Tag Archive | Relationships

September 7th, A Day To Remember

Sep7

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It was 19 years ago today, September 7th, that I was wheeled into surgery to remove the remains of a tumor that had been destroyed by months of chemotherapy. Prior to that chemotherapy, I had been about 195 pounds. By the end I was around 140, and honestly probably more in the 130s. By the end of chemotherapy, most days were enough time awake to eat, maybe watch a single TV show or two, and then sleep, 20-22 hours per day. And then I was told the tumor was dead.

Chemotherapy was over in mid-July of 1996. I was given basically 6 weeks to gain a little strength, then the surgery would ensure that the remains of that tumor were gone.

What was supposed to be a 4 hour surgery became 10. The tumor had apparently been wrapped around my aorta and in dying to the chemo, it had become this rock hard substance. My surgeon visited me later and apologized for the extra time but said he was literally chipping that stuff off my aorta, like flakes of cement.

The tumor had also been wrapped around the nerve to the left vocal cord. That nerve is a bit weird and shows how evolution does things, not always in the most sensible way. That nerve comes from the spine, over to the heart first, then back up to the left vocal cord. There was no way to separate the remains of the tumor from that nerve so it got cut.

This left me unable to speak since the left vocal cord was flaccid and unable to flex to meet the right cord, since no neural signals could now reach it. To correct that, a plastic implant was inserted in that vocal cord in another surgery in early November of 1996. I still have slight numbness in my hands and feet from chemotherapy. My scalp was ravaged by chemotherapy and never really recovered. And my hearing, already a 20 decibel loss in my good right ear, became a 50+ decibel loss and I finally admitted that I needed a hearing aid.

Despite all this, I survived. But this all also made me think very hard about myself, who I was, what I’d done to myself emotionally and psychologically to get to where I was then. I also got to see my children graduate from high school, get married, go to college, have children of their own. It took me another 8 years, to about 2004, to really learn about and understand the words transsexual and transgender but I’d bought into another lie – that if I hadn’t transitioned early, I couldn’t transition at all. It was six more years after that, 2010, that the mother of all dysphoria episodes began that simply would not relent and which drove me to the brink of suicide, before I finally admitted I needed help, and with prodding from Julie Jeznach, I finally sought that help.

The rest, as they say, is “herstory”. People to whom I gave my life, my time, my love, my earnings, have rejected me. That’s their choice and I have to accept that, but it’s still bitter. And knowing what I know today, I can honestly say that I do have regrets. We’re not supposed to have regrets and I know that I can’t change the past so I don’t plan to wallow in these regrets at all. But I do acknowledge them. And if I’d known 30 years ago what I know now, I would have just walked away instead of worrying about other people’s emotions and opinions.

So I write this today with my younger trans friends in mind. Being trans can suck. People can be ugly, cruel, callous, hateful. But we’re trans and we can’t escape that truth. My advice to you, to each of you, is make your decisions for yourself first. Anyone who can’t handle the decisions that you need to make for you neither loved you nor is your friend so is not worthy of your consideration of their opinions.

While I am very happy with where I am in life right now, in one sense, I write this today to my younger trans friends to say “Don’t be me.” Don’t put others ahead of yourself. Don’t defer what you need to be happy to make others happy first. Most of the time they won’t care about you. Not really. And those that do care? They’ll have your back and be there for you.

Have a good September 7th, a good Labor Day, and a good day for yourself first and foremost.

Of Nerve Endings, and Random Sensations, Coupled Against Unlikely Future Probabilities.

Aug3

When I came out to my spouse in 2012, I knew the risks. Part of me held to some silly vain stupid hope that my marriage could be salvaged. Part of me wanted to believe that she and I, we, were better than that. I should have known better. I shouldn’t have even given the tiniest spark to such vain hopes. I didn’t choose to end that marriage. She did, no matter what she claims to the contrary. She’s the one that laid down the ultimatum of “transition, and we’re done”.

But I saw this exactly like I saw my fight against cancer in 1996. I had a great medical team, therapists, doctors, endocrinologists, and they all agreed that my health and well being were best served by transitioning. So with great reluctance I began that process, and I spent two months crying myself to sleep in 2012, grieving for my marriage. There’s lots I could say that I learned here about how others felt about me, but I don’t want to focus on such negatives, so I won’t.

Throughout my transition, up to now, this point, after having had GCS, I’ve been celibate and not actively looking at the dating community at all. I am aware that there is an entire fetish subculture that chases pre-op and non-op trans women as “chicks with dicks”. If you don’t like that phrase, it’s the ugly reality of how our society views pre-op and non-op trans women. It’s ugly. The woman is viewed as a “thing” and she’s used as a thing. The complete epitome of male sexual objectification of women occurs in the trans “chaser” community and how they treat those women.

For that reason alone, I stayed out of the dating pool. And because I was technically still married. It’s just a marriage of tax convenience but this too will end soon enough. But now GCS is done. And things are changing. I’m still a long ways off from being a responsive sexual partner to someone, but the nerves are beginning to wake up.

And wake up, do they! Random firings all over the place. An electric shock sensation that would make me leap out of bed except certain sutures are pretty sore at the moment. Random neural firings just all over the place.

Of course, then there’s dilation too. I’m not very far along on this yet but already I’m discovering that certain sensations are pleasant, that they even make me wonder what certain experiences would ultimately be like.

And that leads to day dreams. I suppose many women, trans or not, dream of finding Mr. Right (and some of finding Ms. Right). I admit to such thoughts, such dreams. But I also admit to the cold reality that trans acceptance among those my age, late 50s give or take a few years, is pathetically, horribly low. And that’s where day dreams snap back to reality. Within all probability, my remaining years will be spent alone, fending off dates from men who want nothing but sex, with almost zero chance of finding that person who wants a relationship, a friendship, a sexual intimacy, all together with a person with whom they could spend the rest of their life.

Could it happen? Yes, the odds are not zero. But will it? The odds are not good and I know this. It crosses my mind every single day. And I knew this going into transition and still chose transition, because the alternative was to die.

When people say trans people have a “choice”, it’s not much of a choice when the choice is between finally being yourself or dying. Yet I know people who would have preferred I had killed myself. Unfortunately for them, I chose life, even if that turns out to be a life alone.

In the meanwhile, I have close friends, supportive friends. Two of my three children accept me and want me involved more in their lives. I have nieces, nephews, a sister-in-law all who support me and eagerly want to see me again. It’s been a few too many years since I was back to Ohio.

What I plan to do is live my life. I’ll be open to that day that Mr. Right walks into my life but I won’t pine away wondering if or when he ever will. If it happens, good. And if not? Someone lost a chance to find out how much this trans woman could value a life partner.

The odds aren’t good but if I don’t play the game, I can never win, right?