standing waves

CW: Rant/vent/temporary emotional expression, not 100% what my logical mind says, etc., but I feel it so I want to write it.

Some day I’ll have made a body which is not only feminine, but also fit and beautiful. It will need dieting, it may need exercise, it may need more drastic measures. Some day people won’t have to make an active effort, or make me a favour, or be in some unexpected rare mood, to find me attractive.

Some day I’ll have gathered enough accomplishments that people have no choice but to be impressed and believe I am interesting and intelligent, so that I’ll be someone people have no choice but to think of as special and worth their efforts.

Some day I’ll have learned enough empathy and style and social skills and energy and discipline and focus that I’ll be able to not hurt people by being sloppy or lazy or by mistake, that I’ll be able to fascinate them so they’ll want to seek me out.

Some day I’ll have gotten wise enough to feel at peace either which way, instead of being volatile and clingy and needy, I won’t seem so desperate any longer, and therefore won’t be as scary and distasteful to others, won’t be a walking warning sign for complex baggage and drama.

I just have to keep making myself slowly, painfully edge closer to some ideal of perfection, and then perhaps I’ll experience the sort of validation that apparently I’d need in order to believe I can have value to others.

This is silly. I am crying again, I’m irrational, I’m messed up, I’m being silly. I fascinate myself, at least. And I’ll just bury myself in efforts of self-improvement, and then maybe some day I won’t feel like this. Hard to stop crying, interesting. I’ll be OK. I have a paper to revise.

Should I hide emotions like these? Nah. It’s just so hard for me sometimes to believe in myself, I’m so inclined to second-guess it when I receive appreciation. It must be tough to deal with, and I keep on crying. Oh well.

moe doe

So, I have emotions apparently. Which is interesting. There are now two posts made here but flagged as private, which is not quite a sustainable solution. Need to work that out on a meta-level.

Also need to remember that it is about meaning, not happiness, and that my own emotions are beautiful because I feel them, whichever they are.

tonal total

I was at a meeting and had a few times where I could speak up under poor acoustics. It was stressful. My voice stayed in a low register because I didn’t have the headspace to work or habits not to have to. I hated hearing the sound of my voice then, knowing how masculine it came across.

I still won’t be quiet. But this really bothers me.

awww yis

So, other progesterone users seem to use the amounts actually indicated by the Powers protocol. I should do this also. Which does mean I should start cycling again, deciding on a starting point. I want to invite women close to me also on gel dosable E2 and P4 to cycle with me. Get in touch if you know how to and we’ll actually seriously do it, period tracker app and all.

Discovering that, as I had somewhat suspected, now that trans alignment and dysphoria is mostly under control given I am quite a way into transition, I’m getting to the point where I can deal with whatever my emotional damages are. I don’t know to what extent they are impacted by the loss of my grandfather. I don’t know to what extent they are impacted by the breakups which made me afraid. I don’t know to what extent the self-alienation of dysphoria intersected with body desirability perception to make it vaster and stronger over the years. I don’t know to what extent there were any hurdles in my attachment (in particular perhaps, my being so early in language and social development might have meant I considered myself personally responsible earlier than is healthy).

Either way, it’s clear over time I have a pathological fear of rejection, that I expect it, that this fear is very easily triggered, and that it drives me to constantly crave relational validation as well as to scrupulously ensure I do all I must to maintain good standing. It emerges, by and large, almost but not exclusively in my romances (whether formal ones or those odd cases where we decide afterwards it really was a romance).

I think this is good. I can do exposure training on the fear, try to remember to be mindful within it – which is almost but not quite so hard as not zoning out when touched – and I can try to use my newfound peace and introspection to define the edges of this phenomenon better.

I’d do well I think to look to my friends with BPD in how they cope with what they experience. I don’t think this is the same – just as I am not autistic – but I can still make use of some of their wisdom.

In other news, I’ll prepare templates for SRS recommendation letters. This feels exactly as when I asked academic collaborators for recommendation letters and they asked me to write a template for them. I made slightly different versions for each so that they would not look identical when I needed to submit both. There is some beautiful cosmic humor in this.

revolutions

I had a lovely date and a night of multichannel communications, bolstered by wisdom and humility. So many new impressions and shifts and thoughts. Her scent follows me subtly. I am late for the Scientific Council and that will be fine. It felt like coming face to face with reality. It felt like gentle fun. I maintain faith of connecting more and in more areas still. If we hurt each other it will be fine. I don’t need to preplan what might happen.

I kept fading out into… somewhere and she sensed it each time and told me to stay in the moment. It’s seriously hard work, I hadn’t realized how I keep escaping mentally during sex. Always to some extent.

I wanted my parts touched but even with the greatest care, and with the sensations feeling good, I feel like I’m keeping watch against something when it happens. So hard to stay even when I want to.

I cherish communication that is mutually desired. I hope for time shared simply being present together. I anticipate the future. This day is beautiful.

fort

These are more intense days yet again. Much is not gender-related except I did it gendered, but I want to express it.

Very time-pressured during this week. One day all spent filming, with two people I have crushed on. I had a lot of fun. I was stressed I would not do it well but it worked. Seeing the movies – in some angles and lighting, it almost appears as though I pass visually. My voice does not, but I actually look pretty good. Sometimes. Photographed by a girl who knows her stuff, in good makeup.

Then the homework. I will provide more material to help make my legal case to the insurance. Then I will perhaps have the choice of Schaaf/Morath or Chettawut. May still be leaning towards the other. It feels like I am longing for surgery now.

I went to a castle (well, resort that was a monastery with horses, swans and weird art) east of Babylon, almost to the Polish border. Place and landscape were beautiful as so many things at once. The meeting took most of two days and I needed to stay focused, could not work much on my manuscripts. I stayed very visible, and kept worrying I was too pushy. I was nervous giving my talk, and as previously, froze some and tried to hide it when I talked about the part where I outline my planned research in trans people. That said, I think they recognize me. I think my strategy from before work. I am sure I do not pass as cis to these people, but they accept me. In particular, the young women smile at me. In line for the toilet stall, someone complimented my boots.

Oh, and I definitely, totally wear a miniskirt and a corset to a meeting for research leaders. No-one has told me not to. Not all is wrong with the world. Over post-dinner drinks, spoke with she who previously misgendered me. I talked about my alignment and surgery and identity, she of her minority religion. We got on well now. I think she knows me now.

Getting tired and drained already, physically, socially, intellectually. Have some hopes of meeting up with someone this weekend, and to do so in a state of such drain (not too severe but somewhat), as I somehow long to go from exhaustion to meaningful communication while extra vulnerable, this being a feature rather than a bug. I am an emotion junkie but what else is new?

Apparently I volunteered to help coordinate efforts to harmonize study protocols and patient data. That will come back to bite me but if I do deliver all of this then maybe I do have a chance at tenure. Mid-day we left to circle Babylon to another castle (this more typical) on the diametrically opposite side. I put white noise in my headphones and semi-slept in the car.

I do need to learn the language. At least clinicians, if not basic scientists, spontaneously shift to Akkadian if all present are natives. I don’t want the vulnerability and feeling of being a liability of being the person who forces that shift.

Still, evening and dinner went fine. I ate much more today than my diet plans for, this is the issue with planned conference schedules. Some good conversations. Maybe one person getting weirdly familiar, or just a mistaken feeling of mine.

After sleeping in the car and feeling relaxed and vulnerable, I find myself thinking even more fondly-but-idly of a certain collaborator. He is old and married and I don’t like men, do I? But he smells always weirdly, oddly sexy, and I know he is smart and kind and pragmatic, and sticks out for me, and cares about me. I feel safe around him. I feel like a high school girl crushing idly on her teacher. I emphatically do not want that to go anywhere whatsoever, but it does fascinate me how I seem to respond.

Tomorrow, end of second meeting. I might get to socialize thereafter. If not, I will probably try to work until I am too tired to get anywhere, then watch sci-fi. Tonight I will have more sleep than yesternight. All in all, I am vulnerable, emotional, real, and entirely satisfied and at peace with where I am and with my own volatility. At least that is part of my truth.

wayfinder

I saw my new therapist. This was fascinating – the first time I work with an actual trans healthcare provider, and seeing others there as client. Many in my circle even work with her as well, so there is structure in the connectivity network of Expat Trans Babylon. Unsurprising. Also, she asked me if I was MtF or closeted FtM and even though I cannot believe anyone can be uncertain of this, it was still very flattering.

We’ll try a few things. I feel quite confident she can get me the documentation no matter what for Chettawut, and that’s most important. She recommended Thailand over Munich actually, which is another reason to maybe go there anyway. But we’ll also try to see what we can do with regards to the MDK application, we’ll prepare it and see if it is covered. If so, then I have more options. So all in all, I hedge my bets, trying to explore all avenues. I think that is the best strategy I can take.

I have homework, this excites me.

tempus spatium

So, from what I am told, post-SRS it is hard and/or painful to climb stairs for a number of weeks. My home is a century-old apartment building currently being slowly renovated. I live three flights up. Elevators will be installed at some point, but I cannot see them ending up placed anywhere except a half-stair down from my door, so even when in place, getting home would involve walking through a building zone and some steep steps.

In addition, there are steps in the shower, which is old and clunky and cramped. I’ll eventually have that replaced, but it makes no sense to do that until the water mains are also replaced, something which is planned for… sometime.

Taken together, these things may suggest there is a period of at least 1-2 months early in SRS recovery when living at home will be… difficult. My backup I guess is the guest house my institute hosts, where I stayed some times in the past; there I know there are no-stairs handicap-equipped ground floor rooms, based on the fact all these buildings were East Babylon hospital grounds at some point in the past. I can take lodging there if I book in advance far enough, I just have to budget for that also.

In some sense this is good though. Realizing that even if the elevator installations happens fast, it still won’t let me stay at home in early recovery, that means I have no reason to let waiting for refurbishment keep me from proceeding with my SRS prep.

Also saw instructions provided post-op from my native country. They detailed how to lie down and get out of bed without spreading legs. This scared me viscerally as I juxtapozed it with Chettawut instructions not to spread at all during first three months, as stitches may be hurt. This is immensely scary, as it implies there are habitual movements of just navigating space that can hinder recovery, not just hurt but even cause damage, sabotage.

So what I have to do from now on is to practice that until habitualization, learning to lie and sit and stand without spreading legs wide at any point. If I train it already now as a necessity, I will feel more secure that I shall be able to maintain it when I have to.

Is this obsessive? I don’t think so. I’m planning something very large-scale, it makes every bit of sense to take it seriously on all levels.

In other words, I suppose I am sure I’ll have SRS as soon as I can make it work.

puella magica

My two favourite Disney trans princess narratives to date:

  • Moana/Vaiana: Shaman princess acknowledging what she is and that she has to risk all social and anchoring assumptions because of it, eventually all is reconciled and her truth accepted: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPAbx5kgCJo
  • Frozen: Witch princess (queen – late transitioner after long denial period) having taken the steps and come out at high social cost, still certain that this is her reality and only authentic choice, building and reconciling her life; this is the starting point, rest of the story is all about her family eventually coming around to accept her: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moSFlvxnbgk