Tag Archive | Transition

Adjust Your Attitude

Feb5

“The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” ― Winston Churchill

The above is blatantly and starkly true. For years, I let the pessimist in me hold me back. Finally, reaching rock bottom, I reached out for help and found a therapist who helped me find the “glass half full” perspective on things. I’ve taken that initial learning and begun to apply that to more and more parts of my life. And I also learned to admit that I can’t do things alone, reaching out for help, and finding it. And finally, I learned to let go of those who didn’t want to support me instead of obsessing over losing them. I realized they had walked away from me, not the other way around, so I let them go. Yes, it hurt but once I made that admission, that they no longer wanted me in their lives, I was able to heal from that hurt.

This all comes down to “adjust your attitude”.

I see many trans folk each day saying “I can’t” or “Soandso won’t let me” and the only ones who, in my opinion, can legitimately say that are our trans youth. They are stuck with their parents and whether or not their parents accept them. But if you are an adult, you get to choose. And sometimes we have to accept that we cannot have our cake and eat it too.

When it became apparent that further fighting my inner self was going to kill me, I finally relented. I have people to whom I gave decades of my life, and literally hundreds of thousands of dollars from my total earnings who now openly despise me. But I knew that I had to be me and if they could not accept me, that was their loss.

By adjusting my attitude, by seeing the “glass half full” as often as I can, I’ve managed to move steadily forward. I’m accepted as myself anywhere in public (except occasionally around a few people I knew from before). I am full time. My legal name is now Cara, not David. I am still professionally valued and supported at work.

By realizing that nothing comes easily, by focusing on “baby steps” (thank you Paula Ult, Mia, Carolyn, and so many more for that advice!!), I have accomplished far more than I ever expected and now am on the verge of getting even more done.

All of this stems from a change in attitude. I stopped arguing with myself. I stopped accepting society’s definitions for many things and as I did so, I learned that science had already walked away from those cultural falsehoods as well. I stopped letting my rational mind limit me. I stopped letting other people define me and chose to define myself, listening to my heart, my intuition, my inner sense of self. And in doing these things, I have found personal peace.

So if there is one piece of advice I would give to each person who is unsure of themselves, it is this – adjust your attitude! I know this is not easy, but until you do, you will be just like I was – foundering in your own self-doubts and fears.

P.S. Enjoy the journey!! “Don’t be concerned about reaching your destination. Enjoy the journey and the destination will take care of itself.” Jenny Marie

An Unexpected But Perfect Gift

Jan6

Two years ago in December, my mother passed away unexpectedly. She was in her late 70s but had COPD issues due to a lifetime of heavy smoking but otherwise members of our family tend to live well into our 80s and 90s. So mom’s passing was unexpected and I can honestly say that even at my age, I miss her greatly every single day.

Mom never had much. Abandoned by my father when we were still small children, plus health issues she had mid-life made life tough on our family but Mom kept us together. She raised us, loved us, and was thrilled as each of us grew to adulthood. But for herself she never had a lot. One thing she did have was free and clear ownership of her home from her early 50s onward.

It was a small home in a small town in eastern Ohio. It wasn’t worth a lot. She had little savings. Plus it took us two years to sell that house. Because of her financial situation, my guess at the value of the house, legal fees, funeral expenses, house maintenance while we waited for it to sell, etc., I didn’t expect to get much from my mother’s estate.

Anything would have helped, of course, but I expected a few thousand dollars total.

Before I go further, I’ve budgeted out about $15,000 for my trip to Thailand for my gender confirmation surgery. I’ve waited a lifetime for this and could wait a few more years as I saved the money.

So imagine my surprise when I was informed that I and my siblings would each be receiving approximately $16000 as our last gift from mom.

I’m sitting here with tears in my eyes today, looking heavenward, and repeating “Thank you, mom”. For even in death, her last gift to me turned out to be perfect.

The Myth of Post-Op Regret And Suicidality

Jan2

There is a popular myth going around that attempts to quote from this 2003 Swedish study:

Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden

People using this study do so selectively. Let me explain the statistical manipulation going on with gender surgery detractors and the myth they try to construct.

First they note that general population rates for suicidality are around 1.6% in the United States. Then they note that suicidality rates for post-op transsexual people are about 4.1%. They then claim that since this is “hundreds of percent higher” that surgery does not work.

But let’s talk about the reality. What is that reality? It is that the pre-op suicidality rate for transsexuals is 41%!!!

Yep, that’s right. Pre-op rates of suicidality for transsexuals are 1000% higher than post-op rates. How do we know this? From the UCLA Williams Institute study Suicide Attempts among Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming Adults. (Warning! PDF!)

And the Swedish study actually supports gender surgery. Their conclusion?

This study found substantially higher rates of overall mortality, death from cardiovascular disease and suicide, suicide attempts, and psychiatric hospitalisations in sex-reassigned transsexual individuals compared to a healthy control population. This highlights that post surgical transsexuals are a risk group that need long-term psychiatric and somatic follow-up. Even though surgery and hormonal therapy alleviates gender dysphoria, it is apparently not sufficient to remedy the high rates of morbidity and mortality found among transsexual persons. Improved care for the transsexual group after the sex reassignment should therefore be considered.

Note what is said very, very gently and in careful scientific language: “This highlights that post surgical transsexuals are a risk group that need long-term psychiatric and somatic follow-up.”

So what detractors are doing is selective statistical selection to “prove” their biased point. When we take the entire picture, we see that gender surgery actually reduces suicide rates to 1/10th of what they were pre-op. And, as the Swedish study concludes, what trans people need is more support, not because they are trans, but because too many people in society today are just ignorant assholes.

Two Weeks

Oct13

There’s something different, even liberating about finally having legal identification that confirms that you are you. It took me a few days to realize that this and I am still having trouble verbalizing this but society at large has confirmed that I am me and not some defensive shell any longer.

Part of it is the realization that should anyone directly challenge me (it hasn’t happened so far!) I can pull out my driver’s license and a credit card and say, hey, this is me. Got an issue with that?

I discussed this with my therapist last week and yes, I’ve been thinking about this blog post since then but wasn’t ready to write. That lifting of weight has allowed my mind to go elsewhere now. Exactly as my therapist predicted, certain other things have begun to happen that I would not have been ready for had she not warned me and discussed this with me.

Without getting into too much detail, I’m attracting notice and it’s been positive notice so far. I don’t want to get into too much detail here (I have with a few friends in email), but this notice coupled with a lot of exploration of my true self with my therapist has led me to understand some things that I repressed for a long time. So let’s just say that I am noticing back at some of those doing the noticing. 🙂

All of this makes me very aware of the fact that I am sort of “mid-stream” in the medical process and still have quite a ways to go before I’m “done” as I envision things. But these unexpected results also have me feeling very positive about how far I’ve come at this point, regardless of how far there is yet to go.

This is all food for thought as I remember that in 24 days a dear friend will be arriving and the day after that another will as well. And this year, unlike last year when I faced our annual gathering of friends with a little trepidation, I have no such worries.

First Day At Work

Oct7

Gee, I’m finding a lot to say this month, but I suppose there’s a lot going on that deserves noting.

Monday, October 6th, was the first day that Cara was present in the office. I completed the legal name change last week but since I work mostly from home anyway, Monday was the first day at the office as me.

HR paperwork was done, with an enthusiastic congratulations from the HR rep who helped me correct the relevant forms. My new health insurance card should be available to me within a few weeks. If there are any issues, she said she’d be sure to notify me.

New photo for ID was taken. They’re all mug shots but I have to say I like this one better than the old one.

IT began the process of changing my email and user ids. We seem to have gotten most of it, but not quite all yet. My contact there wants me to wait 24 hours to be sure all the changes to the Domain Controller are propagated outward to the secondary controllers before we investigate any anomalies.

My team mates all apparently had similar reactions. I walked in and “Who is.. oh! That’s Cara!” 🙂

Got home from the office just a few minutes before my spouse, who pulled up having stopped at the grocery store after her classes were done. So still wearing my “power” suit (black blazer, black knee length skirt, white button down blouse, black hose and black shoes) I walked out to help bring things into the house. My neighbor, who is a strange old coot who also happens to own a strip club not too many miles down the road, was getting out of his truck. He stopped and stared. 😛 That’s the third time he’s seen me as me in the last week and it won’t be the last. I suspect he wants to wander over and ask a question but hasn’t done it yet. Color me amused.

I do have to say though, that my employer, being a Norwegian company that has strong and explicit corporate language protecting all LGBT people, and which has apparently fired people for breaking their zero tolerance policy on those issues, has been superb. Every step of the way, they have been helpful, and I was even able to get them a few answers they did not yet have since I am apparently the company’s first transitioning trans employee.

I made some PF Chang’s for dinner (hate the restaurant – too pricey, but love the frozen meals at the grocery), and spent the evening chilling out.

An excellent first day at work for Cara. 🙂

 

P.S. Today I saw my new company photo propagating to correct locations and more and m0re of the corporate IT domain controllers appear to be getting my updates. It’s nice seeing my name and correct photo showing up where it should. 🙂