fresh hells

Some nasty surprises re: the offer the company gives me for home refurbishment. If they charge that much, they break my time frame for when I can have SRS with Mesopotamia, assuming I still have to pay out of pocket.

But I also recognize more and more how there seems to be way too many Suporn girls needing hours and hours of dilation six months or more in. That is not an option. I must go to Mesopotamia. Next week I have a consultation with them.

So the as-yet uncertainty on the financing has me feeling very visceral terror again. I must work out a solution. Most elegant would be if I can somehow get my health insurance to pay for it. Not having to pay 30K out of pocket would be useful. It may still mean it takes longer and at this point I really. Don’t. Want. To. Wait.

I hate these misshapen parts and want them gone, need to know they will be as soon as possible. I just have to be smart about it.

I’ll find a solution. It’s what I do.

staggra

Epiphanies come quickly these days one after another. Experience is so intensive and it shifts. My life has weird dynamic ranges. I go from the very detailed or the very obscure to the very high level. In the past weeks I hung out in squats and witnessed the Babylon arch-Chancellor inaugurate something. I hang out with drifters and philanthropists and teenagers and medical bosses, and am at once a patient and part of the treatment infrastructure. I really am spanning systems at this point, in one way of witchery.

By way of the less impressive watch tool, I found Suporn dates in November opened up this morning. I’ve been dazed all day since, but I emailed. I expect someone else requested them before me, but it lets me know I must escalate, accelerate, proceed.

And if I get a November date, that is less than nine months ahead. Almost nothing. I feel like someone who just stopped using contraceptives, still not expecting a pregnancy so soon even though she planned for it, set it in motion. Like the process falls out of your control and it’s time to struggle to get all in place. But I don’t know yet. It’s like I wait for a pregnancy test. It may well be negative still.

Today I didn’t shave and didn’t put on foundation, but still went to another inauguration ceremony and talked to people. I feel individual hairs but don’t see them. Need to let them grow until I see them, to see colour. This is less scary now. As is being out and social.

Core to that is, I believe on an emotional level that I either pass for cis or am read as trans. I don’t expect to be misgendered or parsed as cis male. Surely I am clocked often. But at the same time, I know on some level I have passing privilege now, to some extent. I am treated better than some of my sisters because some of my changes went quicker, some of my starting points were better. Increasingly I have to remember that also. Still really wondering how often I am not clocked. I’m really curious about this.

ertia

There are lead-heavy things in the beauty of our alchemy. Life moves, it’s powerful, I mingle pain and pleasure. I am in love, I feel weariness, I feel pride, I feel fear and I navigate it. Beyond anything else I am indubitably alive, and eternally hopeful.

It seems like these past few months my emotions have undergone a shift. It coincides with progesterone but not with cycle position within that or maybe even dosage. Possibly enough things have happened on many fronts. Whatever the case, I believe perhaps now I am experiencing some form of the increased emotionality I was hoping for from transition.

Basically, when I have fallen in love, it has felt very very powerful and continues to, with corresponding intensity and realness of emotions indirectly attached. I sense this especially because I can see the emotions making me act sometimes rashly or stupidly, without it being trivial to inspect and stop those actions. This is new to me.

Not always practical but I want it nonetheless. I need to work out strategies for monitoring and policing myself better, if I can act on emotion now in this manner. But well worth it for the aspect of being alive.

In terms of SRS prep, spoke with HR to check procedure for “being off work for two months, due to recovery from a surgical procedure done privately in Thailand”, not described in more detail and not needing to. It should work fine, my insurance should cover six weeks (need to verify) and I can combine with holidays + what does it even mean for me to be off work?

So it still feels surreal but I take the steps to test it in the external world. Moving forward. Probably will ask about dates again soon.

imbolc I

First year I celebrate it, my appropriative faux-syncretist Imbolc appropriately was exactly as not expected, which is to be expected. There was some drama which I am still unpacking, with issues colliding where I suppose everyone involved had hoped for synergy rather than malergy. I was nowhere near as graceful as I would like to have been, but think I did not do significant damage at least.

As for damage sustained, much more was gained than lost. At Imbolc is the Goddess in her Maiden state, naïvely receiving, adoring, fully open to being hurt and disappointed, and certainly not wise yet. So she makes mistakes and she hurts and she is hurt, and it is only through these experiences that she can come to understand her dynamics and learn to go beyond them when desired.

I’ll say that whether justified or not, at this point it would be counter-productive of me to not feel all I can feel. I must wallow in every cascade, every implication. Already I discovered new things, including facets of emotion I was not aware were there. It does not matter if they are desirable or not. I must stop censoring, and only after I have done that can I do other, more complex processing; how else will I be able to unlock emotion more generally? Two avatars of Chaos have both demonstrated this to me in words and action; both have hurt me in similar ways and I have love for them both.

All such aside, a dear friend suggested to me strategies for motion and increased body awareness. I took her up on some – for the first time today I was jogging (all right, briskly walking) to the Babylon Main Station, trying along the way to stay aware primarily of my body. It was exactly as hard as expected and I often lapsed, but I did sense the interconnectness much better while in motion (contra to body scanning lying down). Most interesting, and valuable going forward, was that there exists some extent of (controllable) hip sideways motion when moving. Not only can I sense this but also control it, and I could try to habitualize its increase.

Arriving at the station, this day I was all right out of bed without makeup, no shaving (but no stubble is visible since some time now), in old pre-transition bulky black exercise clothes. This too very much an emotional and social experiment which will be repeated. I was not really gendered either way, so I can’t assess it, but from mirrors, I think that if anyone reads me as male, it will be as a tall pre-teen effeminate boy. It probably confuses, and some fraction also probably saw a woman as they passed me. Since otherwise I never go out without makeup this may be a useful recurring experiment.

Did not take a sports bra on in the hope of feeling jiggling; I did not. But the body scanning approach while running seems like something I could slowly get better at, and I could also do it standing or walking.

We move.

xaos

So much at once good and bad. Good – adventure, walking in Finnish hospital tunnels, meeting collaborators for posh vegan food, fully OK threesomes, flying back and forth. Workshop on intimacy for AMAB people with dysphorias; heard stories of South American travestitas and hijra from Pakistan; including divisions within their communities. A woman who had bottom surgery last year offered to let me see her vagina and to put a gloved finger in it; not sexual, very enlightening and empowering, all things considered. Potential future hookups with yet other people. Spending an evening writing reports, with a friend coming over for company, then staying for what turned out to be conversation, cuddling and sex. Date with a guy tomorrow, another next week – I promise this was not supposed to be a post about my sex life. Had more bottom electrolysis this morning, then lots of meetings. In which one person misgendered me, and another mentioned immune system sex differences not hormonally driven, both of which make me a dysphoric mess, at the same time as I have to make lots of decisions on project reporting, paper writing, data analysis, statistics and administration. Plus looking so much forward to the party this weekend. Am I being my own stereotype? Maybe. I love this but it is intensive.

intent

Things very intense. Some various things do stand out. My voice really bothers me, I really have to fix this and I don’t yet know how to escalate efforts and to remember to do all that is needed. I must.

Also, perhaps indicative of primitive weirdness. Changing my office most likely to the bigger one across the hall. Because this is an old hospital, it has an ensuite bathroom with a bidet. And the thought struck me since I saw it, “this is an office where I could work long days even on a 3/day dilation schedule“. I don’t think anyone ever had that particular revelation before in the history of our species.

Will do what I must. Which at this point means science.

attaché

Spending two days in an emotionally charged and impactful part of my professional environment, the very LARP-like scientific coordination meeting for a major project I am part of. I was very nervous or perhaps vigilant beforehand, feeling I absolutely had to have solved all my action points and to have provided solutions of sufficient impact where everyone feels involved. I felt this less than before because I now have my new job position taken up, so I am more secure and less dependent, but I am still dependent, and so felt it more than before at the same time as I now meet these collaborators in most cases for the first time since transitioning, and definitely for the first time since going somewhat full femme in my presentation. So situational and personal minority stress making me concerned and fearful, expecting acceptance if fully useful and efficient, and fearing – hopefully baselessly – that I would be questioned, misgendered or pitied if not. “He” went insane, tried to change sex, and now look how much worse “his” science has gotten.

For whatever reason this did not manifest. People have been great, wonderful, accepting. I think I told them all over email that I transition, but for whatever reason everyone seems to know, as I want them to, and I have not been deadnamed. Nor misgendered, excepting I saw an email sent between other parties using my new name but old pronouns. From someone who uses the right pronouns to my face, so not sure what to make of it. This does not improve my view of him. There were some awkwardnesses, but mostly very much a non-issue – people ask me about other things in my life, congratulates me on things etc. but my gender or my transition simply is entirely a non-issue in the public communication. Which is how it should be. I do feel wherever there is gendering (not so much) e.g. bonding between people in similar strata of age, sex, seniority, that I am included as I seek. Some acquaintances are deepening towards potential homosocial friendships, other established friendships already are close and open in ways where I feel no gender barriers in the way whatsoever as well as fully accepted. All good, and if I will come to meet some of these people less often in the future following end of the project, I will miss them. Subsequently, I must maintain collaborations not only for professional reasons but also for personal ones.

What felt really good was how free I felt to present while remaining me. I did my thing (semi-arrogantly discussing figures, algorithms, results, interpretation; commenting on things, suggesting things) feeling much more relaxed than usually. Ended up with voice perhaps melodious and in middle range but not so high as I wanted, hard to remember while also being heard. That bothered me some (as in, I feel dysphoric when I feel my voice is parsed as masculine). I did all this with open-footed high-heel sandals showing off painted nails and legs, in skimpy summer dresses (not even black ones!) and moderate makeup, as well as my signature occult symbol amulet. That last felt important, I am still myself, still S as the driven scientist and seeker for immortality, still someone who talks too much and comments too much and pushes some boundaries, but also someone who lets herself to be as fully femme in presentation as she feels like. I did this and since it worked well professionally, since I had some results and got good responses, I feel this makes me believe that by and large I am accepted, with some fully, with others at least on the surface.

So that was all good.

Things continuing with many many many things at once, personal things and work things and formal things (like registration and housing and company connections that are not work-related), and I feel I can only resolve a few matters each day. There is a list and I do the most urgent things first. This largely feels good, it feels OK. Most of the time I am less stressed, less sad and fearful than before, or it feels differently. I can’t quite say. This appears to be less the case just before I take each next estrogen dose, so may be linked to the dips as blood levels fluctuate. When I really do get stressed from outside sources it is more obtrusive, less easy to not feel. Still possible to ignore and not act on, but not possible to not be somehow affected by. Sometimes vexing but worth it.

places and chaoses

Things are intense and tumblng. I was with lovely people on a remote island, attending a wedding. This meant, like I hoped, for the first time trying to live as a woman in a very gendered environment; I had nice dresses and hung out with the bridal party. All in all, this was fun and empowering. More valuable: spent all that time with a group of Deep Southern US Army/Navy/Air Force folks, as a non-passing trans woman, and they did not challenge me. The only problematic interaction in that regard was a club which made some excuse to not let us in, and my party responded by yelping them into oblivion. I feel loved and cared for in these ways.

Now traveling to places where relatives live, for holidays. Trying to schedule a body hair removal session before the NYE party. Bothered by how many places only offer intimate waxing to “women“ but not stating whether they recognize trans women as such, meaning I have to email them all and ask…

Sort of sleep deprived and a little meh, and a little angst prone (”what if there is research anywhere that challenges any assumption my identity requires?”). Leaning towards recognizing my thoughts today as skittish/clouded enough that I should not engage with this out-of-left-field worry, I should not go into OCD territory. There certainly exist people who believe that humans do not work like I think I work, and some of them may even have published their thoughts. But ultimately, the important thing is what I think I feel/need, and that acting on it seems like it is making me happy, and that further experimentation will show if I am wrong in this regard, and that my identity (and state of form and person, as these things shift and evolve throughout transition) remains valid nonetheless.

Shall seek to just continue my sciencing and correspondence en route.