am now. I was actually pretty happy with who I was before, too, but I'm even happier with the new me. But being transgender doesn't define me completely. It doesn't even come close.

I don't try to hide it. I don't want to hide it. I also don't want to hide behind it, like this is all that I am.

Last night at softball, my teammate's daughters cheered me on with chants of "go miss Suzanne!" These adorable little tykes will never know me as anything but Suzanne, as a woman. They don't know there was ever another me.

It makes me feel really good sometimes, just little moments where I'm not thinking about the transition or being transgender. I'm just me. And I looked in the mirror this morning as I was getting ready to leave for work, and I thought, "hey, you look cute today." And maybe I don't get a thrill from dressing as a woman or wearing makeup, but I still like it. And I wasn't scrutinizing every little thing about myself that needs to be fixed or changed, because I'm pretty happy with how I am today.

I hope it lasts. I could feel this way forever and never get bored with it.

Ennui

2009-06-10T18:12:00.004-04:00

I haven't really felt like posting anything here in a while. I haven't felt like doing much of anything. I've been wasting time, which is something I need to stop doing; there's plenty I need to do. I'm not exactly sure what I want to do now, but I do feel like a big part of my journey is now complete.

In Phase 1, I tore apart my life and reinvented myself. I feel mostly settled in that now. Everything I'm doing now -- everything that I am now -- feels more or less natural and routine, and even though I can't pretend that being transsexual makes my life any easier, there's nothing particularly noteworthy I have to say about it that I haven't already said three or four times already. This is just me, and I don't have much in the way of internal conflict about who I am or who I want to be anymore. Or external conflict either, for that matter. I feel pretty well accepted in society.

So maybe I'm just taking a break before starting on Phase 2: getting my life in order. I've said it before that as I made this transition, somehow my whole world has managed to come crashing down around me. The things that I'm not satisfied with now are more to do with my career and my love life (and, I suppose, my advancing age and the state of the world economy, but there's not much I can do about those) than who I am.

I'm not making any promises about whether I'll keep going with this blog with any regularity or not. Frankly, it was important for me to get some things out there early in my transition. Posting it in a public forum was, I suppose, some kind of way of forcing myself to come out to the world. Now it feels more just like exhibitionism. My private life should probably be more private. I've held back remarkably little in the past two years, which may have made this blog interesting, but my life is for me to live, not for others to find fascination in.

So, I'll probably be changing gears some here. I'm not exactly sure how, but I know some of the things I won't be doing:

Posting mundane details of what I'm doing from day to day. There's a whole service (Twitter) devoted to that, if you want to see how dull people's lives really are.
Posting links to trans-related news stories and other things. God, there's a million people doing that already, too. The world doesn't need another.
Posting just for the sake of posting something, since I haven't done it in a while (this post excepted, naturally).

Aside from that, I guess I'll just see what I feel like writing about, if anything. Maybe people will want to read it, and maybe they won't. Either way.

Anyhow, the vicodin I popped 20 minutes ago is about to start kicking in, so I'm going to finish my glass of red wine then epilate my legs. Hey, did you happen to see that news story about the DJs who said those awful things about transgender kids? I'll find the link and post it here for you in my nightly update later on...

Closure

2009-05-07T21:03:00.004-04:00

It really wasn't supposed to hurt this much. I'm supposed to be ready to move on.

I saw Alison for the first time since she broke it off with me. I guess that was just under three weeks ago, but it seems like a lot longer. I'm not over her. I didn't go in to this kidding myself that I was, or that I would get through seeing her without crying. All I promised her in my email was that I wouldn't cry as much as the last time she saw me. It went pretty much according to plan. I cried a lot less than last time.

We got together for drinks after work at a gay bar we both like in DC. It was nice to see her. I caught her up on the depressing chaos that is my life these past few weeks. How I have no real idea what I want to do anymore, career-wise. Not this, whatever it is I'm doing now -- I've got it narrowed down by that much, anyway. How I quit my support group. How I'm slowly getting my legs back into shape with the jogging. How I'm getting ready to start dating again, looking for other jobs, and so forth. Alison told me about her mother having rotator cuff surgery, and how she's applying for other jobs, and she's doing her activism stuff. And she's not seeing anyone new yet, but she's chatting with a couple of girls on OkCupid.

I didn't talk about how I cried for three days straight after she dumped me. I didn't tell her how I still pile the extra pillows up behind me when I go to bed every night and pretend she's spooning with me. Or how that usually still makes me cry.

I still don't get exactly what wasn't working for her. She says she didn't want to be in a serious relationship. Okay. In my mind, I can't help but append that with the qualifier "with you", but okay. I guess that's just another way of saying, "I didn't love you". Nothing new there. I've been through this before, and I'll get through it again. The only things I'm still mourning are things that were never there at all in the first place.

I'll be fine. Soon enough, I won't even miss her anymore. One day, I'll be able to think about her without my eyes welling up with tears. Eventually, I'll find someone new who makes me feel as happy or hopefully even happier. And I hope that Alison finds someone she loves who loves her as much as I did, or more. I hope that she and I will stay good friends, and we'll be able to get together for drinks without either of us (mostly me) crying at all.

I'm not there yet, but I'm at least to the point where I want to be over her. I just want to move past this lonely, miserable part and on with my life.

Still, I'm going to need those extra pillows again tonight.

Starting Over

2009-05-02T01:17:00.003-04:00

I've been back at work for a week now. It's been weird. Depressing, mostly, I guess. Everything feels depressing to me right now, not just the job. I'm hiding it well so far, but it's starting to catch up with me. I break down sometimes. Other times, I just feel like I don't want to do anything at all. No interests, no hopes, no goals, no dreams.

I don't have any regrets about the surgery. The timing of it, my choice of Dr. McGinn, everything going back to whenever it was that I finally decided I was going to live as a woman -- it was all the right decision. At the same time, right now my life feels pretty fucked up, and a lot of it has to do with having had the operation, or the timing of it anyway.

Being demoted back to where I was 10 years ago in my career while still working on the same team is somewhat humiliating. I'm looking to people I used to manage to mentor me as I start over with programming in a language I've never used before. I went from being good at my job and receiving mostly excellent performance reviews to suddenly being well aware that I wouldn't hire myself for the position I'm in now, and for good reason. I'm talented, but lacking in any expertise. Motivationally, they've put me in a position where if I were to do outstanding work, it reinforces the idea that demoting me was a good idea. I have no desire at all to try to work my way back up the corporate ladder anymore. I wouldn't want my old spot back if they wanted to give it to me. Mostly, I hate the thought that these people who used to respect me as their manager now feel sorry for me.

I had a session with Dr. Payne this afternoon. She said it sounds like they're trying to force me to quit because they feel like they can't fire me without it being discriminatory. It's probably a good strategy if that's the case, but I haven't gotten the sense that that's what this is. It feels more like they just didn't have a spot for me since I was taking off two months right as the company was going through a big reorganization and a wave of layoffs. Maybe if I hadn't had the surgery, I'd have kept a management position in the new organizational structure, or maybe they'd have fired me because they didn't have a place for me. I don't really know. Maybe this new position is a very clumsy attempt at charity. Maybe it's a clever way to get rid of me. Maybe it's just a really misguided attempt at strategic realignment. I guess it doesn't matter to me. The result is the same.

Objectively and rationally, I can deal with my current situation just fine. I'm past most of my major expenses for this transition. Despite suffering catastrophic losses on my investments in the past year, I have plenty of money left over, and I still have a paycheck coming in. I'm smart. I learn fast. I work hard. I make friends easily. I'm honest and loyal. I should have plenty of good options, and a bright future ahead of me.

Emotionally, I'm having trouble dealing with things as they are right now. At work, in relationships, and socially, I just don't feel like I have a lot of energy or a lot to offer. I don't really know what I want to do and everything I might do seems daunting.

I'll work through this. I break down sometimes, but I always pick myself up after. I sometimes don't feel like doing anything at all, but I always do what needs to be done. I manage to keep up with my dilation schedule, and I get out for a run every day, and I go out with friends and try to cheer up.

I'm not giving up. Not even close.

My E3000 Diary: Clearing #5

2009-04-24T19:12:00.002-04:00

At this point, I feel like I've really covered everything there is to say about my experiences with E3000. They're top-notch. It's really painful. The swelling lasts a few days. All of this is getting to be routine.

This time around, I had Jani with me again, which was nice. I also had to dilate 6x per day while in Dallas, since I'm still in the initial recovery period from my gender confirmation surgery. Dilating that often is hard to do when you're travelling. To make a long story short, I dilated whenever and wherever I could, like in the airport bathroom on the way back (I found one of those unisex ones that's private and locks. I sat on the floor, on a sterile pad).

The trip was nice. I visited with my friends in Dallas and had fun with Jani, who still won't leave the hotel with what she thinks is stubble, even though nobody else can see it. Jani's one full clearing in Dallas ahead of me, plus she says she had something like 100 hours of electrolysis before coming to E3000 (a good argument for doing it this way, with full clearings, in my opinion). So Jani's facial hair is pretty much invisible. Mine's visible, but you gotta look close. The guy who was hitting on me all the way on the flight to Dallas didn't seem to notice mine, even though he was putting his face about 10 inches from my stubble when he leaned over to talk to me. Based on the mildly homophobic comments he was making about the gentleman sitting next to us on the aisle, I feel certain he never saw my beard shadow. Anyway, at this point I feel pretty comfortable going out with 3 days' growth, but Jani's just paranoid. Nothing new there.

It took 6.5 hours for Sabrina to clear me this time. I was doped up pretty good the whole time, and mostly in a haze. I took a bunch of stuff (valium, vicodin, motrin). Except for the lidocaine shots, it was fine. Not fun, but given that my face took about 20 hours to clear that first time, we're making great progress. I'm scheduled again in June, and once this gets down to only a few hours, I'll definitely have to reevaluate the travel expenses and whether it's worth it to fly down to Dallas. Still, I can't argue with the results so far.

Another clearing done. We're definitely getting there.

Passabilty Part 2: Part-Time Stealth

2009-04-18T19:54:00.004-04:00

I was thinking this morning how I just had invasive and life-changing surgery, and for what? Convenience? To make my life simpler? If anything, it's been highly inconvenient and it has done anything but make things simpler, especially coming off the week I've just had. Maybe Alison and I were not going to work out as a couple, but I'm pretty sure part of the reason she broke it off with me is that this is a really inconvenient time for both of us. So having surgery seems to be making my life pretty much complexified, so far.

But that's not right. I didn't opt for surgery just because it makes things easier or lets me live in society with the gender marker of my preference; that's part of it, but really, I did it for myself. It feels right. I hope so, anyway. But not having a penis anymore does make some things less tricky and dangerous, society-wise.

Today was kind of a big day for me. I met my new softball team for our first practice. I haven't been on a team in about 14 years I guess, and the last time I played was a company picnic 10 years ago. I wasn't worried that I couldn't play, though. I used to be pretty good, and I could always hit decently. And I'm fast.

What I was worried about was that I signed up for this team without telling them anything about myself except that I'm female and I've played 3rd base and several spots in the outfield. I didn't mention the trans thing. Frankly, I wouldn't really mind if there were some parts of my life where people don't know I'm trans. I guess I don't care if they find out at some point, but I don't want it to be how they see me straight away. I'd rather they get to know Suzanne the woman before they know that I used to fit in pretty well in the men's league. Maybe they'd be mad if they found out (I doubt it), but I don't know that I'm obligated to wear a sign around my neck. If they ask me about it, I won't lie. If I suspect they know and it's making things uncomfortable, I'll tell them. Otherwise, I just want to play softball and make some friends, but I'm not eager to tell them about how I was born male just yet. I'd rather they don't know.

So, even though this is softball, where the point is to get dirty and sweaty, I spent a good bit of time on my appearance this morning, wondering how much makeup I could get away with. I decided a little foundation wouldn't hurt (and it has SPF 15) and some clear mascara. Curled my lashes, a little brow powder, a hint of blush, hair back in a ponytail, and voila: yeah, I look like a girl. I am a girl. I should look like one.

Oh, and I wore the silicon boob enhancers -- the ones I almost never ever wear and now I'm going to wear them for sports? -- under my sports bra. That was a risky move. If one comes out or shifts around, now it looks like I'm being deceptive. But whatever. They make it look like I have boobs. The sports bra makes me look totally flat, which I pretty much am.

Practice was fun. I ran around. I dove on a couple of plays in the infield, and got dirty. I was rusty as hell on the fielding, but I can still hit. I felt like I was really clobbering the ball. I hit a couple of shots that one-hopped the fence. That felt good. Funny, 'cause I never had any power before ... oh, yeah... I forgot we use a littler ball here than I'm used to. Women's league and all. Okay, I might be dangerous with some more practice then.

Practice included men and women, since the same people also play on two different co-ed teams. I had told them I was mostly interested in the women's team, but by the end of practice, they were asking if I'd mind subbing in in the co-ed games, I guess if they're short-handed. Yeah, okay, I can probably play some on Sundays, too. Then they were fighting over which co-ed team gets me. It's nice to be wanted.

If anyone suspected there was something wrong with me, they sure didn't let on. They seemed to be just happy to have another woman on the team who can play. If they did suspect I was transgender, would they have said anything? Probably not, but I think they'd have been weird about it. I'm pretty good at picking up stuff like that. I think they didn't know, and that's just fine with me.

Not everything in my life has to revolve around being trans. Passing gives you options to get away from some of this stuff once in a while, so it doesn't feel like the focus of everything you do all the time. Frankly, that's just what I needed right now.

Numbness: the thing that hurts the most

2009-04-16T11:19:00.003-04:00

I was dreading this feeling. I knew it was coming, but I didn't know how fast. At some point, holding onto your grief becomes just too exhausting, and you have to let it go. There was a part of me that was dying, and clinging to it wasn't keeping it alive, but it was all I knew how to do. Now the wound inside me is healing and scar tissue is forming in its place. It's much less sensitive. I'm sad, but my whole world has not collapsed. I'm lonely, but there are things to look forward to. I still cry, but I don't have to dwell endlessly on unrealistic hopes about what might have been.

Me from two days ago would look at the person I am today and hate her. Pre-breakup Suzanne wasn't stupid or naive enough to think that she had found a perfect love that could never be replaced, but she was in love and she wasn't picky enough to think that it has to be perfect, either. She wasn't ready to let that go just yet, and somehow it seemed like a terrible injustice to put Alison up on the shelf in my mind of girls I've dated and broken up with and gotten past. Bittersweet memories. It should have come down to more than that, shouldn't it?

Today's me is moving on, not because she particularly wants to, but because she has to. I'm realistic. I know things will be better soon. I accept that Alison and I probably wouldn't have worked out in the long run. I'm glad for the memories. I'm not unemotional, but I am becoming more and more rational about it. Somehow, it seemed better to be able to embrace my misery and hold onto it, however much I knew I couldn't do that forever. Maybe reality is just the thing that destroys our feelings, and leaves us numb.

Time heals all wounds. It also leaves you a little bit bitter and jaded. Accepting that is accepting your own death, albeit slowly.

Time to move on. I have things to do. I have to dilate again, then I'll go for a run, and I'll go from there. It's a beautiful day out and the sun is shining and the birds are singing and I hate myself.

Pity Party

2009-04-14T21:28:00.002-04:00

My eyes are so red and sore that my tears feel like acid against my eyelids. They're not flowing as freely anymore, but I think that's because I've pretty much exhausted myself from crying, or else maybe they're just dried up. It took me two hours this morning to take my pills and get motivated to dilate. Most of the morning, I spent curled into a ball on the floor sobbing.

Wake up. Cry. Dilate. Laundry (running clothes). Cry. Dilate. Go for a run, and break down crying about five times along the way. Dilate. Curl up on the floor of the shower crying for about half an hour. Write a letter to Alison, which I may never mail. Dilate. Do my taxes. Dilate. Eat some raw cauliflour (if you want to complain, stomach -- here, digest this. That's about 10 calories and you're going to have to work for them, too. No reason you should be happy when the rest of me is miserable) while sitting in the dark crying. Write a blog entry (this). That's my day. I've lost count of how many times I've broken down in tears today. Well over 30, I'd guess.

At least I only have to dilate one more time before bed. And I filed my taxes. And I got out for a run in the pissing, cold, miserable rain that's supposed to keep up for two more days without letup. About as productive as any day, really. Also about as depressing a day as I've ever had. Maybe not the worst day of my life, but probably the most miserable. The weather definitely cooperated with that.

I don't know why this breakup has me so emotionally crippled. I've never felt this bad after being dumped the last three or four times. Maybe it caught me at a time when I wasn't prepared to deal with it. Maybe I stupidly thought that I had found someone I could be happy with for a long, long time. Maybe my new hormone levels are messing with my brain and need to be adjusted. I had been feeling a little depressed already before this and was thinking about going on antidepressants. Better living through chemistry. It's starting to sound good.

Or maybe I'm just tired of people telling me how wonderful I am when they don't want to be with me. Yeah, I guess I'm so fucking wonderful that nobody can stand me. That must be it. I'll just enjoy my own company for the next 50 years then. I'm looking forward to it.

I watched an episode of "House" the other day. The supermodel who was dying from a mysterious ailment was, in the end, diagnosed to be (spoiler alert) intersex. She had XY chromosomes, but complete androgen insensitivity syndrome, meaning that to all the world she appeared to be 100% female. Until House diagnosed her, of course, at which point he started referring to her as "he" and "him" and said that the cure was to "cut off his balls". Plus, he helpfully added that this also solved the little incest problem she had with her father, since "now it would just be gross". Because she's a dude.

Nice one, House. Way to bring me down.

But I love that show, and House was only saying what most of the world is thinking. I was mad at him for a couple of days, but he's echoing the sentiments of millions of people out there. Those are the same millions of people that make me depressed about my prospects for a relationship with anyone who's not "like me". And if I do date another transgender person, it doesn't work out because at least one of us doesn't know what she wants right now. And so I end up alone.

I remember whining like this before, about 6 months ago. That was right before I met Alison. And for a while, when she held me in her arms at night, I didn't feel lonely and everything felt like it could work.

And now it feels like it can't again, and I'm more miserable than before. It's time to cry some more then dilate then maybe sleep. I'm exhausted. I can't take much more of this.

Living the Dream

2009-04-13T22:20:00.004-04:00

Two weeks ago I dreamt that Alison broke up with me. I woke up crying. Tonight, she broke up with me for real. I started crying as soon as she said "we need to talk" or whatever it is people say in those situations. I felt myself instantly withdraw into my head, and all I could hear was the ambient sounds of the restaurant. Alison's lips were moving, but I couldn't process most of what she was saying.

"It's not you." "You're beautiful and smart and fun and I don't deserve you." "I just can't be in a relationship right now."

I picked up bits and pieces, but I was paralyzed. Everything sounded far away and muffled. All I could feel were the tears streaming down my face. I knew this was coming, too. From the way Alison had cancelled plans with me yesterday, to the fact that tonight she wanted to meet somewhere in the middle between our places, to the way she didn't want to talk about plans for this coming weekend at all. Well, except for the part about how she was going to roller derby on Saturday, without asking me if I'd want to go. The signs were all there, and I'd seen them but I didn't want to admit it. But I still knew. I've known since that dream; I was just hoping I was wrong.

I feel stupid. I knew this was going to happen. I cried about it on the phone with Jani last night, a full day before Alison broke up with me. I spent all last night thinking how hard this recovery period is going to be on both of us and our relationship, and how lonely it would be without her. I thought about how nice the past five months has been with her. Not perfect, but nice. In the shower this morning, I thought that even if we don't make it through this period, it's still been a nice relationship. Not every relationship has to last forever to be a success. Ours was, as far as I'm concerned.

But she wasn't in love with me. And I guess that's that.

Passability

2009-04-09T08:48:00.003-04:00

On Tuesday afternoon, as I was lounging around the house waiting for my next dilation session (and it's never a long wait), the doorbell rang. I was wearing a tee shirt, pyjama bottoms and slippers, with no makeup and my hair tied back haphazardly. I hadn't planned to do much but stay home and dilate, so this is my standard uniform these days. I figured I could ignore the doorbell easily enough, but it might be one of the neighbors stopping by for a chat. That would be an excuse to invite them in and have another cappuccino. So I answered it.

It was a college-age kid working door-to-door sales. He called me "ma'am" right off the bat, and didn't seem put off by my appearance or the least bit confused about my gender presentation. Hormones, electrolysis and voice training work. It was a nice feeling. It could have been really awkward and embarrassing, but in the end I was only embarrassed that here it's almost 2 in the afternoon and I haven't even gotten dressed. There was a time when I thought that would never happen without cosmetic surgery.

I still have reservations about going out without makeup and/or dressing like a slob. It feels silly picking out an outfit to go to the Home Depot to buy painting tape, or putting on makeup just to run out to Whole Foods for soy milk and bananas. Passing as a woman at all times is important to me, even if I don't always feel like putting in an effort. I don't mind looking androgynous as long as people can tell I'm female. I don't like the feeling that I've got to be constantly working at it to maintain a female identity, like I'm putting on an act. It's getting less and less like an act, and more like just me.

"Passable" can be a sensitive buzzword in the trans community. A transperson who's not passable is every bit as transgendered as I am. Someone whose gender presentation causes people around her to react with gawking stares is not any more or less "successfully" (another sensitive term, by the way) transitioned than someone who is accepted readily and completely by society. But not being passable means being in for a harder time generally and being at greater risk for discrimination and/or violence. Passability goes a long way towards acceptance. To me, it was probably a dealbreaker on this whole transition. Not that I'm (quite) that vain, but if my overall presentation couldn't be female, then I'd have probably stuck with living as male or ambiguously-gendered. Transitioning's about expressing who you really want to be, but it creates a pressure to be convincing in the role you define for yourself.

Having had my new vagina installed (it's looking and working great, by the way) ups the stakes for me on the whole passing issue. Before, if I didn't feel like parts of me looked female, not only could I blame the penis for that, but it was also my ticket back into the male world if this got too difficult. Now, what am I if not female? If passing was important to me before, now it feels absolutely essential. The surgery doesn't help me to pass except for in very rare and specific circumstances, such as a locker room or the beach, and these are the very places where I'm still not going to feel totally comfortable with my body. I find myself scrutinizing it more, and whereas before I was pretty okay with the things that don't appear female, now I'm more critical.

It's hard work being yourself. Or, I guess I should say it can be hard work depending on who you decide to be. Really, we all invent ourselves, as some compromise between who we are and who we want to be, between who we are on the inside and who we are on the outside. Both concepts are flexible to an extent. Successfully transitioning is accepting what's on the inside and being satisfied with what's on the outside. Being passable only helps other people to accept you, but if that didn't matter, we wouldn't care at all who we are on the outside.

I'm sure it's a lot easier being a stand-up comedian if the audience laughs at your jokes. Transitioning's a lot like getting up on stage, except now you're hoping the audience doesn't laugh.

On Dilation

2009-04-06T09:27:00.002-04:00

Look, I've tried writing this post about three times now, and I keep starting over. To me, it's becoming about as boring and monotonous as dilating itself, and I don't really know what to say. Here's the short version:

I'm dilating six times a day, at about 40 minutes per session. It takes a lot of time. It means I can't get out of the house as much as I'd like, or for much other than short trips. Getting out for even a few hours means spending the rest of the day in what feels like a nonstop cycle of dilating or getting ready to dilate again. On the other hand, it's working. I'm showing better progress than I'd expected, both for depth and girth. I've moved up two dilator sizes, including ordering a larger size online than Dr. McGinn gave me after surgery (based on her recommendation), and even that one's getting fairly easy to insert. It's a real pain, but it's not painful. The discomfort has been very manageable since the first couple of weeks. It's depressing in a lot of ways, but I'm getting through it and next week I can start running again.

Now some specifics:

Frequency: Dr. McGinn prescribes 6x per day for the first 8 weeks (I'm halfway through that) followed by 4x per day for 16 weeks. That's a lot of dilation. Some surgeons recommend less. I don't know of any that recommend more. I don't know that more would be even feasible for many people. As with pre-surgical electrolysis, there may be differences in opinion on this. Some surgeons may think too much dilation carries a risk for complication. I don't know. I'm not sure I really care. Like most people, I'm going with my surgeon's recommendation.

Based on my experiences, I think she's probably right on this point, or at least it's working out well for me. If you're going to stretch yourself out post surgery, this is the time to do it. Going in, I wasn't sure if gaining significant depth was possible or just based on apocryphal stories. I've heard of transwomen losing depth, and it not being uncommon or the result of too little dilation. As your skin heals inside you, it contracts as scar tissue forms. It gets less flexible. I was expecting to be able to maintain depth, but not really increase it. Instead, I've gained a full inch. Better than I'd expected, and I'll be happy to maintain that from here on. If I lose a little depth from here as it heals further, it's also no big deal.

Setup: I dilate in my tub (dry, no water), which is one of those big jacuzzi things with plenty of shelf space around it. I have a board running across the top acting as a desk. I sit on a rubber donut and towels. Cleanup is easy. My laptop and phone are handy. I can watch TV, surf the internet or whatever while I dilate. I can easily adjust the angle I'm sitting at by sliding up or down the back of the tub. I don't have to worry about making a mess. This works well for me, and is the same setup I've been using since the hotel in Bensalem, PA.

Schedule: I try to space the sessions out as evenly as I can. About once every 3 hours when I'm awake. The first and last sessions are always the hardest, motivation-wise. First thing in the morning, it's the last thing I want to be doing. Late at night, I'm often falling asleep already, and I'm tempted to skip it. I don't. Yes, it gets depressing sometimes, but I just do it, whether I feel like it or not. Six times a day, every day. Every goddamned day.

If I need to block out some time to go out, say to get together with Alison for a few hours, I can do as many as 3 sessions in a 5-hour window, but that's pretty much all I'm doing. Dilate, watch an episode of House downstairs, dilate again, etc. I'm convinced "House" is a great show to watch when you're dilating. He's always so miserable, so by comparison you're kind of having fun.

Lubricants: I use mileral oil gel (aka baby oil gel) exclusively. Again, my doctor's recommendation. If I had gone to a different surgeon, I'd probably be using KY. I'm sure it would be fine. Mineral oil gel works fine and is better than pure mineral oil, since it sticks to the dilator instead of running right off it. Less messy.

Technique: I am very wary of causing complications, but now at 5 weeks post-op, things have healed a great deal, and I am not as worried about causing tears. I spend as much time as necessary getting the dilator to depth comfortably, using steady pressure while trying to relax my legs and abdominal muscles. Sometimes I twist the dilator back and forth slightly, but usually this isn't needed until it's very close to maximum depth. Then I push with about as much force as I can exert with one or two fingers and hold it there for 20 minutes. Sometimes I push a little harder and twist the dilator back and forth some more to try to stretch the skin out some more. That seems to work well. I figure if it doesn't really hurt too much, it's good. But I am careful not to push so hard as to tear something. As I see it, tearing things that are inside you is a bad thing. I learned that by watching "House", too.

I'm currently using two different sizes of dilators, since I can get the smaller one in deeper, and I do that for 20-25 minutes before moving on to the bigger one for 10-15 minutes. When I was only using the blue one, it took me less time per session, but now that I'm doing blue and green, it takes longer. The same thing happened when I moved from pink (smallest) to blue. I used both pink and blue until I could get them both to the same depth, then stopped using the smaller one.

Pain/Discomfort: The first week was the worst. There's a muscle that, as a result of surgery, now has a tear in it. Through that tear, I'm inserting things that it doesn't particularly like having pushed through it. At first, keeping the pink dilator in for even 20 minutes was agony. Now, it's getting much more stretchy, and I could sit there with the green one (two sizes bigger) in me for an hour if I wanted to.

Pushing fairly hard, even at maximum depth, is not all that painful. Uncomfortable, yes, but not painful. Pretty much what I'd heard from other people going into this. Dilating is hardest in the morning, when things have had a chance to tighten up, and gets progressively easier fast. Moving up a size in dilators hurts, but that gets better fast, too. There's one size up from the one I'm on now, but I'm not sure if it's worth doing. I know I could do it, I just don't know if I want to.

Overall: Like everything in this transition, it's hard but it's worth it. It's a lot better than the pain of the first two weeks post-op, but it is kind of monotonous and at times it feels like my whole life is on hold until I get done with this. I find ways to entertain myself and take my mind off it. The rest is just finding the time and having the discipline to see it through.

On Surgeons

2009-03-22T20:59:00.003-04:00

I've had a couple of people recently ask me about my choice of Dr. McGinn for my surgery. Choosing a surgeon for my gender confirmation surgery was quite an ordeal. I was anxious to make a decision as quickly as possible for several reasons including (1) my friend Jani was going to Dr. Suporn in Thailand and if I chose him, we were going to go together, (2) some surgeons have a long waiting list, and (3) some surgeons seem to recommend or require genital electrolysis before surgery and others recommend against it. I was under a lot of pressure to make a decision by around September of last year, because I wanted to get a date and get started on preparations.

So I scoured the internet for information about SRS surgeons, and I discovered several things:

- There are a handful of surgeons widely considered to be the best in their field.
- There are two basic techniques, with some minor variations by surgeon: the penile inversion and the Suporn technique.
- Almost everything you'll find is either people cheerleading for their surgeon (who is unquestionably the best in their opinion) or people trashing their surgeon due to serious complications they experienced.
- Even though some people have gone to a second surgeon for revisions, nobody has any real idea about how another surgeon's results would have compared to theirs, because you only get one shot at this.

Based on the overall sense I got from people's good vs. bad experiences and the number of cheerleaders for each surgeon, I started with a list of five possible surgeons: Marci Bowers, Toby Meltzer, Dr. Suporn (Suporn's his first name, and what everyone calls him), Christine McGinn, and Pierre Brassard.

I eliminated Dr. Bowers (1 year waiting list -- with the way my company was going I wasn't going to wait a year) and Dr. Meltzer (way more expensive than the others, and I didn't find anything that justified this). Brassard and McGinn both seemed like great choices from all I had read, and Brassard was recommended to me by my endocrinologist. Suporn has a cult following and a significantly different technique that he invented. McGinn had the advantage of being a 3-hour drive from my house and of being trans (as is Bowers). I definitely liked the idea of having a surgeon who's been through this herself.

All of these surgeons had excellent scouting reports on the various message boards and groups. Suporn's followers were actually a bit overly fanatical. I briefly joined a Yahoo group for patients of Dr. Suporn to ask about the advantages and disadvantages of his technique. When I posted questions, I got back was a mix of useful information, advantages that didn't apply to me, and replies berating me for even considering not going to Suporn. I distilled it all down to this: Suporn's technique is probably the best option if you have a small penis and want to be able to have penetrative sex with men. I couldn't really get a convincing answer to the question, "okay, but what advantages does Suporn have if you don't have a small penis?" A chance to have a fun an adventure in Thailand and a lifetime guarantee on his work seemed to be the gist of it. I wasn't in this for the vacation, though, and a lifetime guarantee isn't so great when I have to fly halfway around the world for revisions. Airfare's not included in that guarantee.

I was still leaning towards Suporn anyway, though, because he did seem to have a great track record and going through it with Jani would have been nice. In the end, though, I decided against the Thailand option after talking to my friend Jessica. Her thoughts were that Suporn's method is more invasive, requires longer recovery time, and I wouldn't get any more depth from it anyway, since I aparently had no shortage of material to work with. This was kind of news to me, since I always thought that I had kind of a below-average sized penis, but it turns out that most of the other boys in high school were probably lying or measuring wrong (note: you're supposed to measure along the top). I decided that depth wouldn't be a problem for me with either technique, but the penile inversion seemed safer and more likely to produce good sensation (I found no data on this, but I figured less invasive means fewer nerves lost). Plus, there was no real need to fly to Thailand, and complications could leave me stranded a long way from home for quite a while. That narrowed it down to Brassard and McGinn.

In the end, I chose Dr. McGinn after going up and meeting with her in person. I'd read as much as I could find about her in advance. It seemed like people really liked the results they got with her and she had an excellent reputation, but the same was true for Brassard. She didn't have as much experience working on her own as the other surgeons on my list, but people seemed to agree that her skills were top-notch. Plus, she confirmed for me when we met what I'd pretty much already decided, that among the list of top surgeons, there were really no bad choices. She never tried to convince me that she was better than the others, only that they are all very highly skilled and none of them could guarantee I wouldn't have complications. McGinn seemed honest and forthright, and has a great reputation. Good enough for me.

Now that I'm three weeks post-op, I'm still very happy with my choice of Dr. McGinn. She's lived up to her reputation. So far, I'm happy with my results cosmetically, with sensation and with depth. Those were the main factors I was interested in going into this surgery. I'm still swollen a bit, but things are healing nicely. I'm sure I could have gotten great results with any of the surgeons I'd originally considered, but I'm glad I went with Dr. McGinn. She's been great. The results are great (I think). She's been very upfront with me throughout the process.

I told my therapist last summer that I wished there were one surgeon out there who cost twice as much as everyone else but who everyone agreed was the best. I'd have gladly justified the extra expense for a better result. But there isn't. The fact that there were lots of good choices made it harder. Most of the stuff on the internet is just people claiming that their surgeon is the best because they had such a great experience and result, which makes it harder still, and confusing because they don't have any idea what how their results would have been with another surgeon. Some of these girls seem like they'd be happy with anything that resulted in them no longer having a penis. It's really hard to read anything into the cheerleaders' comments.

You might think that having no bad choices would make your decision easier, but when the stakes are high, it really makes it stressful. If your results are less than optimal, you'll end up second-guessing yourself for a long time, and nobody really knows who's the best or which technique is the best. I'm happy with my choice of surgeons. I'd pick Dr. McGinn again. Based on my circumstances, she was probably the best choice for me. There are other great surgeons out there, too. That's really all I've got to say about it.

A Quick Update

2009-03-18T13:07:00.003-04:00

My recovery is going better and better every day. Dilation is getting less uncomfortable. I think I'm ready to move up a size on the dilators today. Yesterday, I had a check-up with my endocrinologist/general practitioner, Dr. Baker, and afterwards I stopped by the office for lunch and to visit with people. I'm getting around pretty well now, and I'm barely taking any painkillers. I should be able to get out for walks now. Big improvements. In three months, I get my first gynecological exam, and a chance for Dr. Baker to check out Dr. McGinn's handiwork. I think he'll be pleased with what he sees.

Starting next week, I think I'll start working on some projects around the house, as allowed within my rigorous dilation schedule (6x per day for the first 2 months). Gardening and painting, mostly. I'm not sure how much of a pain that's going to be, what with being in a near-constant state of preparing for or cleaning up after household chores and dilation. I guess we'll see. I can't wait until I can get out and run again, but that's still a few more weeks away. At least I can walk, almost sort of bend over, and sleep on my side again. Last night, I slept almost 9 hours straight for the first time in weeks. I'd have slept longer, but Alison called me and woke me up at 8:30. She's doing well, too. She's planning to go out shopping tomorrow. She's back here in 4 days. Can't wait to see her.

This is the point in the recovery where it feels like everything I just went through is starting to pay off. Things are going well, and there's no major discomfort or pain. If I hadn't already written extensively about the past two weeks, I'd probably tell people in retrospect that it wasn't all that bad. Memory works funny. In the end, though, it was difficult and painful but worth it. At least I think it's worth it. I'll know for sure in about 30 or 40 years. And even if it wasn't, I guess it was just something I felt like I had to do. So I did it, and here I am, and I'll deal with whatever comes next. So far, so good.

Right now, all I've got to deal with is the drudgery of the aftercare and feeling like I'm cooped up in the house. I was practically a shut-in for years before I transitioned, though, and I've always excelled at tedious, repetitive tasks. I've made a career of it, even. This won't be a problem for me.

I don't feel all that different (I mean except that I feel sore and kind of swollen), but I wasn't expecting to, either. I don't have any regrets, despite the ordeal I just went through, and I'm glad I did it.

There is the finality of the thing, though. Not so much a regret as a realization: there's no going back now. Only forward. Wherever that takes me. Good.

--------

Side note: I'm glad the new slash polls are such a big hit. Nearly 29 of you voted in the last one, and 50% of those polled said that the slash polls rock (or possibly that you like cats -- it's hard to interpret the results of these polls). I only added a poll to the top of my blog in the first place when I wanted to sort of keep track of how many people had visited (before I figured out how to add a hit counter). This new format allows you to convey twice as much information per click. I think it's going to revolutionize polling as we know it. You keep voting, and I'll keep coming up with useless poll questions and then discarding the data afterwards. That's a promise. I mean, until I get bored with the idea.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Days 8 to 12

2009-03-14T17:45:00.005-04:00

[This post is a continuation of my series on my sex reassignment/gender confirmation surgery. See prior posts in the series here, here, here, here and here (now with pictures!)]

Addendum

I forgot to mention a couple of things in my prior entry. I knew I would. It's hard to remember everything that happened over a week when you're lying on your back unable to type (except on the iPhone, but I didn't take notes). I probably latched onto most of the stuff that was easy to recollect, like the times I was in agonizing pain. Most of the first week post-op was tolerable if uncomfortable, though. Some of it was interesting in ways. All in all, it was an ordeal, but looking back at it now, I'm starting to forget the pain and misery and recall the parts that were almost pleasant. I could see how months or years from now, it might not seem like it was all that bad. I guess painful things go like that, sometimes.

The only things of real importance that I left out, though, were the phantom limb sensation and the orgasm. They're kind of related.

That first day when I woke up in my hospital room, my immediate sensation was not one of severe pain, but more of a dull ache. The weird part of the pain was that I could still feel every part of my former male anatomy, and nothing felt out of place. I wasn't really expecting that. I thought I'd lose sensation for the most part at least for starters, but it felt as though I still had all my nerves in place. Little twinges of pain were in easily identifyable parts of my body, and at the time, my mind was still identifying my old parts as being configured as they used to be. So, basically, when I woke up after surgery, I still felt like I had a penis, albeit one that felt pretty bruised up. I guess maybe that's not unexpected, but I hadn't really thought through what it would feel like after surgery. I'd describe it as feeling exactly the same as before.

My second night in the hotel (early in the second morning, really), I woke myself up with a shock. I'd been having an erotic dream, details of which I won't go into, but in my dream anyway, I had an orgasm. I woke up in severe pain with lots of blood rushing to my pelvic area. I was seriously worried I had ruptured something. It was not at all pleasant, and it hurt for some time after. I guess the orgasm (if it really was one) was pleasant enough, but I was asleep for that part. Kind of scary, really, when I'd just been through so many problems with bleeding. In the end, though, I was fine, and I guess my body knew what it was capable of handling. Probably having so much sensation and swelling in that area caused a bit of arousal once I had healed to a certain point, and then my unconscious mind sort of took the ball and ran with it (or so to speak).

In the end, I didn't like having that scare or the pain, but I was somewhat relieved that sensation in my newly-rearranged genitalia seems to be working nicely. That was actually a big fear of mine, losing sensation.

Day Eight (Tuesday, March 10)

Dr. McGinn gave me some instructions to get ready for taking out the catheter. Over the past several days, I was supposed to spend 4 hours at a time crimping the tube to allow my bladder to fill up. Something about training the bladder muscles so that when we take it out, I don't have trouble peeing.

I think my record over the past 4 days has been about 2 hours, and usually by the time an hour went by, I'd be in extreme pain. I spent a lot of time not following that instruction. It really, really hurt. I don't know why, but it might have had something to do with the fact that I was drinking huge volumes of water, and generating a lot of urine. I invented my own alternative exercise, which was less painful, which involved me consciously trying to pee and watching as the air bubbles in the catheter tube moved visibly. I did Dr. McGinn's shut-off thing when I could, but not very often, and I figured my bladder was still working as long as I could make the pee line move by sheer force of will.

Monday night I got more sleep than I expected. Good thing, because the catheter was seriously starting to bother me. It started to feel like it was jabbing me on the inside. Tuesday morning, I noticed that a lot of the tape holding the tube in place had come loose. That might have been why it started to hurt, from slight movements.

People had told me that getting the packing and catheter out were not all that painful. So far, almost everything that people told me wouldn't be all that bad had turned out to be all that bad. I went into my 9:30 am appointment with Dr. McGinn expecting the worst, but knowing that this was something I'd just have to get through.

I got dressed in the morning, had breakfast, and mom and I headed out to McGinn's office across the street from the hotel. It took me almost 1/2 hour; I was shuffling along at a snail's pace. I expected that. We got there early.

I closed my eyes for the first part of our check-up. Dr. McGinn made some comment about how I shouldn't look because she knows I can't stand the sight of blood. There was no need. My eyes weren't opening for anything at this point, and my whole body was braced. Dr. McGinn pulled out what felt like about 100 feet of ribbon from my vagina. I imagine it was covered in blood. It sort of tickled and felt weird, but it did not actually hurt. I was pleasantly surprised.

The catheter came next. Still, my eyes were firmly shut for this. It felt weird. Dr. McGinn fiddled with some things. I asked her if that was it, and she said no, that's just her deflating the balloon that keeps it inside me. Okay, take a deep breath. Zoom. Not painless, but quick. Not exactly painful, either. It's out. Thank god. Only, it didn't feel all that much better than having it in. I was expecting more relief. Oh well.

Last up for today was my dilation lesson. This is the part where my squeamishness really got in the way. Dr. McGinn held up a hand mirror for me to look at her handiwork, but I had a real problem not looking away. It looked like a big, swollen, gaping open wound. I needed a couple of minutes after the first glance, which was quite shocking. "Hey, you bought it. You gotta look at it." Okay, okay, just give me a second here to process this. Eventually, I got over it, and McGinn showed me how to insert the dilator. She made me do it myself to make sure I had it right. Aside from the shocking appearance, getting the dilator in wasn't all that difficult as long as I could find a way to relax my muscles. Hard to do when you're on edge, but I managed.

I left my first post-op appointment feeling okay, if a bit worried about my ability to do this six times a day. But, hey, I bought it, like Dr. McGinn said, so I better take care of it. I have good depth post-op. I don't want to lose it. Dilation is the only way to keep my body from trying to heal this cavity up. I'll figure out a way. I have no other choice here. Good.

The last thing Dr. McGinn wanted me to do before leaving was to make sure I could pee with the catheter out. Immediately after we took it out, I was feeling like I needed to pee. Now, not at all. I drank about 8 dixie cups of water while waiting in the reception area. Still nothing. Kathleeen, who had her surgery the day after mine, comes in to have her catheter out too. She gets it out a week after her surgery. I had to wait an extra day, because my swelling is so bad. Kathleen's wife Carolyn is there with her, and Kathleen seems to be quite a lot better at walking and standing than I am. I'm recovering slowly, I guess. Anyway, we chat and decide to get together tomorrow for dinner or something.

Lisa, Dr. McGinn's assistant, suggests I get a cup of coffee after Kathleen goes in for her appointment. The coffee does the trick almost immediately. I pee successfully, if erratically. I'm spraying all over the back of my thighs because of all the swelling. Anyway, I can do it. It feels a little weird, but the same muscles are involved as before. Everything still works. I'm happy. No big complications.

Mom and I grab lunch at SaladWorks, which is pretty good. Sitting is damned uncomfortable, but I can manage 20 minutes as long as it's in a booth. I pee again before we're done with lunch. This time's not as messy. Things are working okay.

The rest of the afternoon, I spend mostly resting and dilating. I figure Dr. McGinn's lesson counts as one dilation. I'm supposed to do six times a day, but today I'm starting after noon, so my goal is three more times, for a total of four my first day. That sounds reasonable. Tomorrow, I'll try for six. I decide to set up shop in the bathtub. It gives me a place I can lean back a little and brace myself with my feet. I sit on a towel (not a hotel towel; one I bought at Target for $4 when I was shopping for my supplies). It's kind of uncomfortable on my butt, but aside from that, it gives me a good place I can sort of relax my knees and sit my back at close to a 45-degree angle, which seems to be ideal for this.

Dr. McGinn gave me two dilators: pink and blue. There are 4 widths in all: purple (smallest), pink, blue, and orange (biggest). I'd heard before that she doesn't see the need for the purple one, which is too small to do much good, and the orange one is kind of frighteningly wide. You don't need that one, either, apparently. Anyway, I'm on pink for this week and next. Then maybe I move up to blue. We'll see.

I can get the pink one in pretty easily, as long as I relax my muscles. I'm very glad Dr. McGinn showed me how to do this. I'd have probably hit a stumbling block or two if I'd have had to figure it out myself. Anyway, getting it in isn't as tricky as I expected, but keeping it in for 1/2 hour is pretty much impossible. I'm too swollen. I manage almost 25 minutes before the pain is unbearable. I'm playing a game on my iPhone to try to distract me, and also keeping a countdown timer going. If I didn't have something to distract my attention, this would be horrible. As is, it's not really as bad as I expected, except for the part where I'm trying to last 30 minutes. The bathtub works well. I'll stick with that. Makes cleanup easy.

Mom suggests I try sitting on my foam donut we got to make sitting in a chair more comfortable. I use that my next dilation and it's much better. I get through my goal of three sessions for the day, although I don't make it the full 30 minutes any time. I'm getting it in deep, though. I'm doing what I can. This should work.

At the end of a pretty long day, I'm hoping to be a lot more comfortable sleeping without the catheter in me. I'm not. I'd kill for the ability to sleep on my side. I can't. I'm still too swollen.

Day 9 (Wednessday, March 11)

I'm going for six times today, and hoping I can make it close to 30 minutes now. Overall, I'm feeling lots more mobile than yesterday. Every day I'm getting much stronger. Climbing in and out of bed is almost not a project. I'm still spending most of my time lying down or dilating, but this is progress.

I try to stick as close to every 4 hours as I can: 2:30 am, 7:00 am, 11:00 am, 3:00 pm, 7:00 pm and midnight. Setup takes me about ten minutes. Cleanup about five. Since I'm struggling to go much past 20 minutes per session today, I'm usually done in under 40 minutes total. That leaves a lot of time to lie on the couch and try not to think about my next dilation.

I pop a couple of Tylenol or Motrin 20-30 minutes before each dilation. Motrin is supposed to help with the swelling, but I'm only supposed to take it every eight hours. Tylenol I can take every four. I seem to be losing stamina. I think my record today is about 25 minutes. I've got an appointment with Dr. McGinn tomorrow. I'll mention this problem and see what she thinks. Anyway, at least I'm getting the dilator all the way in. No problem there. It's only really uncomfortable after it's been sitting there a while.

Carolyn and Kathleen come over to our hotel for some wine and cheese and crackers and other assorted snacks my mom has prepared. We have a nice long chat. Kathleen is having more problems than I am at this point. She's not sitting, and gets tired after a while of standing around. I'm glad we scrapped our original plan to go out to dinner. I'm not really ready for that much sitting up either.

Day 10 (Thursday, March 12)

At 8 am, I have another follow-up appointment with Dr. McGinn. I'm up and dilating at 6:30. It only takes us 15 minutes to get over to the office this time. I'm getting a lot more mobile. I'm feeling good, even though the dilation really hurts.

Dr. McGinn checks me out and likes what she sees. I have good depth. Everything's healing really nicely. I'm still really swollen, which is what's causing me problems, but aside from that I look good. I can go home tomorrow if I want, but I should take it really easy, because too much walking around could make my swelling worse. I'm anxious to get home. My mom is, too. It's been a difficult past 10 days.

I get my paperwork from Dr. McGinn. I now have a letter officially proclaiming that in the eyes of the medical world, I am female. I don't feel a whole lot different than I did before the operation, but this is a big step nonetheless. I can get my IDs changed. I am physically female. Is it a dream come true? I don't know. It feels good though. It's reaffirming.

My friend Stacey from DC is up at McGinn's office for electrolysis today. She comes up here about once per month, doing not quite the full clearings I'm doing down in Texas at E3000, but close to it. She's doing about 7 hours of electrolysis today. Afterwards, she swings by and we go out for sushi. I've been craving sushi since I was in the hospital for some reason. We find a really good place nearby. It hits the spot. I spend all of dinner probably scaring the hell out of Stacey describing the ordeal I've just been through. She's going in November. She'll be fine, though. It's hard, but you get through it and in retrospect it doesn't seem like it was all that bad.

I'm ready to go home in the morning. It's going to be nice to get back to familiar surroundings.

Day 11 (Friday, March 13)

Friday the 13th. Good day for travelling, I guess. I dilate twice in the morning before we go. Dilate, shower, breakfast, pack, dilate. While I'm on my second session, my mom loads the car up. I'm not supposed to lift anything heavy for a while. I'm not allowed to help.

While I'm lying on the couch, my "Get Well Soon" balloon from my stepfather drifts right by the hotel window on its way to the freedom my mom has accidentally given it. It makes me laugh. I call her cell phone to tell her to make sure to be careful with my balloon because it's very special to me, but Mom left her cell phone here in the room. Joke spoiled. Oh well.

The drive back to DC is mostly not all that bad. We stop for gas and for lunch. It's supposed to be 3 hours. We should be hitting the beltway around 2:30, so we should beat rush hour. We don't. There's an overturned tractor trailer or something. We get home finally around 4:30. The last hour was kind of killing me, but I manage.

Dilate. Shop. Dilate. Cook. Dilate.

My time for the next 8 weeks is going to be scheduling my life around the dilations. Mostly at this point, they're not all that bad. But I don't have all that much time to do things with all this dilation. Oh well. Mom takes me shopping, so that I'll have some groceries for the week before she leaves tomorrow (she moved her flight up; my stepfather misses her). After eating out for a week, I really feel like eating a home-cooked meal, and I want to do something nice for my mom before she goes, so I cook us a corn and pepper frittata with homemade salsa, and some cauliflour and brocolli. It's pretty easy to make, and tastes nice and fresh, which is a good antidote to too much restaurant food.

I insist that Mom can't help cook, but she helps clean up anyway. It's our last night together. We watch a movie and I dilate again before bed. Five times today. Not bad, given that it was a travel day. Plus, it's getting easier now. I make it the full 30 minutes a couple of times.

Day 12 (Saturday, March 14)

I'm a little stiff and sore in the morning, but by afternoon, I'm feeling almost mobile. I can sit up for long stretches of time. I can make it the full 30 minutes on my dilations most of the time. Swelling's still bad, but down a lot. Things are healing nicely. I'm still taking it very easy. I think this is the point where a lot of girls get into trouble, thinking they're capable of more than they really are. I'm not looking for complications. I've had enough of an ordeal here.

My mom's flight is at 2:30. She's going to take the bus to the metro, since I probably still shouldn't drive her all the way there. I decide to drive her to the Metro (1.5 miles) when the bus doesn't show up, though. Of course, when my mom walks back to get my car, the bus comes, but hey. Driving's not really bad. I can do it. I'm not straining anything. I'm being really careful.

Several of my neighbors cleaned up my back yard (a catastrophe of weeds, and one of my projects for this recovery time) as a welcome back present. Sharen from next door also cooked me some chicken and brought it over. Everyone's been so amazingly nice and supportive throughout my transition. I know other girls who have become social pariahs with their neighbors after transitioning. My friends, family, coworkers, and neighbors have been just, well, amazing. I'm really lucky. These past couple of weeks have been hard, but they've reminded me of what a great support network I have here.

From here on for the next several weeks, I only need to take things easy and stick to my dilation. I can pretty much take things from here. I'm doing really well.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Days -1 to 7

2009-03-10T14:08:00.006-04:00

[I've been unable to get at my laptop for a week, so this one's a big update. I'll probably misremember some things and get some of the details wrong. What follows is my recollection of the events from the night before surgery through a week post op (yesterday). Enjoy.]

In my prior post, I said I'm not brave. I've confirmed that pretty well. I am able to put myself into a situation where I'm scared as hell and have no choice but to move forward. Is that courage? Stupidity? Determination? Some combination? Well, whatever it was, I did that...

Day Minus One (Sunday)

Sunday morning, my mom and I drove up to Bensalem, PA. There wasn't anything I needed to do until 4 or 5 pm, but we got up there around 1 and met my friend Lisa, who lives in nearby Philadelphia for lunch. For some reason, there are no open coffee shops in the area, but my iPhone guides us to several nonexistent and closed places before we settle on a cheesy local diner. I'm on nothing but clear liquids today, and have been on a liquid diet since yesterday, so the orignial plan was not to go to a place that serves real food, but here we are. My french onion soup (I just ate the broth) is actually pretty satisfying. The diner's playing an odd mix of music from Lisa's and my high school days (crappy '80s rock). It's awesome.

I get back to the hotel just in time to start on my surgery preparations at 4 o'clock. Driving around looking for coffee takes longer than you'd think. I've heard that this part is rather unpleasant. It is, but not for the reasons I'm expecting. At 4, I drink half a bottle of magnesium citrate (laxative). It makes me feel slightly queasy for a few minutes, but it's not even bad tasting. I watch a couple of DVDs. Nothing happens. At 8, I drink the other half of the bottle. I'm expecting this to clean me out. Nothing. Some minor grumbing in my intestines, but otherwise this isn't doing anything. I start to worry.

Around 9:30, I page Dr. McGinn. I had heard to expect to spend half the night on the toilet. The fact that I haven't gone once even makes me worry something's wrong. She says not to worry and to use the enema (last step in this process) in the morning as planned. I'm probably just already mostly cleaned out from being on the liquid diet 2 days straight.

Day Zero (Monday -- Surgery Day)

I actually slept pretty well, surprising me. Shouldn't I be more of a wreck? I get 5 hours of restful sleep though, and get up at 4:30 am to do the last step. I've never given myself an enema before. I'm not really sure what to expect, so I administer it to myself in the bathtub. Clear liquid goes in. About 3 minutes later, clear liquid comes back out. Nothing. Now, I'm really worried, but I can see what McGinn thinks in an hour.

My mom asks me at a little after 5 if it's okay that she takes a shower. She doesn't want to tie up the bathroom for obvious reasons. I tell her it's fine. About 1 minute after she gets in the shower, I have a sudden urge. Of course. Luckily, the hotel has a ladies room off the lobby. The enema has the desired effect, and I feel pretty much cleaned out and a lot less worried. This was the one thing I was supposed to do the night before surgery after all. Anyway, it's a relief.

We get to the hospital a little before 6 am, right on time. We check in, I have blood drawn, I change into a hospital gown and I'm lead over to "Short Procedures". I thought 4 or 5 hours was a long time to be in the OR, but maybe not. I guess that's comforting in a way.

Dr. McGinn is there right on time. She had warned me the night before that we might not start on time because Philly was forecast to get 10 inches of snow the night before. I told her I didn't have any big plans for the rest of the day anyway, so that was fine with me. My little joke. Anyway, she made a point of being there early to check on me and how I'd done with the bowel prep. I told her it was fine, in the end. All according to plan, or sort of, anyway.

I don't know why a doctor would schedule surgery for 7:30 am, but it does have the benefit of not giving me much of the morning to fret over all the things that could go wrong. The nurse sticks an IV in my arm (I hate needles, but I'm coping pretty well) and then the anesthesiologist comes over and shoots something in my arm. That's all I remember. I have no recollection of getting wheeled into the OR, having the mask put on me, or of waking up in the recovery room. I think I went to sleep in the prep room, then woke up in my hospital bed, although Dr. McGinn says I spoke to her in the recovery room. I talk in my sleep all the time, though.

Around 1 pm Monday I'm wide awake in my hospital bed. I'm not the least bit groggy or disoriented. I feel like I've just woken up from a really good night's sleep. Everyone told me I'd be groggy and incoherent and might be drifting in and out or have trouble focusing. I feel absolutely fine except for a minor soreness in the groin area. I feel very much awake. A little talkative, maybe, but lucid.

I also feel something else: relief. I've been fretting this decision to go through with the surgery for months. I was stressed over choice of surgeons, getting the paperwork and preparations together, and the question of whether I should even do this at all. Now all of those are done deals. No more choices in front of me. I don't know that I made the right decision, but I'm no longer at all worried about it because my path is set. I chose to have surgery. I chose Dr. McGinn. I got through preparations. I only have one thing left to do, and that's to recover. I still don't know how hard it's going to be (if I did I'd be very, very scared), but there's no choice in the matter. Get better or die trying. I feel very relieved and comforted by this. A huge weight is off me.

Most of the next 40 hours after surgery I spend wide awake. I get tired eventually, but it's like my mind won't shut off. I'm pressing the morphine drip button every 10 minutes like clockwork. I figured out pretty early on that if you press it before 10 minutes are up, it beeps 4 times in rapid succession and gives you no morphine, but if you press it at any point after the timer has reset, it gives you a dose of morphine and one long beep. I usually start pressing it after 8 minutes or so, and just keep pushing the thing until I get a long beep. Since I'm not sleeping, I'm pretty much getting the maximum dose.

Mostly, I'm okay for the first day, but it's uncomfortable lying on my back for such a long time not being able to sleep. I'm glad I have my iPhone. I can write emails and listen to music and it's easy to hold in front of my face.

The nurses at Lower Bucks Hospital are very nice and extremely sympathetic for the most part. There's one nurse who seems intent on rolling me over on my side a little more roughly than I'd like, and seems generally sour, but the rest are very cheerful. I try to be cheerful and friendly back, for the most part. They seem to be having some trouble figuring out what Dr. McGinn wants them to do with me, and later I find out that I'm actually the first surgery she's done at this hospital. I knew we had to change hospitals last minute, because the other one was taken over by a Catholic organization that didn't approve of this type of surgery, but I thought Lisa, Dr. McGinn's assistant, had told me I wouldn't be the first. Gulp. I'm not thrilled with this bit of news. Someone's got to be the first, but I'm not crazy about it being me. Especially when it seems like they don't know what they should be doing with me (roll her and change her dressing or let her lie still, but in a pool of her own blood?). They seem to have checked with Dr. McGinn and she wants me mostly undisturbed for now, to give me a chance to stop bleeding, but they're also concerned with the fact that I'm lying in a little pool of my own blood.

I'm still feeling okay, and I can't do anything but lie here anyway. I feel like it'll all work out in the end, I'm sure. I keep pressing the morphine drip. Whatever's happening to me, I don't want to feel it.

Day One (Tuesday)

At 4:30 am on Tuesday, one of the nurses, Stephanie, thinks maybe she should roll me and change the pad under me, since Dr. McGinn will be checking in on me later in the morning, before her surgery for that day. I tell her I think Dr. McGinn doesn't want me moved, and anyway she should be here soon enough. She seems unclear, but is willing to go with my plan. I'm really, really, really not looking to be the one in charge of this project. I want it to go like this: you tell me what to do and I do it. I don't have any medical training. But in this one instance, I'm pretty sure it's better to just wait. It was. Dr. McGinn doesn't want me moved. I'm still bleeding a lot. It's better to let me lie in a little pool of blood than to roll me over and make it worse. Sounds good to me. Let's go with her plan. She has fancy certificates on her wall, and seems to know what she's doing. She's done this before. It's the rest of us that are going through it for the first time here.

By Tuesday afternoon, I'm wishing I had gotten some sleep the night before. I also kept my mom awake all night, since she insisted on staying and sleeping in a chair in the room with me that night. I think I slept maybe an hour and a half and she couldn't have slept more than three all night. Details are somewhat fuzzy, but by late morning, I'm feeling sort of cranky and I can taste salt in my mouth. I really don't like the IV drip. I feel sort of bloated and not very good, and I feel like I should feel hungry since I haven't eaten solid food now in almost 4 days, but I'm not hungry at all. I don't like the IV.

Dr. McGinn's supposed to be stopping by sometime around dinnertime, I'm told. I knew she had that other surgery today (actually on a friend of Jani's from Virginia Beach -- cool), so I don't know when she'll be here. I can have a sleeping pill tonight. That'll be fantastic to get some rest. Sleeping pills knock me out for hours and hours on end. I can't wait. I'd like it at 3 pm, actually, but I can't have it then. They want me asleep after 9 pm. I guess it's easier if you're sort of on a normal schedule, even though I don't really have a schedule here. I'm lying here. I have my mom (freaking out slightly wondering when McGinn's coming back as we get past 5 pm) and my iPhone and the TV. I tried to watch some daytime television, but this is seriously unwatchable. I remember now why I cancelled my cable a year and a half ago. I can watch DVDs on my laptop, too, but it's sort of hard to work, since I can't sit up at all. I'm completely supine, flat on my back.

By the time Dr. McGinn comes by at 8 pm, I'm getting pretty cranky and sick of not sleeping. I really want that sleeping pill. She asks me what happened, since I was so chipper this morning. I'm also running a bit of a fever now. At some point today they took me off the morphine and put me onto vicodin. I think the fever may have something to do with getting off morphine, but I'm not sure. My heart rate's at over 90 bpm (it was 50 going into surgery), so these things may be what's keeping me from sleeping. I'm bleeding more than she expected. I think when you're bleeding a dangerous amount, they probably tell you you're at the "high end of normal" to keep you from worrying. Dr. McGinn says my bleeding is at the "high end of normal", which makes me worry. She knew my blood clotting was slightly irregular going into surgery, but still good enough that she felt comfortable operating. I should be fine, but I can't sit up until tomorrow at least. This is starting to be torturous, the not sitting up part.

Tuesday night I force my mom to go back to the Ramada. I need her to have a good night's sleep. If she's stressed out, she's making me stressed out. I can tell she's really stressing the fact that I'm uncomfortable and there's nothing she can do about it. Anything she tries to do, like hassling Dr. McGinn or the nurses, is likely to be counterproductive. I sort of snapped at her about that, since I had been very patient waiting for Dr. McGinn to come back and she had been kind of fussy and insisted the nurses call her. My thinking is that if you call your doctor too much, you're bound to aggravate her, so if she says she's coming by around dinnertime, you don't start calling her until she's actually late, say at 9 or 10. Anyway, I feel bad about it. I am cranky and irritable. My mom's being great. I seriously would be scared as hell without her here looking after me and she's doing great. But she's tired, and I'm tired. We both just need a good night's sleep tonight. After she leaves, I send her a text message telling her how great she's doing and that I love her. She is. I do.

I finally get my sleeping pill at around 9. I'm mostly watching the clock as it kicks in at 10 pm. I wake up feeling very refreshed like I've gotten a good night's sleep. Then I look at the clock. It says 11:00. Can it be 11 am? No, too dark. Nobody here. Can I have slept an entire day? No such luck, as I look at my iPhone calendar. It's been an hour. Fuck. Seriously? Sleeping pills usually knock me out for 10 hours flat. I cannot endure waiting until morning in this position and wide awake. Why am I wide awake?

I press my call button for Stephanie, who is working her second night shift in a row. I can't even hear the familiar "ding, ding" out in the hall you usually get when you press the button. My door is closed, but still, it's dead quiet out there. This is turning into a horror film. I briefly consider calling my mom (Why, so she can run back here and find a nurse? She'll never go back to the hotel if I do that) or dialing the hospital's main line from my cell phone. Then I remember I have another phone on my bed. It must have like an operator number or something. Probably it works like room service in a hotel, right? Well, I can't figure the thing out, but it's a moot point, because Stephanie comes over the intercom and asks what's wrong. I'm in horrible pain from lying on my back, and it's keeping me from sleeping, that's what. She's coming over.

My options are limited, it turns out. No, I can't move my bed from being completely flat. McGinn's orders are that I have to stay flat because I'm still bleeding. No, I can't have another sleeping pill or vicodin, but I can have a Benadryl. I don't know what that is (later I find out it's an antihistamine -- yeah, those knock me right out), but I don't ask. Sure, give me that. I can also have another pillow under my head. I don't really understand why I can't move my bed up like 2 degrees, but I can prop myself up with a pillow, but I'm not in a position to argue here. Sure, another pillow and a Benadryl. Great. I decide that if I can prop my head up with a pillow, then I can also raise my legs a little, so I adjust my bed just slightly while Stephanie's off getting my pill. It's a big relief to move like 2 inches after being in this position for I don't know how many hours. 40?

I start watching an infomercial about how I can buy foreclosed homes for $300. Nah, I'm pretty sure if I wait for the market bottom, those will hit $200. I'll wait. I drift off to sleep, thankfully.

Day Two (Wednesday)

At 4:30 am, I wake up in pain. I took my last vicodin at 9 pm, so it's been a while. I'm allowed to have them every 4 hours. I buzz Stephanie, and tell her I'm in pain. She tells me I should have called for it earlier to stay ahead of the pain. I'm not sure how I could have done that given that I was asleep the past 5 1/2 hours. Oh well, I got a good night's sleep and I feel loads better.

My mom comes by around when they're serving breakfast. I'm really not hungry at all and they've still got this IV drip in my arm, which I hate. It makes me not want to eat much, but I drink some Ensure. I've been drinking these vile things the past couple of days. They have protein. Good for healing. Blech. I can't believe people drink these things.

By lunchtime I'm in okay spirits. Dr McGinn comes by and says I look like I'm doing much better. I am feeling a lot better. Much stronger. We're going to get me out of bed. Okay by me. It's not all that bad getting up, but I feel very lightheaded even propping my head up. Standing's okay. Not really painful at all, but it feels weird. I have a catheter and my groin is all packed up with lord knows what. I don't want to know, but it feels uncomfortable moving around. Still, it's nice to be standing up. My reward for a good 5-minute stand is that I can sit up now if I want. That's way better, even though sitting upright for long periods is sort of uncomfortable because it puts too much pressure on my wounds. Just being able to move feels great though. This is progress. I also get to have the IV out, and I can eat whatever I want, but I'm supposed to drink as much of this Ensure crap as I can choke down. Drinking nasty sugary-milk-flavored something is way better than feeling like crap with an IV in my arm though. No problem.

They inject me with something to help thin my blood, to minimize the risk of blood clots. I would have had this yesterday, but I was bleeding too much. Mom's really happy I'm progressing, and overall, day two after surgery is looking okay. My appetite is returning somewhat. Day two would have been the real turning point for me in my recovery except that I'm about to experience...

Day Three (Thursday)

This one's kind of a blur for me. I remember this much: at some point, it became clear that giving me the blood thinner was not a good plan. I'm back to bleeding a lot. I can roll myself over pretty good, so the nurses can change me, but we're still packing me with ice (forgot to mention that, but all the time I've been lying in this bed, they are putting three big ice packs on my groin) and every time we change the pad I'm sitting on, they say something like "you've still got a lot of discharge here." I assume this is mostly blood we're talking about. I don't care to look. I gross out easily.

Also, early in the morning, when the nurses change my pad, the nurse whose name I don't know but that my mom and I have been referring to as the "mean nurse" (all the other ones are super sweet) wipes me down kind of rough while turning me, and I feel a sharp pang on my right side, like a tear. The pain from this little maneuver stays with me for hours.

By afternoon, I'm back to lying on my back and we didn't get me out of bed all day. The pain from this is starting to get really bad. I'm not happy, and I really don't like taking this step back. But if my job is to lie here and not move, then I'm going to lie here and not move. I do what they tell me. I'm not the one who has to look at the blood, just the one who has to lie in it.

It's also my job to endure some severe pain, as Dr. McGinn fixes some serious swelling that I've got, I think on the right side where I felt the tear this morning. She puts in a drain. I don't know what that means, but it feels horrible. I'm crying while she does it. She injects me with morphine and then lidocaine. I'm a complete wuss when it comes to pain. I'm hitting the nurses up for vicodin usually by hour 3.5 in my 4-hour cycle. Today's my worst day by far.

My friend Lisa comes by to try to cheer me up. I play Uno with her, but I can only see my cards, not the stack. She could pretty much put anything down and tell me it's whatever card she likes, because I can barely turn my head enough to look. We each win a few games. I'm not 100% sure we're playing it right. I haven't played Uno in forever. It's nice to have company. My mom's best friend from high school also stops by briefly. She lives in Philly, too, and they're still in touch. They're going out for dinner.

Thursday night, I'm (I can tell from people's reactions) not looking so good. I'm pale. I'm feverish. I feel really weak, much weaker than this morning. I'm trying to keep my spirits up, but Dr. McGinn says I may not get out of the hospital as planned tomorrow, and I'll need a transfusion if I don't stop bleeding soon. I'm sorry. I'm not trying to bleed. Tonight's horrible, but I do manage to sleep some with a sleeping pill.

Day Four (Friday)

I wake up Friday feeling a little stronger. Definitely not as weak as yesterday, but not strong, either. I call for my vicodin, and about an hour after popping 1 1/2 of those is when I feel at my best. Three hours after (i.e. one hour until the next dose) is when I start feeling like I really need another. That last hour is getting tough to endure. I consider hoarding half a pill and taking that at the 3 hour mark, to even out the dosage and get rid of this horrible feeling, but I don't. I had my mom ask Dr. McGinn if I could just do 1 pill every 3 hours instead of 1 1/2 every 4 hours, but I can't. So that's that. I do what they say. They make me better. We each know our job.

Mom's job is to worry. That's what moms do. After Dr. McGinn comes in in the morning to check on me and sees that I'm doing better, she decides we'll get me out of bed again and see if I can walk. I can. It's not a big problem, really. Tiring, but I can do it. McGinn says that we'll get me up three times today and then see if I feel ready to move to the hotel. My bleeding's slowed down again and my hemoglobin count stabilized this morning, so I won't need a transfusion. My mom's after the nursing staff to get me up again around lunch, because the original schedule was to have me check out at 4 pm today. I don't really care about the schedule. I don't really feel ready to get out of here, although I'm getting noticeably better even by early afternoon. I just want to lie here and get some strength. I'm eating a lot. That's good. I'm drinking Ensures. That's vile, but good for me.

My second stroll around the part of the hospital immediately outside my room goes pretty well. I feel okay. I get to have my vicodin right before we get me up, so I'm generally feeling good for these little jaunts. When I'm not feeling good is right at 4:30 when my friend Dean shows up for a visit. Dean came up from DC just to visit me. He's such a nice guy. He brought a bunch of cakes he got in Chinatown in Philadelphia. I tell him I could eat 100 slices of cake, but really 1 is my limit. We've got a lot of cake.

Dean gets to see my Jekyl and Hyde routine, starting with Hyde. When Dean shows up I'm in my miserable clock-watching state. I'm staring at the clock on the wall feeling like shit and trying to calculate when is the earliest time I can call the nurses for more vicodin and have them give it to me. Usually, if I call them after 3 hours and 45 minutes, that's close enough to the four hour mark. It turns out I don't need to call them this time, because we're 20 minutes from my 3rd walk of the day, and they want me feeling good, so they bring me my pills without asking. First time they've done that.

At this point, it takes me less than 20 minutes to go from sweating and miserable to downright cheery and peppy after taking the vicodin. I'm a completely different person, ready to stand up and shuffle down the hall. I'm friendly as can be. 20 minutes ago, I was death warmed over. I don't like the vicodin cycles at all.

The third walk goes very well. I don't need the walker or anyone's help. I can go a long way. I feel pretty strong. We decide to call Dr. McGinn, who says she'll come by and see if I'm ready to check out. Meanwhile, Dean and I eat cake and chat. I'm glad to have him here. I told him already he can stay with me and my mom at our new suite, which I may or may not be moving to tonight. Turns out, I am. I can leave if I feel strong enough. I'm still a long way from recovering, but I don't need the nurses for anything. Sounds like a plan.

Getting over to the hotel is a bit hard on me. I'm really glad Dean's here to help my mom with the move. We share my mango cake with the nursing staff, who seem to really appreciate it. I manage to get out of the hospital and into the car easily enough, and the only big difference between the hotel and the hospital is that I can't adjust the bed. That makes things a little less comfortable, but I'm also in charge of the vicodin now. Once I get to the hotel, I decide to take a pill (I'm down to 1 pill every 4-6 hours instead of 1 1/2) after only 3 hours, since the move was hard and as a reward for getting out of there. 3 1/2 hours later, I'll be tempted to make that a permanent change in my schedule, but I don't.

The hotel I've booked (with the help of Lisa from Dr. McGinn's office) is really nice. We've got a giant suite with a big bed (for me) and another big room with two pull-out couches. It's very reasonably priced, and has plenty of room for me, my mom and an overnight visitor (Dean).

Dean and I chat and then watch a movie (American Splendor -- great film). I think I fell asleep before the end, but I wake up in time to take my next pill. I always wake up in time to take my vicodin.

Day Five (Saturday)

Dean's off back to DC (really off to Mexico on vacation, but by way of DC) in the morning, early. I'm mostly bored today, and I'm really starting to hate the vicodin cycle. I also notice that I'm not actually feeling any pain that the vicodin's getting rid of, just a craving for the way it makes me feel not horrible.

By noon, I decide I've got to start cutting back on the narcotics. Instead of a full pill every 4 hours, I'm going to take 1/4 of a pill and see if I can make it 3 or 4 on that. Not surprisingly, it makes the time I spend craving vicodin much longer and the relief not all that great. At 3:30 I pop another 1/4 of a vicodin and start a stopwatch on my iPhone, to see how long I can go before the cravings overtake me.

Dr. McGinn calls me in the afternoon to see how I'm doing. I tell her I'm not really in much pain, but I'm getting extreme cravings for the vicodin after 3 hours ("Uh, oh") and tell her about my plan to keep popping 1/4 of a pill instead of 1, to start to phase off them. She approves. I should have asked her if quitting cold turkey would have any kind of effect on my recovery rate, because by about 7 pm, I'm considering that giving the pills up altogether may be easier than trying to phase them out. I'm not sure I can make it, but I know I don't like this pattern where I'm feeling lowsy for 2 out of every 4 hours, and fine for the other 2. I decide if I can get to 24 hours on my stopwatch, I'm off the things. So I switch it to a countdown from counting up. 24 hours is my target.

This turns out to be a rough night, but I've just had several rough nights, so why not one more while we're at it? I lose my appetite completely (but manage to choke down some food, because I need to keep eating to get strong and recover), I feel hot (could just be hot flashes from hormonal changes), I feel generally sick, and I'm sweating like crazy. I still manage to get some sleep eventually, with the help of another Benadryl.

Day 6 (Sunday)

I'm still feeling the cravings for vicodin, but not nearly as bad. Honestly, getting to 8 hours without a pill was the hard part. The rest has been okay. At this point, I'm sure I'm on my way to kicking the habit. Unfortunately, I hadn't realized there actually was some pain in there the vicodin was masking, if I'd have ever given it a chance to wear off. It's a very tollerable level of pain though. I can deal with it, but I don't feel at all good. I'm taking Tylenol and Motrin now for the pain and swelling. I have a lot of swelling. I can't have my catheter out until Tuesday, because I'm so swollen. This sucks.

The hotel is comfortable, though, and I can get up when I need to. I'm getting up about 3 times a day. I can brush my teeth. I can use the bathroom (and empty my own catheter bag). A little independence feels good. I still need my mom here to bring me about 10 cups of ice water per day and to bring me food and (ugh) to help me change my maxi pad. Major bleeding stopped a couple of days ago, but I'm still needing a couple of pads a day. Well, anyway, I don't know how I could possibly have taken care of myself the past couple of days. It's really great that my mom is here for me.

Still, I'm basically where I've been for coming up on a full week now. I'm on my back about 23.5 hours per day. I can barely move. This is getting very tiring and frustrating. I can't wait for this goddamn swelling to go down because it's really uncomfortable. I can't wait until this catheter is out of me. This is all starting to wear me down. I'm trying to make the best of it, but I sort of wish I could just sleep for a couple of days here and avoid all this.

It'll be better soon, but not before it gets worse.

Day 7 (Monday)

If I were a normal person with a normal amount of bleeding/swelling, I'd have had this stuff out of me today or maybe even yesterday. Instead, I'm still here in bed all day.

On the one hand, I'm more mobile day by day. I can get up easier. I can stay up longer. I can wash my hair, and give myself a sort of bath with the big packs of wipes we took when we left the hospital (mom grabbed everything because they said they had to throw away everything we didn't take with us -- need any gauze? We have lots). So I'm not an invalid.

On the other hand, I can't sit up for very long without feeling the throbbing pain in my groin from the blood rushing to it. I am in a constant state of discomfort, varying from minor to extreme. Extreme discomfort is what I'm feeling tonight, when I'm about 11 hours away from getting the catheter and packing out. I'm starting to count down the hours, wondering how I can make it. I'm trying to sleep. I'm trying to distract myself. I'm wondering if this is all going to be worth the torture I'm putting myself through.

I know it will.

A lot of things are like this, I've found. They take so much work that if you knew how much it takes, you'd probably never do it in the first place. You'd give up before you started. But if you can stick it out, eventually it's totally worth it. Dean and I talked about this the other night. I said in a way it's nice because you can get all the bad stuff out of the way upfront and then it's good. You almost forget all the bad stuff, as long as you don't go foolishly writing it down in some kind of online journal where you're bound to go back someday and relive it. It's also nice if you can commit yourself to the point where there's only one option, which is to move forward. As hard as this is, I know I'll do the work and I'll get through the pain because I don't have any choice. I don't give myself the option to back out because it's too hard.

My whole transition has been like that in a way. A lot of the things that I've done that I was terrified to do, I've done because I didn't see any choice about it. I set myself up where the thing I want to do is actually the path of least resistance. Quitting is not an option.

As horrible as the past week has been at times, at some point I'll have forgotten all that pain, and I'll be enjoying the rewards of what I've done. I think that's a sensible plan, to have put myself in this situation.

Still, it bothers me that other transwomen seem to have little problem with this, and for me it's been everything I feared it would be. Or maybe they just won't talk about it, or forget how hard it is when they get past some of this difficult stuff. I just hope that this week is the worst of it. I need to start seeing some progress, or I'm going to ... well, ... keep going, since I don't see any other choice in the matter.

We'll see.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Day Minus 2

2009-02-28T21:46:00.003-05:00

I finished up the week at work easily enough. We had a little happy hour yesterday, and about 12 people showed up from work. That was fun. I didn't drink. I don't think my doctor said I had to give up alcohol, but I'd heard from someone that it was a good idea to cut it out going into surgery. Whatever helps.

I've been running around for what feels like a week straight, getting ready for my trip tomorrow. Everything on my list is done, except for packing, which is nearly done, too. I'm exhausted. Today, I also feel sort of weak and not quite myself. Maybe it's the hormone deprivation finally kicking in, or maybe it's just stress combined with hunger. I haven't had any solid food today, so aside from soup and fruit juice and a couple cans of Slim Fast, I haven't eaten anything. Tomorrow, I'm down to just clear liquids. I don't expect to be feeling very good tomorrow night. Last night, I got very lonely and just started crying uncontrollably after I went to bed. I really wished Alison had been there to hold me.

Monday, 6 am. That's my check-in time. I'm focused on that, and trying to distract myself until then, because the reality is that I don't have much to do between now and then, I'm terrified, and I don't feel great about any of this. I'll get past it, but not without a lot of pain and anxiety.

My mom is with me now to help me through this. I picked her up a few hours ago at the airport. She's going to be with me for the next two weeks. We'll drive up to Philadelphia together in the morning, then we're going to meet up with my friend Lisa who lives up there. By late afternoon, I start my surgery prep, which involves lots of laxatives. I spoke to Alison her night before surgery right after she had done her bowel prep. She sounded exhausted and miserable. I got a voicemail from her this morning, and she sounded even worse, even though she's doing well with her recovery. I wish I hadn't missed her call. I can't call her; I have to wait until she calls me again, and we're in timezones 12 hours apart.

My friend Jani and I talked for over an hour the other night, while she was recovering from her latest round at E3000. Jani is now 10 weeks post-op. She seemed tired and frustrated with the dilation. It seems annoying and very time-consuming. Jani was one of the most gung-ho people I've ever seen for this surgery. It would take a lot to break her spirit.

I'm hopeful I'll be happy with the results. I think I will be. Alison and Jani will be, too. It's just going to take going through a lot of not very pleasant stuff to get there. A lot of work.

People tell me they think I'm brave, but I'm really not. I don't feel at all brave, really. All I am is determined. Scared, but determined.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Day Minus 4

2009-02-26T19:35:00.002-05:00

I finally got home early enough to get out for a run before the sun set completely. First time that's happened all week. It felt really good. I was getting really sick of the gym. Running uphill on a treadmill for an hour in an empty gym while staring at a wall is probably a good metaphor for something, but it's also just damned boring, especially when someone changed the channel on the TVs from CNN to ESPN and they're showing boxing (blech!). I'm pretty sure I could at least have been watching President Obama as he tried to convince me things are gonna be all right.

Every other day this week, I've been getting home around 10 or 11 at night. Today, though, I finally got pretty much everything I need to do done at work before I go on leave, and so not only did I go home just after 5, I also decided that tomorrow morning I'll volunteer to answer the phones for our foreclosure hotline (and really, who wouldn't want a transsexual helping them with advice about their mortgage?), since I don't really have anything else much to do. Projects are all chugging along nicely, with documentation and plans all in place. They might screw everything up when I'm gone, but that won't be my fault. At least I'll know I left things in good shape.

Most of the rest of what I have to do between now and Monday is just packing, a few errands, and some shopping. My paperwork's all in place. I've been following my doctor's instructions. I'm all set, pretty much.

On Tuesday, when I went to Health Services to get the forms for my short-term disability, there was a new nurse running the place. I had to explain my condition all over, and she was very encouraging and enthusiastic. After I told her I was having sex reassignment surgery, she said something like, "Oh, so you'll be changing your name as part of this?" I just laughed and told her no, I've taken care of that already. Suzanne is the new name.

I think I've told that anecdote at least like 4 times now. I must be insecure. Well, it made me feel good most of the day.

Later on that day, I got seriously pissed off in a meeting, when I felt like I was being accused of trying to make a unilateral decision when really all I was doing was recapping a decision made by another group in a prior meeting -- a meeting I didn't even set up in the first place. I wrote an email to the offender telling him the points he was bringing up and the objections he had were good ones, and he should follow up on them, but I didn't care for his tone. "You're right, but lose the attitude," is how I closed it. We're still friends. Air cleared. I may have been extra sensitive from the hormone level changes. Can't really tell, to be honest, because I'm moody and stressed out when I'm on the hormones a lot of times, too. Anyway, I gave them all fair warning I might be flipping out this week. Storming out of one meeting in a week isn't a bad record on that. I've held it together pretty well, considering the pressure I'm feeling.

But not today. Today I got home early and I went for a run and then had some dinner, and everything that needs to be done is done, and everything I need to do is easily doable. I may be a mess in 4 more days, but right now I'm okay.

Oh, and halfway around the world, Alison should be checking in to the hospital for her surgery in about 1/2 hour. I should get an update on how she's doing by morning.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Day Minus 8

2009-02-22T14:26:00.002-05:00

I have a week left here in DC before I head up to Philly. One more week at work, a few miscellaneous things to do, and not much else. Really, I'm just tying up some loose ends and waiting for my surgery date. I'm not as freaked out by this as I thought I'd be at this stage. Maybe the reality of it hasn't completely sunk in yet.

I had my last appointment with my therapist, Dr. Payne, until after the surgery. We spent the session mostly just chatting, like we often do when I don't have anything that's really bothering me on my mind. She's genuinely excited for me, and I think a little proud of how far I've come. She said she wasn't expecting to feel so excited. She's made a huge difference in my life, and has helped me through some big changes. This upcoming change seems small compared to all the other stuff, but it carries a lot of weight. She gave me a hug at the end of our session.

I drove Alison to the airport this morning. She's on a plane to Thailand as I write this. I cried a little when I dropped her off, because I'll be a little worried about her (even though she'll be fine) and I won't see her again for a month. When she gets back, we'll both be pretty far along in our recoveries. Our surgery dates are 3 days apart. We can help each other through the rest of the process, whatever it entails (and I still don't want to know, because I scare easily).

I was glad I cried this morning. I guess I found out I'm not an unfeeling robot when denying myself estrogen and progesterone. It's been a week since I took any hormones, and I still don't really feel any of the bad effects from that I'd heard about. I feel okay, just a little less emotionally volatile. Yesterday, I ran from Alison's place to the Capital (3 miles), then around the National Mall and back to her place. A little over 10 miles in all, I think. I felt fine, although it was a little longer than I'd been used to running since the cold weather set in. Maybe lots of exercise helps offset whatever sorts of hormonal hangover symptoms my body was supposed to be feeling. I want to run a lot this week, anyway. I'll be taking probably 5 weeks off from running, and I want my legs to be strong going into that.

Alison and I spent a lot of time together this week, largely for the same reason. I'm gonna miss that crazy girl. But not so much her zombie impersonation, which is a little too convincing and genuinely scares me (plus, she bites!). Okay, it makes me laugh, too, but it is scary -- trust me.

Back to my upcoming surgery, I've been thinking a lot about why I even want to do this. I figure it's a good time to think that through, before I actually go through with it. Part of the reason is definitely for convenience. There are situations (locker rooms, hospitals, jails, having sex, wearing tight jeans) when not having the genitalia expected of your sex can be an uncomfortable or dangerous situation. I don't think that alone is such a great reason to go through with such a painful, difficult and expensive operation, but it can help. A bigger factor is that I can't conceive of a situation where I'd really feel comfortable anymore with the male equipment nature chose to bestow on me. It all works and everything (although I don't produce sperm anymore, I can still produce plenty of erections and orgasms and such), but it doesn't feel at all right. I think I'll feel more comfortable just in general with genitalia that looks female. And then there are the medical reasons, too. I can't go on taking spironalactone (anti-androgen) forever, because it's not good for you long-term. You've got to get rid of the source of testosterone one way or another. This seems like the best option to me for that (there is one other, mind you) and there's no way I'm going back on testosterone.

All in all, then, I don't have any real reservations about this, except for the idea of what I'm about to go through scares the hell out of me. It won't be so bad in the end, and even if it is, I'll get through it and it will have been worth it. Seems funny to me that I'm comfortable with this. Sex reassignment surgery was not something I used to see as something I'd ever want, and that was one of the main reasons I couldn't conceive of transitioning even two years ago. Now, it feels like something I really need to do.

One more week. It's coming up fast. Let it come. I'm ready.

My Feminizing Genitoplasty Surgery Diary: Day Minus 10

2009-02-19T23:41:00.005-05:00

[This is the first in a series of posts in which I will document my upcoming surgery and recovery. Yes, there will probably be pictures. No, definitely not of that -- think more along the lines of me in a hospital bed giving a thumbs-up sign while grimacing in pain.]

I think "sex reassignment surgery" or "sex-change operation" are currently the most commonly-known terms for the procedure I'm scheduled to undergo in 10 days, but those terms are out of favor with the trans community. I really don't feel like going into a big discussion on why the terminology is so sensitive, or writing about how I feel about it (hint: I don't really care except that I prefer to be understood), but since I don't much like any of the other terms being thrown about these days, either, I'm going with what Wikipedia claims is the medical lingo: "feminizing genitoplasty".

Actually, I kind of like that. It gets around the objections I've heard to the other terms ("you're not really changing your sex") while having certain clarity some of the other terms lack (e.g. "gender confirmation", "gender affirmation" -- I don't think surgery's a good tool for confirming things so much as fixing them, and I feel pretty affirmed in my chosen gender as is, besides). Okay, feminizing genitoplasty it is then. "Vaginoplasty" is the other medical term I've heard for it, but it lacks pizzaz. "Getting your dick chopped off" is probably closer to the street patois, and certainly has flare, but it seems a touch informal, and also it's a terribly inacurate picture of what the procedure actually entails.

Not that I know a whole lot about what the procedure entails, but as I was explaining earlier today to my friend Rob when he asked me what am I going to do with it after the surgery ("donate it to a female-to-male transsexual?"), very few parts are actually wasted in this procedure. It's a rearrangement, not a lopping-off. I don't really want to know more about it. I am very squeamish about medical stuff. Fortunately, I don't need to know. I am paying Dr. McGinn to do this, and even though I never technically saw any credentials, I am pretty sure she must have gone to medical school or at least watched a video on how to do this. She's the one that has to know what to do with all the parts, not me. I plan to be asleep.

For my part, I'm trying to get myself as healthy and ready for this as possible. I've got a whole list of things to do: foods to avoid, places to shave, medicines to take and not to take. I went off my hormones three days ago. I don't get to go back on them until two weeks after surgery, because they can cause blood clots, which could kill me during (or presumably after) the operation. Not dying is a big part of my contribution to this process. That and $16,500.

I was expecting that getting off the hormones would have a bigger effect on me than it has so far. It's only been three days, so maybe the worst is yet to come, but I thought I'd be bitchy and moody and miserable. If anything, I feel less emotional and more steady. I don't like the feeling. It feels ... wrong. I'd almost rather be a mess. I feel like I should be an emotional wreck, like that would make more sense. Instead, I feel pretty calm and more or less in a kind of jokey mood. I also feel colder than usual, and tired. The tired part is probably because I went to the gym after therapy tonight and ran 6 miles on the treadmill then did the stationary bike for 40 mins (while watching Ann Coulter on Larry King Live -- am I trying to punish myself?) and then had a sauna.

Which, by the way, gives me another good idea for a name for this operation: "make-me-not-feel-like-a-total-fucking-freak-in-the-women's-locker-room surgery". Because that's a big part of it. I'll still find lots of things not to like about my body, but at least I won't be quite so frantic to cover it up with a towel once this is over.

Anyway, maybe in a couple of days, I'll be a complete mess from the hormone changes. Let's hope. For the next 10 days, I'll be trying to eat healthy, get lots of rest, and exercise a lot. When this all goes horribly wrong in the end, I don't want it to have been my fault. We'll see in about two weeks.

Fragile

2009-02-17T00:35:00.003-05:00

Alison's got to be sick of me poking fun at her for beating me up on Valentine's Day, so I won't do it here, even though she doesn't read my blog and probably never will. The fact is that she knocked a champagne glass off the edge of the bathtub completely by accident (while trying to move the flowers she got me for Valentine's Day out of my way), and by some strange happenstance, the glass just happened to fling directly into my eye in such a way that it both cut me and gave me a black eye. I can't really explain how, because the glass itself didn't even break, and it doesn't have any sharp edges. I bled a fair bit and although it's healing fine, my eye is still pretty bruised up.

The rest of the evening up until that point had been perfectly nice, with a quiet evening at my house relaxing and cooking dinner (a shrimp curry noodle dish of my own invention that Alison had seconds of and then polished off the leftovers for lunch the next day, so I guess she liked it) and splitting a bottle of wine and then a bottle of champagne and a nice bubble bath. The rest of the evening after the champagne glass incident involved us driving to the all-night drugstore for medical supplies, with me bleeding and crying and probably not in the best frame of mind to be driving at all in the first place.

Alison picked a bad time to accidentally cut my face. I was already self-conscious about the fact that I was still a little swollen and sore from my last marathon electrolysis session in Dallas two days before. I was still holding a lot of stress from the past few days and worries over my upcoming surgery. I was half drunk. And then there's the fear... and this brought it out again suddenly and in a big flood: that fear that here I'm already working pretty hard just to try to look feminine, and that at some point I won't be able to keep that up. It's vanity, I suppose, but it's hard not to be a little obsessed about your looks when they won't match your gender identity if you leave them up to nature. When you feel like you're working as hard as you can, and you're not making any headway at all, a minor setback can seem like a tragedy.

Anyway, I'm fine now. I felt silly even at the time bawling like a child over a fairly small cut, but in my weakened mental state, it was already distorting itself into a hideous scar. I knew I was overreacting, but I guess I also knew I just needed to let some things out, and so I did. Alison felt horrible about hurting me, and I felt horrible making her feel so guilty in turn. To her credit, though, she didn't get mad at me or tell me I was being stupid, which I was and I knew it. She just let me cry and then she put some ointment and a band-aid on my cut and then she held me and told me it would be okay.

In the end, I guess it was a pretty nice Valentine's Day.

My E3000 Diary: Clearing #4

2009-02-13T01:25:00.010-05:00

This is my fourth in a series of posts documenting my experiences with Electrology 3000 in Dallas, TX, which specializes in hair removal for people who are transgender, like me. Go back and read the first, second, and third installments as well, if you like.

Wednesday, February 11:

I haven't shaved since Saturday, and I'm extremely happy with the amount of beard shadow I have left at this point. I didn't feel all that self-conscious flying with some stubble the last two trips, and this time it's almost not even on my mind, because you really can't see it unless you look close. At work this week, nobody notices at all that I haven't been shaving. So I point it out to people: "Look close. I have stubble! See that? I haven't shaved since Saturday." I am bad at being "stealth" at work.

I've got a 5:00 flight from Baltimore, with a 2-hour layover in Charlotte. I leave work a little after 2 pm after a remarkably productive morning and a quick lunch with some friends outside (it's over 60 degrees in DC today -- can't miss a chance to eat outside on a day like this in February). Anyway, I'm glad to get a bunch of things done at work today, because I'll be out the rest of this week, Monday's a holiday, and two weeks after that is my surgery. I have a busy couple of weeks ahead to get things ready for me to be gone starting in March.

Speaking of surgery, here's a quick sidebar:

E3000 (Dallas) versus Papillon Center (Philadelphia)

In preparation for surgery, besides the trips to Dallas for facial and genital electro, I made one trip two weeks ago up to Dr. Christine McGinn's office outside of Philly. Her office offers full-service transitioning help, including electrolysis similar to what E3000 does, but it's much closer to me. I'm also going to Dr. McGinn for my sex reassignment surgery (or "gender confirmation surgery" if you prefer).

The techniques are basically the same. Papillon charged $100/hr versus the $150/hr E3000 charges for "South Pole" work. Dr. McGinn's office is only set up to handle one electrologist at a time working on you, plus as of this writing, she only has one electrologist on staff. Overall, I'd say the injections themselves hurt slightly less with Dr. McGinn, but that might have been because I popped a vicodin beforehand. The electrolysis was slightly more painful but was very tollerable. Total time to clear my genital area was 3 hours, versus 2 at E3000, but I think some of the extra time was due to the fact that there was some confusion about how much needed to be cleared. E3000 technicians are more experienced and have handled lots of sugical prep work. I got a larger area cleared at Papillon Center, some of which may not have been necessary, but it's probably still good to get rid of some of that excess hair.

I had horrible, excruciating pain the evening after my clearing with Papillon Center, starting about 6 hours after the treatment. It felt like shooting and burning pain in the genital area, mainly at the lidocaine injection points. It was so bad the first night, I called Alison and Jani on the phone to cry. I have a theory that possibly Dr. McGinn used a thicker needle, which left me with a lot more soreness. My groin was bruised and sore for about a week. With E3000, I had some minor soreness afterwards for a couple of days, but no real pain to speak of.

It could also have been a fluke, or it could be because I got more electrolysis with Papillon Center (3 hours). If that's the case, I highly recommend not doing more than 2-hour sessions. I'm sorry that I won't be able to experiment with that anymore for you, but I'm done with surgical prep work (And thank god -- I did not at all enjoy my time spent getting needles stuck in my ... well, down there -- some people actually might, but more on that later).

Wednesday, February 11 (again):

I've got a pretty tight schedule in mind for this trip. I'm supposed to get in to Dallas at 10:15 pm. I've got a rental car lined up and a hotel near E3000, in Addison. My flight back to DC is for Thursday at 8:15 pm. Like last time, I figure it's easier to fly back the same night as my clearing, since swelling is always worse on the day after treatment.

On the way back, I'll have a direct flight home, but for this flight, I'm stopping over in Charlotte. I think I did the same thing last trip. The Charlotte airport sure has a familiar look to it. No, wait -- I think I stopped here on my way down to Jacksonville, FL for my grandmother's 90th birthday. Yeah, that would make more sense, because that's actually on the way to Florida. I don't think Charlotte's on the way to Dallas, because the 2nd leg of my flight today is 3 hours, which is about the same as DC to Dallas. Anyway, layovers and delays are about to make this a long day for me...

As soon as I land in Charlotte, within 100 feet of getting off the plane, I get called "miss" and "young lady". I almost always get "ma'am", generally. I strongly prefer "ma'am" to "sir", of course, but "miss" has a nice, youthful ring to it, and "young lady" just about makes my freakin' day. Yeah, I like Charlotte. I think I may have to move here. According to their standards, I am both young and a lady, both of which are very much open for debate in most other places, trust me.

One problem with Charlotte, though, is that they're not equipped to handle a light drizzle any better than DC is equipped to handle snow. If you've ever been in DC for the first dusting of snow of Winter, you know what I mean. Anyway, all the flights out are delayed, and mine is no exception. We push off from the gate about 20 minutes late, then sit on the runway for about an hour, watching plane after plane take off southbound. The captain periodically comes on the intercom to tell us about how they keep stopping all of the westbound flights because of winds, plus there's a lot of westbound flights ahead of us even if they did start letting us take off. It doesn't look all that windy. The pilot's very vague about even guessing how long this is going to be, but he doesn't sound at all optimistic when he says "folks, ... er, it looks like it's gonna be... er... at least another 15 minutes I'd say..." over and over again.

After an hour of this, I suggest to the woman next to me that maybe we could take off heading South, then, you know, once we're up in the air, maybe the pilot could turn the little steering wheel thingy a bit to the right. I'm sure I've seen them perform this sort of maneuver before in fancy Hollywood movies and air shows and suchlike. She agrees it's a good idea. If she and I were flying the plane, we'd be up in the air as of 45 minutes ago (or, more likely, possibly crashed someplace by now, but definitely not sitting on the runway). We finally take off well over an hour late in any case.

We don't make up any time in the air. I remember when airlines used to do this (and offer you free alcohol when you were delayed an hour), but that was before jet fuel prices went way up. Also, they're charging $2 for a soda now. Screw that, by the way.

I land in Dallas at 11:45 and hop the shuttle to the rental counter. Fortunately, Hertz is still open. Some of them seem to be closed. I'd be taking a lot of cabs if I didn't get a car tonight. Maybe next time I should book an earlier flight. I was trying to fly as late as possible so I could work at least half a day today. Some of you who follow my blog closely may wonder why. I'm not sure I know, but bear in mind that anything I write here about work is usually me venting, so you only see the bad stuff. I guess I still feel a fair bit of loyalty to my company. They are giving me paid sick leave for this electrolysis, which doesn't eat into my vacation time. That's really pretty nice of them, when you get down to it.

I swing by a CVS for essential supplies: a can of soup (clam chowder, low sodium), a chocolate bar (Green and Black's) and toothpaste (I couldn't find my travel-sized one). I check in to "America's Best Value Hotel" in Addison (hey, I didn't name it -- it's $45 a night though) at 1:30 am. The front desk clerk looks very sleepy. I am, too. So sleepy that I decide not to go back to the front desk when room 109 turns out to have been slightly used since it was last cleaned. All the towels have been used, save one, and the bed is still made but the pillows are piled up like someone was sitting on it watching TV. Good enough. I've got one clean towel. The room doesn't smell bad and seems okay. I fall asleep right away, after a really long day.

Thursday, February 12:

I've arranged to meet my friend Lisa for breakfast at 8 am. She lives pretty near this area. She also lives right near George W. Bush's new place. I live right near Dick Cheney's new place. I think she got the better of that deal, neighbor-wise.

Breakfast was nice. We chatted about a bunch of stuff, including my upcoming surgery and Lisa's massage school. The morning's off to a nice start, and it's a gorgeous day in Dallas. 70 degrees and sunny. I'm popping vicodin and advil in preparation for E3000, and I also smear some aloe and lidocaine lotion on my face. I don't know if that will help any with the shots, but it's worth a try.

9:30 am. I'm ready for round 4. I've got Sabrina and Star again. They're a good combination for some interesting chatter. Our conversations revolve around such topics as Star's upcoming due date (a boy, due in April), my upcoming surgery, the woman who gave birth to octuplets, movies, Hollywood hunks (and some who haven't aged well), the pregnant man (Star and Sabrina: that's weird. Me: yeah, pretty much), other celebrity transsexuals, and creepy E3000 wannabe clients who seem to just want to have the ladies inspect their private areas. I ask Sabrina if anyone has ever gotten -- erm -- excited when undergoing the genital electrolysis. Oh yeah, and they're outta here fast is the reply. I suppose maybe that leaves a niche business possibility for someone else out there.

Anyway, today is probably the closest I've had to having fun in the chair (appropriate girl-talk fun, mind you, not the other kind -- get your minds out of the gutters). I mean except for the shots, which are about as not fun as non-fun gets. I'm a big baby, though, honestly. Except for around the lips, this level of pain is not at all intollerable. It's really my aversion to shots that's killing me and making me whimper with each injection. I just hate shots. I hate them even if they don't hurt. I hate them more when they do hurt. These do. The vicodin is a big help. I pop another at lunchtime, and I'm downing Advil like they're Tic-Tacs all day. Someone (Lisa in Dr. McGinn's office, maybe?) told me you can safely take like 20 Advils in a day. I had been doing 10 max. I'm popping more this time to see if it helps with the pain and swelling.

Lunch was Hershey's kisses from the E3000 candy bowl and some low-sodium clam chowder. I've been watching my salt intake this week because someone commented on an earlier installment of this series that it might keep me from swelling as much. I call my mom at lunchtime, because she sent me an email saying to. We go over some of the details of my upcoming surgery. She's going to be with me for the first two weeks, to make sure I'm okay. That's really great of her.

Today's electrolysis is over before 4pm, and it went by fast. Almost pleasant, really. Not at all bad for about 10 hours total of electrolysis. I had been hoping my clearings were down to more like 8 hours at this point, but it's still big progress. Last time was mostly 2 technicians all day until after 6 pm. This time, I'll have plenty of time to catch my flight back. I'm not at all rushed.

Jani's not with me again this trip because we had originally both booked Feb 23, and then I moved my date to Feb 12 so I could get in another genital clearing in before surgery. Then it turned out Feb 12 was still too close to my surgery date, and I'd already made travel arrangements, so here I am alone and not getting a clearing down there, anyway. I've been text-messaging Jani during the breaks today to coordinate our next trip, since neither of us has booked it yet. She wants April 23, then when I book and confirm that for both of us, she wants a Monday instead. Grrr. I'm having a hard time relaying this to Star as I keep changing what dates we want, and Jani won't answer her stupid phone. Somehow it ends up with me trying to explain why Jani wanted April 23 (2 months exactly from Feb 23) and then changed her mind and wanted a Monday (so she can grow facial hair in Dallas over the weekend).

For some reason as part of this, I ask Star to check Feb 23, and Jani's name should be there. She does. It's not. I send Jani a text: "You're not booked for Feb 23. When is your next appt? Call me." She finally calls me, and she's noticeably upset because she's already made plane reservations, etc., etc., but I already have her back on this -- E3000 has a slot on the 23rd open, and I just want to be doubly sure that's her date before I go booking that in her name and confusing matters worse than they already are.

Me and Jani are BFFs (or BFsF?). I've always got her back. Always. I get her in the books for Feb 23, and set us up for our next trip on April 21 (not a Monday, I know -- don't ask, okay?). Friends should always have each others' backs. That was always in the guy code. I figure it's in the girl code, too, or if not, let's add it, because it needs to be there. For transgirls, especially, we need friends we can count on for lots of this stuff, because life can be pretty hard at times.

4:00 pm. I'm out of E3000, and I head to Burger Street for an olive burger and a small fries. Lots of salt in that, I am well aware, thereby blowing my experiment on low sodium intake and it's effect on swelling. Okay, so sue me. The manager at the Burger Street is really sweet. He asks me what's wrong with my face, since it looks kind of like I got beat up. A guy in the parking lot just asked me the same thing. Must be the ice pack. I tell the parking lot guy I'm okay, just burned. I tell the Burger Street guy I just got electrolysis. He says his friend had a bad reaction to waxing once and swelled up. I tell him this is way worse than waxing, but more permanent. I'm off to the airport with tons of time to get my flight (almost 4 hours still).

At the airport, the TSA girl likes my outfit. "Look at you with your little chocolate outfit. It's cute." Thanks. So, I look burned but cute. I think so, too. I'm trying to make a new ice pack using a TSA baggie and a scoop of ice from the bartender at the airport Chili's (want the recipe?) when Alison calls me in tears. Shit. I can barely hear her with the stupid PA system going at 400 decibels and a million people walking and talking all around me. I manage to find a semi-quiet area so I can try to hear what's wrong.

Alison's flight to Thailand is next Sunday, so 10 days from today. I'm driving her to the airport. Her surgery's less than a week after that. Her friend Kayley, who was going to come with her for two weeks and help get her set up and see her through the first week of recovery, just cancelled on her. Jesus. I'd go with her myself, only my surgery is 3 days after Alison's. We booked those dates before we'd ever met each other. Otherwise, I'm sure we'd have worked it out so that we could help each other through our surgeries. See? This is what I'm talking about with regard to back-having of your friends, and the virtues thereof (see previous discussion, above).

Alison's friend aparently does not have her back, and now everything goes straight to hell and she's left scrambling and possibly alone on a trip for a very scary procedure in a far away country. Which is pretty fucked up, if you ask me. Alison is 7 hours away from me at least, and she needs a hug right now from the sound of it. I can barely hear her on a cell phone in a noisy airport. That's also pretty fucked up. This is bad timing all around. I wish I had stuck with the 23rd, as originally planned. I guess I should have, so I'd have also had Jani's back for her next trip to Dallas. Probably the whole reason Jani's reservation got messed up was when I changed mine. It's a bad day for people having one another's back. That's all there is to it.

I'm having a hard day, myself. I got 5 hours of sleep last night, I've been in a chair and on painkillers all day, my face is burned, and now all this. I check my email on my iPhone and there's more bad news: Dr. McGinn's office still doesn't have my chest xray from two weeks ago. Last Friday, the woman on the phone at the film lab in Georgetown University Hospital told me she was faxing it to Dr. McGinn right away. I guess not. Now, I'll have to sort that mess out again. This shouldn't be this hard, for a doctor to ask for an xray and for a hospital to produce it. I'm feeling stressed and helpless.

Then I do a really stupid thing. Yesterday or the day before, I saw a headline about a 16-year-old transsexual who had a sex change operation. I wisely did not click on it, thinking that it would depress me to see this girl and how pretty she no doubt is, with no trace of masculinity to her. I see the same link now, posted on someone's Facebook page. I click it for some reason, maybe because I'm at an airport with two hours until my flight, or maybe because I'm still a little loopy from all the Advil I'm popping. Whatever the reason, it's a mistake. First off, she's gorgeous. She started hormone replacement at 12 or something. How nice for her. Then, it says in the article that she's also a model and a singer, and she's got a hit song or something. She'll never have to fly down to Dallas to have every hair on her face electrocuted over and over and over and over. She'll never have to work on changing her voice, because it never dropped. Her face, her body, everything will develop just like any other girl's.

Screw this. Seriously. I didn't need to see that right just then. I'm feeling really bad, and now I think I'm starting to finally get a handle on what's been scaring me about my upcoming surgery. I mean aside from the obvious risk of complications and whatnot. No, because I'm thinking about this little-miss-perfect-transsexual girl and I'm wondering to myself why do I care? I'm not all that jealous of Jessica Simpson or any other beautiful pop star/model/actress girls, so why should I care if this girl got lucky. I mean, good for her for realizing who she was early enough to avoid all this crap. But it's not just jealousy. Some of it is, but that's not all of it. I'm worried that this is too hard, and that I'll give up at some point. I'm not strong enough. Up until surgery, I still feel like I have the option to give up. Afterwards, if it's not liveable, I don't know what would be. I think that's what's got me nervous about taking this big step forward in a couple of weeks.

Rationally, I don't see any way I'd change my mind about living this way, but it sure does hurt sometimes to think about the chances I wasted when testosterone started to take me over physically and I was too scared to admit I didn't want those changes. So now I'm sitting in an airport in Dallas, my face looks like 5 lbs of raw hamburger, my girlfriend's crying 1500 miles away and there's nothing I can do about it, and I'm feeling crappy about myself. I want to cry, seriously.

I sleep most of the flight home, which landed 15 minutes early. On the shuttle bus to the parking lot, some guy slams his suitcase into my knee as he passes and doesn't even apologize. Thanks, asshole. I needed that to punctuate the day.

I'm home by about 1 am, and I ice my face some more, slather on zinc oxide and go to bed around 2.

Friday, February 13:

My friend Jessica was supposed to be a guest on a local radio show this morning: Elliott in the Morning. I got a text message from her last night about it when I landed in Baltimore. I set the alarm radio for when she was going to be on, but they had a different guest on for the brief period I maintained consciousness, and I woke up long after the show was over. Too bad, because I like it how Elliott talks about having "our friend Jessica, the transgender" on the show. Jessica's a frequent guest.

I'd say my face looks much better than last time at this point, even. Each trip is getting easier, recovery-wise. My face is tight, and I am swollen, but not to comic proportions. I continue with icing through early afternoon. It really isn't at all bad.

I think I've gotten the mixup taken care of with my chest xrays, and they claim (again) to have faxed the results to Dr. McGinn's office. Lisa from Dr. McGinn's office confirmed already that they have everything else (my letters, EKG and stress test results, and my check). I should be all set.

Alison's busy packing. Tomorrow I'll help her move to her new place. Then we'll deal with the other stuff. She sent me flowers for Valentine's Day. Nobody's ever done that before, I don't think.

25 Things About Me

2009-02-07T10:47:00.002-05:00

I don't usually go in for chain emails or the little Facebook gimmicky things, but I decided to finally get in on the "25 Random Things" craze.

If I'm going to force this upon 25 of my friends on Facebook, why not the rest of you, while I'm at it? Here is my list (some of this is nothing new):

1. It took me about 10 minutes to figure out how to post a note here on Facebook, and I'm still not sure I get these notes.

2. When I was a child, I had a severe phobia of heights. I couldn't even go up the stairs in the back of our house, because they only had the horizontal part and not the vertical backings. I was afraid I'd slip through and fall. I could climb about 2 rungs on a ladder before I'd be terrified and shaking.

3. I still can't handle heights very well, but I am able to control my fears better now. Three years ago, I rented an articulated boom lift, and used it to do some work on my townhouse. It went 40' up. I was terrified, but I did it.

4. In high school, I was a finalist in the Westinghouse (now Intel) Science Talent Search. I got an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington DC (where I now live) and $1000 cash (a lot of money to me at the time) along with 40 other finalists. I felt like I was the one kid who had no business being there. The girl who won had cured cancer or something. I made a volcano using paper mache, baking soda and vinegar (no, not really -- it was something on modelling elastic collisions between rods, but still).

5. I can sleep through almost anything. I once slept for about 30 minutes while all the smoke alarms in my house were going off (my roommate at the time was trying to light a fire in the fireplace and didn't open the flue). On more than one occasion, I have managed to sleep all the way through my alarm clock (or, at least I assume it went off, anyway).

6. My heart once stopped for about 3 or 4 seconds, causing me to pass out. I regained consciousness with my nose pressed to the hardwood floor. My hands were bruised, so I guess I caught my fall. That was a little over a year ago. My heart does that sometimes, but it usually doesn't stop for that long.

7. I once fainted in Health Ed class (8th grade?) when they showed us a Navy training film that showed a live birth. There was blood everywhere (in the film), then I felt really dizzy and cold and sweaty. The next thing I knew, the film had stopped, the lights were on, and I was staring up from the floor at my classmates and my teacher, who looked very concerned.

8. I was 17 the first time I kissed a girl.

9. I was 21 the first time I kissed a boy.

10. I like to cook. I've been cooking since I was in kindergarten. I think I probably made dinner for the whole family by age 8 (Mom's idea -- she liked to put us kids to work).

11. When I was 17, I took a year off between high school and college. I moved to London. I knew nobody there. I had almost no money. I shared a 100-square-foot room in a house with an Israeli guy (Yoshi) and worked whatever jobs I could find. I didn't have a work permit. I travelled around on the continent on a Eurail Pass for a little over 2 months, and lived in England for about 6 months. I slept in parks and on trains sometimes.

12. I knew I wanted to be a girl when I was 4 or 5 years old. I remember feeling very ashamed of that, even back then.

13. I always wanted to be Wonder Woman. I especially liked her army uniform. So I guess I mostly wanted to be Diana Prince.

14. I seem to have a natural talent for games, especially card games. I used to win enough money playing poker in high school and college that I never really had to work a side job. I think people owed me about $3000 in uncollectible I.O.U.s by the time I left college.

15. I played in the World Series of Poker twice, in 2004 and 2005. I didn't win.

16. I kind of hate poker now. I don't like games where if I win, someone else is going to feel bad for losing. It makes me feel guilty for winning. I like games where the point is for everyone to have fun. Competitive fun.

17. I wrote these out of order. #17 and 18 are the last ones I'm writing, and I can't decide which of the remaining billions of things about me should make the cut. So I think I'll just put "I like kittens" in for #18. Or maybe that I have a secret crush on Demetri Martin (no, that's just too personal -- better keep that secret).

18. I like kittens. Yes, definitely.

19. I don't consider myself to be completely male or female. I side more towards female. but I think that a large part of my personality is decidedly male. I don't like that side as much, but I tollerate it most of the time.

20. I almost always think that I am fat, or worry that I am getting fat. I thought I was fat when I was 6. I wasn't, but I thought I was. I had kind of a distended belly, like those little malnourished kids in Africa.

21. As of recently, I feel a strong compulsion to be truthful at all times.

22. I am an extremely good liar. Especially to myself. Years and years of practice.

23. I sometimes worry that the real me has been buried so deep inside me for so long that she can't ever fully come out. But I'm trying.

24. I often cry when I think about all the things I didn't do because I was scared or ashamed.

25. I'm proud of who I am and what I've done.

Taking a step back

2009-02-05T00:04:00.003-05:00

I should feel lucky that I have a job at all in this economy. As a transgender woman, especially. I should.

The thing is, what I really feel is that just at the point in my life when I'm really starting to feel good about who I am -- as soon as I accept myself for what I am -- everything's coming crashing down around me. The nearer I get to my surgery date, the more things deteriorate in my personal finances, my company, and the world economy.

Today, I found out that when I get back from my recovery from surgery, I'll have my old job waiting for me. Unfortunately, it sounds like my old job from 6 years ago, before I was promoted to team lead then project manager then senior project manager. Plus, with my team's budget, I don't even see how I fit in there, even if it were possible for me to go back to programming. I don't see how this is going to work at all, but at least I'll have the option to start looking for new jobs once I'm post-op. Meanwhile, if they want to pay me to try to brush up on my programming skills, I guess there's no real harm in that. It's a demotion, yes. It hurts, yes. It sucks, in fact. But I can deal with this and a whole lot more to get what I want.

Up until now, I've felt trapped by the fact that I couldn't even look for a new job when I'm planning to take so much time off in the next couple of months. There was one position I interviewed for within my current company a few months ago that I am nearly 100% sure I could have gotten if not for the fact that I told the interviewing manager (and friend of mine) that I'd need March and April off. Needing this time off is limiting my options. As things got worse and worse with my company and I saw others flee for positions with companies that are not losing $500 million per day, I didn't even send out my resume (I wanted to, believe me) because there would be no way to take off the time I need with a new company without first establishing myself.

I'll be really glad when I'm past this surgery. It's really starting to feel like it's holding me back, just by being out there. 3 1/2 weeks until I go under the knife. Two months after that until I can return to work full time. Compared with everything I've done so far, that's nothing.

Overall, I'm really happy with where I am right now. I'm happy with who I am. Things are going really well between me and Alison. Everything else is sort of a mess, but I feel pretty good about myself.

I'm going to call it progress.

Words, Part 2: The Penis, Mightier than the Sword

2009-01-29T20:34:00.005-05:00

I got my second letter today. I only had to meet with the other therapist twice. She had a draft ready before our second meeting, which we used to clear up a few details and answer some follow-up questions from the first session. She didn't seem to have any reservations, and told me she thought I was very passable and that I seem to have a healthy attitude and approach to my transition. So the paperwork's out of the way, with just over a month to my surgery date.

I'm happy to have that done. If she hadn't agreed to writing the letter within a month, I'd have had to go to another therapist. But I also didn't want to go into our first meeting demanding that she work according to my schedule, which was to get that letter by mid-February. Going into therapy with an ultimatum would have been a good way to make her not want to help me. So I didn't even bring it up, and instead I let her tell me how many sessions we needed after getting to know me a bit. By the end of the first session, she was confident we'd need only one more, which was great with me. One less thing to worry about. This was just another piece of paper I needed to prove what I already knew, that I am ready.

Alison was happy for me when I got my first letter, but thought it was kind of stupid that I had to get another letter at all to back up the first therapist's conclusion. After thinking about it a bit, I kind of agree. Sure, it's a major decision and it's irreversible, but I'm an adult and I can make my own choices about my body. People who choose to have a baby aren't necessarily ready or qualified to raise a child, and that's a permanent change in their lives, too. Of course, you don't usually need a doctor's help to conceive, but if you did, do you think anyone would make you go see a councellor to make sure you're having a baby for the right reasons?

I think it comes down to this: what I'm about to do seems crazy to a lot of people. It must seem like I could just be confused. Why would a man want to get rid of his penis? Penises are how society defines a man, and maleness is considered a virtue. So getting rid of one must mean there's something wrong with you in the head. It's a downgrade. Men think their penises make them superior to non-penis-havers. They really do. Even though it plays a relatively minor role in a man's day-to-day life, many like to think it's the most important thing about them, and a symbol of their awesome manly power and invulnerability and entitlement to take charge. If you've got a big penis, you're a god among men (who are, in turn, men among women, putting you two tiers above women). Everyone should tremble in fear of their own inadequacy compared to you. Why would you give that up? You'd have to be nuts, right?

I'll be completely honest. I don't even hate my penis. I never have. The only reason it feels like it doesn't belong anymore is that I've realized that I am female, and society (except for a certain minor segment I don't have much interest in) doesn't care for women with penises. It gets in the way now, both literally and figuratively. It doesn't make me feel like any less of a woman having it there, but it does hurt my ability to live as who I am. And I don't feel any real attachment to it; I just don't particularly hate that it's there. I don't think I'll miss it, either, though. I expect that sex will be better without it. Right now, it feels like it's in the way, and it does sometimes embarrass me somewhat that it's there. I don't hate it, but I don't want it, either. And I don't have any real reservations about getting rid of it. Tucking is a real inconvenience; I sure won't miss that.

Anyway, I'm not crazy. I'm also not expecting my surgery in March will dramatically change me. I'll be the same person I was before. It'll feel closer to normal, I guess, which will probably be nice. It'll open up some new sex options, while closing others that don't feel right anymore, anyway. That's pretty much what I told the second therapist. Good enough for a stamp of approval on another form.

Advice for the Budding Transsexual

2009-01-29T01:49:00.005-05:00

I've come across a fair number of sob stories -- no, calling some of these "sob stories" is trivializing them -- I've come across a fair number of horrible, tragic stories since I started accepting who I am and talking with other trans people. Every transgendered person I've met has a long story, many of them sad. Too many, if you ask me, and too long.

My story was never all that compelling. I didn't know what was "wrong" with me. I didn't want to admit that what I felt was real. I wanted to live a lie, because the truth was too hard for me to accept. I retreated into the sanctuary of my own mind and a fantasy world where I could be the person I wanted to be.

The fantasy was always there, and it was nice to daydream about. But I always had a thousand excuses lined up for why I could never transition. I'd never pass. I'd never get over the shame. I'd be ridiculed, mocked, and maybe assaulted. I'd regret it. People would think I was weird. People wouldn't like me.

It's really easy to give up before you begin if you think about all the things in your way and all the things you'll never be able to do. I used to think about those things a lot. Now I realize that everything that was in my way was something I was putting there myself to stop me. I built my own blockade to hide behind, because I was scared. I was scared of what I would become, or maybe I was scared of what I already was, and didn't want to admit. I was safe behind a wall of reasons I could never do this, and that was comfortable to me because not ever starting meant never having to confront those fears.

I've met several transpeople (mostly younger girls) over the past year and a half who have nothing but reasons for why they can't do things, or why their life will never be happy. Usually, nothing that's wrong in their lives is in any way their fault. Any solution you might propose to a problem they're facing is quickly met with a reason it would fail ("I tried that but...", "I can't because...", "Even if I did that, ..."). Failure's never our fault. We never had a chance. Sure, we never really took a chance, either, but the game was rigged from the start as anyone can plainly see.

You can make a compelling argument for why anything that's hard to do is actually impossible. Focusing on all the things that will probably go wrong and obstacles you'll never be able to figure out a way around is a great way to convince yourself it's not worth even trying. It's hopeless, so why bother? Then again, some people try, and fail; others try to fail. Which kind of failure would you rather be?

One day a year and a half ago, I stopped looking for excuses to stay put, and started looking for things I could do to move forward. I didn't know if I could do this. I didn't know how I was going to do it. I didn't even know if I wanted to do it. But I did it anyway, because I finally saw all my excuses for what they really were: a defense mechanism for my own fears.

As hard as this transition has been at times (and believe me, it's hard at times), I don't think I've once regretted doing it. I do have regrets, but they're all about the time I wasted convincing myself this was never going to happen.

That's my story, and that's my only real advice. In the end, there's only one person who can really help you and it ain't me, kiddo.

Ringer

2009-01-27T20:35:00.003-05:00

In my early college days, my friend Chris and I organized some casual pickup softball games on Sunday mornings. Chris used to lure people to the games down by the bayfront by providing free beer. Eventually, we got some money from the student government to buy a few bats, some balls, and bases -- then things really took off, with sometimes as many as 10 or 12 people showing up to play. That was no small feat, considering how many of the players were hard to rouse at the ungodly hour of 11 am on a Sunday. We often had to beg people to come play and drag them out of bed, personally. It was a highly-successful program that continued for years, rivaling other popular student activities such as participating in really annoying drum circles and being involuntarily committed to a mental institution for evaluation under Florida's "Baker Act".

I never much went in for warm Busch beer (by the way, yuck!) on a Sunday morning, but I did like softball for some reason. I eventually started playing on a team made up of a mix of faculty, students and alumni from my college in a local softball league. I played with that team for several years, and I was not a superstar, but I could hit pretty well and my fielding was not at all bad, if a bit inconsistent. I made the occasional spectacular running over-the-shoulder catch and also occasionally botched an easy fly ball. It kept the games exciting, because you never knew what was going to happen when the ball came my way. Our team was pretty good, and we even beat the middle-aged-policemen team one year to win the league championship.

After college, I played briefly on a team at my first real job. It was a coed team and we forfeited about half our games for lack of enough female players. Oftentimes, we'd be desperately calling female friends who had never even played softball to come play on our team that same night, because we needed 5 or whatever number of women was required. We had 15 guys on the team. They all showed up every week. If there was a game at all, you were lucky if you got to play a couple of innings if you were a guy. Sometimes, even when we had enough women, the team we were playing against did not, and so they'd forfeit. It was not as fun a league as the college team. I haven't really played since.

With surgery coming up in a month, and me about to get a nice, legal "F" on my documents, I thought it might be fun to get back into softball. Fairfax county has a website that lets you post if you're interested in getting on a team. I filled out my vitals, including clicking "female" for gender. I didn't really say anything about the fact that at one point I used to be a pretty decent player. Of course I also didn't mention the stuff about my physical gender at birth, either. No need to complicate things; this is just a softball league.

That was yesterday, and already I've been asked to join 3 teams outright, and to "try out" for another team that is, according to the voicemail, "... one of the best if not the best coed team in Division 1, and we also play in tournaments and blah, blah, blah." I told them basically nothing about myself except my name and sex and I've got people clamoring for me to play with them. Ten years ago, I was lucky to get in the lineup for a couple of swings on my company team. Suddenly I'm a hot commodity to strangers. So be it.

I don't know if I'm any good anymore. I'm sure I can still field pretty well. I'm fast. I doubt I can hit as well as before, and I never had any power to speak of in the first place. Hormones have made me a lot weaker, I've noticed. I bet I can still throw okay -- I mean, for a girl, of course. Actually, I used to be pretty good at throwing like a girl (i.e. stepping forward with the same foot as your throwing arm). I figure I'll just adopt a "don't ask, don't tell" policy for now when dealing with potential teams and teammates. I don't mind if they know I'm trans, but I don't see how it's really important at this point.

I'm going to join the one all-women's team that asked me to play. Coed was always less fun, with its plentiful forfeits and goofy rules designed to even things up. And when testosterone is involved in the game, it just tends to make things less fun, anyway. I've always found that to be true.

Change I can believe in

2009-01-22T20:19:00.006-05:00

I live in DC (okay, not in DC proper, but a quick jog from DC). Two million people came to town this weekend to take part in the ceremony to inaugurate our new president. My mom and stepdad flew in from Chicago to be a part of it. Alison and I watched it from my living room, because it was too damn cold and crowded in DC. Mostly, too cold.

But I did my part. I made my parents a nice breakfast and packed them a little brown bag lunch to take with them (I felt like I was sending them off to school), and got them to the Metro at 7 am. Then Alison and I went back to sleep, and woke up at much more civilized hour to watch some of the proceedings. When President Obama said something about how we're strong as a nation in part because a lot of us would rather work fewer hours than see our friends lose their jobs, I turned to Alison and said, "That's true. I'd take the day off to avoid seeing my friends get laid off. Definitely." So, I'm helping to make America strong, in my way.

Actually, that day is coming where I work, and I actually did think about taking the day off, but they never told us when it would be. Turns out, it looks like it's tomorrow. Rumors have been flying about "The Big Day" being every Friday since mid-December, but from today's flurry of activity, it looks like tomorrow's really it. Lots of reports of mysterious meetings being scheduled and the higher ups being councelled by HR on how to lay people off (there's no easy way -- I've done it, and it's not fun for anyone involved). I didn't buy in to the previous rumors, but it looks like it's really just a question of how many people they're going to cut tomorrow and whether this is just a first round of many or whether we're done cutting for a while.

Personally, I'll be happy if I make it through tomorrow with a job. I have 5 weeks until my surgery. I really don't want to be out of work while recovering from my operation. That would put me in a really bad spot. After I get back, if they let me go, I will at least be ready to look for new jobs. The economy may still be in the crapper, and I may have worsened my prospects for finding a new job (as a woman and as a transsexual, my opportunities are probably not as good as before), but at least I'll be ready to work. I've been laid off before (Domino's Pizza, age 16; Greenwich Financial Modelling, age 28) and it wasn't fun, but I found better jobs each time. Really, the only bad part about getting laid off is the "off" part.

I'm more worried that the whole world seems to be going to hell and collapsing all around me. Funny, but it feels like the better I feel about where I am personally, the worse I feel about the state of the world. I could really have timed this transition a lot better by picking, say, any other time at all. Five years ago. Ten. Twenty. Thirty. Any of those would have been good. I'll deal with whatever comes along, but I'd appreciate it if someone would get this whole economic meltdown contained. I'd do it myself, but I have more important things to worry about right now, like me.

Oh, well. There's a nice new president who's clean and articulate and smart and confident and unflappable. The last one was clean and... um... well, he owned a cowboy hat. I hope this new guy can get the country back on track soon. I don't want a return to the gluttonous eighties, nineties and early-to-mid oughts. I'd just like something serviceable.

Words

2009-01-15T23:28:00.005-05:00

Neither of us seriously contemplated sexual reassignment surgery for her during our first meetings, but gradually this option became more and more compelling. Ms. Clayton no sooner took one step forward, than she was comfortable with it, and ready to move to the next. She has accepted disappointments and found ways for dealing with them, but for the most part, she has gloried in her new life as a woman. ... I have no hesitation in supporting her request for gender reassignment surgery.

-Letter from Dr. Catherine Payne dated Jan 12, 2009.

The Harry Benjamin Standards of Care for Gender Identity Disorders state that two letters from mental health professionals are generally required for genital surgery. I got my first letter in the mail two days ago, from Dr. Payne. The second will be from a therapist who evaluates me and corroborates her recommendation. I need to get that second letter soon. My surgery date is less than 2 months away. I'm scared, but I'm ready.

It was also exactly a year ago today that a judge signed an order granting my request to change my name legally to "Suzanne Jennifer Clayton". That was more or less the start of my so-called "real life test", another requirement for surgery. I remember seeing that piece of paper in my hand and feeling the gravity of what I'd just done, of what I was committing myself to. Up until then, I was "Suzanne" to some friends and family and "Scott" to the world. One signature on a piece of paper changed it, and suddenly all of my IDs would start carrying my new chosen name, bringing me further past the point where I could comfortably turn back if I weren't ready.

Dr. Payne and I reflected recently on how far I've come since we started meeting in June of 2007. She didn't expect me to end up where I am now. She confessed to me that when she first met me, she thought I was probably gay or a crossdresser or just confused sexually. I'm glad she didn't tell me that at the time, because it would have crushed me, even though back then I didn't know where I was going to end up or what I was, either.

Maybe I surprised myself where I've ended up, or maybe I always knew where I wanted to be but just wasn't sure how I was going to get there. In any case, here I am now, staring at another document with the power to help me drastically change my identity. This one is the culmination of a year and a half of self-exploration, self-reinvention, and trying to establish my new place in society.

It seems like it shouldn't fit on such a thin piece of paper. This letter carries a lot more weight than you'd know from feeling it in your hands.

Transsexuals Among Us

2009-01-12T22:44:00.008-05:00

Probably the weirdest thing that happened to me this weekend while I was down in Jacksonville, Florida was when an old woman shook my hand and told me how warm my hands were. That doesn't sound weird unless you've actually held my hands, in which case you'd know that I met the one person in the world with worse circulation in her fingers than me. It's sort of a family trait, but just take my word for it -- my hands are ice cold.

I was in Florida for my grandmother's 90th birthday party, a nice little party with 150 of her closest friends and relatives held in an evangelical church. She's great, my granny. She's really happy for me and I can tell she's proud of me for going through this. I'm really happy for her, too, since she's 90 and still in such good health. I think she's really enjoying this part of her life, and I am too. My grandfather died many years ago at 92. I doubt he'd have been as comfortable with my transition, having fairly rigid definitions of gender, but I think he'd have probably come around, too, in his way. I love my family. They're so supportive and loving. Strange, but very supportive.

Pretty much everyone else at the party was oblivious to my "condition", as far as I could tell. Possibly not this one family, from whom I got a strange vibe, but they might have been tipped off about me (for reasons I won't go into). Anyway, I felt pretty much welcome among a group of (mostly elderly) strangers.

When I got home, my friend Keith sent me a link to a story about people trying to revoke transgender rights in Gainessville. Some conservative group ran ads that showed a little girl going into a women's restroom followed by a scruffy man, with the words "Your City Council Made This Legal" (check it out). I realize I'm preaching to the choir here, but honestly, this is really disgusting. Implied in this ad is that (a) allowing transgender people to use the bathroom of their chosen gender enables child molestation, (b) somehow it would be more acceptable for a boy to be in a men's room alone with a creepy pervert than a girl, and (c) transsexuals = perverts. It's kind of a beautiful in its oversimplicity, really. Why, you can even agree with the message and still claim you don't have anything against transgender people. I don't have a problem with those people themselves, I just don't want scruffy perverts in ballcaps molesting my daughter, which would obviously happen if... wait, how does this work again? Well, kudos to the ad wizards who came up with this one, anyway. I think it's a brilliant little piece of shock propoganda.

It's a pity that to many people, trans rights come down to these sorts of inflamatory non-issues. And it's a shame that most people don't have the slightest idea what being transgender is really about, as if it's just some kind of sexual thrill for us. I think I'm very lucky to blend in sometimes. I avoid a lot of this sort of misunderstanding and bigotry and hatred mostly (or so far -- knock on wood). I don't expect that stuff will ever disappear. I've met a lot of transgender people, and by and large, we're a strange bunch. We'll never quite blend in as a group. Different = fear.

But I can still walk up to a lot of the people who don't realize they should be afraid of me and what I represent, and the biggest clue they'll get is that my hands are the icy cold hands of pure evil. If I'm wearing gloves, they might never know...

Cost/Benefit Analysis

2009-01-06T22:22:00.005-05:00

My latest credit card statements include my most recent trip to Dallas, Christmas shopping and travel expenses, and lots of new entertainment expenses now that I'm dating Alison (restaurants and clubbing expenses, mostly). The only thing that shocked me was that they didn't really seem all that much higher than normal. The bills were high, sure, but these days they're always high. There's always a shopping trip or a medical expense or something pushing those balances up every month. So I just sign over my paycheck month after month to Discover and Chase and Wells Fargo and watch my savings flatline.

Upcoming for this year, I've got a $16,500 invoice for my upcoming surgery in March, more E3000 sessions for at least a few more thousand dollars, and probably some cosmetic work ranging from $6,000 to $30,000 depending on what I eventually decide I want. None of it is tax deductible or covered by my health insurance, of course. And, lo, the pile diminishes.

I haven't been tracking my spending since I started on this little adventure of mine. That's kind of too bad, because it would be interesting to know how much this all costs me in the end. I didn't keep track mainly because it doesn't really matter and part of me doesn't want to know, besides. Offer me any amount of money to go back to living as a guy for the rest of my life, and I just can't do it. It wouldn't be worth it. I never even gave the costs much thought from the outset. They were pretty much irrelevant, even if this costs me everything I have.

Sometimes that doesn't make a lot of rational sense to me, because so much of this is is scary and depressing and exhausting that I'm not sure why I'm willing to take on so much risk, put in so much effort, and sacrifice so much just to live as the gender I always wanted to be. I still have days when I'm reminded of how hard this can be and how fucking horrible it could turn out. The old me would have still opted to transition knowing the outcome (so far), but I also have to admit he wasn't so wrong to be afraid all those years. There's a comfort in hiding this part of you away. In a lot of ways that's easier, and certainly a lot less risky.

This was never about rationality, though. If you follow your heart, you're going to end up making sacrifices and enduring some pain and self-doubt. You never know how much until you do it. Some things don't really lend themselves to risk management and cost/benefit analysis. So we plow ahead and hope this turns out well. If it does (and so far it looks like it does), then great. If it doesn't, well at least we found out. Better than living your whole life not knowing what it would be like, I guess.

Fuck it. Happy 2009. It should be an interesting year.

E3000 Diary, Round 3

2008-12-18T12:59:00.003-05:00

I'm trying to squeeze in two more full clearings (North and South) before my surgery in March. This trip's a bit different logistically than the first two for a few reasons:

1) Jani's not with me. She's actually having her big surgery in Thailand at the same time I'm in Dallas. I'm alone for this trip.
2) I had to book for a Wednesday to get an appointment this week, so no staying home for the weekend with my beard growing. I haven't shaved since Saturday, but I'm still going in to the office Monday and Tuesday.
3) Since my recovery was so much faster last time, I decide I can fly back immediately and recover at home. I've got electrolosis from 9:30 am - 6:00 pm Wednedsday and an 8:00 pm fight back to DC. Sitting at home by yourself beats sitting in a hotel room by yourself.

December 16 (Tuesday)

If anyone notices my beard growth, they're not saying anything. I'm trying to decide if that's good or bad. On the one hand, not having it pointed out to you that you look like shit sounds like a good thing, right? But on the other hand, are they unobservant or just too sensitive to your feelings to point out to you when you really do look rotten? Because either way, it sort of belies anything nice that these people might say about you other times. Maybe you always look sort of weird to them, and they're holding that back.

I'm over thinking it, I know. People are polite, and I have to go turn that into a bad thing in my head. I don't want to be stared at for being a freak, and yet I sort of wish people would notice that I don't look at all at my best today, because I'm planning to look better soon. That's all. But first, I'm planning to look much, much worse. We'll get to that part soon.

After work, I leave my car at the office and hop on the metro to Reagan National Airport. I might get an occasional look, but I definitey don't get stared at much here, either. Or at the airport. Or on the plane. Finally, in Dallas, on the shuttle bus to the car rental counter, an old woman next to me is staring at my face. She thinks I don't see her, but I do, out of the corner of my eye. Yeah, she's staring good and hard at my stubble, and she thinks it's weird. Good. I do too.

It's late when I get in. Too late to impose on my friends who live in Dallas. I get a car, check into a cheap hotel I booked near the airport (Super 8 - smells a little funny, but the heat works -- oh, yeah, it's 30 degrees in Dallas by they way, which is colder than it was in DC -- and it's comfortable). The front desk clerk is cute and very nice, and an older gentleman flirts with me on the elevator. He definitely doesn't notice the stubble. Maybe it's just not that noticeable, except up close.

I get ready for bed and check my email for news on Jani's progress. She's through surgery and everything's good so far. I write a quick congratutatory note to her and turn in for the night after watching a couple of reruns of Sex and the City. I've got Pikachu to keep me company. Mr. Bear and Meekrat have been to Dallas on previous trips, but this is Pikachu's first time here. He's a little nervous about that, but I'm here with him to make sure he's okay.

Here we are, getting ready for bed at the (très chic) Super 8 Motel near DFW airport in Dallas:

December 17 (Wednesday)

I'm up and showered and packed up by 8 am, leaving me plenty of time to enjoy the complimentary breakfast buffet at the Super 8. Fodor's says that this is a "can't miss" if you're staying in Dallas. Try the raisin bran. You'll swear it's a brand-name cereal -- it's just that good.

The guy who checked me in last night is still working the front desk when I check out. Why do I spend so much time complaining about my job? Oh well.

I'm over at E3000 at 9:10, just as Sabrina's opening up. I pop 3 Advils (forgot to bring any, but they have a big jar of them in the bathroom, I remember. I don't have any other drugs this time, because my supplier is off in Thailand having her fancy new vagina installed, so she can think she's all better than me. I will never forgive Jani for abandoning me in my time of need this way.

Star's out sick, leaving me with one technician for this morning. Denise works on me solo until lunch, and then after lunch Sabrina will try to free up so I've got two again. Good, because I can't really stay late or come back tomorrow, since my flight out is at 8 tonight.

The shots hurt just the same as before, with or without whatever drugs Jani had been giving me. They didn't help the pain. They did help calm me, though, because 3 times during the procedure I start crying and beg them to stop for just a minute so I can collect myself. It's horrible. It's painful. I pop about 9 Advil over the course of the session, hoping it dulls the pain somewhat.

The electrolysis itself is painless as with the other clearings, except when they grab a "stray" hair outside the numbed area. Those are way more painful than other electrolysis I've had, so the shots, as horrible as they are, are absolutely worth it. I'm hoping more pain means more effective. E3000 is defnitely focused on results. I'm glad for that.

Over lunch, I chat with the other client they've got in, Chloe. She's here for treatment #5. She's also doing face and surgery prep. I ask her how many clearings she's expecting to need. She says they told her 14. Fourteen?!? I want out of this. I can't live with the idea that this would take me 11 more sessions. I'm not even going to think about this. She must be mistaken. Anyway, her face is getting cleared much faster than mine. It looks like she's almost done for the day, after having two people work on her for the morning. I'm also more swollen.

In the afternoon, with Sabrina added into the mix, we start to get more chatty. I chime in when I can, but I'm trying to talk without moving the parts of my face that they are working on, which is very hard to do. Plus, my lips have balloned up to 3x their normal size and my entire mouth is numb. I still manage to get them to dish some dirt on a couple of the more obnoxious clients they've had over the years. Nothing I haven't seen before. Hang around with transsexuals enough and you'll meet some strange characters. (Readers of my blog excluded, of course.)

Around 5 pm, we're nearly done with my face and it's time to start working on my genital area. This is the third time today I am crying and begging them to please stop in the middle of a round of shots. After that's over, the rest goes painlessly, and I'm out the door by 6:15, more or less on time for my flight. Thanks to my awesome driving skills, a rental car shuttle that's ready to go when I get there, and a short line for security, I'm at the gate by a little after 7. My flight is late, though. I think we take off at 9 pm or so.

I'm getting some stares this time. I look hideous. I've been crying, my hair's a mess, and my face is swollen to hell and back. I fix myself up a bit in the airport bathroom, but this is as good as it gets:

I land in DC at 12:30 am, and the trains have stopped running, so I grab a $20 cab back to my office, where I left my car yesterday. I stop in to my office, and skim the 100 emails in my inbox, and answer 3 of them. I'm home by 2 am, swollen and very tired. This was a long, long day, but it's nice to be home.

Flight: $290
Hotel: $55
Car: $70
Electrolysis (approx. 11.5 hours total): $1290
Cabs, meals and incidentals: $40-45

Total for this trip: $1750

December 18 (Thursday)

I think it was a good plan to fly back last night. Had I stayed in Dallas until today, my face would have been more swollen for the flight. It always swells up the worst the day after the procedure.

I know how the rest of this will go. My face looks no worse than it did at this point last trip, so by Saturday I'll be mostly better. I think I had almost as much electrolysis this time around as with the prior session. I'm hoping with the next session (booked for February), it doesn't take 10 hours to clear my face alone.

After a couple more of these trips, I might be able to do this more locally, and cut down on travel expenses. My friend Stacey does 5-6 hour sessions up in Philadelphia. She doesn't get her whole face cleared in that time, but she does get the lidocaine injections. Down here in DC, I was paying $125/hr without the shots. I've got to check with her on what she's paying.

I really like all of the ladies down at E3000, though. They seem genuinely sympathetic to trans women, and they're extremely good at what they do. The process itself sucks, but they definitely make it more tollerable.

Anyway, that's another successful clearing under my belt (literally, for part of it). If this is session 3 of 14, well, I'm going to have to reconsider this whole process though. I mean, if people aren't even going to notice the stubble when I don't shave for 4 days, why am I putting myself through this torture?

My aim is true.

2008-12-14T23:28:00.003-05:00

I'm wrapping up another really good weekend here. So far, so good on the relationship front. Alison and I have a lot of fun together. We went to a lesbian bar on Saturday, got a little drunk and made out on the dance floor. I like dancing. I like dancing with Alison especially.

I also met Alison's sister and her sister's partner on Friday night. They were visiting from out of town. They seemed really nice, and I don't think I made a horrible impression or anything. It went well. At one point over dinner, her sister asked us we were "exclusive". We've only been dating for three weeks, and so we hadn't really discussed it, but I've never been the sort of person who would date more than one person at a time. Not seriously, in any case. I turned to Alison and let her answer, though, and she said (after a pause) "yes". And I agreed, "yes". Her sister laughed. Did you just decide that right now? "Pretty much, yeah."

Later in the evening, Alison's sister mentioned a former girlfriend who broke up with Alison because she decided she was into guys. Suzanne, don't hurt her. I got a little knot in my stomach from that one. Alison asked me if I liked guys or girls before she asked me out that night at Dean's birthday party. I sort of thought I was leaning towards being into guys more than girls. Now I'm not so sure, but I know I'm in a state of flux, sexually. I was almost hoping to avoid a serious relationship right now just for that reason. Anyway, I told her at the outset that I'm bisexual, and that's true. Bisexual, but I've never slept with a guy.

At one point this weekend, I clarified to Alison that there is a chance that sometime after my surgery I'm going to decide I need to be with a man. Frankly, I don't know if I will or not. I only know there's some curiosity there. Suzanne, don't hurt her. I don't want to hurt her. I'm not trying to hurt anyone, but I can't deny that I'm changing in ways I can't control.

I wish I had slept with a couple of the guys who hit on me in bars and clubs in the past 6 months or so. I wish one of the really cute ones had even made a real effort to get me to have sex with him. It probably wouldn't have been all that great, and I'd feel like it's out of my system. Then I wouldn't feel like this is weighing on me for some point down the road.

This is stupid. I've been dating Alison for three weeks. I don't need to think 5 years ahead. I'm having fun with her. She likes my cooking. We get along great. She likes stuff. I like stuff. When I wake up in her arms, I feel happy and secure. I'm definitely falling in love with her. What's some guy going to do for me that she can't? Most of the guys I've even found attractive are gay and wouldn't want me. And who needs some musty man pounding away inside you, anyway? Women are way more interesting to talk to and do things with.

So, I'm still going with this and seeing where it takes me. So far, so good, like I said. In fact, soooo good.

Funny Girl

2008-12-08T22:24:00.002-05:00

I've been trying to make an effort to clean up the paper trail of my old self, replacing his name with mine on old accounts and records. Why does it matter? I'm not exactly secretive about being trans and don't plan to go "stealth". Maybe I just don't like that there are all those things to remind me. I keep coming across stray accounts with "Scott" still on them, and it doesn't really bother me, but I try to correct them as I find them.

This week it was the organizers of a science competition I was a finalist in back in school (they contacted me -- or rather him -- for a survey) and my Amazon profile. I used to write satirical reviews of (mainly) classic literature on Amazon. I was trying to capture the absurdity of the way people on the internet will offer up their uninformed opinion on things they do not understand, by juxtaposing my semi-literate off-topic reviews with great works of fiction. Some of my reviews got deleted by Amazon I guess, but a lot are still up there. I know for a fact that I reviewed "1984", because (a) it's one of my favorite books, and (b) I make reference to the deleted review in my take on "Brave New World". I remember giving "1984" a bad review because it was a sci-fi book that wasn't even set in the future. I mean, come on! Oh well, some of my satire is lost to the ages then.

Well, anyway, my favorite part was always the comments people left on my reviews where they didn't get that it was a joke, and so they'd get all indignant that I had given a bad review to "Moby Dick" after I'd read only 20 pages and decided it was crap because Melville wouldn't stop rambling on and get to the part with the whales. The internet is good for messing with total strangers. They play along, because everyone's used to people being complete idiots online.

I used to like to do that sort of thing a lot more. Many of my college friends, who knew me as being rarely ever serious, thought that my transition was just a big prank when I told them. My friend Keith even had a friend of his analyze my pictures to make sure they weren't Photoshopped. I can't blame them. Scott was usually joking if he wasn't completely closed off.

Well, that was him and this is me. I'm a lot more serious these days I guess.

In other news, my new more serious style is starting to earn me critical acclaim. I recently received a review of my writing from none other than famed film critic Roger Ebert. He wrote, "This is deeply facinating." How many authors of blogs about being a transgender woman do you know who've received such high praise for their writing? Only one, I bet.

Why is this girl smiling?

2008-12-06T03:01:00.004-05:00

Being transgender isn't always fun. There, I finally admitted that for the 100th time here.

Then again, sometimes it really is. When I was closetted with this, I always liked having this part of me, even if I did feel like I had to hide it. My shameful secret was a source of a lot of pain for me, but it was never something I wanted to rid myself of (okay, maybe once or twice, but practically never). I don't know if it's because this has been with me ever since I can remember, and so I feel that it's just a part of me, or if it's because in my fantasies it also gave me joy and a sense of fulfillment at times.

Now that I'm out and pretty comfortable with myself as I am, I may not always be happy with myself or even happy at all, but there are a lot of times when I do feel yeah, this is good -- this is who I am and it's nice. It's not much like the fantasies I had before, because it's actually much better. Sometimes.

Other times it sucks. I've covered that pretty well, and I won't dwell on it anymore today. Being transgender does suck, but it's also great.

Here are some things that are great:

1) Whenever someone treats me like a woman. A stranger. A friend. Whether they know or not. Sometimes it still catches me off guard even, not because I'm expecting to get called "sir" but just because it's still novel in a way. It's always a good thing.

2) Feeling like a woman, finally. Whether I look the part or not, this is pretty much a full-time feeling for me now. It's great. Amazing, even. Sometimes it feels strange, believe me, but overall, amazing.

3) Forgetting that I'm even a trans at all. Rare, but sometimes the transgender thing isn't even occupying my thoughts at all.

4) Noticing subtle changes in myself. Little things that Scott would have done differently. For a while, a lot of this felt fake in some ways, and now it's just natural. I don't recognize that other person I used to be. I don't just mean physical changes, but also my reactions and attitude and approaches to everyday things.

5) Crying for no reason. Why is this on a list of good things? Because it feels good to let it out, even when I don't know what "it" is. I credit the hormones. Testosterone would have made me want to yell, break something and/or bottle it all up.

6) Being myself. Finally. I'm still me, only better.

Girls Just Want To Have Fun

2008-12-01T00:34:00.003-05:00

Just when you think you have things figured out, something comes along and jars you and throws your whole perspective out of kilter.

For me, it started a month ago, when I had my Halloween party. I was a little bit drunk at the time and I was chatting with another trans girl who seemed to be interested in me. I was dressed as a boy, but I still felt very much like a girl. It felt a little bit strange to be flirting with another girl, but I guess that's not really new territory for me. Alison was very beautiful and seemed nice. She seemed to like me. I wasn't at all sure how I felt about dating a girl, but I was definitely attracted to her. I was hoping she wasn't attracted to me because I looked masculine.

We met again a week ago at another party for a mutual friend. I was a girl again this time. We chatted all evening; we danced at a gay cowboy bar; we sang karaoke together. We were awful at two out of three of those, but it was fun. It felt good. She asked me out for a date later in the week and I said yes.

Since then, we've been together a lot. It's been something of a whirlwind, and it has included some of my most memorable dates ever. Plus, besides just dating, we've been shopping together and got a mani/pedi for an upcoming formal benefit we're going to later this week. I helped Alison pick out her cocktail dress. She helped me find a stole to go with mine. We're going to be dazzling as a couple, I think. I can't wait for Tuesday.

I'm a little bit confused since I know that I am also attracted to men. I worry that could come between us eventually. I could also see this turning into a bond I could never have with a man or a genetic woman. I was lonely, but I thought it wasn't a good time in my life to start a romantic relationship. As much as I like Alison, and as much as I love being with her... as much as I think that I am falling in love with her, I wonder if I am setting myself up for a fall.

I guess I'll just go with this and see where it takes me. That's worked well for me for the past year and a half.

My E3000 Diary: Second Clearing

2008-11-03T22:48:00.005-05:00

When I tell people I'm heading back down to Dallas for more electrolysis, some comment, "but I thought you already did that." Yeah, this is the not fun part of being a MTF transsexual -- the stubborn little hairs on your face grow back a few times for you to kill them again and again. I don't quite know why, but I think it has something to do with God hating transsexuals (see E3000 Diary #1).

Only this time I'm not just working on my face, but also my preparations for surgery in March. That's going to involve removing hair from what the ladies at E3K refer to euphemistically as the "South Pole region" and which I refer to somewhat more directly as my penis and scrotum. Sounds fun, right? I agree. Let's begin.

-------

Sunday, November 2 - Travel Day

I'm flying from DC to Dallas with 4 days' beard growth. It's far, far less growth than I had two months ago before my first clearing, but the upper lip is still pretty obvious, and up close there's no hiding these hairs, which still grow quite fast on me. Good. I want the little bastards to be long, so there's no escape for them tomorrow.

I really don't think I attracted much attention at the airport or on the plane. I notice a few stares, but the stares only seem to say, "I don't like you or your kind, you queer freak of nature". So I don't really mind it. I just smile back politely with a "yeah, so what're you gonna do about it, Mr. NRA ballcap?" stare of my own. That gets me the "you're lucky this isn't a dark alley and I don't have my redneck friends with me" look as NRA baseball hat guy turns his glare away, and I smile my smug "yeah, that's what I thought, b*tch" smile. Because that's how I roll today. Just like that.

Thanks to the new airline baggage policies, I'm flying carry-on, which means I had to freeze the gumbo I'm smuggling through, leftover from my party the night before. I have a great argument ready if they want to confiscate it. The policy is against liquids, but unless the policy specifically states "at room temperature", I've pretty much got them on a technicality here I think. Lots of things are liquid if you heat them up, after all, and they're not confiscating that stuff. The hummus, since it's at room temperature already, I'm planning to claim is more of a solid colloidal suspension than a liquid, per se. I don't actually know if that's true or not since I don't know exactly what that means, but it sounds good and I'm sure they won't know either, plus I can always hold the container upside down with the lid off and it doesn't fall out. That's no liquid or gel, right there, see? I'm actually prepared to lose both arguments, in which case I'm out some leftovers and tupperware.

The TSA fails to inspect my carry-on bag at all, so I'm happy to have my stuff to take to Dallas, but a little disappointed for losing a good chance to argue with someone about an idiotic policy. I'd rather have the gumbo, though, so that's a win.

In Dallas, Jani picks me up at the airport and we have dinner (contraband homemade gumbo and hummus) with my friends Scott and Lisa. We call it an early night, and head to the hotel. Jani's switched us to the Staybridge Suites, which is a little more than twice as expensive (a bit over $100 a night) as the Homestead Suites we stayed at last time, and is a mile or so further from E3000. Totally, completely worth it. We've got a huge room, a giant closet, a nice kitchen that's well-stocked, daily maid service, a breakfast buffet, and the room doesn't smell like mildew. The internet connection is like twice as fast, too, and it includes a wired internet connection as well as the wireless. Yeah, I'm never going back to Homestead. This place is nice.

Jani said not to take her photo, but I wanted a picture of the room in here. So I blurred her out. There we go.

------

Monday, November 3 - Bring the Pain

I wake up early, like at 6 am or so. I rudely wake up Jani to see if she wants to go downstairs and have breakfast with me. I know what the answer is before asking (she's not leaving the hotel room with stubble except for the trip to E3000), but I offer to bring her back some fruit and a bagel, which she takes me up on. I must be in one of my in-your-face moods because I decide to eat down in the lobby, unashamed of my obvious beard growth. I figure tomorrow I may be more in the mood to coop myself up again, icing my face. The less time spent in the room today, the better.

Over at E3000, I have Star and Sabrina again as my technicians. Same as my last trip. They're in a chatty mood in the morning, and I join in as much as I can for someone with a numb face and needles being jabbed in me every few seconds, trying to speak without moving my jaw or lips.

The lidocaine injections are just as bad this time as I remembered from last time. Anything near the lips is torture. The electrolysis itself is painless. This time it's going much, much quicker. I mention when we go on break that I'd arranged for us to work on my "South Pole" after we're done with my face. And by "South Pole" I mean my penis. And by "work on" I mean jab needles into it and apply electric shocks. I don't need to point these clarifications out to Sabrina and Star. They know how this works.

I don't know how it works, though. When we get to the genital region after the lunch break, I ask Star if we're doing lidocaine injections down there, hoping the answer is, "no, of course not -- we have some kind of cream and you won't feel a thing". The actual answer is yeah, it's injections, but she hears it's not as bad as the face. I try not to panic thinking of that long needle jabbing me in places that don't especially like sharp objects coming near them, let alone breaking the skin.

It turns out Star's sort of right and sort of not at all right about this being not as bad. The first few injections, right above the penis, I don't even feel. As we get a little lower, I can feel it, but it's not as painful as the ones in my face. It's still a bit nervewracking, and by "a bit", I mean a lot. I don't need that thing for much anymore, but I still don't want people sticking it with a needle. I can't help but imagine the pain I'd feel if the needle went in just a little further.

Then comes the scrotum. Now there's no need to imagine being poked directly in a very sensitive area, because now it's happening for real. Okay, I'd rather have the injections straight into my lips again instead of this. Not only is it incredibly painful, but it's uncomfortable, too. Plus, I'm making it much worse thinking about the possibility of getting jabbed in a testicle with a needle. Star tells me not to squirm. I'm trying. I tell her to be careful. She is. I whine and tears are flowing down my cheeks. At some point in there, I think I may have confessed to having masterminded the September 11 attacks.

Once the injections are over, the rest of the genital clearing is a breeze. We're done in about 2 hours and I don't feel a thing. The whole area is numb. Was this better or worse than I expected? I don't really know. I guess some things were better, and others were just as bad as I'd imagined. But it's over, and it was tollerable, in a really really painful and agonizing sort of way.

Overall, I did about 12 hours of electrolysis this trip for a full clearing of face and genital area. That's versus almost 20 hours just on my face last time. I probably had more lidocaine injections than the last trip, but a lot less actual electrolysis. My face is red and swollen, but nowhere near to the proportions as last time. There's some bruising, but it doesn't feel totally numb and tight like last time. I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, but I was hoping for a much faster recovery.

We'll see in the morning how much this swells up. I'm guessing it won't be nearly as much. Maybe after this trip, I can cut these trips down to a couple of days instead of 4 or 5.

-----

Tuesday, November 4 - Election Day

I spent last night icing my face, and put on some zinc oxide right before bed. The swelling is there, but it's only about as bad as it had been 2 days after treatment last time. I figure by Thursday the swelling should be almost gone if I keep icing it and taking Advil for the swelling.

I feel a bit traumatized from yesterday's torture session. I can't say that I'm actually sore in the genital area, although there's some really minor bruising. Nothing painful. Still, I have this overwhelming urge for avoidance of my genital region. Like the poor thing just wants to curl up in the corner and for everyone to leave it alone. This feeling will last a few days, but it's not a soreness exactly, just an aversion. So no icing or anything needed down there, but my penis doesn't seem happy with me. It has no idea -- just wait until March. It's really not gonna be happy then.

Tonight is the big exciting election for president of the US, which used to be a country of some importance in the world before we destroyed our reputation and economy in a series of massive blunders. Since I still live in what's left of the US, I went ahead and voted absentee before flying down to Dallas.

I totally called the election yesterday, by the way. When our chatter turned to the election, Star seemed to be favoring Obama while Sabrina definitely seemed to be for McCain. I was between the two, and both had sharp needles they were using on me, so I was as diplomatic as possible, finding nice things to say about Sarah Palin ("she's very beautiful" and "people do seem to like her folksy charm"). It was easier to find nice things to say about Obama, what with him being so clean and articulate for a black man and all. Anyway, I voted for Obama. When Sabrina left me and Star alone, I told her Obama was definitely gonna win, my guess with 350-360 electoral votes. No question about it. Okay, I had some lingering doubt -- you never know with polls I guess, but I was pretty sure.

The election results were surprisingly boring, and it was pretty much completely over when an hour into the counting, FOX News was already calling Ohio for Obama. Game over since Pennsylvania was clearly going blue, too, and everything else was falling in line as predicted. Jani doesn't like the way I keep wanting to switch back to FOX, but I'm interested in how the different networks call it. They pretty much all know it's over when Ohio's gone to Obama. It is.

Too bad, because with nothing to do but ice my face and sit in a hotel room, I could use some excitement. But I'm happy enough with the results.

My face is tight, and there's redness, but really this isn't at all bad. Not nearly as bad as last time. I wouldn't particularly want to be flying home today, but I guess I could if I had to. I'm not sure I look any weirder than when I was flying with 4 days' growth. Next session, I'll only plan to stay in Dallas a couple of days after treatment. That'll cut down on expenses, and get me back to work earlier.

-----

Wednesday, November 5-Friday, November 7 - Not much to report

Starting Wednesday, I pretty much feel okay going out. I work remotely for most of the day. I call in for a couple of meetings. My voice is a bit off, with my mouth swollen, but again not as bad as last trip. Jani looks even less swollen and red than I do, but still won't leave the hotel room. That's Jani.

Wednesday night, Lisa and I go for yoga. I am forced to look at my swollen self in the mirror for an hour and a half, but I'm not all that self concious about it, even though I'm definitely not at my best. Sweating like crazy (the yoga studio we go to is about 90 degrees or so) doesn't seem to hurt my face. I avoid the sun for the next couple of days, but I go out when I feel like it. I get a lot more work done than last trip.

Friday, Jani's heading home and I move to a new (dirt cheap) hotel near the airport. I can't make my work laptop work on a wireless connection today for some reason, so instead I spend the day shopping and exploring Dallas. I had tried to change my flight back, but the airlines won't even let me fly standby if it's not the day of my flight. I don't know why. They like arbitrary rules.

By Saturday, my face looks unswollen and hair-free for my trip home. Time to enjoy a week or so of not having to shave at all. I like the peach fuzz that grows when I'm not shaving, but all the coarse hairs are gone.

This is getting to be a breeze. Except for the stuff on my genitals. That's torture. I figure I need to do that 3 or 4 more times before surgery. I can do that I guess.

Seeing how the other half lives

2008-11-03T21:43:00.004-05:00

I'm back down in Dallas for round two with E3000 this week. I'll post a diary of my recovery once I'm done, but as a preview it looks like I should be dealing with a lot less swelling this time around. So far, so good. We'll see.

The night before flying down here, I had my annual Halloween party at my house, which was a big hit, I think. Halloweenapalooza is a tradition I started last year, when it was more or less a coming out party for me. Last year's party featured lots of people from work mixed with several of my transgender friends I'd met online in Second Life, who travelled great distances to get together for what turned out to be my first weekend spent as Suzanne. That was a good time. That weekend gave me a taste of what living as a woman would be like, and I really haven't looked back since.

Ironically, a year later for Halloweenapalooza '08, I found myself going out dressed as a boy for the first time in 8 months, when I needed ice and plastic bowls for the party at the last minute. Since I had to stop shaving last Thursday for my electrolysis today, I decided to use the beard shadow (enhanced by some brown eye shadow) for my costume. I went as Hunter S. Thompson. Fishing hat, aviator sunglasses, a cigarette holder, and some of my old boy clothes from the dwindling stash that I still haven't given away to friends or to charity. Well, it worked, although I don't think I made a terribly convincing boy at this point. Putting on that costume only reinforced for me how much my voice and manerisms and really my whole personality has changed in a year. The look itself felt totally fake, and not at all me. I have no desire to go back to being a boy, but it was an experience.

The party was good, despite the fact that sometimes these days I feel like I have to practically beg people to hang out with me, and this was no exception. Maybe I just need friends who are more fun. How many people did I invite? 60 or so, I think. I think I had about 20 people actually show up [most popular excuse: kids; lamest excuse: the time change this weekend costs me an hour of sleep], and 3 of those were my neighbor's friends who happened to be visiting from Wales this week, and whom I'd never met before. Well, they were among the last to leave, at 4 am. The people who did make it to my party were all fun, anyway, so it was a good time. I did a much better job with the food this year (gumbo, which I could keep hot on the stove, and assorted snacks including a sun-dried tomato hummus, which I thought came out great). I had a good time, and somehow managed to wake up early enough the next morning to clean the house completely, pack for my trip and squeeze in a quick jog (jogging with a hangover is not as much fun as it sounds, for those who are wondering).

I wasn't totally comfortable presenting male, and I didn't actually feel like a boy at all -- if anything it highlighted for me how much I don't feel like a boy -- but I did feel like I was treated differently. Jason, Kevin, and Merv, my new friends from Wales, seemed to treat me as one of the guys. I'm not totally sure what they thought, but they were nice enough. It was just a sense I got, though, that to them I was a guy who likes to act like a woman. I didn't like that sense, but I guess that's what I get for my ambiguous gender presentations. I was happy that people who know me seemed to have no trouble referring to me as "she" and "her" despite my manly appearance. It was something of a novelty to be in boy mode again, and not having to check my hair or makeup is a convenience I'd forgotten about.

Another thing I 'd almost forgotten about was that when I'm dressed as a boy, people lecture me about my weight, that I'm too skinny. That used to be a several times per week thing back when I was still going to work as Scott, but since transitioning full time in February, not once had anyone suggested I need to gain weight, until Saturday. Double standard, I guess. My weight's fine for a girl but not for a boy. I can live with that.

Many More Milesones

2008-10-27T21:16:00.003-04:00

I decided about 3 weeks ago to run in the Marine Corps Marathon, which was yesterday. It was something I'd thought about doing going back to when I could have actually registered for it, but I was on the fence about whether I wanted to do it or not, and then registration closed. So I hadn't been training for it or anything, thinking I couldn't get in.

A friend told me recently that some people sell their entries on craigslist after they injure themselves. I decided to test out my legs for longer distances than the 10-11 miles I'd been doing on my longest runs. Turns out my legs can take a lot of punishment, because 16 miles felt pretty okay with no ill effects the next day. I bought an entry (at a discount to the original entry fee I'd have paid to run under my own name) and decided to give it a shot. I got in one more long run (over 18 miles this time) and figured from that that 20 was no problem if I kept it slow and steady, and I figured once I made it that far, there would be no way I wouldn't see it through to the end. How hard can a silly marathon be compared to what I've done already, after all? As long as my legs didn't give out on me, I knew I'd make it to the end.

The race was actually fun. The weather was gorgeous. I really enjoyed about 22 miles of it, and the last 4 I managed to plow through with some difficulty but little doubt (and with a little walking, finally, around mile 23). I was exhausted at the finish, but I felt good about my accomplishment. I ran it faster than I'd expected, too, finishing just under a 10-minute mile pace at 4:21:45. I'd have been happy just to finish at all.

More than just the run and the crowds cheering us on, which was great, I really liked the fact that I could be out without makeup and with my hair back and wearing clothing tight enough to highlight both my small chest and my abnormal (for a girl) crotch, and still everyone seemed to see me as a woman and nothing more. I chatted and joked with fellow runners along the way. I got called "ma'am" by all the marines tending the course and the finish. Nobody stared at me or seemed confused about my gender.

It's a nice feeling, and one that I didn't really expect to get this soon and without any surgery. My hair, which is now at a nicely feminine length, and my voice, which has little trace of masculinity left, are a big help. And the hormones have definitely softened my features. I like this. This feels good. I don't even care much about that other stuff like why I am the way I am. I'm just living my new life and enjoying it.

I also graduated from my voice program last week. They told me I'm really good at the voice techniques they taught me, and I don't need lessons anymore, so I'm switching to just an occasional checkup. I think my voice is getting better on its own now, so I doubt the checkups will even be needed. I don't even have to think about using my new voice, and the old voice takes a big effort to try to recreate (which I do as a little parlor trick for friends, occasionally, although it doesn't sound at all like me anymore). I never ever get clocked on the phone anymore. That's a wonderful feeling.

I also (finally and to my great relief) chose a surgeon for Gender Confirmation Surgery. I'm going with McGinn. She's close, she's nice, she's smart, she's got a great reputation, and when I went up to Philly she confirmed a lot of what I had already all but concluded from my research on various surgeons and techniques. March 2. That's my date. 4 months left to get really nervous about this, but I'm pretty happy with it. It coincides pretty nicely with just after the end of officially being full time for a year. I think that's a sensible amount of time to see if this is the way I want to go.

I'm not worried about wavering in the final months, either. I can't imagine what could make me change my mind. This is definitely who I want to be. There's no finish line to transitioning, as I said in an earlier post, but even as tiring as this can get sometimes, I'm really starting to enjoy the run, wherever it leads.

Dating Myself

2008-10-11T12:45:00.002-04:00

A week from today will mark exactly 1 year on hormone replacement therapy for me. October 18, 2007. That was the start of my physical transition. A week from today will also be my first consultation with a surgeon for what's now commonly called "gender confirmation surgery". Others might know it better as "sex reassignment surgery". That's not the end of my transition, physical or otherwise, but it is a big step and it's not one you can undo.

I won't pretend it doesn't make me nervous to some degree, but honestly, I think I'm ready. Aside from the risk of complications and the (miniscule, I think) long-term risk that I'll wake up one day and decide I would have been happier not to do any of this, I've decided that this is something I have to do regardless. Life's full of uncertainties. You can't let it hold you back.

A little over a year ago, I embarked on a journey and decided once and for all to explore a side of myself I had kept hidden since I was very young. I had no idea if I'd end up actually transitioning, or if I could even be happy living as a woman. I just felt like it was something I needed to do, because I had lived in shame and fear and doubt for long enough and it wasn't working for me.

It's strange to me how "Scott" even thought he could do this. In retrospect, I have no idea how he thought he had it in him. Looking back, it seems reckless and altogether too difficult, and not at all like him. I guess he got a little taste of what it might be like to let this side out, and he decided it was too gratifying that he couldn't possibly not try, at very least. And when Scott was really motivated towards a goal, he'd sometimes border on obsession working towards it. I think I was his last great project. I'm glad he didn't give up.

38 years ago, I created Scott. A year ago, he created me. Funny, but I think we're both proud of what the other accomplished.

Hitting the wall

2008-10-09T21:51:00.003-04:00

Sunday, I started to regret the pace I had set for myself somewhere around 7 miles into my 10-mile race. By the time I got to a mile from the finish, I felt like I was dying, but I wasn't going to stop after coming that far, so I kept pushing. At the time, I was thinking that I wasn't enjoying this anymore, but I was still going to finish what I started. It wasn't a good feeling. Not at all.

Today, I wish I were back at the 9-mile marker from Sunday. I want that feeling back. I want my legs to feel like they might quit on me. I want pain and pure exhaustion and the feeling that I might actually collapse.

Maybe I want to feel like I'm collapsing, because it feels like the world around me is collapsing, too. Maybe I want to feel like I'm not strong enough, because if you're strong people expect more of you. Maybe I want to feel like there's just this one task and all I can do is focus on it and there's nothing else I can do. Maybe I just want to feel so tired that I can't feel anything else anymore.

Or maybe I just want to feel like there's a finish line up ahead, because there isn't one.

Going off the rails...

2008-10-06T20:49:00.004-04:00

To borrow a phrase from Jim Anchower, I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya, but there's just not enough hours in the day to keep you up to date on everything that's been going on at Casa Suzanne. So I won't. But here some highlights of the past few weeks:

Took a trip to San Francisco and visited Jani for a week. Had an amazingly awesome time. Ran a ton. Hills are fun!
Visited my friend Lisa in Philly for the weekend. I hadn't seen her since right after college. Had an amazingly awesome time. Shopping and talking mostly.
Ran in the Army 10-Miler. Finished in the top 20% of the field and top 100 out of 1500 in my division. Hit my pre-race target of 1 hour 20 mins. Nearly dropped dead at the finish line, but I made it.
Started running an online support group in Second Life at the Transgender Resource Center. Pretty interesting stuff. This will force me to log in for a couple of hours a week again. Dunno if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Tried my best to ignore the continuing and escallating meltdown of the world's financial system. My portfolio is a train wreck at this point, but it's only money I guess.

Overall, life's been really good lately. Crazy, but that's how it goes.

I'm looking forward to running (or "facilitating" -- I hate that word) the support group series especially. I like to get other people's perspectives, whether they're further in their transition or earlier. Once in a while, someone writes a comment on a post that gives me some new insight into something. Yesterday, an anonymous poster left me a nice comment that took a slightly depressing turn at the end:

... we TGs may all think that we pass and are gorgeous, but the realty of life is that we ain't as pretty and flawless in presentation as we think we are. I lost a million dollar job four years ago to pursue my true self, and after literally having to start from scratch with my career and education I sometimes wonder if it was really worth the loss. I am alone 99% of the time...
Your charm and enthusiasm reminds me of myself four years ago; you are in the fun stage of becoming. Unsolicited words of advice: be very sober about your decisions; I have often wished that I would have taken an SSRI under a caring professional instead of taking the drastic and life altering steps that I took. In the end, we must all fall off the cliff I suppose. Good luck at grabbing the branches on the way down.

I had to think about that one. I can't pretend that this hasn't been one of my big concerns from the beginning, that I might be heading for a cliff. "Life-altering" is putting it mildly. Life-upheaving is what this is. I don't plan to try to go deep stealth. I have nothing against those who do, but I think they might be setting themselves up for disappointment. I'd rather try to make the best of who I am, and I was born male. Nothing I do will ever change that.

I don't think I'm 100% passable, either, although I am really happy that I can go out without makeup and in skin-tight running clothes, and nobody mistakes me for a guy. I get some quizzical looks on occasion, but mostly I get ignored. Nobody calls me sir, ever anymore. If I answer the phone and they're looking for Scott, I get asked if I'm "Mrs. Geese". I usually laugh and answer "sort of" to that.

People will mostly know or suspect I'm trans if they spend a lot of time with me. I know that. I guess my goal isn't so much to pass as to live as who I am. And I am a transwoman. I can accept that, I think. Maybe some people can't. Maybe I'll never find a lifelong partner who can really accept me for who I am. That's possible.

I'll even go so far as to concede that there are ways I could have found to be happy living as a guy, never having transitioned. Maybe one of those ways even comes in a pill. I'd still rather find my own way, and live the way I want. I can't rule out the possibility that I'm setting myself up to be shunned and alone and miserable, but if I end up feeling alone 99% of the time, that's better than trying to live walled off inside my own head and alone 100% of the time, isn't it? Plus, if I end up alone, that's mostly my own doing, because everywhere I look there are supportive people around me. I don't think that will go away.

Maybe my life will never be easy from this point on, and maybe I can't control it anymore, or maybe I never really could. I know I'm closing off options by doing this, and opening myself up to unfair treatment, discrimination, and so on. The way I see it, I'm living with something that just isn't fair. I can't change that, and I'm going to just make the best of it.

If I'm heading for a cliff on a crazy train, maybe I'm just going to have to let it take me for a fall. I'll just try to have some fun on the way down.

Stylin'

2008-09-16T22:02:00.005-04:00

I like my new hairstyle. I think it suits me. My new stylist, Merlin, is really nice, too. She works in a salon right downstairs from my office, in the same building as me, and she happens to be the daughter of my therapist, too. Mother and daughter are both working on my head now. Getting your hair styled feels kind of therapeutic. I think they're both in their chosen professions because they like to meet people and get to know them.

I told Merlin I want to grow it out at least another 4 inches. She cut it shorter in back but left it long in the front, and layered it some to give me volume. I'm going to have lots of fun playing around with styling it. Better plan for an extra 20 minutes in my morning routine from now on. I may have to cut back on cappuccinos some.

On the way home, I put the windows down and let the wind blow my hair all around my face. It feels fun and flirty.

Merlin talked me into coming back in a couple of weeks for highlights. We didn't have time today. I can't wait.

And I can still tie it back in a ponytail when I want. Yep, this will work. We're definitely getting there.

The Natural Look

2008-09-15T20:40:00.015-04:00

I'm finally weaning myself off the wig. It was a great shortcut to passability when my hair was still too short, and for when I still had that little balding patch on the back of my head I developed in my 20s. Now that time, Rogaine and Propecia have gotten my real hair to the point where it's much more workable, I don't think I need it anymore.

I stopped wearing the wig when I went to Dallas last week. I've been playing around with styling my hair for the past few weeks to minimize my widow's peaks and to see what works best with my face. I think I'm done with the wig pretty much for good.

Today was the first day I didn't wear it to the office. They hadn't seen me in a week. My own hair is getting close to the same length, and it was always pretty close to the same color. Nobody seemed to notice. That, or they're too polite to tell me it looks worse now. I think they didn't notice, mostly. I like the feel of my own hair a lot better, especially when I pull it back in a ponytail. I sometimes whip my head back and forth just to feel it swinging back there. It feels like happiness. Tomorrow, I've got an appointment to get my hair styled. I haven't had it cut in 16 months. She's not cutting it short; I'll tell you that right now.

Other things are growing too, besides my hair. I noticed on Saturday when I wore a bra I haven't worn in a while, one with really moulded cups and a lot of lift, that while I was walking along, I could feel some slight, well, bounciness. That made me giddy. Giddy like you feel when you shake your head from side to side and your ponytail goes thwack! thwack! on the back of your head and it's really yours not a wig and you know because you can feel it. I'm still not even to an A-cup even, but I've got growth, and they're my boobs. My real boobs.

A lot of trans girls get breast augmentation, because we're not going to get as much natural growth as genetic females, especially if we missed out on puberty the first go around. I know Ashley and Jani are both talking about going the surgical route. That's a good shortcut to femininity, like wearing a wig, and I don't begrudge them for it in any way. Still, I think I'm going to stick with what nature and pharmaceutical companies gave me. I think it's a better look for me.

Small but cute. Natural. All me. Like my ponytail. Look at it. Tell me that's not adorable:

My E3000 Diary

2008-09-12T12:21:00.019-04:00

In the interest of providing a little practical advice on transitioning and documenting this trip for comparison with my next trip to Dallas in November, I'll depart from my normal ranting for one long post.

Background

Electrology 3000 is a clinic in Carrollton, TX specializing in permanent hair removal for the male-to-female transsexual. You can find places that do electrolysis and other hair removal procedures just about anyplace, but there are some practical benefits to going the E3000 route, especially for beard hair removal.

Advantages

Speed: A full clearing of the worst beard might take 2-3 days with two operators going at your face simultaneously for 7-hour shifts. Compare this to one electrolygist working for an hour or two at a time on you, squeezing in appointments when you can manage, and this is just much more efficient, and gets you where you want to be much quicker. Clearing every hair off your face in a single round means none of the hairs in the growth cycle slip by. If they're growing, they'll get zapped, and there's no escape for the little bastards.

Pain: E3000 uses litocaine injections which, although the shots hurt like hell, completely elliminate all pain during the electrolysis itself. I could not stand more than an hour or so at a time without litocaine, and I know women who can't take more than 1/2 hour sessions, even with numbing cream, which is not nearly as effective as the shots.

Expertise: E3000 has an excellent track record, uses the latest technology, and knows how to safely rid stubborn beard hair from your face. The business was started by a transwoman, and they have been in business for over 20 years specifically geared towards working with transsexuals.

Cost: At $105/hr per technician (as of September 2008), this costs less than the $95 per 45-minute session I was paying in DC. Even if you have good, cheaper electrolygists in your area, the technicians seem to work much faster than what I was getting for $125/hr by me. Plane fares and hotels add significant cost, but I think that's more than offset by the speed E3000 electrolygists work and the benefits of their method of full clearings, which will catch every hair in its growth cycle more often.

Convenience: If you have not transitioned, it may be fine for you to do an hour of electrolysis several times a week for months on end, all the while maintaining some beard growth. For the rest of us, it's godawful to have to grow out 3-5 days of stubble, even if it's only in a patch on your face.

Disadvantages

Cash: Although the cost itself may be less overall, you're going to need several clearings (6-8 I've heard) and each trip's going to be over $1000. The first clearing could be over $3000 including travel expenses if you have a lot of hair. No spending a few hundred here and there when you have the cash and the time. Once you start with the program, you really need to see it through for several clearings. I'm budgeting $10-12k for my face alone, all tolled with travel costs. Added to $20k for SRS coming up and some other potential cosmetic work, and this is going to be an expensive coming year for me.

Recovery: For me, this was not a big problem, since I get time off work with full pay from my job for basically any medical procedure I need relating to my condition. For others, taking weeks at a time off of work may be a huge problem. This might add significantly to the cost, or at least eat up all your vacation time.

Appearance: You will have to grow 4-5 days worth of facial hair over your entire face going in. After treatment, you will look like a baboon (or in my case, Jay Leno's obese twin brother) for several days. This is mostly a psychological disadvantage, and can be dealt with, but it's a key downside and is inevitable when you just had 20,000 electric needles stuck in your face over the course of a couple of days. I'll cover this more later.

Cessation of other procedures: When I first called up E3000, I had just stopped laser hair removal, which was only partially effective for me after 7 full clearings and 6 additional touch-ups. They told me I had to wait 6 months to begin with them, because many of the hairs removed by laser would grow back, and I needed to be at full growth to start with their program. No waxing, tweezing or other stuff allowed. Okay, so I waited 6 months and stopped doing all other hair removal on my face. By the time I was scheduled to start, I was really starting to hate my beard shadow again, which had for a time been almost acceptably faint from all the laser I'd been doing.

Preparations

Assuming you're coming in from out of town, plan to stay at least 3 or 4 full days after the end of your treatment. The Homestead Studio Suites located very close to E3000 is cheap and reasonably comfortable. $39/night (+ various taxes brought it to around $50) is hard to beat, and you get a full refrigerator with freezer, which will come in handy for ice storage. Get enough food to last most of your stay, try to ignore the mildewy smell the rooms all seem to have, and make yourself as comfortable as you can.

I haven't had a problem at the Homestead Studios, but recent gossip over at E3000 is that a patient got insulted by a manager here (who reportedly told her she was too ugly to transition), and there is a new, better, cleaner and slightly more expensive deal negotiated at the Best Western 1.5 miles away, which offers a shuttle to E3000 and also has a kitchen (essential) for $79/night if you tell them if you're an E3000 patient. I'm planning to switch to there next visit, and will offer a comparison in a couple months.

You will need for your first visit (the essentials):

Ziploc Baggies (don't cheap out and get ones that aren't as water-tight)

Ice (1 big bag should do it)

Paper towels

Food to last you for your stay (or a tolerance for eating pizza for a week)

Pictures of yourself from when your face looked normal. On a computer, digital camera or whatever. Bring something to remind you.

Advil

Water, and lots of it. A couple gallons will do. Keep your skin hydrated!

I also highly recommend the following:

Aloe, moisturizer and clay face mask.

A friend (preferably someone you can stand to be in a hotel with for 5 days straight). Buddy up if you know someone who's also doing this at the same time as you and share expenses.

Drugs: Ativan (kind of like Valium), Vicodin (like prescription-strength Tylenol) or any other prescription drugs you can get your hands on. In my case, these came courtesy of my friend Jani who underwent the procedure with me. Don't ask your friend what they're for; just take them*. She's your friend. A doctor prescribed them. You think you're smarter than someone who went to medical school for like 12 years or whatever? Come on!

Chocolate, or other comfort food

Computer, DVDs, books or something to keep you entertained while you recover

* Disclaimer: Nothing in this post, especially this part, should be taken as expert medical advice, or even advice a sane person would follow. Don't EVER take someone else's drugs, even though I freely admit that I did. Or, take them but don't sue me. Or get your own from a doctor, even better. Jani says** you can get a lot of Valium or whatever if you just ask your doctor for 3 or 4 (“I'm going to be going though a difficult recovery and I may be feeling very anxious at times. I'd like something to calm me down, but I only need like 4 pills.” Bingo, you get a prescription for 20).

** Don't sue Jani, either.

Diary (Trip 1, September 5 - 13, 2008)

September 4 (Thursday):

I shaved in the morning for the last time. Went to work as usual. Came home and did exfoliating face mask, a hot bath with candles, and moisturizer (olive oil with a few drops of essence of lavender -- my new moisturizer) before bed.

September 5 (Friday):

I show up for work with 1 day's growth. Not too terrible, but I hid in my office most of the day. It's summertime, and the office is quiet (Maybe too quiet, as I'll find out tomorrow). My flight to Dallas is 7:30pm out of National Airport. My prearranged ride from work, Pete, is so embarrassed to be associated with a known transsexual that he latches onto any lame excuse he can not to come in today ("My wife had a baby last night." "Yeah, Pete, your wife had the baby. You just sat there. Come on!").

I lug my heavy suitcase through the Metro. US Airways charges me $15 to check my bag. They want $2 for a soda, which I wouldn't have wanted if it were free. They are clearly biased against transwomen, even though I'm like 99% sure the woman at the check in is trans. I gave her the "hey, sister" nod when I checked in. Why do I always wear a skirt when I'm travelling? My legs are freezing.

Flight gets in 1/2 hour early, and I grab my bag, rent a car, and head for the hotel where my friend Jani (on her 3rd trip to E3000) has been staying since last night. We hit the Kroger's up the road for supplies. Jani insists on buying a Brita water filter pitcher instead of just getting a few gallons of filtered water. I'm cranky from the long drive and uncomfortable flight, and I'm balking at our shopping cart loaded up with stuff, and I'm being pretty grouchy. Should have done the shopping the next day -- remember that for next trip. We make it out unscathed and still friends even though I'm snippy (Sorry, Jani!).

I moisturize before bed (skin needs to be at it's best for this).

September 6 (Saturday):

Ugh! Look at that beard shadow. It's nearly hopeless covering this up. I make a vain attempt to conceal my beard, put on tons of sunblock (this is Texas in the summer) and make the best of it. I hang out with my friend Lisa, who lives here. We do the Home and Garden show with a couple of her friends I hadn't met before, hot series yoga (don't get me started on the anxiety I feel changing in the women's locker room with 3 days' growth), and dinner with Lisa's husband Scott (also my friend from pre-transition) at a fun tex-mex place owned by a transsexual. Every business in Dallas is owned by transwomen. Awesome!

Before bed, I do a clay mask followed by aloe all over my face, and then moisturize heavily before turning in.

Oh, and my company, Fannie Mae, gets taken over by the government. Jani tells me the news in the morning, pretty much ruining my mood. Great, my options were already worthless, my stock had already gone from $60 to $6 over the past few months, and now it's going to open for $1 on Monday. Plus, maybe I'll lose my job soon. Wonderful. Just what I needed this week.

September 7 (Sunday):

Brunch with Scott and Lisa and I don't even try to cover the shadow this time. Cafe Brazil is awesome. I have a cappuccino and a mexican omelet. Yummy yum. I have some Second Life business to attend to about volunteering for trans support groups online and have to dash back to the hotel.

Sunday night I repeat my skin care from the previous night (clay mask, aloe, moisturizer). I try out a Vicodin to make sure it doesn't have a bad effect on me. I think it makes me sleepy. I fall asleep.

September 8 (Monday):

My appointment is at 9:30 am. I take 2 Advil, a Vicodin, and a Valium (or whatever that was) in preparation and Jani and I are puttering around the hotel room (Jani: "They never open before 9:30") when E3000 calls because Jani forgot she scheduled a 9-am microdermabration. Oops. We dash over there, but it's only 5 mins away. I get to watch Jani looking uncomfortable as they sandblast her face as I wait for my appointment. It's supposed to clean out the pores and exfoliate. I've been exfoliating a lot, so I guess that was a good idea.

Sabrina works on me today. Sabrina's pretty much all business. She's fast fast fast. I couldn't chat if she wanted, since she starts on my upper lip. The upper lip is going to be the worst for swelling; I know that going in. Best to get the worst part done first, Sabrina says. I happen to disagree, but she is holding a needle that shoots electricity out of its tip, and so I am in no position to argue the point, I guess.

The litocaine injections (I never once saw the needle, because my eyes were firmly shut each time) feel like a very long incredibly thin needle going through the skin from one side of my face to the other, and as it's being extracted and the litocane is injected, it feels like they loaded it up with more even smaller needles and those smaller needles are filled with pure pain and evil. I apologize for screaming as Sabrina injects me over and over and over and do my best to stay completely motionless. I am not an expert on how you give shots, but I don't think having the patient jerking around when you have a 6" needle stuck in their face is the sort of thing you'd want them to do. Sabrina says I'm doing great, with the same tone as President Bush's advisors probably tell him he's doing a great job running the country, and she says she's leaving the room to write down some information after each series of injections, but I strongly suspect she's leaving the room mostly so she can laugh at me.

(Here's a copy of what she wrote in my file -- I sneaked a peek when Sabrina wasn't looking):

9:30 am - Patient screams in pain when injected with litocaine.
10:00 am - Patient still screaming in pain when injected.
10:30 am - More litocaine. More screamin'.
11:00 am - I told her she's doing great and all, but really this b*tch needs to stop screaming.
11:30 am - Okay, this time I just told her I was injecting her, and didn't even really do it. Yep, she screamed anyway. What's up with that?
(and so on...)

At 1 pm, we break for lunch and Jani and I eat in the break room while the whole office heads over to Burger Street for a little over an hour. We brought canned soup. E3000 has lots of ice packs prepped and I use 'em on my upper lip. There is a big bowl of candy up front. We fish out all of the "fun size" Twix and eat those. If you go to E3000 and the candy bowl has no Twix, I'm sorry about that. My bad.

6:30 pm we finish up, and my upper lip, both cheeks and part of my neck are done. I am not in pain. I am red and swollen, and I look simply awful, so naturally I snap a quick picture of myself with my iPhone and send it out to family and friends. If they think I look bad today, wait until tomorrow.

Jani's done, too, only she's done done and I'm only done-for-today done. Back at the hotel, Jani makes us ravioli for dinner and we break out one of three bottles of wine from Friday's shopping trip. I slather my face with zinc oxide, go through a few ice packs (recipe: ice in a Ziploc bag, wrapped in a paper towel) and take more Advil, which is supposed to be good for reducing inflammation. I'm planning to pop 6-8 Advil per day for the next week. I think this is a good idea primarily because the bottle says not to take that many, and I don't trust big pharmaceutical companies.

I sleep well, drowsy from painkillers and wine. No real problems.

September 9 (Tuesday):

They said the swelling would be at its worst the morning after the procedure. They weren't lying. It's really only my upper lip that's bad, but when I wake up, it's kind of hanging over the lower lip it's gotten so big and swollen. There's a big purple bruise along one side of my lip. I think maybe Sabrina injected me with one of the shots directly through the lip to see if she could make me scream louder. No, not really. She's very nice.

Going into this, I was mainly worried about the 2-day process because on the second day, we're already working with a face that's bruised and battered and swollen. Turns out it wasn't a real problem. The pain of the litocaine injections is already at the maximum level for how much pain your face can feel, so it wouldn't matter if they decided to inject this stuff through your eyeball -- it would still hurt the same.

Okay, maybe it's not that bad, but the shots and procedure was no worse the second day only this time Sabrina and Star are both working on me at the same time, which means more shots at a time and generally more discomfort. Star's newer than Sabrina, and probably not quite as fast, but she seems thorough and the results on Star's side of my face look as good as the Sabrina side. Sabrina had a little less area to cover on me, and after lunch she went to work on another girl they had in for her first clearing. I met "Ryan" -- she's presenting male at the moment -- at lunch. Nice kid. She publishes an online comic, which I read and it's pretty funny, but you can't have the link because she's not "out" and also the main character in the story is trans and that's a spoiler at this point in the comic, and I promised not to spoil that.

To finish my neck, they have me tilted pretty far at an angle upside down, which by close to 7 pm when we're finally done (done done!) is really killing my back. Glad I did yoga the other day. Total cost over 2 days was close to $2000 for E3000. Adding travel, lodging, and food should put me out about $2700 for this trip. The next session we can do my face with 2 electrologists in 1 day (yay!), so this is the most expensive one. Ryan's doing a 3-day adventure for her first clearing. I'd have probably been in that boat if not for the laser.

As I check out, a transwoman who I haven't met but I think she's been at the clinic all day and doesn't seem to be a patient looks at me and says, "you look awful". I smile and take that as a good sign. You wouldn't say that to someone if you were worried there were something seriously wrong with them.

My face looks like a cartoon. I have to laugh as I catch my reflection in the mirror on the way out. Despite the forewarnings, I was unaware my face could swell up this much. I snap more pictures, and send one out to friends and family. I ice heavily and pop lots of Advil. I sleep fine, propped up a bit with my head elevated. There is no pain, but my face feels very tight.

September 10 (Wednesday):

Look, here's some practical advice for you if you're going through this, and I advise you to heed it. Don't pray to God or ask anyone else to pray for you to make your swelling go away. There are three possibilities, as I see it:

1) God hates transsexuals. This is a popular theory, but I find it unlikely, personally. Anyway, praying to Him is just going to attract unwanted attention. Remember what he did to Job? He liked Job, fer crissakes. Job was His favorite person in the entire f*cking world. Know what happened to God's second favorite person in the world? Nothing bad at all, that's what, because nobody ever noticed him, on account of Job taking all the heat. Guy #2, who nobody ever heard of, lived happily ever after and God pretty much forgot he was even around, which is a good thing. So don't push your luck, sister. Try to fly under the radar. This God is a god who you hope He forgets you're even there.

2) God loves you (and/or transsexuals in general). Praying to Her is probably still useless. She knows what you're going through already (She's God) and this is either some bizarre test or She wants to help you but can't. Or, She's already doing all She can for you. Either way, you're just making Her feel bad over something that just is the way it is and nothing can be done about it. Maybe for whatever reason we can't comprehend, if She magically made your face normal again, it would force Her to have to torture a little kitten to death in Somalia or something. You don't hate kittens, do you?

3) There is no God. You might think then that it doesn't matter, but studies have shown that for whatever reason, when people are praying for you, you have a better chance of developing complications. Maybe it's psychosomatic, but if so, it's probably a negative effect. Play the odds here and stay away from the calls for divine intervention.

But I digress.

I did not pray for God to heal my face. My face when I woke up was incredibly tight. Still no pain, but lots of discomfort. It felt like an effort to squeeze a couple of Advil in between my gargantuan, inflated lips. I can barely speak. Jani makes a joke about how I look and sound like I should be at the Ronald McDonald house. She's a card, that one. I spend most of the day with ice packs on my face and I probably wouldn't leave the hotel room if there were a fire.

I doubt I'd even order a pizza looking like this so I'm glad I've got Jani there in case we need to, and I'm glad we've also got plenty of food here -- comfort food like chocolate and ice pops and beef jerky. I also have my photos of my face from 3 days ago still in my digital camera. Even though I can't help staring at my face in the mirror (Jani keeps telling me to stop that, but it's like trying not to stare at an accident on the highway), it's nice to see what I looked like before my face was inflated to comic proportions.

I make jambalaya for dinner for me and Jani, and we polish off most of bottle #2 of the wine. By bedtime, my face feels slightly less tight. I'm hoping (but not praying) this swelling subsides in a few days.

September 11 (Thursday):

Something really bad happened on this date a while back involving some planes and buildings. We now commemorate the tragedy of "9/11" every year by coming up with a new idiotic ritual to perform before boarding planes to add to the list of other idiotic rituals. Take off your shoes and put them on a conveyor belt. No liquids allowed unless they fit in 3 oz containers and are contained in a single baggie. Et cetera. They have a contest every September for a new idea and the rules of the contest are simple: your security measure should slow the security lines down as much as possible while maximizing inconvenience, and (important) must not increase security at all. Ideally, a terrorist should be able to circumvent the rule in about 1/10 the time it takes you to follow it, like, say for instance, by noticing that a quart of nitroglycerin packed in little 3-oz containers is plenty more than enough to blow up a plane or by putting the bomb in a working laptop without first stripping all the electronics out, so that it still turns on.

I hope they pick my new security measure this year: you can only board the plane if you first prove that your shirt is not made of explosives by putting it on backwards as you go through the metal detector, while (this is the important part) also walking backwards, so that it still faces front. That's in the running for the top three this year, but I think it's going to go to a guy from Des Moines who submitted "all watches and other timekeeping devices must be preset to the timezone of your final destination before you pass through security". I'll admit, his makes more sense, security-wise.

Jani doesn't even realize it's 9/11. She asks me what today's date is when we're out making a Dairy Queen run later tonight. She's going to find an "invitation" for "freedom reeducation" when she gets home to San Francisco on Saturday. I'm sorry, Jani, but I just had to make that phone call, as much as I love you, because I love my country more.

Patriotic American that I am, I observe a moment of silence this morning by making a pot of coffee and then drinking some coffee while checking my email. But, you know, in like quiet reverence or something. Jani, meanwile, snoozes away like the freedom-hating terrorist she is at her core.

Okay, the swelling's down quite a lot. It still looks, well, horrible, but I don't feel like my face is about to explode anymore. Redness is not bad (lots of zinc oxide) and except for my upper lip, there's not much bruising. I look pretty much like I gained 70 lbs or so. A lot less cartoonish than yesterday. Jani says I look fine when we go out later for a drive and to Dairy Queen, and I should take this scarf off that I have wrapped around my face, because it makes me look like a terrorist (as she claims), not an Indian princess (as I claim). Well, it takes one to know one, Jani. It takes one to know one.

Wait, wasn't I keeping this diary as a practical guide? I seem to be straying from the advice portion pretty heavily here. Sorry.

Okay, by Thursday night (2 full days post treatment), my neck and jawline are the most swollen parts, and I feel okay. My skin looks pretty good, all in all. I credit my pre-electrolysis regimen (go back and read it) of exfoliation, aloe and moisturizer (wait -- no need to go back -- I just repeated it all right there for you) and staying hydrated and rested. Sleeping pills might be a good thing to take along if, unlike me, you have trouble sleeping.

I've switched from ice packs to heating pads on my face today. I think the key thing now is to get blood circulating. It feels nice. I don't have much discomfort anymore. I'm also chewing gum, which may help with loosening up my jaw and speeding the healing process.

I still sound like Cindy Brady when I talk, with a severe lisp, and it gets much worse when I'm drinking, which I do. Jani and I mostly polish off bottle #3 of wine tonight over dinner. I have more jambalaya, but Jani eats beef jerkey for dinner (somehow that's healthier than jambalaya), since she had Arby's for lunch while I had miso soup and rice cakes and carrots. We watch a movie and I am starting to feel almost normal.

Normal for me, in any case.

September 12 (Friday):

I'm still swollen, but now it's minor. My face looks a little fat and a bit red. It's healing fast. I should be fine flying out tomorrow. I'm still popping Advil, and washing my face with warm water frequently.

When I rudely wake her up in the morning by pouncing on top of her, Jani mentions that my voice is back to normal. Yay! My face is getting there too. I feel okay to go out for lunch without the scarf. Jani and I go to Burger Street, as recommended by the women at E3000. The manager seems very nice as he takes our order. Okay, that's a tasty burger. And they have curly fries (we split an order of those). Jani and I decide we are going to make a trip to Burger Street a tradition for future electrolysis trips. Get the olive burger. It's delicious.

Later on, Jani and I go out for Thai food with Lisa. Scott's too tired to join us. I explain to Lisa in graphic detail about different sex reassignment surgery procedures as we eat some kind of spicy soup and green curry fried rice. I highly recommend the Banana Leaf restaurant, by the way, and the green curry fried rice, which is not on the menu. Jani maybe got sick from all the spicy food later on, but I have always had a cast-iron stomach and I love spicy food.

I show Lisa my photos of my recovery (“Cool, those are going up on Flickr, right?” “Of course! Look how hideous I look.”) and she says I look really old after day 1, like I've aged 20 years. She says my face looks mostly okay today, though, and anyone who didn't know what my jaw and chin are supposed to look like would just think I'm really fat. Jani adds, yeah, but only in the face, like I have Down's Syndrome or something. Did I mention how it's great to have so many friends around saying encouraging things to you during this process? No? I wonder why…

God's still mad at me, I think. The plagues of making me be born transsexual, the face swelling, and destroying my company and thereby wiping out much of my retirement savings weren't enough, I guess, because He also sends hurricane Ike straight at Dallas just to fuck with me, personally. Jani's flight out tomorrow is cancelled. Mine is still on, but they're expecting 30-40 mph sustained winds at the airport by tomorrow at noonish. My flight's at 11:20. Maybe I'm too fast for God to catch me. We'll see. Okay, old man, it's on!

I slather up with lots of aloe tonight, followed by zinc oxide. I pack and head for bed.

September 13 (Saturday):

Friday the 13th is never more dangerous than when it falls on a Saturday. I'll need to be careful today.

I wake up before my alarm, and check the internets for updates on my flight status (delayed 1 hour already - not a good sign), announcements at the Dallas/Fort Worth website (no update to yesterday's warning) and the path of hurricane Ike over on weather.com. Ike's still not done punishing all the transsexuals in Houston, I guess, because now it's not predicted to hit Dallas until late afternoon. God did not bring his “A” game out for me, apparently.

My face today looks noticeably better this morning, and for the first time (we're at 4 days post-procedure at this point), the upper part of my jawline is back to looking completely normal. The swelling is receding, and is mostly isolated now in my neck and chin. I notice I still can't comfortably open my mouth fully (trying to eat a nectarine for breakfast) but aside from that my face does not feel as tight as it did yesterday. I take my last couple of Advils I plan to take for this trip. I think they've helped all they're going to help with the swelling.

Overall, I'd rate my face as nearly acceptable for public use today. It's obvious if you look at it that there's a lot of redness and spottiness on my chin especially, and I draw a couple of curious glances at the airport, but women aren't clutching their children close to them as I walk by or anything. It looks like I have a big chin and a skin condition. To paraphrase Jani, hey, that just makes me fit in even better in Texas.

Oh, and I do still have this large purple bruise on my upper lip, left over from Monday's electrolysis. It does not hurt, but it's not getting any smaller, less dark, or less purpley. Lipstick does not hide it, and I'm not planning to wear much makeup today below my eyes anyway. Oh well. If anyone asks, I plan to tell them my pimp beat me up. Nobody does. :( I get “ma'am”ed plenty at Whole Foods (buying fruit and nuts for the trip home) and at the car rental return and at the airport. Nobody seems to think I look out of place or unfeminine. Most people don't seem to notice my skin. I had been nervous about flying out so soon my first trip here, but I've always been a fast healer, and I think my face is doing nicely. I should be fine for work on Monday, if I still have a job, that is.

My flight's on schedule for the revised takeoff time and there are like 10 people total on this flight to DC. “We'd like to announce boarding of all rows at this time. Just do us a favor and take any seat you want behind row 8, please.” Dammit! The “everyone-must-sit-behind-row-8-for-security-reasons” rule must have won this year's contest. Why didn't I think of that one?
Nobody seems worried about evacuating Dallas or anything, and Ike's down to a category 1 at this point. I make it out of there before the heavy rain even starts to come down, so I win. In your face, God! What's that? Did you say something, God? No? I didn't think so.

Summary:

Overall, the experience was better than I expected and the results look great so far (I mean, aside from the fact that I still look like hell as of this posting). The procedure itself was not as uncomfortable or as painful as I was worried it might be. My face, which is healing fast at this point, looks completely undamaged. I fully expected that. E3000 has a great track record for avoiding scarring and came very highly recommended in the trans community. Nothing I've detailed here is at all at odds with other accounts I've read of the process or people's experiences.

Ideally, I'd recommend a first clearing before transitioning full time, and it would be even better if you could do 2 or 3. I think this is the easiest and probably the cheapest way to go if you can handle the travel and holing yourself up in a hotel for days on end. In my case, the laser treatments I did starting back in October 2007 were probably a good idea for getting rid of the darkest of my beard shadow quickly, and I'd bet this first clearing would've been much harder without those treatments, so despite having to wait almost a year to start this, I'm happy I did laser first.

Getting the time off of work 4 months before transitioning at work would have been harder to explain anyway if I'd have started this a year ago, but I guess it would have just meant coming out to HR earlier. Not sure I could have done that. In September 2007, I wasn't 100% sure I'd even transition at all. That's not something you can take back once you tell them at work, though.

Next trip, I will be flying in the day before my treatment (I proved to myself this trip that I don't mind going out in public as a bearded lady), and I will plan to stay a week again. I don't expect the swelling to be nearly as bad for treatment #2, but it's still gonna swell up. The needles are the only thing that scare me, but I'll get through it.

I got through a lot this week, and despite the fact that this should have been a really horrible week for me, I kind of had fun. Yeah, definitely bring a friend if you can. The thought of being cooped up in that hotel alone for a week is not a pleasant one. Thanks, Jani!

Aside:

If you found anything helpful in this post, feel free to comment about it so I know how not to let useful information slip into my insane ramblings in future posts. If you have any questions I didn't cover about the treatment, I'm also happy to try to answer those in the comments section.
And if you didn't like it (hey, you sure read a long way for someone who didn't like it) or if you just don't like me/transsexuals in general, well, go ahead and complain about that if you'd like to.

Ghosts of the Past

2008-09-10T16:55:00.005-04:00

My face feels slightly less distorted than this morning. I think it's healing pretty fast. I can almost speak normally again, and probably by tomorrow my voice will be acceptable. So much of what I put into speaking like a woman, which was becoming my default voice recently, was rendered impossible by not having full range of movement of my mouth. Scott's voice, the one I was having trouble recreating on demand, was suddenly and unwelcomely back with me, albeit a very slurred version of its former self. Scott's face made a reappearance, too. Ghosts of the past reemerged this week to remind me of how far I've come, or maybe just to haunt me.

That face makes me want to cry. No, not the handsome boy with a cute little beard and a happy-go-lucky grin. He's my face from age 20, aged a bit but not much worse for wear. Kind of a novelty to have that back and, as I wrote about a couple of days ago, it was sort of a kick to go out as a gender queer boy or a drag king or whatever that version of me was.

No, this face I see now is the one that haunts me in the back of my mind constantly. The pudgy face in the mirror today is the swollen reminder of how my face looked all the time not so long ago. When I was fat. Really, really, really fat.

I haven't really talked about that in this journal, but people who knew me two to three years ago saw me at my worst. I didn't weigh myself much back then. I didn't like being photographed or seeing myself in the mirror then, either. I may have been over 230 lbs at one point, or 100 lbs heavier than I am today. That was me at my worst, stressed by a lonely existence, a demanding job, and a general fear of intimacy. A layer of fat acted as insulation against relationships and sexual attraction. Stress eating to fill the emptiness in my life was my favorite way of not dealing with my real problems.

These days, I guard what I eat pretty closely, and exercize regularly. I don't fast or completely elliminate any foods from my diet, but I'll admit that I am pretty obsessive about my weight. I won't relapse. I won't let that happen. I plan to get healthy and stay that way, whatever it takes.

As for the problems that caused my obesity in the first place, I can't claim that I've dealt with them fully. I am still lonely sometimes. I still have a job that makes me want to reach for a big bar of chocolate at the end of the day. I still have a fear of intimacy. My inner demons are still with me, but I'm more in control of them now I think. I feel better equipped to deal with them in any case

This week has reminded me of how far I've come and how much work I still have to do, but more importantly it's reminded me of why I'll never go back.

This morning, as I was moping around the hotel room, Jani for some reason mentioned that it's a shame that by the time you have your life figured out, it's about time for you to die. I replied, "wow, Jani, do you want to go to a party later, because you're just so much fun." God, I hope that's not it. I'd hate to finally get my life in order and find out it's over. I'll just have to start enjoying it for what it is and be satisfied with making progress.

And stop looking back so much, because when I do that I don't like what I see.

Electrology 3000

2008-09-10T01:17:00.010-04:00

Turns out if you individially burn and tear out all of the hairs in your face, your face doesn't like that. I'm going to chalk that up under "things I didn't know but could probably have guessed at". Ah well.

Yesterday was torture. Monday I had one technician working the whole day on some of the easier parts. Today, most of the day was two technicians at a time, going after the chin and neck.

The litocane injections in my chin, the ones that went right into my lower lip from underneath, were bad enough to make me cry. Getting me positioned for the neck, leaning upside down slightly, was killing my back by 6:30pm to where I was ready to say, "let's just leave a few for November when I come back". "Just a few more strays... you're gonna feel these ones, hon."

Well, I look absolutely ridiculous, but aside from the lower half of my face feeling very tightly-stretched and being completely unable to speak coherently, I feel okay. All in all, I got over 20 hours of electrolysis done in a couple of days. That used to take me months. This way was cheaper and more intensive and overall less painful, although the 45-minute sessions never required any downtime for recovery.

I probably won't be leaving this hotel room for the next two or three days. It's as bad as I'd heard and imagined appearance-wise. For discomfort, it's really not bad. If not for the extreme puffiness, it would be about like a mild sunburn in terms of pain. Not even a bad sunburn.

This trip will be the worst for appearance and downtime. The next trip I'm already down to only 1 day with 2 technicians. My beard should be 30-40% reduced from this session, permanently. After 3 or 4 times down here, I'll barely swell up at all and will be able to go out the next day, like Jani could easily do even though she refuses. After 6 or so trips over the next year, I'll be done and I'll never have to shave my face again.

Well worth the discomfort. These photos will give you a quick idea of what we're talking about here, but they were taken with my iPhone, so the quality is less-than-stellar. I have better photos I will load to Flickr once I get back to DC on Saturday.

(left: Monday, before electrolysis -- the last full beard I'll ever grow.

right: Hey, hey, hey! It's Fat Albert! No, wait -- that's me 2 days later. Jani looks on, covered in zinc oxide)

Gender Queer

2008-09-08T20:38:00.003-04:00

I'm sitting in a hotel room with ice packs and zinc oxide on my face, which is red and swollen and bumpy. I look like a chipmunk. Tomorrow, they tell me I'll look even worse. Jani's here with me. She looks considerably less swollen, but very red, like she's been sunburned across half her face and slightly roughed up in a bar fight. She looks worlds better than I do. This is her third trip down to Dallas for intensive elecrolysis, but it's my first.

Jani's done with her electrolysis for this trip, and is now down to the rest and recuperation phase, but I have another 8 hours to go tomorrow, to get rid of the hair that's still covering my chin and neck. We only covered my upper lip, cheeks, and some of my neck today. It went okay, though. Much, much better than the 1-hour electrolysis sessions I'd been doing until Jani convinced me to come down to E3000 in Dallas, which is a place that specializes in transsexuals.

For the past 4 days in preparation for today, I've been growing a beard -- the last full beard I'll ever be able to grow. It's not quite as full as when I was a guy, but even after over a dozen sessions of laser and a year on hormones, it's probably still well ahead of the growth an average guy would have. God damn my hairy ancestors. Jani had 4-days growth, too. If you looked real close and squinted, you could sort of see oh yeah, there are some little hairs there -- well I'll be damned.

Jani's been holed up in the hotel since Thursday. She won't go outside with stubble even though she looks perfectly fine and feminine. I tried to coax her out numerous times, but she wouldn't budge. She says she's afraid of getting beat up, but I think it's just her insecurities. Me, I figure I'm going to be stuck in the hotel long enough icing my face that I'm not going to let a little stubble stop me from having some fun first. Or even a lot of stubble. So I pretty much just gave up on trying to cover it up and went out looking gender queer, which I think I pulled off pretty easily with my hair back in a ponytail, eye makeup, a tight black top and jeans, a scarf, and women's tennis shoes. I didn't seem to get a lot of stares, even though this is Texas.

Ironically, in some ways this felt like less of a disguise than going out as my true self. Maybe that's because I left no doubt in people's minds what I was. You could take one look at me and lump me into whatever category you assign to what is clearly a man who is trying to look effeminate but not trying to fool you into thinking he's a woman. "Queer" or "fag" to about 90% of the world, with no time needed to process that information. I was accepted (or ignored or scoffed at) readily wherever I went. That part was kind of nice. No surprise reactions. No having to feel like I'm "on" or need to try to fool people. This is who I am. Ball's in your court, Chester.

That part was an interesting experience. Something new and less work than being trans feels like at times. Being a bit of an impostor wasn't so much fun, but it's better than staying cooped up in your hotel, I think.

Tomorrow, we take the rest of this hair off and then I'm back to mostly just female, but with a swollen face. I'm planning to call the cops tomorrow night and tell them Jani done beat me up so that she at least gets out of the hotel room for one night this week. Look for us on "Cops" next week.

Can't give this away

2008-08-31T04:00:00.005-04:00

I've been to three bars and a club in the past 2 nights. The bars were mostly a total bust. One guy at the first bar talked to me and seemed interested. Lee was not really my type, a former marine and current narcotics officer in DC. He was cute enough, but he was too muscly for my tastes, and he smoked. Smoking's a dealbreaker, sorry.

Still, I was more in the mood to get hit on than to be choosy, so I flirted anyway. Somewhere after 20 minutes of smalltalk, he lost interest. Actually, it was right after he asked me if I'd ever been married or had kids. No and no again. Did it suddenly dawn on him? Is never having been married at my age a red flag? Doesn't much matter I guess. I left and tried another bar. One guy looked like he wanted to approach me, but was too shy. The cute guys at the table next to me never even caught my eye. This crowd was too young. Strike two and time to call it a night.

Tonight (Saturday) I went out with my friend Dean (a FTM trans guy, who's into men) and some of his lesbian friends. We met at a gay bar, but Dean was late, leaving me on my own for almost 1/2 hour. Nobody said a word to me. I felt invisible. I was pretty sure I looked hot in my dark purple camisole with a shiny, tight pencil skirt and heels. Maybe too fem a look for the gay crowd.

After Dean and his friends showed up, we went over to a gay club. The same one as before. It was actually a lot of fun. The drag show was great and the dancing was exactly what I was in the mood for (among other things). My feet are throbbing as I write this, sore from about three hours straight of dancing, but I didn't attract many guys tonight. Maybe being with Dean and his friends was a deterent. A couple of guys danced with me. Not nearly as many as last time. I think it was just luck of the draw, though, and I was destined to go home alone again tonight.

Oh well.

The sad fact is that I have no real idea how to meet guys who I am at all interested in who would date a girl like me. Sometimes that depresses me, especially when I think how few very understanding and open guys out there are out there who I could actually date. On the other hand, I only need to find one, and besides, I'm pretty happy with who I am and my life the way it is now.

As I was getting ready to go out tonight, I felt really feminine and happy. I'm a girl. This was my dream and it's come true, plus it's better than I'd even imagined. Even when I'm lonely and I can't find a decent guy, well at least I'm a single woman having trouble finding someone, not a guy. I'd rather be happy with who I am than live a lie, even if it dooms my love life forever.

Their loss, I guess, but they sure seem to be taking it rather well.

Why am I even doing this?

2008-08-26T00:58:00.003-04:00

No, not the transition stuff. That's going very well.

I've been thinking lately about why I keep this blog. Sometimes I think it's to help other people. People like me. But that's not true. Most of what I write here is of no real value to anyone but me. Something about writing things down helps me, either now or later when I go back and look at what I wrote months ago, to monitor my progress and see what I was going through.

I could do that with a private journal, though, so why do I put this out on the internet with my real name and photo on it and keep very little private? That's the question I've been pondering. There are some things I've had to leave out -- things that would hurt other people if I wrote about them -- so this can't just be about venting, or a diary would be better. I could write anything. I have therapy for that, anyhow. I don't hold anything back in therapy. Between sessions, I have friends.

So why do I pour my innermost feelings out here for anyone to see? It's not about trying to be popular, I don't think. If it is, I'm doing a lowsy job. This thing doesn't get a lot of hits*. Most people probably skim what I'm writing and miss the point half of the time. Sometimes maybe I only make sense to myself. Anyway, if nobody reads some of the things I'm writing, that's fine. I am flattered if people find it interesting, but it's not really why I keep this here for strangers and friends alike to see.

Why, then?

I remember once when I was young and I got a splinter in my finger, I left it there for probably a week, because I was really squeamish and I didn't want to deal with the pain. So instead of digging it out, or getting someone else to, I let it keep hurting me for days on end until I finally managed to extricate it (I think it mostly worked its way out on its own, actually, even). That's how I used to (not) deal with unpleasant things. Maybe I still do, sometimes. But I'm trying to get better about that.

Opening up is uncomfortable sometimes, too, but it feels like progress. Writing in a private diary would be just the same way I was dealing with all of these feelings before, only documented. In this blog, I can't take it back or squirrel it away where people can't see it. It's out there. So then I'm out there. I guess that's it, or a big part of it.

I had a point to this post before I started writing, about why I was even thinking about this, but I guess I'll get to that next time...

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* Aside: I do get a kick out of sometimes checking where some of the visitors to this site came from [yes, I can see that -- this lack of privacy thing is a two-way street on the internets]. Tonight alone there were 2 hits from Google searches: "crossdresser nail polish utube" and "being transgendered stories". I really have to wonder what that first search was looking for. Not this, I'm guessing. I showed up somewhere in the 15th page of results under that search. That's real determination, to click through that many unsatisfactory results when you can't find what you're looking for in the first 140 matches [hint: it's "youtube", not "utube", you ildigerate**. Also, you can just go to YouTube and search there. Sheesh].

** I made that word up. It's like illiterate, but with the internet. You can use that.

Good to be home

2008-08-19T20:33:00.004-04:00

I got home late last night from a 5-day visit to Chicago. I was there for my family reunion, which gave about 7 more relatives on my mom's side a chance to meet the new me. It went very well. Everyone seemed more comfortable with me than I expected them to be, which is great. I wasn't particularly worried going into the visit, but I was pleasantly surprised. I guess I'm pretty comfortable now with being a woman, and I think that puts people at ease somewhat. Or am I giving myself too much credit?

I also got together with an old friend from when I was 10 years old. To me it seemed like he hadn't changed at all. Another friend of mine, Dave, who was my best friend since I was 1 year old up through high school seemed more than a little put off by my transition, and even though he's known since November or so, he's probably just not ready to deal with it yet. So he came up with a bunch of excuses not to get together with me and we traded a few voicemails and never managed to meet up. That's not much different from most of the times I've come home to Chicago in the past 10 years. I almost never see Dave anymore. There's always a million excuses. Sometimes I don't even bother to call him when I'm in town. I may not bother next time, either. We'll see.

The highlight, though, was lunch with my friend and former coworker, Dawn. We went back to one of our old haunts downtown and had crabcakes and gumbo. Just like in the old days, but now much better. Dawn also gave me a bunch of books including one I read most of on the plane home and from which I am already getting some good tips on on how not to look old. That's just what I need. Missing out on most of my prime years as a woman was a big concern of mine, but yeah, now I'm starting to agree that 40 is the new 30, which puts me back in my 20s.

Anyway, it was good to get back to Chicago to see everyone again, but it's also great to be back home in Virginia. I was a zombie at work today after getting too little sleep last night and having dragged (okay, wheeled) my suitcase around all day through two public transportation systems. I barely managed to get through the 500 or so emails that had piled up in the 3 days I was out of the office. Oh well. Tomorrow I'll finish unpacking and get caught up at work, but tonight I've got a candlelit bath and some incense and a nice cold glass of wine waiting for me.

This place is empty and quiet and tonight that's just what I'm in the mood for.

Fee Times a Mady

2008-08-11T20:29:00.004-04:00

I could lie and say I went to a gay club this weekend because I wanted to go dancing without getting hit on by guys. In truth, I was hoping for just the opposite. Gay men aren't generally interested in trans women, but there's no danger that they'll beat you up if you "fool" them, and somehow I find gay men just less threatening in general. I even considered going out intentionally androgynous, to try to attract men with my unbridled masculinity. In the end, though, that didn't feel right, so I wore a little black dress and tarted myself up for a night of dancing.

My friend Sarah came along. She was my designated driver (Sarah doesn't really drink) and also my safety net in case I got in over my head. We had a code word worked out in case one of us wanted the other to make an excuse to get away from unwanted attention. I didn't really figure I'd need that, but it never hurts to have an escape plan worked out in advance.

Three gin and tonics later at 2 in the morning, I found myself dancing to techno music surrounded by a sea of shirtless, smooth-chested men. I kissed three of them, although really only the first and third ones counted, because guy #2 was by way of apology for making out with guy #1, who was #2's boyfriend it turned out. Philip, guy #3, was the cutest anyway. I was dancing with him and totally giving him the eye. He was gorgeous, and I think he was into me, although honestly a lot of these gay guys seem pretty fickle. One boy, who I didn't kiss, but who I let caress me while we danced, whispered into my ear, "you're way too hot for a gay club" and then wandered away. Hmm. Another cute asian boy who was bumping and grinding with me for a while told me to wait there while he went to the bathroom, but he never came back. Humph!

Anyway, Philip was the cutest of the lot. He was dancing with a few other guys and was there with a girl, but he kept looking over at me. I ran into him and his little fruit fly girlfriend later on the stairs and he pulled me aside and kissed me spontaneously. That was magical. Things are a bit of a blur for me, but Sarah says the girl gave me the evil eye and then they were gone. Somehow. Oh well.

I don't think I really understand men, but that night was pretty much just what I needed. Next, I probably need to find a place where I can meet guys and maybe actually talk to them before totally macking all over them. Yeah, that might be nice.

[Note: I bet nobody gets the reference in this post's title. I don't suppose it would have helped if I had titled it "Wookin' Po Nub" either, would it?]

Evening things out

2008-08-04T21:36:00.003-04:00

Try this simple test: flip a coin, over and over again, calling out “Heads!” or “Tails!” after each flip. Half the time people will ask you to please stop.

- Jack Handy

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah, lying on the couch feeling just generally depressed. Here's the thing about that, though -- Sunday I was thinking about whether I'm happier this way and whether this whole thing is even about whether I'm happier or not. Anyway, I was trying to imagine back to my life as it was 16 months ago, before this gender crisis of mine started. I think lying on the couch feeling generally down is pretty much where I was back then, too. Somehow, I used to be more tolerant of that state of ennui, but if anything, I'd say I probably experience that feeling less now. I just feel it more.

Strange, but maybe that explains why when I had a drink with my friend Harun (the "life is beautiful" guy from this post) last week after work and he asked me if I'd do it all over again if I had the choice, I didn't even have to hesitate before replying, "yes, absolutely." Things are up and down more than before, but on average, it's better. Much better.

Some things aren't better. Some things are a pain. Some days are miserable. Still, I wouldn't go back for anything. It's not even close. So I guess I'll just keep that in mind and try to ride out the lows. My life is much harder, but more rewarding. My state of mind is more volatile, but I'm more fulfilled. In some ways I feel much more pressure to maintain my feminine persona, and in other ways I can't believe how natural some of this feels.

Oh, and Harun quit, by the way, which is why I took him out for a drink. Friday was his last day with the company. Recently, when I'd run into him in the halls and ask him how he was, he'd reply with "they're killing me" instead of his usual "life is beautiful" or "fantastic". He was really sad to be leaving, but it was the right choice for him. Last week, he was back to "life is beautiful" even though he was really down about leaving. Morale is pretty low at the company. We're losing some good people here, trying to cut costs by piling too much work on people.

I'm sure he made the right choice for himself. I'm sure I made the right choice, too. In the end, it's going to work out like it's going to work out, and the ups and downs are going to even themselves out.

Ups and Downs

2008-08-03T23:08:00.002-04:00

Today's been pretty much nuts, with my mood varying more than usual even for me. I've gone from crippling depression to feeling pretty much okay; from looking in the mirror and despising what I see to feeling pretty. This might be the new dose of hormones I'm on that I'm still probably adjusting to. I'm going through a second puberty of sorts from the hormone replacement therapy I've been on for 10 months now. It's pretty much like the first time through puberty, except completely different, and at a stage in my life when acting like a surly teenager is less age-appropriate.

Transsexuals (or me at least) are generally eager to up their doses of hormones as high as their doctors will allow. 6mg of estradiol up from 4mg makes me 50% more a womanly now (or something). Anyway, I'm not likely to try to talk my doctor out writing me new scripts when he wants to up my doses. Keep the hormone replacement coming -- give me more, more more! I probably won't even mention the mood swings during my next appointment with Dr. Baker for fear of losing that extra little blue pill each day.

These mood swings are getting worse though. I've been wavering between happy and going absolutely bitchcakes at work, especially. I suppose that's the biggest reason I feel like I need a change of jobs soon. I can't handle the stress of my current job with all this other stuff. Or maybe I can handle it, but it's still not helping matters. So I'm pretty okay with a change of pace at work in a few months or however long it takes me to find a new spot. The idea of leaving has had me pretty down for the past few days, too, but I'm getting over it. Seems kind of silly when I haven't even been offered anything else, let alone accepted a new spot.

For now, I'm finding ways to combat the doldrums. Despite this being mostly a down weekend, I did manage to get out some, do a little experimenting in the kitchen (corn and pepper frittata, which came out really good -- want the recipe?), and go for a couple of nice runs. And feeling depressed also helped me catch up on my sleep. I don't think I got off the couch until 1pm today. So that's... um... good, I think.

I'm really going to make a better effort to get out of the house more next weekend, though. I don't think being cooped up here is helping matters. Every time I decided it was time to stop moping around and do something, I felt better. Until the next wave of depression hit, that is. Sooner or later, it's bound to calm down, though, right?

Moving on

2008-07-29T21:39:00.007-04:00

One thing you probably wouldn't get a sense of if you follow my blog regularly is that I do have quite a lot of moments of relative calm. I tend to write these entries more often when something is exciting or something is really bothering me, depressing me, or frustrating the hell out of me. I don't have all that much to say when things are just normal, and most of the time, things are.

This is not one of those times, so you get one of my usual blog entries today...

I need to quit my job. I can't do this. I'd really like to switch to a job where nobody knows me, and they're getting to know me as Suzanne for the first time, never having worked with him. I can't point to any particular reasons why I shouldn't be able to carry on in my old job, but I'm pretty sure this isn't good for me. In fact, it's killing me.

Maybe I already needed a change of jobs before all this started and my transition is just opening me up to the reality of that. Maybe I'm just not as good as he was at this job. That's what it feels like. It feels like people expect me to be something I'm not; something I can't be. They want to go on like nothing's changed, but something big has changed, and that something is me. I just need a job where I can reinvent myself without living in the shadow of my former self. It makes a difference, whether people knew you before or not. I don't mind if they know I'm trans, but I don't want them to have known me as a man.

This decision is one I've been putting off since I first transitioned. I couldn't change jobs then, but something told me this was going to be a problem. I still wanted to give this a good chance to work. It isn't going to work though. I sort of knew that when I had my first 1-on-1 meeting with my manager after going full time, and I mentioned to him that I was glad the company supported my transition, and I was especially happy that management was so supportive, but knew it had to be harder for him, since he has to work directly with me. I asked him whether it was strange for him, and in his reply I sensed discomfort: "well, you know, whatever."

I'd have been fine with genuine support or an honest admission that he was put off by my transition. Trying to carry on like nothing's changed isn't going to work for me, though. That's how I feel he's been treating it, and even though I doubt he would admit it to himself let alone me, I don't think he's comfortable with this. That's going to just continue to strain our working relationship. Maybe I'm wrong about the cause, but lately it feels like he's just looking for things to find fault with me and ways to blame me for things that are outside of my purview. I'm not getting much encouragement in there. I think he'd be relieved to see me go, too.

Well, he wins. I'm leaving. Today, I updated my resume, applied for a couple of other open positions within the company, and spoke with two directors I've worked with in the past about things they have open or opening up. I feel like I've been with my current group for about 9 years too long, and even though I love my team, I find myself hating my job lately.

I'll look for something in a new company as a possibility, also, but until I'm done with sex reassignment surgery (currently planned for the end of the year), I don't know that it would be a good thing to start off with a new company needing to take over a month off. It's better if I can find a way to stay here in the company for now, but I can't stay where I am.

This job is holding me back in more ways than one, and feels like an anchor to my former self. Maybe that's just me, and maybe it's not just me, but it's still there either way. I'm glad I transitioned within my current position, but I think now it's time to start fresh.

Scared straight

2008-07-22T01:17:00.007-04:00

I read another news story recently about a child in England who is 12 and wants to have sex reassignment surgery to become a girl physically. The usual controversy erupts about whether it's okay to supress her (genetically male) body's natural hormones -- hormones which, left unchecked, will make her look masculine -- until such time as she's legally able to choose surgery at age 16. People against her parents allowing her to blocking testosterone at such a young age point to the 80% of transgendered children who, if allowed (forced?) to develop naturally as their genetic sex will never opt to live as their preferred sex. People in favor of allowing the child to begin transition (or at least delay things) at such a young age point out that that's total bullshit and these other people have their heads up their asses. And the debate continues...

When I was 12 years old, I met a transsexual in person for the first time. I had more than a passing* interest in the encounter, being well aware at the time that there was something different about me. Karen (formerly "Kenneth"**) was a client of my mother's, and had been fired from her job as an airline pilot after transitioning. She eventually got a nice settlement out of Eastern Airlines, which went bankrupt a few years later (and let that be a lesson to other companies out there). I don't remember why she came to the house, but I do remember meeting her. Have I mentioned this before? Well, it doesn't matter.

The experience was honestly not a pleasant one for me, although Karen was perfectly nice. She was frightening to me. When I saw her, I saw what I might become, and I didn't like it one bit. She was quite large for a woman, with a masculine voice and face. I remember those hands, too. They looked huge to me. Giant, burly things. Karen had been an Air Force pilot, and I assume as Kenneth, she was quite masculine. I'm probably combining the memory of meeting her with the transsexual played by John Lithgow in The World According to Garp, which also came out about the same time as this encounter. Lithgow played a former pro football player who transitioned from male to female, and he looked every bit the part. I'd bet Karen wasn't really that unfeminine, even, but that was my impression as a kid meeting her. I'm sure she looked a lot better than John Lithgow (no offense to him intended, but I don't much suppose he'd care, not actually being trans).

If Karen had been indistinguishable from a genetic woman, I'm pretty sure I'd have had an easier time accepting my own transgender nature. I think I'd have seen in her the possibilities of living as a woman. Instead, I saw in her the difficulties of being someone who looks out of place in their own body. Coupled with the fact that she'd been laid off for transitioning, it was not a very appealing thing for me to think that this could be me. It was not a pretty picture in any way, really. I think that experience (and many others mostly from television and movies) were enough to make me suppress these feelings and deny them for years and years, because the reality of my situation was just too frightening to me. Or the reality of what I thought my situation was was too frightening.

I have a great deal of respect and admiration for transsexuals who have the courage to live their lives the way they want to even though they will always stick out because of the effect of hormones on their bodies. I know for me that could have been a dealbreaker, though, had I grown to be 6'5" and built like a linebacker. I'd bet I'm not alone in that. It definitely makes it a harder choice.

I hope that kid in England gets the medical treatment she deserves, and a chance to make her own decision without testosterone making it a much harder choice. I'd be willing to bet that if she's allowed to develop physically as a woman instead of a man at puberty, she won't decide to back out. I can't say whether she'll be happy or not, but I doubt she'd be happier if allowed to develop "naturally".

As for me, I'm glad I'm in the 20%*** who still opted for this post-puberty. I'm not all that jealous of those who made the choice at age 12. I don't much care anymore that I "wasted" so many years (since, as others correctly point out to me, my time as "Scott" gives me something of a unique experience and was hardly a waste), but it's still a scary thought to me that I could have gone my whole life thinking**** this was impossible or too difficult.

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* note: ha ha
** style note: I see a lot of writers who would put the female pronouns and her female name in quotes in this story, but I think I speak for the entire trans community that we prefer it my way: She, Karen, used to be "Kenneth", who was at one point considered a "he". Are we clear?
*** note: I have no idea if that statistic is accurate
**** and thinking of ways to add four footnotes to one blog entry -- mission accomplished!

Dream Analysis

2008-07-07T22:27:00.003-04:00

I've been having some weird dreams over the past few days. I already mentioned the one about my face burning and then I realized my makeup was causing me to be disfigured. These were similarly strange, but not as scary.

In one of them, I was acting in a movie, only it seemed to be completely ad-libbed. Or maybe my part was but everyone else was scripted. I was playing a transsexual. Mostly, the movie seemed to involve me in a variety of social situations and meeting people and their families (kids and such). I kept screwing up, even though I didn't have lines. Then, after we filmed the last scene, one of my costars called me "Elizabeth", which was my name (not my character's name, my actual name) only I didn't realize she was talking to me because I didn't think that was my name (note: it's not). But it was in the dream, and I just didn't know my own name.

Another dream was probably heavily influenced by the fact that I had the Xbox randomly shuffling through my mp3 files while I was reading, and I dozed off for a couple of hours on the couch for a nap. There's a song by Oingo Boingo called "Change" that's like 16 minutes long, and in my dream, the Xbox was playing that (it probably really was) and the song was repeating and I couldn't get it to stop. There was a party going on at my house, and I was trying to get it to stop repeating and play something else, and somehow the Xbox worked like a jukebox by putting quarters in it. And there was loose change everywhere, like all over my house, spilling out of jars and lining shelves. Still, I couldn't fix the thing. I woke up and I had a lyric stuck in my head from the song:

I like my stupid life just the way it is
And I wouldn't even trade it for a herd of screaming kids
And it hurts my brain to think of all the stupid things I've said
And if I could change the future I would change the past instead

Only that's not quite the actual lyric. That second line is from a different verse. It's supposed to be "And the chaos that surrounds me like a flock of screaming pigs". [What? No Boingo fans out there? Ashley, back me up here.]

Okay, I don't completely understand what those dreams are about. But since lately I've been confronted with two people on my team at work having kids (one last week and one due next week) two other friends getting married and others having kids, I'm going to go ahead and conclude that one thing that's bothering me is that I'm now sterile. It's possible that I couldn't father children at this point even if I were to go off the hormone therapy. I don't want to father children. I don't even know that I ever want children. Still.

So maybe that's the part of "Scott" that's dead and that I mourn. Maybe that's why messing up some miter cuts on crown moulding has me sobbing hysterically, because I didn't think it through carefully enough before I made the cuts.

Maybe I'll talk to my therapist about those dreams. I told her about the face-burning dream and she said dreams are my subconscious mind trying to work some things out. Sometimes I wish it would work these things out and leave me out of it. I've always thought my stupid brain is too smart for my own good.

Or maybe it's all just hormones.

Remodelling

2008-07-06T08:18:00.004-04:00

Last night I cried on the phone with Jani for a good 20 minutes, I think. I pretty much cried myself almost to sleep. Blerg. Oversensitive and tightly-wound are not ways I thought I'd ever describe myself, and yet here we are...

Lately, I've been focused on several projects around my house, mostly painting and redecorating. My home office is almost done. I've got lots more to do when these are done. Sometimes I need the feeling that I'm making progress that I can see, and painting a room gives me that sense of accomplishment.

Yesterday, I was going to finish off the office and start painting the guest bedroom. Instead, I learned the hard way that it's really hard to get the cuts right when you're installing crown moulding. [I also learned that it's really hard to nail a 10-foot piece of crown moulding up all by yourself and I think later I'm going to learn how hard it is to pry one down when it's nailed in really good.] In the light of day, it should be mostly salvageable, but yesterday I felt hopeless and bitterly disappointed with myself for getting to the point in this project where I can't give up, but realizing I don't have the ability to do it, and it's going to end up a horrible mess. I can fix it, though. I knew it wasn't really hopeless, it just felt that way.

The worst part was the feeling that (a) I wish I hadn't decided to do this project and (b) I felt like I couldn't admit my failure to anyone. Stupid, ashamed and helpless. That was the feeling. Jani was the only one I could even talk to about it for some reason, and she wasn't answering her phone, so when she called me back I was feeling really lonely and isolated in addition to helpless and ashamed. And I was already curled in a ball on the couch, bawling, when the phone rang. Jani calmed me down after 20 minutes or so. She's good like that. I still felt lowsy, but not hopeless.

This project -- not just the office, but the whole house (and not just the house, of course) -- seems overwhelming to me sometimes. I don't handle the minor disappointments as well as I should. My expectations are too high. I know all of this. I still can't help it. I try to keep moving forward as best I can, but there comes a point in a lot of projects where you feel like you can't turn back and if at that point you suddenly realize you've made a huge mistake and the whole thing could come crashing down on you, well, it's not a good feeling, that's all. And when you're taking on a big project all by yourself, you've got nobody to blame but yourself if it all goes wrong.

This room is in a state of flux right now, but it's starting to come together. It's already about a million times better than it was before, even though I'm not done quite with it. It's going to be great when it's finished. I know that.

I just don't always see things that way when I suffer a setback.

Staring into the void

2008-07-02T00:46:00.004-04:00

I wish therapy were this Thursday instead of next. Group therapy is tomorrow and every Wednesday, but that's really hit-or-miss lately. Last week was "miss", in a big way, which kind of brought me down because the week before was really, really good and I went in to last Wednesday with high hopes that were dashed about 15 minutes into the session. The last 45 minutes were completely pallid, for reasons I won't go into. It was not productive, and let's leave it at that.

My biweekly sessions with Dr. Payne are still going very well. I find it easy to open up to her and talk about anything at all. She was the one who got me thinking last week about whether I mourn the loss of my former self. I'd like to explore that more, but I'm not sure I'll get anywhere in group therapy, and writing about it here is not likely to give me much insight either.

But I can try.

Scott is dead, as I talked about in my last post. In some ways, he feels like something I could hide behind, and in other ways, he felt like a part of me. He was both a friend I now grieve for and a cancer I'm better to be rid of. I feel a loss, and yet in most ways I don't feel any different without him.

It's very strange. I doubt you could understand what I mean. He's not here anymore, and I miss him in some ways, but I don't want him back, and I can't really figure out what if anything I've lost. I'm the same person and yet I'm not.

Yeah, this isn't getting any clearer, is it?

Okay, let's focus on what I feel is gone from me, because that's the part that's hard to pin down. If Scott was a facade and nothing else, then I haven't lost anything except a comfortable way of hiding from things that I did not want to confront, namely a world that I was afraid would not accept me without him. That might be right. Not so much a piece of me that's gone as a coping mechanism for dealing with my own doubts and insecurities.

I'm worried he was more than that, or that in getting rid of him, other parts of me had to be sacrificed. Like, for instance, with Scott came social acceptance. No, most people accept me as Suzanne, so I don't think that's it. Maybe normality. I don't feel normal. As a guy, I could convince myself and others that for all practical purposes I was a guy. As a woman, well, in some ways I feel closer to people and yet for all the acceptance I feel I can't help but dwell sometimes on the issue that it's going to be really, really hard to find someone who accepts me romantically for who I am. And by "for who I am" I mean as a normal woman, not as a tgirl/tranny/she-male/fetish/freak. Because I'm not interested in being accepted as that. I'm not that lonely yet.

But if that's all that's gone from me, then that's not really part of me either, because I was never going to really feel normal in a relationship as a guy, either. I never did, not completely. So, the thing that's gone is still just a way of fooling myself and others that I'm something I'm not. I don't think I'm any worse of minus that crutch. And maybe there's even someone out there for me who will accept me for who I am as a partner if I just stop complaining, get off my ass, and get out and meet him or her.

I think I feel a bit better about it all now. I see the loss of my male self as more of an addition by subtraction than anything else. Good enough for today. Tomorrow maybe I can find something new to whine about. Goodbye, Scott. You were fun to hang around with, but you weren't real, so I'll try not to mourn you.

RIP

2008-06-28T11:03:00.000-04:00

I'd been toying with the idea of going out dressed as a boy sometime, just out of curiosity, but I've pretty much dismissed it as too complicated, logistically. What if the neighbors saw me? I'd feel nervous to talk to anyone, since my male voice sounds pretty awkward at this point. What if someone asked to see my ID? At best I'm going to look like some kind of freak, and not like a man. Could I even pull it off?

Funny how those were some of my fears about going out as a girl not long ago. Times have changed. I've changed. I'm really not that person anymore. It's been gradual, but I really think "Scott" is pretty much nonexistent now. He was him and I am me, and we're different people. In another way, I'm not him at all anymore but he was always me, or parts of him were always me, but there's not much (anything?) left that was all him and not also me. Well, maybe one thing, but surgery will fix that soon enough.

Sometimes when I think about it, I feel sorry for Scott. I mourn him. Scott was a nice guy. He was a sweet, if misunderstood, boy. He could be arrogant and impatient at times, and I can see why people were sometimes put off by him when they first met him, but if you got to know him, he was really very honest and loyal and caring and funny and sweet.

The more I think about it, the more I realize he's really gone. I can see remnants of him around this place, but he's not here and he's not coming back. Not ever. In a way, I feel guilty for destroying him and taking over his life, but it was his choice. He knew the deal. He always knew the deal. I don't remember many times he didn't feel in control of the situation. I was always there, too, but I was pretty much willing to let Scott call the shots. But not anymore. I doubt I could even recreate him if I needed him. I wouldn't know where to start.

Maybe I don't feel guilty. He did this to himself and to me, after all. Maybe I feel abandoned. It does feel sometimes like I've lost a close friend. I've gained a lot, but I've lost what was effectively a shield against a big, scary world.

So who the hell am I now, then? I've really got to start finding out. Well, I don't need Scott's help for that anyway. That's something he was never really much good at. Poor thing.