I've had an exceptionally tumultuous time, been through a lot physically and emotionally. I've found out who some of my true friends are and that some people just suck and that you have to learn the difference and let the ones who suck go.
SO okay, lets start from the beginning, shall we?
Pre-Admission, True Friends, and the World Cup-
First, I got my surgical pre-admission. I was called at 9:30 in the morning, informing me I was late for the appointment which was at 9:00. They were pissed I wasn't there but gave me an hour to get there or they'd scratch my day. They also told me it would take 3 to 4 hours and that I had to get there as quick as possible. When I got there, it took only an hour and a half and I was told I would have a date between a week to a month after that.
That was a Thursday, and not wanting to wait for ages, I called on the next Tuesday (to this day wishing I'd done the freaking Monday instead) and right then and there they booked me for the next Tuesday. One week notice. I was freaking JAZZED. That Saturday, Shan threw a very impromptu party for me. I had a Superman cake, an effigy to burn a bra as a metaphor for my breasts, and this awesome book that my friends signed wishing me good luck with the surgery or what not. It was really amazing and I'd spent the whole week now obsessed with my breasts… more than I'd been in years. I was constantly aware of the pain they caused and the discomfort and I had never wanted them gone more.
But I also noticed during the week that the Rugby World Cup was going to begin that Sunday. I was supposed to call on Monday to confirm my slot and get a time, but I called on Friday and the nurse had no idea what to make of the schedule and told me to call on Monday. I called and as it turned out, the hospital was overloaded with idiots who'd gotten hurt during the world cup opening ceremony and all surgeries were cancelled until further notice.
For six weeks, SIX FUCKING WEEKS, I agonized over it. It took two weeks before they finally told me that the only day the surgeon operated was on Tuesday and so if I wouldn't have to call as often. This first two weeks. I was incredibly depressed. I felt like I'd never wanted anything more and then it was gone. I was on a time crunch. I had until November 1st before I would have to draw the line myself because I just wouldn't have time to heal up enough to travel home and be sociable. Every day inched closer to that, and every day I was hearing nothing.
I finally got the relief of knowing it was only one day a week, so I'd just obsess about it on Monday (hoping to get a call to say 'come tomorrow') and on Tuesday (knowing it was another day passing that I wasn't having my surgery). Time inched by. What made matters worse, is that after I got my pre-admission I'd posted my excitement, and then again when I got my date and I was met with a surprising amount of hostility. A lot of 'why are you using our system, you're not from here', 'you're taking a surgical spot away from a deserving Kiwi', and a lot of other jealousy and resentment. Once I lost my date, I was still left with all that negativity around me and I felt like shit. A few people really stood up and stood out as friends, while others proved they weren't worth my time. Shan and I also learned that you didn't have to know someone for very long to have a profound friendship. She had someone volunteer to sit with her at the hospital and at that point we weren't particularly close friends (she ended up not being able to but we've since become great friends).
During that time, I felt so down that I isolated myself. I saw a few people but it was mostly at Shan's insistence. I felt like an idiot because I'd been so excited for the surgery that didn't end up happening. It was a really hard time for me.
Towards the end of the world cup, I called again and FINALLY got a date. The Tuesday following the closing ceremony. To say I was skeptical would be a fucking understatement. I was TERRIFIED it wasn't going to happen. I was scared there'd be a full out riot and it'd shut down the hospital for weeks… because at this point it was the 25th of October. If we went one more week, that was my cut off. Two more and I would have to wait until the New Year, which would've brought me down for the rest of the year. So I watched the Final with bated breath, praying to God, The Goddess, Allah, Buddah and everything else that I could of to make sure the All Blacks won. It was the most stressful game to watch because in the end, they inched by to win. I spent that night checking to see if there'd been celebratory riots starting in town, and did a few more times. I called on Monday to confirm and I was in. It didn't feel real. It was so shocking really. Surprising. I was certain I'd wake up and it'd be a dream. But no. I got packed and the next morning we went to the hospital and I got checked in. I'd barely slept the night before and when I got into the operating theater and laid on the gurney, I fell asleep.
Surgery-
The one thing they didn't fully prepare me for wasn't the pain (which there was a lot of) but numbness. Not in my chest but in my thumb, index, and middle fingers on both hands. Both hands got quite swollen, not even done swelling yet, but the fingers were completely asleep. It wasn't until late the second night that someone finally addressed that as more than just "interesting". The nerves for your hands run near your armpits, there is a small chance they can nick the nerves and you can lose sensation in your hands. The nerves for the first three and the last three are bundled together (middle finger's so awesome it gets to be on both sides of the nerves). They put you in almost like a crucifixion position, for about 2 hours (my length of surgery) and that puts strain on all of those nerves. It took until Thursday night before I had my feeling fully back. The doctor realized it was strain and not permanent damage because it was on both sides and fairly uniform. But that was never a potential downside of surgery that I was informed of.
The first day I was sore, I came out and spent about two and a half hours in recovery because my breathing was shallow and the pain was constant. I went to my room and was tired, but extremely lucid. My wife was there, as was her support person, and a friend who goes to school near the hospital so they were talking and I'd interject here and there but then fall right back to sleep. I was surprisingly coherent compared to when I got my wisdom teeth out and would make jokes that didn't make sense at all.
I slept, a lot, but not very well. Pain would wake me up every couple hours and the night nurses at Auckland Hospital are INFINITELY better about getting meeds when you need them than the day nurses. Day nurses will get sidetracked or forget and I went 4 hours without pain medicine one day (not fun).
My first night was rough, my Oxygen levels were low and my blood pressure was high so I was on air all night which gives you a monster of a sore throat that no amount of water can help with. They're mostly just trying to keep you comfortable and sleeping, but my best sleeps were always in short bursts because after a while I'd need pain relief. I also firmly suggest bringing earplugs if you're not in a single room. I shared with three other patients and two of them snored. Not just that but it's easy to fall asleep it's just hard to stay asleep. Nurses come in and out, you can hear beeps of alarms for other people… it's just necessity and if you don't use them, then that's fine.
I slept about 3 hours of actual good sleep that first night, the rest of it was kinda this very dazed/drugged semi-sleep. The doctors then showed up at about 8-9 and asked how I was. My response was always, 'I'm alright'. I'm pretty good with managing pain, but for them, this translated to a desire to discharge me. The nurse came in a bit later to start discharging me and I refused. I hadn't slept, the pain medicine they used had been too strong, and I'd been on oxygen all night. Not to mention half my hand was numb and somewhere around 11am I started swelling (which is normal and acceptable the nurses don't really know that though). It took a little bit of convincing but they let me stay.
The second day I pretty much slept, ate, showered, and visited with friends when they came by. For showering, because of how my bandages are, I am allowed to, only from the back and with a towel pressed to my chest to cover the bandages. Something I would suggest bringing that I hadn't thought of was a shoe lace to drape over my neck and hang my drains from while I showered and safety pins to attach them to your pants because I got very tired of carrying them. But then again, I had massive breasts with a lot of blood and fluid that went to them and so I've had a lot of drainage. At that point, I thought I would have mine in at least until November 3rd when I get bandages off, but the doctor thought possibly even longer. You have to do less than 30ml in 24 hours before they'll let the drain come out.
Pain was pretty hard to control the second day (I have an issue with codeine so that left me with morphine and the morphine pills were quite strong). Since it's a public hospital, I would go a while between when I rang the nurse for pain meds and when I would get them. The doctors didn't always come see me, so nurses would be explaining things to them and they wouldn't always do it right. One pill they tried since they wanted me off of liquid morphine knocked me into space. Within ten minutes of taking it, I was dizzy, couldn't open my eyes without feeling like I was falling. I got some anti-nausea medicine but the nurse didn't talk to the doctor about it, nor did the nurse who she handed off to who KNEW I didn't react well to it. So when it came time to get my drugs again, they brought me the same thing and I refused it because it'd been such hell the first time. She then had to track down a doctor, during shift change, and it took a couple hours before they got me anything else, and by the time they came back with liquid morphine, my pain was the highest it'd been period.
It eventually subsided and I stayed for a few days to fully recover. Here's a couple pics of me right after.
I had 2.3kg (or about 5 pounds) PER BREAST taken off.
Intermission-
So I went home and had to set up a pillow between Shan and I so she didn't roll onto me which was a godsend really. It also kept my drains from getting tangled. Oh my freaking drains. I got my bandages off on the third but was nowhere near the drain amounts they wanted so they had to stay in. I had to go to the nurse every couple days to get the bandages checked and I'd give them my draining info. Every Thursday I would see the Breast Clinic and Dr. Jones' team and that was really good.
On a Saturday, I had an appointment and the nurse I saw decided to "help" a couple of my scabs and picked them. The one on my left drain site hurt like a monster when she took it offend I should've known something went wrong. On Tuesday I got my drains out, they were finally low enough and they were just driving me crazy. It'd been three weeks at that point since the surgery. I felt done. The right side came easy but the left had a lot of resistance before it literally popped out of my chest. The nurse thought the drain site looked angry and was going to put something on it, but forgot and bandaged me up to send me home.
That night it started to swell and by Wednesday it was red and angry and had cellulitis which looks like horrible stretchmarks. I was nervous but I was seeing the doctor the next day so I didn't want to go to A and E if it wasn't worth it. At the appointment, they were not excited about the mark at all. It was pretty large, angry, red, and INFECTED. They readmitted me to the hospital, then and there, but let me go home to get lunch and pack before I had to be back. They wanted me for 24-48 hours (tops) just to attack it with some antibiotics and get it over with. God I wish it'd been that easy.
Hosptial, take 2 -
So I checked in and the first nurse took 3 tries to ATTEMPT to get an IV in me. He gave up and the next nurse did it in one shot but in the crook of my left arm which wasn't a great place to do it. The antibiotic they used is exceptionally painful, it causes damage to the blood vessels and it's just shit really. You're supposed to do it over an hour, but the pace it was at was like someone was dripping acid on me to sever my arm. It was awful! I believe whole heartedly that the nurse messed up the dose. I think he at least doubled it, if not more. At the only rate we could do it at without me writing in pain, it took 4 hours to do what should've been done in an hour. The next nurse put me on a pain pump at the same dose and it hurt at the same level as the 4 hour drip… maybe a little more, but not as severely as the first time (hence why me thinking he effed up the dose). The next nurse doubled the saline and ran it through at the same speed as before. And that was fine…. except that it made me so nauseous that I couldn't eat. I barely touched anything on two meals and felt like throwing up both from being super hungry and also from the sight, smell, and thought of food making me sick. I let them know, hoping for something to help with the nausea but instead they changed my antibiotic. *le sigh*. The next stuff was weak. VERY weak. No progress in my infection was made and the 24 hours came and went, as did the 48 hours.
I finally was sent to get an ultrasound, to see if there was a collection of fluid or something that was stopping it from healing properly. He used a 30cc syringe to draw it out and it popped like a balloon when he entered the needle. Fluid gushed out and he was able to fill the syringe as well. It should've been the end of it, but the hole had to be filled and it was… by a hematoma. I went back to get a second ultrasound two days later, the same size and shape but this time filled with clotted blood that they couldn't draw out.
A week finally rolled around and I couldn't do it anymore. Over the last four weeks, almost half had been in hospital and while I'd had a ton of visitors the first stay in hospital, not many came the second time. It was fine, but I felt exceptionally isolated. I was allowed out between antibiotic doses but it never felt long enough and felt really down and depressing. I also had been having issues with my IV. We'd switched it from my left arm to my right hand because I felt like it was shredding my vein because I needed to move my arm and use my arms to support my weight cause I couldn't use my chest but they'd put it in facing my fingers and not my wrist so the line caught on everything and was causing bruising down my hand that they didn't see. It got to be so painful that I'd wince or cry out during the IV flushes. They tried again to change the sites. Two tries by the nurse. Four by a doctor. Both said I should drink more water until I told them I was drinking three liters… so they decided to take it out… let me rest and try in the morning again. I got oral antibiotics instead of IV and the next day I finally asked my doctor (after days of hearing "let's see how it is tomorrow") if I could go home. I was taking oral antibiotics already and if I didn't have to get another IV that'd be great by me. He all but kicked me out there. It was a Thursday and I'd have to see the clinic on Monday.
Monday they decided to cut it open, force the hematoma out, and wick the infection out (stick a cloth in it to drain the fluid). I had to go to the nurse every day for two weeks to get this done, and eventually down to every other day. December 6, I got to move to once a week and on the 13 they told me I was done. Infection finally gone, hematoma gone, and finally able to start recovering. It's not perfect but I'm going to go in for a revision in March/April to touch it up.
Here's how it looks now.
So okay, other things. I missed one shot by two weeks and that sucked ass. I was supposed to do it the first Monday after my surgery but I wasn't in the mood and the day ran away from us and then it just slipped out mind. It wasn't something we remembered when we could actually do the shot, but it eventually got to this place where a tiny confrontation just escalated. It was quite literally a non-issue, but I was just hysterically sad and then I was like "I need to take the shot now". Shan had forgotten I hadn't taken it, so she was like "it's next week, you'll be fine." Once I reminded her, we had the shot drawn up and taken very shortly after. We're traveling home for the holidays which will be the first time I'll see my parents since I started transitioning… yes there's Skype but seeing me I think will be different…. but it's for 24 days. I had originally planned to not take the shot and just let it lapse. But then Shan has class the next day when we get back, and then we won't do it till the next Monday and I don't think I can really afford to do that and forget. But we shall see. I see my GP on Monday so we'll see what he thinks.
Alright, on to Stats:
Weight: I was down to 257 at the hospital but I came back up to about 260 since coming home.
Libido: Shan and I went over a month after I'd gotten my surgery. It was brutal. We haven't gotten into the full swing of things still cause I do have discomfort sometimes on my sides, but I have to get off at least once a day, if not more.
Skin: My face is rougher, which feels more like skin than hair issue. I've got some acne issues still but I'm pretty on top of it right now. I still zit up towards the beginning and end of my shot cycle. My back still is a bit problematic but not as bad.
Hair: It is thinning but coloring helps it. I'm going to try stuff but hopefully I don't go bald.
Body Hair: Not a really good representation this time because I shaved everything off before the surgery. It's mostly grown back but not as thick as it was before
Dosage: 250mg
Amount of time on T: 1 year!
Build: Post surgery I'm not in any shape. Next time, I'll say more.
Menstration: The last time I'm going to include this stat because I'm almost a year off my period and it's not coming back.
Energy Level: I've had such a weird few months that sleep and rest ha
Voice: It seems to have settled. But I'll let you guys be the judge.
I've got a youtube but I got to edit before I update it. It'll be up soon.
