Moving along

Hello interwebz. How are you? I'm good, but I look like I was suntanning at ground zero. Actually I'm pretty happy with how fast my face is healing. I overestimated the improvement that I'm eventually going to see as my face heals and I now think it's more in line with the 30-40 percent that the Dr. promised me, but I'm still cool with that.

Anyway,

I'm going stir-crazy here in my little condo. Today I felt a lot better so I cleaned the kitchen, the bathroom and I took care of a couple other things that I'd been neglecting. By the time I go back to work in a couple of weeks this house is going to be flipping spotless. I made a tasty dinner of fishies and miso soup which turned out awesome. (So I was in house wife mode today. =P ) Tomorrow when my wife is at the library I'm going to FINALLY watch my voice training thing. Other then that not much to report.

I've been worried about my wife. For a while she was getting out and doing stuff but now she's back to sitting on the couch in her pajamas watching Netflix all day. Yesterday evening she started crying and when I tried to get her to tell me why she said that she didn’t know. It's of course because of me and my gender identity, but either she couldn't articulate what was going through her mind or she just doesn’t want to talk to me about it.

Later we had a good discussion about our future together and it went very well. I keep feeling guilty and acting like my trans-status is like some huge betrayal but she doesn’t think of it like that at all. It's just been a difficult year. Getting all that stuff out and laying our respective cards on the table really cleared the air and today we've been joking and laughing about our situation all day. I'm very lucky to have such an unconventional relationship with my weird and wonderful wife.

Oh, my new shoes arrived today! I guess that's not actually a big deal but they are my first pair of general all purpose shoes that I've ever bought so it made me happy.

These are the shoes. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00336FVUW/ref=oh_o00_s00_i00_details They are very comfortable and I may get the same brand again after I buy me some female style combat boots.

And speaking of combat boots, that somehow brings me to my strange, constantly evolving gender identity. If I had to describe myself, I would say that I'm Transbigenderqueer. Really, my gender is all over the place and I don't conform to typical cisgender norms for the most part. The cool thing is that I'm starting to become more comfortable with that, but it will make things more awkward when I eventually have to start coming out to my family and work. I mean, I'll probably just say I'm trans since I identify more as female than I do male and that's how I will primarily present myself as, but I'm still the weird nerdy person that I always was and I don't see myself going all stealth mode and assimilating into society as a standard, generic woman.

Eh, I actually wanted to write about a specific topic for this entry but then I started typing and just went with the flow. Next time bloggy.

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Maybe I should start to spell it Paige? Hmm. That's the cool part about being trans; you get to pick your name. I think everyone should get to pick their own name when they turn 18. Uh, Ok. This time I'm really logging off. Promise.

Edit - I LIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Here's a cute link just for fun.  =D   http://chotpot.tumblr.com/post/20436491880/people-are-butts-about-gender-sometimes-so-here

Post OP Report

Ello! I am typing this without my glasses on, (more on that later) and I'm on pain killers so I'll do my best to keep this post as readable and coherent as I can.

Yesterday I finally had laser resurfacing done! I was put under general anesthesia and the procedure took about an hour to do. The OR staff was friendly and professional and I felt like I was in good hands. All in all it was a great experience.

The OR nurse who went over my pre-op stuff was super nice and she had bad acne when she was younger and has had laser resurfacing also. She said she was in her mid 40's which blew my mind as I would have guessed that she was in her mid 30's. Then the anesthesiologist came and and he refereed to me as Page. When he left the room the OR nurse looked at my sheepishly and told me that she would let him know what my actual name was, and I had to explain to her that I went by both. I think she figured it out after that.

They took pictures of my face and put me into the OR room. There was this weird blanket that was like a sheet with an air bag in the middle of it which had warm air cycling through it. When it was on me it felt like a light cloud of warm, comfy awesomeness. I want one of those for the house. The doc told me that he was going to put me to sleep and I told him to go for it; I didn’t get much sleep the night before and I was looking forward to the nap.

The next thing I knew I woke up in the recovery room and it felt like my face was on fire. The nurse keeps giving me phenergan and it took a while to get the pain under control. The nurse was surprised at how quick I recovered after that. Then I went home and now I'm living like a recluse until my face is all healed.

<Random note – When people go under general anesthesia they sometimes say silly stuff. When I asked the nurse if I said anything she said no, but when they wheeled me out from the OR to the recovery room I outstretched my arms like I was a plane and flying, which is actually keeping in character for me.>

As for my current status, after the really bad pain I had coming out of the surgery my face has only hurt a little bit yesterday and today hardly at all. I have awesome pain meds so that's helping of course, but I bet that by tomorrow I wont need them at all. Facial swelling is part of the healing process for this procedure and the nurse said that I might not be able to see that well by the third day, but I've been sleeping with my head elevated and I'm taking Motrin to help with that. Right now it is a bit swollen, but just barely.

My face is red, raw and it looks like it's covered with rows of thousands of tiny dots. That's where the laser drilled those tiny holes to stimulate collagen production. For the first three days I have to keep my face slathered with bacitracin, and after that I have to keep it coated with aquaphor. I can't let my face become dry until the skin is healed, otherwise it will scab and that would be very, very bad.

My face is also slowly leaking serous fluid which is yucky, but that's all part of the healing process. I wash it (carefully) once in the AM and again before I go to bed. Then maybe twice during the course of the day I apply gauze dunked it a cold water/vinegar solution. It feels really awesome and it wipes away some of the old goop on my face so that I can apply fresh goop.

Although my face is all gross right now, looking in the mirror I can plainly see that me skin is going to be MUCH smoother than it was before. The Doc said to expect a 30-40 percent improvement, but I think it's going to be like 40-50. Over the course of the next five months my face will continue to heal and produce collagen, so it wont look it's best until about 5 months have passed. That means that over time it's going to look even better, and for once I feel really good about my face. (Or my future face anyway.) I'm very optimistic and I bet that if I was to do this again in a couple years that after the next treatment my skin would look flawless. I was so worried before I had the procedure, but now I think it's going to work out better than I could have hoped it would. (Hurray!!!)

I had a bunch of plans to keep myself busy over the course of the next two weeks. One thing I didn’t count on was the fact that I can't wear my glasses seeing how the skin on my nose was laser-ed off along with the rest of my face. I'm blind as a bat without them so playing video games, cleaning, reading, watching movies and typing are now very difficult. (My face is like 5 inches from my monitor as I write this post.) My first follow up appt will be on Monday afternoon and I'll find out then when I can wear them again, probably after the first week I'm guessing.

I have to be careful not to get food on my face so everything I eat has to be cut up into little portions. I'm trying this weight watchers thing now where I have a shake for breakfast and lunch and then a 500 calorie dinner, so eating two meals through a straw makes things easier for me.

<Random thought – So my shakes are chocolate flavored. When the hell did chocolate start to taste so damn good? I don't know if it's the hormones effecting me in a weird way or what but hot damn.>

Speaking of food, I'm really hungry and it's time for supper. I just wanted to check in really quick. I'm very, very happy right now. =)

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The next step

Hello Blog! It's been a while so let's recap. Uh, I've been sick and I haven’t been doing much of anything as a result. Well! Now that we're all caught up lets get to the big news. In two days I finally get my laser resurfacing. I have always been extremely self conscious about my acne and then my subsequent acne scaring. I lived with it as a male but now it's become intolerable and I'm fucking doing something about it. Rar!

I know I've mentioned this before, but this is a very important step for me. I'm soooooo fucking nervous. Nervous that something might go wrong and my face gets even more screwed up and also nervous that after I've healed it'll hardly makes a difference. (And I'm down four grand. =P) I'm trying to keep my expatiation’s low but if this doesn’t make a big difference in my complexion I don't know what I'm going to do.

I am burning all my vacation time for this, so I will have two weeks where I'll be confined to the house. (Which is a tiny condo under 600 square feet.) I'm hoping that after the first week I won't look like a radiation burn victim anymore and I'll be able to go outside at night to walk around without scaring too many children. I'm going to have to avoid sun exposure like the plague for something like six months after the procedure. I don't mind that too much since I'm pretty nocturnal anyway, but I still like to get out and go hiking and shit so that's going to be annoying.

I haven’t been able to exercise for like a week and I've been eating like crap up until today, and since I'm not supposed to exert myself until two weeks after the procedure I'm trying the weight-watchers “two shakes a day” thing. If it works OK for me I just might keep doing it. Then I can have fish, water and salad for dinner. =) I swear to the godess, after only one week of slacking off I look fatter. =(

So tomorrow after work I'm stocking up on any remaining supplies that I need and then vacation begins! Sort of. Kind of sucks that this will be my vacation for the year, but I have to do it. I plan on cleaning every square inch of the house to maintain my sanity. I'll also watch MST3K, old monster movies, play video games, do lot's of reading and meditate. I have a couple book series that I need to catch up with, so despite the fact that my face is going to be raw, painful and disgusting I'm looking forward to it. By the end though I'll probably be half crazed and desperate to go back to work.

RANDOM NOTE – My cat is snoring loudly right now. It's super cute.

Anyway, in the event that I die for some bizarre reason on the operating table I want everyone to know that I have no regrets and also that the moneys in the. . Blarrrg . . .

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My version of a love song

Another Misfit Child

Running wild without a care

Slow dance through the wild

Never getting anywhere

When good times turn bad

When you're lost with out a clue

When you mourn what you had

I'll be there to see it through

I'll be there for you.

I'll be there for you.

As you pass through this life

And the love you seek slips through your hands

In a world consumed by strife

No one ever seems to understand

When all hope is dead

And the razor blade calls out your name

Come and rest your head on my shoulder

I'll be there to take the pain

I'll be there for you

I'll be there for you

Some people try to cut you down

And ignorance is all you see

It's hurts so bad that you might drown

In endless sorrow and misery

When the oceans turn red

And the angles fall from the sky like screaming rain

When the worlds at its end

Our love forever shall remain

I'll be there for you

I'll be there for you

I'll always be there for you

Alas, yet another quick update in which I have little to say

Aaaand yet I post anyway, because writing this crap is like therapy to me. My gender therapist told me that I would be crying a lot for no reason due to the HRT. I AM crying a lot, but I think that I have some pretty damn good reasons for doing so. Last night it was really bad again. Didn’t get to sleep until aprox 0200. Right now I'm literally living for the weekend, because that's the only when when I can get some fucking sleep.

I tried yoga as mentioned in a previous post, as I was looking into doing some more “feminine” (gender labeling, I know it's silly) exercises. I tried a few different instruction videos and I felt really awkward and not at all comfortable with them. I got frustrated and I started to feel sorry for myself, but then I said “fuck it”, and I proceeded to work out with my kettle-bells which kicked my ass and made me happy.

So I know that I need a high activity exercise to keep me interested. Kettle-bells are amazing as they work your core muscles while still giving you an amazing calorie burning workout. I've been doing interval training with them and it kicks the shit out of me.

Things are going better at home and at the same time it's also awkward. My wife seems to be a lot happier which is awesome as I've been worried about her. However, I currently have a platonic relationship with my spouse which feels strange and is a HUGE change from how our old relationship was like.

Last night she mentioned that things seemed better between us and I agreed, but I also tried to attempt to address our personal issues as they have really been bothering me. Our conversation is personal, but it ended on an awkward note and instead of addressing the issue she put on her headphones. In her defense, I was scared to go deeper into the conversation and I failed to speak up, afraid of what the consequences might be. I was hoping she would say something first. What I'm trying to say is that I'm pretty scared. It's hard for me to imagine us not being together but at the same time I can't see us going back to the way things used to be. She's not going to suddenly become a lesbian and I'm probably never going to be comfortable assuming the aggressive male role in the bedroom ever again.

We have an open relationship so maybe that will keep us both from going crazy. Maybe we will find our own lives outside the house and eventually drift apart. Maybe we will remain the awesome kick ass team that we are, and we will just have a very unconventional relationship that is still beautiful and lasts through the years. Maybe she will grow disgusted with me and it will end in a bitter divorce. Maybe I will come to a point where I feel like my relationship to her is holding me back and I will have to end it, which would be fucking awful of me and also lead to a bitter divorce. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

The worst thing about this besides the fact that I've messed up all our plans for the future is the uncertainty. We pretty much had the rest of our lives mapped out before this. Now? Who the fuck knows. I need her and for now she needs me. I just wish things were simpler like they used to be when I knew (or I thought I knew) where my life was taking me. We are both stuck in a holding pattern over a major city and we are slowly running out of fuel.

Page J. Abendroth

(P.S. - Any advise would be very welcome right now.)

Episode IV - Puberty Strikes Back

I'm 32 years old and I'm going through puberty.

Well, it's the second time I've done this now and I'm more prepared but it's still hard. Going through puberty as a male was hell and testosterone wrecked havoc on my face, mental health and my body. Estrogen however, is treating me fairly kindly. As a teenager there are all kinds of neural pathways that are being finalized during puberty also which makes things even more confusing, but I'm all old and stuff now so I get to skip that part. I think.

The thing is that there is a very limited amount of research regarding transgender people and the effect that HRT has on them at a biochemical and/or neurological level. (At least to the best of my admittedly limited knowledge.) MTF folks have reported changes in mood, sexuality, levels of empathy, feeling more forgetful then they were before, as well and liking different activities and abandoning other behavioral patterns that they used to enjoy partaking in before HRT.

I have immersed myself in trans literature since I accepted my true nature, and almost everything I've read thus far regarding Transition is based upon anecdotal evidence. Being scientifically minded this bugs the shit out of me. Hormones are extremely powerful and they can have profound effects upon a persons mind and body. It would seem to me that MTF and FTM persons who are in transition would be excellent subjects for studies regarding left/right brained gender based neurological studies. But hay, I was in the behavior disorder class from seventh grade till I graduated high school, so what do I know. (At least they let me out for all my art and literature classes. =P )

So yeah, I'm a 12 year old girl right now. Except I'm also a 32 year old bio-male. It's complicated.

My dysphoiria is soul crushing. Almost everything about my body is still wrong. I basically identify primarily as female, but when I look in the mirror I just see and ugly dude looking back at me and it hurts like hell. My appearance has become MUCH more feminine, but still I don't look female enough that I could ever pass as one, and I am stuck playing this game at work and in public where I have to conform to my assigned gender lest I be ridiculed for being myself, or worse.

It's gotten so bad recently. Last night I made a pretty positive post. Afterwords I started having some bad (but practical IMO) thoughts and the next thing I knew I was in the shower with the water blasting as hot as I could get it, curled up into a ball on the floor and sobbing uncontrollably. I cried for two hours and I couldn’t stop. I eventually got so emotionally drained that I had to go to sleep. I had nothing left in me.

This happens a lot.

Who am I? WTF am I? How do I explain this to the people I love and respect? When I do, how do I accept the fact that they no longer want anything to do with me at best? I work in a machismo cultured work environment where I am afraid that I will no longer be taken seriously if I present as female. Not to mention that I'm so socially fucking awkward as it is that I can hardly communicate with people I know no matter how much I want to. I just stutter and make a fool of myself. Now I have to contend with being judged by everyone that I come in contact with.

I am terrified of conflict and I just want to make everyone happy so they like me or at least ignore me. I am about to draw a whole bunch of attention to myself and I don't know if I can handle it. I have never felt so alone before in my life.

Trying to end this post on a positive note – my awesome gender therapist has recommended to me that I start going to the “Coming Out Group” at The Center and I think it's a great idea. I will probably meet a lot of people who are in similar situations as me and this is a good gateway to the San Diego LGBT community, which I really want to get involved with. After I get my face burned off and I heal I'm going. I'm desperate to make new friends and to find my place in the community.

Anyway, I know that no one reads my obscure little blog but in the event that you are also Bigender and looking for reassurance in regard to your gender identity please note that most male-assigned-at birth folk seem to take well to hormones. They feel less dysphoria and they report a sense of resonance between their female and male half. So please note that my gender identity issues are not the norm.

I'm different, but I always have been so whatever. Let's see where life takes me. I try so hard to be optimistic, but when looking toward the future all I see is heartbreak, personal wreckage, pain and eternal loneliness. Then again, I believe that we forge our own destiny. Despite all the crap that I've been through up to this point I'm still kicking and screaming. Hell, I thought that I would be dead by 26 and here I am today all responsible and in excellent health.

I can still forge a life for myself no matter what happens. Fates be damned - I make my own luck.

Page J. Abendroth

P.S. - I AM the personification of the “Socially Awkward Penguin” meme. http://www.quickmeme.com/Socially-Awkward-Penguin/

So stuff is like, happening. Also – Things!!! (And more!)

I've been waiting a while to post because I wanted to have stuff to write about and now I wonder if I will have enough time to say everything that I want too. So is life. Things have been pretty eventful as of late. In mostly a good way.

I have locked in a date for my laser resurfacing – March 30^th at 0800. I am sooo excited and nervous at the same time. This is the next milestone for me in my transition and it also addresses a very personal self-image issue that I've had since I was in my early teens when my body betrayed me.

In retrospect I think that something went wrong in utero and I was really supposed to be born female. Testosterone has done nothing but wreck havoc on my body. Since I got on estrogen and spiro my acne has gone away, I feel better about everything, I'm not nearly as depressed as I used to be, (not counting the gender dysphoria, which is as bad as ever) and I feel more grounded and centered than I ever have been in the past.

I am trying to have low expeditions so that I'm not disappointed with the outcome of my surgery, (it's not going to make me look like I have always had flawless skin) but at the same time it's soooo important to me that I can't help to imagine what I will look like when I have fully recovered. This is a huge goal post in my transition plan. After I am healed I start electro and save for my up for first round of FFS. If I decide to go the FFS route, then it will mean that I've committed to a full transition.

Which reminds me of another issue that I'm dealing with at the moment. My gender therapist is shocked at how different I look after three months on a relatively low dose of hormones. Quite frankly when I look in the mirror I am too. I suspected that I would take well to estrogen well but not THIS well. On one hand I am super happy. On the other I'm scared.

I am bigender. While the gender equivalent of my magnetic poles has shifted, I still have times when I identify as a man and I'm worried that I'm going to reach a point (soon) where it will be hard to present as one. Then will come the questions and the mis-gendering, and it will force me out before long.

Now I LOVE my evening walk. It's the bestest part of my day. It centers my entire being, and I get some of my best thinking, and non-thinking, done then. Today when I took my stroll I felt extremely uncomfortable the entire time. Cars full of people would pass and I felt eyes staring at me. My hair, my face, the configuration of my body are loosing/have lost strong male identifiers. I am approaching that awkward point when people are having a hard time assigning a gender to me. Uh, it probably didn’t help that even in a large male shirt I was. . . uh. . . pointy. Yeah, I'm taking well to estrogen.

My therapist recommended that I take up a more “female”exercise routine and I thought the idea was brilliant. As a male I was used to going anywhere I wanted at any time. As a transgender person I am not only in danger for being targeted for assault because I'm female, but I am at extra high risk of being targeted because I don't conform to cisgender stereotypes. Basically there are people out there looking to catch me alone so they can kill me.

Sooo tomorrow I start yoga! At first I was sad to give up walking but now I'm very excited. I've wanted to do it for a while and regarding my spirituality; it's very much in line with where I'm at in this moment of my life. It seems like a perfect fit.

On Tuesday I saw a Dr. regarding my HRT. She said that I should take my E every 10 days instead of every 14 as I've been experiencing some pretty strong mood swings. Then again, I'm basically going through a second puberty right now so I suppose that's to be expected.

<< Random thought's on HRT -

As a man when I got pissed about something I would stew over it for hours and it was really hard to let that anger go. As a woman I get pissed, then I quickly get over it and move on. This has actually had a big impact on my life and it's neat! OK, back to the show>>

Tonight I saw my gender therapist which brings us up to speed I suppose. I'm amazed at how she always manages to steer the conversation in a direction that ultimately results in me recognizing some profound truth about my self which subsequently has a dramatic, life changing effect on me. Yeah, he's that good.

So here I am, alone, scared and androgynous. I feel a need to change, but how far do I take it, and what is the point of no return? Am I really prepared to lose everything to be the woman that I see myself as?

What if I don't want to come out at work but the changes on my body are so dramatic that I have to out myself due to pressure from my peers?

I'm going to take this as slow as possible. I know that in the not to distant future that I will have to spill the beans. I hope that I still have some time. I'm fucking terrified.

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