Manniversary and HUGE update

Okay kids. It's been SEVERAL months since my last confession… I mean blog. (Excuse my bad humor as it may come, I haven't been sleeping particularly well and infect did not sleep the night before).

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.

When do we start?

Has it nearly been a month since I started this thing? Wow I suck. At the time it seemed like not too much has happened but looking back I see I've actually done a lot.

So I got my binder, it only took three days to come from Miami. I LOVE THAT THING! It's a little long, long enough that it slides down over my hips and I'm 5'10 with a long torso. Though the downside is I'm losing weight and I was right on the bubble between sizes so I went with the larger size. It's a little large and doesn't compress as much as I would like it to but realistically I'm not sure if it will. I have large breasts so I can't do miracles but it helps immensely. The more I layer the better it works too. Summer's coming though so I don't know how I'll handle layers in the hot New Zealand summers with 100% humidity.

I also started searching more online, finding more blogs and just snooping around. I know that I want to get my chest done, 100% without a doubt. I'm starting to snoop surgeons, but I know that's a bit away yet. If I want MSP (BC Health Insurance, since I'm a permanent resident of Canada) to cover it (which I would since it'd pretty much be free) then I have a bunch of hoops to jump through, psychological and social as well. It's a bit intimidating because I'm such an instant gratification person- I want it and I want it now. HA! Patience is not one of my virtues. I've started looking at different top surgeons, Michael L. Brown comes up a lot. He's in San Francisco but I really like his work. There's also Dr. Charles Garramone who's in Florida. While I don't like how a lot of his nipple graft work turned out, I must admit I really am tempted to do the "Manscaping" which is lipo to reshape curves into a more masculine form. I'd be down for that.

Anyway, getting ahead of myself.

So I found this group called Gender Bridge online. It's for Trans in Auckland, or all of NZ if they can get to the monthly groups. While I'm usually SO not the 'group' type, Shan and I decided to go. BEST DECISION EVER!

Every single person there was more than willing to help in any and all ways possible. I got tons of cards and suggestions and it's amazing. It's this wealth of information that they're all BURSTING to share. I haven't really used my name (Jacob- duh) in public much. Shan calls me it and that's about it, but I went by it there and it was really liberating. I did kinda auto-correct myself and say my name was Ashley at one point but I caught it and fixed it... Only once though which isn't bad for 27 years of being called Ashley. It was really an incredible and intense experience. I left the meeting completely pumped and thrilled and since then I've been doing more research then I think I've ever done. I'm already counting down the days to the next meeting and have added several members to Facebook (link here) as well. I feel like I've really found a place for myself and that's amazing.

So right now I'm looking to find myself an endo that won't cost me an arm and a leg. The one my AUT doctor referred me to is either 250 or 350 for the first appointment which is way too much. I'm still holding onto my appointment and trying to get MSP to cover it but if they won't I'll cancel it. I've got a couple suggestions from the GenderBridge group and I'm going to make calls on Monday and see what to do. Hormones are the first step for me. My dream (hopefully coming to fruition) is to have top surgery done by next summer (so like Northern Hemisphere Summer for me) so that I can go shirtless. My fantasy (of course) is to have it scheduled and done before this Summer but considering it's Spring already, I know it's wishful thinking. I just want this to begin, you know?

Part of Shan's process is to find support for her because this is a change for the both of us. I've initially gotten in touch with a therapist but again, finances are a bit of a kicker on that. It's not ridiculously expensive but it's still enough to cause a slight pause. I'll check in with both my insurance companies and see if they'll cover it and hope that one of them does. I know worst worst worst case scenario, I can ask my parents to help pay for it but that's it's own can of worms.

I'm still terrified of telling my parents. I know they'll eventually get around to it but my mom had this huge 'mourning' period when I came out and I anticipate a second one, but I really don't want to be deceptive. I don't want to spring it on her after I've had top surgery and a year of testosterone. It'll come up, sooner rather than later. I don't know how they'll take it and Shan's scared they'll cut off the money that they're sending to us already which would put us in a world of hurt and I don't want to do that. Her education is vastly important to me and I don't want to deprive her of anything.

Introduction

So hey. Hi. It's 1:42 in the morning, probably not the best time to start a blog but better late than never, right?

My name on my birth certificate is Ashley. I've really always kinda hated that name. All the stereotypes for that name were preppy cheerleaders or student council president, at least at my high school. I wasn't like that, I was a jock. I'd always been athletic, my dad was hugely athletic and it was just there my whole life. I played baseball, basketball, soccer, track, anything.

I was a quiet kid, really shy and very emotional. I faced bullying throughout elementary school. When I was in Kindergarten I was bullied because I would cry easily. In first through third grade, I was the only girl in a neighborhood of boys and I tried desperately to fit in. I was naive and trusting and just wanted to be 'one of the boys' which lead to bullying there. My family moved to Puyallup, Washington on Halloween and I started school late in my fourth grade year. School became hell for me.

At my new elementary school there was no such thing as tomboy. I had short hair, baggy clothes, and wanted to play sports with the boys during recess. I was bullied and the more I stood out as a 'tom boy' the worse it got. In the fifth grade I humiliated some boy by out performing him in a pick up game of basketball and on the bus ride home he threatened to 'dip my cat in kerosene and throw it's burning carcass into my house'. My parents flipped but everyone else looked at it as 'kids will be kids'.

The next year a guy who was big (like he went on to be a linebacker in high school and if maybe even college) threw handfuls of rocks on my back over and over after slide tackling him in soccer. My back grew into one giant welt and my principal at my school tried to convince me I had an allergic reaction to something. I got in trouble for replying "yeah the rocks thrown at my back".

For my parents this was enough, my mom went haywire and made a huge fuss with the PTA, I got into martial arts and counseling for confidence. My parents are good people, weird but good. My mom is an open democrat and pagan. My father only once aligned himself to any religion and that was baptist and that's cause the military wanted something to put on his dog tags when he was drafted and at his base, the baptist boys had a good basketball team. The reason I brought that up was cause my atheist and pagan parents were considering sending me to an all-girl's catholic school so I couldn't be bullied anymore. I asked for one semester to try it out at junior high, hoping that the influx of three other elementary schools would give me a better chance to fit in.

I also subconsciously started to assimilate more, I was still a tom boy- I was one of two girls who played football in seventh grade because a rule stipulates that no seventh grade student could be cut from the team for any reason. It never made the gender distinction. Somehow having another girl on the team made it okay and the same kids who bullied me for three years were okay with me, at least for two hours during practice. But other than that, I was no longer cutting my hair short, while I wore tomboyish clothes still, I let my mom pick out girlie clothes for me and I slowly allowed myself to wear these clothes. I also didn't try to make friends. The harder I tried, the worse I failed since I didn't seem to ever speak girl properly.

I got on some really good teams for sports and was a great athlete, until 8th grade when my ankle decided to defy physics during an extramural soccer practice. My ankle went up and over the ball and the top of my foot hit the ground while my leg was still straight. It wasn't pretty but it effectively killed my athletic career. It would take a few years before it took full effect but by the time I graduated I had two bad ankles, two bad knees, and couldn't do more than half-ass it in PE.

In high school I faced my first real bullying by girls, again I attribute this to the fact I didn't speak girl. I shopped at all the popular stores, but the clothes I picked were either boy colors or even from the boy's section. I could never fully get comfortable in girl clothes and only wore dresses to my older sister's wedding (which as soon as I finished being a bride's maid I threw on my high tops) and the only two dances I attended 9th grade and Senior prom. I probably had a couple other things like family things where I had to dress up, but I always remember having jeans or sweats to change into the first second I could get out of the dresses. I also had horrible taste in music (I'll admit that freely). My parents listened to country and oldies and while I knew every Beach Boys song by heart, I missed the days when Green Day was cool so I had no idea what was what with music. I just, I didn't have anything to say to any girl and I fell back on old habits of trying too hard.

By my senior year I had a very small group of friends, people I didn't even like that much but that tolerated my presence. I just stopped caring, I didn't try to make friends, I shut down and just was there. I ignored the whispers and the name calling, ignored the rumors of me staring at girls in the locker room. I made some friends then that I'm still friends with now. People that stood up for me when others called me dyke, who when I finally realized I was attracted to girls the year after graduation were still there for me, and who when I first mentioned that I thought I might want to transition asked if I had any names picked out. 95% of the people I went to high school with, I have completely lost touch with (assuming I had touch in the first place). I hear stories about so and so getting married, divorced, having a baby, coming out, getting arrested, whatever, and I don't really care.

I went to school in Seattle, I wanted to be an actress but I had the weirdest logic for it in my head. I wanted to learn how to be a director and learn to speak the language of the people behind the camera so I could be better in front of it. So I went to film school... at a community college. That lasted for a semester since everyone in my program got drunk and high all the time and because no matter what I did the head of the program gave me a C. I could write my name on paper or give him the best paper I ever wrote. It was his opinion that women belonged in the porn industry and that was the only place they had value.

I moved home, which felt like a death sentence. I hate Puyallup. It's filled with so many religious people, not just that... but bigoted religious people. Mormons, Lutherans, Baptists, idiots. The only gay kids in school were the flaming homo boys... well until after when all the repressed religious kids would come out. I got a lot of apologies when I moved back, and I was still technically oblivious of my sexual identity.

A year after high school I was in a writing group online, and that's where I met Shannon. I was 19 and she was 18 and just starting university at UBC in Vancouver. We hit it off and when I went up to check out UBC film school (which I would recommend to anyone in Canada who wanted to do film. It's a great program- not that I ever took it but I know people who have) we met and it was instant sparks. We were friends for a while and eventually we developed into a relationship. Both of our first real romance and we fell deeply in love.

We made some bad choices, mostly about stupid stuff. Like to save her money on bus fare to come visit I drove to Bellingham instead of Seattle to pick her up and I lied to my mom about it. It killed over a half tank of gas and I was later coming home then I said I was going to. Just stupid stuff, I was too worried about coming out to her that everything coming out of my mouth was pretty much a lie. It eventually blew up in my face and I got grounded for lying. It took her some time but she finally came around to me being a lesbian which was funny because she had a lot of lesbian friends in her circle. I thought my dad would be the hard sell, he is from the Mid-West and he's let slip some comments in the past about different people that were ignorant... but he was the one who was cool with it first. I get why my mom was worried about it, she comes from an EXTREMELY religious family who aren't the most educated. She knew that I would face troubles. She knew how sensitive I was and how hard the road would be.

I eventually moved to Canada to be with Shannon, using whatever kind of permit I could get to just be with her. In Canada it was easier to just be us. We never really hold hands or anything when we were in Puyallup but we were open and comfortable in her native land. We dated for years and a week before our fifth anniversary we decided to get married on our anniversary. Our parents and siblings came, along with all of our friends that could make it in short notice, and we got married on the beach in Vancouver at sunset.

During our relationship, we talked about transgender issues several times. I have huge breasts, I always have. My sister (12 years my senior) has never been larger than a C cup, even when pregnant, and I was a C in high school, and when I put on weight after school they eventually blossomed to the DDD or E size (depending on the bra) mammoths they are now. They continue to be the blight of my existence, but back then, they kept me from ever being able to follow through with anything. Shan and I tried twice to get me boy clothes.

The first time we shopped at a store that didn't quite have my size and I was self conscious so I just grabbed the first thing that kinda fit. We also went to Seattle and went to Babeland (a really amazing woman centric sex store). They had packing penises and Shan (who is a huge feminist and a student midwife) was asking questions I was way to embarrassed to ask. We got a harness (the cheapest they had) and went for a soft pack, but being the total boy I wanted I wanted the biggest one. It ended up being a bit of my undoing since it looked ridiculously large in my pants, would always flop over since it didn't fit in the harness, and at that time my hair was past my shoulder blades (though almost always tied up). I didn't bind, not having the slightest clue how to do it and too nervous to really google anything. It ended up being a bit of a failed experiment.

It came up a few more times during our relationship and I grew a little less nervous each time it came up. We went back to Babeland and bought a medium sized pack this time, a better harness, and then we spent time getting me good boy clothes that fit well and hid my body shape. At the time she was working at a baby store in Vancouver and she had a couple products in store for pregnant women or women who'd just given birth and we improvised a very (VERY) half assed binder. I was more comfortable in the clothes, with the penis, but the binder was torture. I'm a big person, with lots of curves, and the binder would ride up like nobody's business. I could wear it for a bit but then it'd roll into my ribs and become too painful to deal with. I couldn't bind since we'd spent our money on clothes we couldn't afford a decent binder so I just went without.

I also did something else extremely liberating, I cut of 13 inches of hair. After elementary school I only trimmed my hair, but never CUT it short. Maybe bangs or layering or something, but it stayed longer. But I finally just thought 'to hell with it' and cut it short. It was incredible... well aside from the fact that the place where I got it cut had different ideas about what my hair should look like than I did. The first cut was great, the second I looked like a butch gym teacher with a boxy hair cut, the repair cut on that was great, but then the next one I had a very pixie-femme thing going on. I had one hair dresser at the place, the one who did the first cut and all the repairs, she was amazing- everyone else thought masculine or boy cut meant I want to look as dykey as possible. I usually got it fixed and it progressively grew shorter and shorter. We also went to the Trans-Health BC office in Vancouver to start scouting my options for the transition but that got put on hold.

Shannon, who like I said, has a passion for women and babies. She had worked in a baby store and was a doula (birth coach/partner) and post-partum doula (helping new parents transition to having babies) but her passion was midwifery. As a midwife she could be a better advocate for the pregnant woman and that is what she wanted but UBC, her former school and only midwifery option in Western Canada, had and still has an exceptionally small and competitive program. I know that if she'd ever gotten an interview, her passion would've gotten her in but alas over a hundred women would compete each year for 10 spots. We looked at Seattle Midwifery School, which would bring us down to the states where our marriage wouldn't be legally recognized but we could live in Seattle which was gay-friendly enough for us. But unfortunately SMS merged with Bastyr College (a holistic medicine school) and the Midwifery program which had once been easy to get into became a master's program and Shan would have to be in school for a few more years to just get the pre-requesits to attend. So an option which we had begun before but abandoned became our new option. New Zealand.

Canada and New Zealand have similar midwifery practices, like the roles of midwives except that in Canada it's more the 'hippy' or 'new age' parents that have midwives while most births in New Zealand are done by midwives. The biggest perk was that in a country of 4.3 million, there were 5 midwifery schools while Canada with it's 33.1 million had less than 3 schools. Of all the countries in the world, New Zealand is one of the easiest to transfer back to Canada as a midwife. So we decided to move here in January for her to go to school. I decided to fill my time by pursuing a patisserie degree (pastry chef) since I've long since given up on film (but that's another blog entry for another time).

After being here for nearly seven months now, I finally started addressing the issue that my newly developed social anxiety was coming from the fact that when I look in the mirror I don't feel connected to the person I am below the shoulders. So I decided that I was really going to do it, I was really going to follow the path that had always been there for me I just hadn't know exactly how to start down the path.

In Canada you have to live as a male for a year to prove your seriousness, which I had been doing- except at work because I worked as a production assistant in film and was on a new project almost every time I worked and it would've been more burden than it was worth. In Auckland, I walked a fine line. I didn't bring any effeminate clothing but I was in a program where I was the oldest by a good 5 years (with the exception of a woman who had 10 years on me). There was a very immature vibe in the program and I was too nervous to really address it. So I kept it up at home, even if I wasn't packing all the time, I used Jake- Jacob, which was the name my wife and I finally settled on after a LONG stretch of time where we tried to decide.

But I finally built the courage to talk to the university doctor about why I don't think the anxiety medication I was on wasn't working with my social anxiety. I had short hair, boy clothes on, but never came close to passing as a male (which somehow I had done in Vancouver sometimes). We talked gender and body dysphoria and about how tomboy was never the right word for me, about how I never really feel GAY (like I still inwardly flinch when I call myself a lesbian but I proudly proclaim I've got a wife- and if you had my wife you would too). And he referred me to an endocrinologist to begin my journey.


I'm at a small empass there since Shan and I are on a fairly limited budget in New Zealand based off of student loans and VERY generous parents, but the appointment may or may not be covered by the student health insurance I'm on (most likely not) so I'll have to fork out between 100-300 bucks for the appointment which isn't something we can do in the near future. So instead we decided to go to underworks.com and get me a real binder. I've been snooping different Transmen blogs and underworks kept coming up over and over, and plus sized ones raved about particular models so we went with one, the 997, since I've got a long torso and need the extra length it offers so it doesn't hit my hips and roll up uncomfortably.



I haven't told my parents now but I kinda have a feeling this may be easier for them to swallow than me coming out. I was always a little boy trapped in a little girl's body. But since I have some other stuff going on right now I'm not going to broach this with them yet. Instead I'm putting it out on the internet.

It feels very cathartic to just vent like this, to just let my fingers confess stuff that very few people know about me. So this is my goal, to write my journey as I take it. I'll include pictures, possibly audio when I start T and what not. I'm not guaranteeing I'm taking the best way to get to my destination, but it's the journey that counts right?

So for now, this it is... an hour and some later. Ha. I'm sorry if my grammar's hell, it is 3am now.

Oh PS, if you're going to write hateful stuff I'll just delete you but if you have questions, comments, concerns, whatever I'll try to get back to you as best as I can.

Night all,
Jake