Disaster Averted

This last week I had my annual physical with my general practitioner. Now as this appointment approached I realized I was getting low on my hormone supply.

Perfect! Usually when these two appointments get close like this I have my GP add a few extra test to the list and send the extra results to my HRT Doctor.

Knowing this I called the office of my HRT Doctor.

Only to find out he was no longer practicing at that office.

In fact they didn't have any way for me to contact him and scouring the internet and other resources I could not find him.

O_O

Oh, did I mention the HRT supply was getting low?

Yep, not good. remembering how when I stopped hormones for surgery I became the wicked stepmother incarnate.

Knowing this I starting scouring the internet and any other trans related forums I could find and came up with a name. Better still he was an Endocrinologist (which my other wasn't), which I had always would have preferred but had trouble finding one two and half years ago. On top of it all he is a well known Doctor at the biggest university around here. Not to mention one of the top medical schools in the country. Double super bonus he accepts my medical insurance.

And he sees trans patients.

Woot!

The issue was, when could I get into see him.

By the time I tracked all this info down the best I could do was call him the morning of my appointment with my GP. Hopefully I could get this resolved and have my GP help me in the mean time if there was an issue.

I called and got a wonderful office associate named Pam. She asked me why I wanted to see the doctor. So I explained I was on hormones and my last doctor was no longer practicing. My current prescription was running out and I needed to find a new doctor.

She told me that wasn't a problem but that he was on vacation in October so when he could get me in was going to be tricky. Yet before that she asked if I was a new patient to the Hospital and University's medical care program. Explaining that I was she still decided to double check.

"Let me just make sure you aren't in here somewhere. What is you last name?"

Which I supplied.

"Ok what is your first name?"

{Knowing that my insurance was on my old name still, and that for now I am legally known as him I gave her that one. }

"Wait...Your {His name}?"

"Yes."

"oh...{pause}...OH! I see, well you aren't in the system, but for our records do you have another name you prefer, so that we can put it into our records?"

"Yes, Kelli. Is it going to be an issue that my name isn't changed yet?"

"Oh no, of course not! We just want to know so we address you correctly when you are here. Are you going to be changing it?"

"Yes, that should be happening sometime in the next six months."

"Great! Well for now we will bill you with the old name but when you change it and your insurance changes just let us know so we can update everything."

"Thank you so much."

"Oh it is no problem at all sweetie. Now lets find a day we can get you in."

Which she did. She was so very sweet and apologized for a system goof on her part. Which didn't bug me at all. She was very nice and extremely helpful so taking a little longer to sort things out wasn't an issue. She found a couple of dates in November for me and I choose the first one that would work the best.

Appointment set she put me on hold and got the records office on the phone to properly get all my insurance info into the system. Before she let me go she did inform me that I would be getting a patient record card in the mail and a notice of my first appointment. And to bring the patient card with me as it will expedite entering my info into the system.

That all set I had one other issue to take care of.

Namely, my current hormone supply was not going to last until the second week of November.

Off to my annual physical I went.

Once my Doctor got into the room, we went over everything that was going on. He did the standard physical once over for someone my age and asked me about my hormones, as he isn't handling them. He just isn't experienced with it and doesn't feel comfortable doing so. Which is fine with me. I just want him to be me standard doctor and take care of the mundane stuff.

This allowed me to then go into the story I mentioned already. He was shocked as he knew the other doctor and had not heard anything. He was then extremely curious as to what had happened. I did stop him before he went to far and added that I was going to run out of hormones soon and was wondering if he could refill my current script so I would at least have enough to get me through the waiting period and than have the new doctor take it from there.

He asked how long I had been on these doses and I told him almost twenty months. This relaxed him a bit as he wasn't going to be changing what I was taking.

We then finished my appointment, had the nurse come in and draw blood for the usual test and the extra ones. Prescriptions in hand I was on my way.

Glad a least to have myself covered until the end of the year and a new doctor on the way. Because when I found all this out I was in total panic mode since things had been going so well up to this point. That and I recalled the misery I was in during the time I had to stop for surgery.

I am so not looking forward to that ever again.

At least I manage to avoid that again.

Tipping the Scales

And no, this post as nothing to do with the bathroom variety.

For me to successfully transition I had to defeat my long standing arguments and logic of why I shouldn't transition.

Minus the fear, which is always there. I had to undo one basic fundamental reason I usually used to stomp out the idea whenever it came roaring to the front of my head.

You(as in me)don't look like a girl.

It was easy to use against myself. As strong as the desire was to do something about my transsexualism I could take one look in the mirror and say; Nope, not even possible! End of story.

I mean really, I had let myself go. I was fifty pounds over weight, I was flabby, hairy and had been cutting my hair incredible short for fifteen years.

To say the experience of stepping outside as me, the first time, was traumatic is a bold faced understatement.

Every argument and logical reasoning, all fueled by fear, I had was in my head resonating like a jet airplane. Screaming at me that this was all wrong, it would never work, etc, etc, etc.

And really I came home and cried that day for two reasons.

First, I never thought it would ever be possible.

Two, I didn't want to live the way I had anymore.

No easy feat. I knew right away I had a very long road ahead of me. Yet if I was going to do this I needed to change just about everything about me.

At least physically.

I started a controlled and careful diet and consistent exercise. Which I maintain as best I can to this day.

I began letting my hair grow out.

Then there was the removal of facial hair. (Still working on this one but I am getting really close. YAY!!)

Next I brought hormones into the mix. This had a larger effect on me mentally but the physical changes cannot be discounted.

The other ingredient was time. Really I started all this four years ago, maybe not all at once but I did start with what I could at that time.

I simply needed to sit back and let all these ingredients simmer for a bit.

When they were close and almost ready I added in a big one by changing a few of my most glaring facial features via surgery.

Really there were a few things that just had to change and a couple I wanted for aesthetical reason.

OK! Shush, so I was also being a little vain. Fine, I'll admit it but if I was going to go under the knife why not spruce up two things. Again I was trying to defeat a long standing reason for not transitioning.

Now that I have taken the time, the pain, the process. Things have indeed changed and for the better.

This was a driving force behind my finally telling HR. I had simply stopped existing as a boy, not counting work.

Once things finally had healed up, and other things kept changing. (Think hair) I would try to present the world with a boy and fail miserably at it.

To the point I can't even show someone my old drivers license and have them use the old gender pronouns toward me.

He, effectively, is gone. The constant reverberation of what the world at large thinks about me, when they see me, has finally quashed those old arguments. They simply have no muscle behind them and their faint little whimper is about to disappear entirely.

I literally tipped the scales the other way. I am no long afraid of stepping out of the house as a girl. It doesn't bother me. I simply am.

The converse side of the equation is that I am uncomfortable attempting to be a boy. Sans work, every other local I step into has viewed me as a girl. I get more odd looks then than I do as a me.

There was a lot of pain. It took a lot of patience but the balance as swung. I know who I am know and I am comfortable with that person.

I am not saying this method is for everyone. Some people might just be able to go into head first and handle it just fine. For me, I need to push myself far enough that there were wasn't another option. Because I knew fear would convince me to take it.

Am I done yet? No. There are a few things left to do. Thought I am far enough along that they aren't a big issue and one of them would only happen after I went full time anyway.

And that isn't that far away.

The Other Woman

Who would be me!

Scandalous!!! It'll be splashed over all the tabloid before I know it.

Now I know I am thinking I totally just shattered your good girl image of me.

I haven't, maybe.

Not sure actually, but let me explain.

Last weekend I was out with B(shocker I know!). This was actually the first time in nearly four weeks we were able to spend any considerable time together. Other than seeing him for about an hour at the end of the evening I spent with C.

So there we were hanging out at his favorite spot, catching up on things, laughing, having fun.

As we discussed everything that was going on he reviled to me that he had a work wife at the new job.

{insert eye-twitching jealous rage}

They are in the same training program. They had been hanging out after work, which is easy to do when you are both getting off the clock at around midnight. He had a lot of good things to say about her and she was the first co-worker at the new job he has come out too.

All in all it seemed like she was someone worth while and he seemed to really like having her as a friend.

While chatting about everything B gets a call from...well I will call her C² since I don't have a clever nickname yet and she shares the same first initial as C...C²

Seems she is out and about with friends for a bachelorette party and wants B to come hang out a bit.

Now I don't know about other locales but the latest thing around here is for a bachelorette party to end up at a gay bar where there is a drag show. I don't get it myself but that is becoming quite common.

The only place in our area is the same location I used to frequent when trying to build up my nerve to go out. It is a gay bar, has a drag show and on Saturday nights is trans night.

I never felt I fit in there and haven't been in a long time.

Yet B wanted me to meet her, I think because he saw the three of us hanging out from time to time. Since it was for him I screwed up my courage and went.

{must resist temptation to stab}

Best timing ever as we parked and headed in C²'s party bus pulled in. We waited out side for the happy(by happy I mean drunk) party to climb(stumble) out of their transportation. It was near eleven at this time so some of them were in a really good mood.

Introductions around as C² explained to the party who B was. Then turned to met me.

From there things get weird but not immediately.

She was friendly but inside B and I ran into our friends S & J whom had already met C² a week or so earlier. I forget the exact story.

Here is what I noticed, S & J are non transitioners. Granted I have a lot of respect for them. I knew my friendship could only go so far.( J even mention this to me very early on. She was super supportive about it. Telling me I never really belonged there to begin with and that she would welcome the day I moved on with a normal existence.)

C² is super friendly to S & J along with a few other people B knew there, mostly other gay men.

Me on the other hand I feel as if there was a gap between us. At first I couldn't put my finger on it as she was friendly and polite toward me.

What was it?

I think I was being sized up as competition.

Before I was just someone B had mentioned or talked about. Now suddenly here I was in front of her and I have no idea what B told her, but I think I was being viewed straight up as the other woman in our strange little relationship.

She knew B was very good friends with me. She knows I care a lot for B. Yet now she had deal with this living, breathing girl in front of her.

On top of that I am sure my looks didn't help her feel any better about it. (I know I have no ego, nor do I think I am that pretty, but really I can't discount what others say to me. Consider I had a lesbian hit on me earlier in the night at a different bar. For REALS!! I know that opinion exists.)

I can't fault for it either. I learned a long time ago this is why I would get jealous of my male friends when I was younger. When they would meet a girl and start spending more time with them than me.

Those bitches were competition!

I just never understood that feeling fully until much later.

Now I know I joked about the stabbing and crazy jealous rage earlier in the post.

I really have no problem sharing B. Honestly the boy needs more good friends and C² seems to be a solid person even if she has a little be of a wild side to her. Even though I got the feeling of being sized up, and maybe not fully welcome, she never made me feel unwelcome.

Time will tell, but honestly this was the first time I think I was really being viewed as such. At least from another girl in direct responses to my relationship with the same man.

Granted B is a gay man and nothing is going on there. It simply was what I perceived.

So for that night I felt like the other woman.

I am sure we will be fine. B asked me, as we were walking to our cars, what I thought of her and I said I liked her. That She seemed really cool and fun. She obviously thinks highly of B, so as long as she is good to him and a positive influence, I am good with that.

Treat him badly and my claws will probably come out, but I am in no way going to compete with anyone for his attention. I know how he feels about me and I have no worries about our friendship.

Besides I am willing to share.

We shall see.

Now, I would never actually be the other woman. Way too much drama there and frankly I have enough with everything else to generate more needlessly.

So stop thinking I am a tramp y'all!