Somewhere in Tammy World: An Update

Somewhere in Tammy World....

Six weeks from tomorrow I will be checking into the hospital.  No, not that hospital, the one in Montreal where Dr. Brassard performs surgery.  I'm not feeling particularly nervous or excited right now but maybe it just hasn't hit me yet.  I have been feeling very happy lately, more than usual and often ecstatic.  I'm going to attribute this surge of feelings to my anticipation of getting this part of transition over with and finally having a body to match my mind.  Looking a few months forward, I think it's going to be really great but I have to get past the pain.  That reality hasn't hit me yet and hopefully it won't until I'm in the recover room.  I'll let you all know exactly how it goes, the good, the bad and the ugly. Hopefully there will be a Lot more good than that other stuff....

This week I went to dinner with my friend Lisa Allyn, who had her GRS with Dr. Brassard in late 2012.  She has a very positive story but she is also very honest with me about all the little things I need to know about going up there.  I'm fortunate to know quite a few friends who have been through GRS, many of them with Dr. Brassard.  A few of them are personal friends so I think I've got a pretty good idea what to expect.  It's different for everybody and never having been in the hospital or having any surgery, I have to admit that even after learning a lot about the experience I have no idea what to expect as far as how I will feel.  It's supposed to be a very emotional time involving a lot of physical pain, but there is a gradual end to the difficult recovery an that's what I am looking forward to.

at dinner with Lisa Allyn....

A quick note about acronyms...

SRS is the older, traditional term for Sex Reassignment Surgery.  Then GRS came along as term denoting Gender Reassignment Surgery.  Now many prefer GCS for Gender Confirmation Surgery.  The evolution of acronyms is sort of like the word transgender replacing transsexual in many cases, as a way to try to remove the word sex from the equation and make it sound better, more politically correct.

In our community you see people use all of these terms plus a few more, sometimes interchangeably.  For me, from now on I am only going to use the acronym GRS because that is what the papers that I received from Brassard's office state.  I am scheduled for GRS, so GRS it is although I think any of the acronyms are viable.  It must be confusing though, for people who know little or nothing about transition.


It Came!

I wouldn't be going anywhere outside the country if my passport did not arrive, and it finally came this week via special delivery.  Mitchell's passport got here a few weeks ago and all I received was a letter stating that my doctor's letter did not have one of the required pieces of information.  So I had to go back to my doctor and get him to write an all new letter.  At least I didn't have to make a special trip as I did it on the same day I went in for my pre op tests.  Speaking of those tests, it's been almost two weeks and I haven't heard back from the doctor's office about them so I have to assume they didn't find anything wrong with me.  I take that as a good sign anyway and have plans to call them the first of the week to see if they have been sent to Montreal yet. 

The final payment for GRS will be due May 16th, once month before surgery.  We are going to make reservations in the next few days, but the plan is for Mitchell and I to fly to Montreal from Raleigh on Thursday.  We will have Friday and Saturday to relax and sight see, then I check into the hospital Sunday night prior to my surgery Monday, June 16th.  Seeing that passport with my picture on it and F for the gender marker made me feel wonderful.  Hopefully I will a letter stating I've had GRS soon and with that I can also get my new birth certificate, which is the only place left that I am still listed as male. 

License to Practice

When I took the class to be a Real Estate Broker back in 2007 I was thinking, maybe this is something I could do as myself one day, although I was more interested in owning/managing rental properties than sales.  The next year, when the fish farm/hatchery I was managing closed down and an opportunity in Real Estate opened, up I went with it.  The first couple of years I made a little bit of money but the market was in a downward spiral.  It was also becoming very difficult to work as my old self.  It felt very fake.  Add that to the fact that I don't really have a "sales" mentality as I'm probably too honest and laid back. 

Doing that business as someone who was going through a crisis of dsyphoria became impossible, so I slowly dropped out but have kept my license active.  The market is very depressed where I live and I doubt I will get into selling real estate again, or make any money with it here in this town, but if I did I know I would do a lot better and be a LOT more comfortable in that field than I used to be. Changing this license is the last piece of the puzzle as far as changing my name and I had to do it before June so that I can take the 8 hours CE to keep my license active. So I am not active in real estate right now (but I can do referrals) and I'm actually very happy to get this in the mail yesterday and place it on my wall.

Pathways

This week this blog reached 150,000 hits and I want to thank everyone for their support and for tuning into Tammy World.  I outreach with a lot of people on the internet and in person and I hear from a lot of people that I inspire them.  I understand that but I don't see why any of them (You) cannot be inspiring as well.  Sometimes we take inspiration where we can get it and if we can see a pathway to get from where we are now to where we want to be it makes the journey much easier. 

If I could have seen a pathway I would have embarked on this journey much sooner than I did, but I am very thankful to be in the position I am now.  We can't look back and regret any mistakes or delays that we think would make things easier now, not matter the situation or context.  Just move forward at a pace you feel comfortable with but try not to suppress doing something you need to do.  That can lead to some potentially major problems.  Wherever you are in life or whatever you are doing, if you are content then be very happy that you are so blessed.  If you are not content then proceed to take the steps necessary to find contentment.

Someone told me when I posted the message below, that I have the ability to talk about transition like it's a regular event.  Well, to me it is a regular event.  To a lot of people it is a strange event they can't understand.  To many it is an event they want or need in their life but they can't see a way to make it happen.  Whatever it is in life that you need to do, just know that you have inside you what it takes to make it happen.  For too long I did not see any possible pathway for me to be myself, even when I got on the internet and saw others successfully making the journey.  I saw too many obstacles, or roadblocks as my friend Lisa Lesher says.  When I figured out that I could do it, things started to fall in place for me.  Believing is over half the battle....

 
It's nice to know that I inspire so many people just by being myself. I don't think I do anything that special really.  It's very easy, trust me.  So now you know that Just by being yourself you too can be an inspiration.  And in your own life it can make All the difference.

Countdown (2 Months)

Two months from today, if everything goes as planned, I will be in Montreal, Quebec, Canada having GRS (Gender Reassignment Surgery).  Today I sent in my initial deposit, about 25% of the total payment due.  So if I pass the pre-surgery physical and nothing happens here at home to delay my trip, my dreams will come true on June 16, 2014.

The plans have been made and stay tuned for further details as things get finalized (hopefully) in the coming weeks.  I guess I still have some anxiety over the physical because I still believe deep down maybe something is wrong with my heart of something else.  I had this same fear about going to the doctor to start hormones but everything checked out ok, so I have to believe it will this time too.  If someone gets sick or there is some tragedy at home, it will only delay my surgery not put and end to my plans.

My plan is to blog about the whole experience from now through the potentially long recovery process.  One of my good friends had her GRS in February, also with Dr. Brassard, and she complained to me today that too many others gloss over the painful details of recovery in their conversations, videos or blogs.  She asked me to be brutally honest in writing about my experience.  That is what I intend to do but I also want to thank her for being honest with me throughout her surgical journey.  it's not always easy but she's been very active almost since the day she got home, so I will take that as a good sign.

Some people I talk to say they had little pain in their recovery, some only taking Advil when they get home and only complaining about having to be inactive for awhile.  Some have a very hard time for awhile or end up with painful complications.  A lot of it is based on individual experience, so honestly I do not know at this point what to expect.  This is one of those things where you have to plan for the worst and hope for the best.  That's the attitude I am going to take going in, but I will tell you this.  I'm going in with a positive attitude and a knowledge that, in the end, I am going to be ok.  I feel confident that I chose the right surgeon. 

Am I scared of surgery, considering I've never had any type of surgery before?  Yes, but I know this is something I need to do to be whole, be complete, to be me.  And therefore I am not going to let fear or anything else hold me back.

Mitchell and I went over the extensive package of information the other day and made our tentative plans for the trip to Montreal.  I am so fortunate to have him in my life, have his unconditional support and especially lucky to have his undying love.  When we went out to dinner that night I just had this feeling come over me.  It was both joy and excitement, but mainly joy.  I told him I was feeling so good at that moment, like everything was finally coming together for me.  These are feelings I've never really had before and even though all through my transition I have had these joyous feelings, this one is somehow a little different.  Things do keep getting better.

When I first started therapy and began to see a clear path to fully transitioning, I would get a grin on my face every time I would think about GRS.  That hasn't changed.  Believe me, the grin was not about lying on an operating table getting surgery.  It was able my life after, the part that I've always dreamed of.  The actual surgery part is the part that sort of wipes the grin off my face because it is a scary thought, I'll be honest with you.  Knowing I will be asleep and it will be over in a couple of hours doesn't completely erase the anxiety.  The recovery will be hard even if it's a best case scenario.  I know that, but still there will be the other side once I get there.  No pain no gain, as they say.  I am just hoping for as little pain as possible and I know I will be ok.

So the journey begins here on my blog.  The road to GRS in Tammy World 2014 begins today I will proclaim, because I sent in my fist payment today.  As someone said, it's now getting real.  Two months from today it will be real.  Stay tuned is all I can say.  I know I use the words "stay tuned" a lot but for this one we are all going to have to stay tuned.  To quote Bette Davis, "Put your seat belt on, it's going to be a wild ride."