Quick Update

I got some T from a friend, free.
The appointment I've waited two months for had been completely incorrectly arranged, was with the wrong person in the wrong place with the wrong job and they couldn't help at all, because my new doctor is a fucking idiot. I'm pretty down (and angry) about it, and if I hadn't of picked up the T that day.. Bah.

I just need to get some bloods done and BP checked and then I'll get me some nice nurse to inject my arse. And then the NHS taking their sweet time will no longer be a big fucking black cloud hanging over my life.
I am still worried about it though, to be honest.

Bah?

So, I'm normally a pretty happy, relaxed person. Well not relaxed - I get excited a lot, bounce around, you know the jazz - what I mean is, I don't get angry. Almost never am I angry or snappy.

Something special is now on it's way in the post.

Something that will change my life.

I am excited, in the explosive, I want to jump up and down and such, way.

Yet I am also very, very snappy all of a sudden. My patience has just evaporated. And yeah, I'm angry as well as excited. And I don't even know why. I'm just angry.

Maybe it's because I'm at work and can't bounce. Maybe it's because my body is currently tearing itself apart and it fucking hurts and it means I can't pack and I have to use the ladies toilets and it feels like fucking defeat. Maybe it's because my psych appointment is on Wednesday and I'm worried because I fucking hate shrinks and the buggering around my local services are giving me. It's been since Easter! Maybe it's because I figured I'd have one last unhealthy treat before worrying about my arteries and it was gonna be crackling and I burned it. Maybe it's just because one or two of the few people I've told are so worried that I'm just gonna dose myself up without checking stuff out. I'm not stupid. I'm really fucking tempted to, but, I don't want to die now that I have a possible future.

At least my family don't get on that track - they know me well enough regarding that kind of thing that they didn't even mention it, just gave me advice on injections and needles and possibly getting people who are trained to do it (Boots, for instance, used to perform such a service, according to my step-mother).

So my current plan is to get to the doctors, get some tests, and get a nice nurse to jab me in the arse once I'm sure it's safe.

Damnation

When I'm down, I look at places on the internet that'll sell me Testogel. It's only £120 for a month's supply. I could afford that.

But I shouldn't, and I'll wait, but it's horrible. Long grinding days, they just don't pass by, they drag slowly like a cat licking velcro.

I can't bear the waiting! Not knowing what's gonna happen. Will it even be this year? For fucks sake it's been so long alreadddyyyy... My life is swirling away down a drain whilst I sit here pretending I can hold a river with my hands.

A Story

Let me tell you a story..

Once upon a time, there was a little boy who led a happy life surrounded by loving, caring family - most of whom weren't related by blood, but by something much more powerful. He got to see lots of beautiful motorbikes, and listen to Guns N Roses and Black Sabbath for lullabies. His parents were very lenient and relaxed about life, being considered 'abnormal' by society already. This little boy was, therefore, very happy. He loved having so many uncles and aunties about, who would all teach him things and tell him stories and jokes and play games, build ships and bases and play with ants. The little boy was quite sure of who he was from a young age, and although his family were entirely sure that he was a girl, and gave him a girls name, they never forced him to do anything he didn't want to do (except maybe washing and wearing at least a t-shirt). The little boy's mother even let him splash in puddles, as long as he didn't do it so that it got on other people.

One day, the little boy learned that because he 'was a girl' he'd never get proper bits like his best friend and that he had a thing called a 'womb' for babies to grow in. Like parasites, he thought, only probably he thought 'like horrible bugs'. After that, one of his most famous (amongst the Family) and oft-repeated phrases was 'I want my womb removed.' He never clarified this, because his life was still pretty good - because he was different from the other children in so many ways (he liked to read, and he liked science and his own pretendings, liked to learn and talk with adults and ask questionsquestionsquestions, and other things that kids his age generally didn't spend much time doing), no-body expected him to behave like the other 'female' children anyway, so he grew up quite happy, playing in the mud and climbing trees and looking at engines and listening to a wide range of delicious music. When he was nine, he moved away from his Mummy, because he was unhappy that he could not help her when she was sad about not being with Daddy any more. He also argued sometimes with his Mummy, because he thought she could be very silly sometimes, and though he had lots of good friends and even liked his little brother (who occasionally wore his few dresses which he NEVER wore himself). He knew he'd miss his friend Joe, and Iphie, and all their families, and the people in the Mosque on the corner who'd always wave at him as he walked to school, but he just made the decision and left London to move to Thanet with his Daddy.

Daddy's new partner was Auntie Kerry (not a blood relative, don't worry), and was now just Kerry as she was now a step-mother. That was nice. She was strict, but lovely and fun, but also very much a Girl. When the little boy was eleven, he fell in love with a girl. She was four days younger than him, and they played a lot and said that they were astrological twins. When the little boy was thirteen he hit puberty, and his body completely betrayed him. He lost his small boyish shape and grew chubby and boobs, and had a yuckfest each month. His lower parts never did turn into what they ought to have been; they taunted him, by changing shape, but it never went far. His voice broke, but not as deeply as the other boys' - this just made it vaguely androgynous, rather than masculine. He hated everything about life, except the girl. The worst part was when all of his friends stopped playing with him like they used to; they never wanted to wrestle or play catch or climb trees or skate with him any more, and all the boys at school treated him like he had plague - except the other geeks.

School was a terrible place for the little boy, but he immersed himself in books and the library and the worlds in his head, and there were a few other children that were outcasts. Secondary school was the first time he'd been to a Christian school - the little boy had enjoyed going to church and secondary school for a year or two before secondary school began. He loved singing in the choir, and found the bible rather amusing, and liked the message of love and acceptance. His parents were very accepting of this interest in Christianity - being Buddhist, they didn't mind what he did as long as he was happy and not hurting anyone. The little boy soon realised, though, that Christianity was not really what he had thought, and so he went back to believing in the tug in his guts and chest that would always tell him right from wrong, and where to go next. Anyhow, in this Christian school, he very quickly got a reputation as 'that weird ginger dyke' which he didn't mind too much, as it meant he could act like himself and people would simple ascribe it to his 'gayness'. He hated PE most of all, playing netball, having to change in a room full of girls (he felt uncomfortable getting changed in front of them, and in seeing them get changed, like a perverted monster, so he'd always go change in the toilet cubicle) and he hated wearing shorts or a PE skirt, so eventually he managed to get a note allowing him to wear tracksuit bottoms in PE. He'd gotten a letter for trousers for normal uniform back in primary school, and thankfully there hadn't been too much of an issue with those after the first few months of secondary. Bullying did not help the boy adjust to the world. He hated school but loved it, because it was full of information and deliciousness. Keeping moving by wandering around at break, or just sitting in the library, were his only refuges from being chased and abused - he had to stay out of sight. There were a few other outcasts who had the same trouble, but he was the only one who people thought was a girl - this was really quite nice, as his geek mates didn't talk about boys and makeup like the few girls who had tried to befriend him before his outcast status got so bad, because they were all just normal 'geeky' boys like him.

One day he asked the girl out, and she laughed at him, because she thought he was a girl too and said she wasn't 'gay'. He was very depressed, but kept it a secret and they stayed friends. The little boy liked black a lot, and thought that gothy girls were hot, so since everyone thought he was a girl, he wore gothy clothes a lot because it was the only kind of vaguely girly clothes he could bear to wear (never tight things, never cleavage showing), and he was beginning to wonder what it might be like to be a girl. He generally wore lovely big baggy jumpers and things. (In fact, the boy still has the hoodie he got for his fourteenth birthday.) Since people thought he was a girl, and he liked girls, he told people he was a 'dyke' because it made him feel less like he was saying he was a girl than any other word. Even though he didn't just like girls, he liked personalities, and intelligence, and so was occasionally attracted to a boy. He got his hair cut short a few times but it looked awful because it was so fair and ginger and it stuck out like a pouf. By the time he was sixteen, he realised that if he was going to be a 'dyke' he could just not wear any girl things at all, and still get to date people. So he wore what he wanted even more, and this generally included really baggy jumpers to hide his chest and figure, and big loose jeans, and big stomping boots. Occasionally, when he was into a girl, they'd go somewhere, and he'd wear something less baggy so that he looked 'cute' and 'curvy' for them. It was uncomfortable, but the girls liked it, so he could almost enjoy wearing a top that showed his collarbones to the world - never any lower though!

By the time he was eighteen he'd dated a few boys and decided he really didn't like that at all, it felt unnatural and uncomfortable and just not right, though he enjoyed the kissing and cuddling and company - he didn't like the way he was treated as a 'girl' no matter how boyish he was, even in bed. He dated a lot of girls too, especially in college. He never realised that he could change himself to look like what he had thought he'd be when he grew up - he imagined, when he was little, that he'd look like his Daddy; with a young slightly feminine face and long hair, just like his Daddy, but a little bit of facial hair and clearly a man, with a smooth, medium level voice and a nice laugh and a good figure for wearing leathers and bike show t-shirts, that he'd be able to get nice tattoos like his Daddy (though his Daddy did not like all his tattoos any more, and taught the little boy a good lesson about forward planning when things are permanent) and that he'd have lots of nice friends of all different kinds. The little boy never thought at all that he'd have to grow up like his Mummy, who was also cool and bikery and tattooed but very clearly a Lady.

The worst part of finishing growing up was that suddenly he was away from his family, and EVERYONE thought he was a girl, and tried to treat him as a girl and talk to him like a girl about things he didn't like. The only people who'd treat him as himself were the guys who'd known him a long long long time, and even then, they tended to adjust their behaviour without realising. Sex was a bad thing because it took so long (many many months of a relationship) to get to trust someone enough to be naked with them. The further he got from home, from college and secondary school and childhood, the more he realised that no-one was treating him as him. They all made assumptions and then when he didn't fit them, they labelled him as 'weird' and didn't like him any more. He felt he would die alone and early, because he couldn't take this thing, he couldn't take that so much of society wanted to enforce stereotypes and sexist views on itself, and therefore, on him: He was sick of adverts on Facebook, for instance, advertising fashion shows and pregnancy wish list sites. Sick of women telling him about their children, or trying to share something they thought was 'cute' but which was in fact ugly and useless. Sick of not being able to ask any lady he liked out for fear of being hurt by her friends for being 'gay'. Sick of not being able to be or do what he wanted in bed. Sick of the guys excluding him without even realising it, simply because they thought he was a girl and wouldn't be interested in the formula one or the page three girl. Sick of the assumption that he couldn't carry heavy things or figure out the best way to pack a lorry. Sick, basically, of enforced stereotypes that whilst he believed to have a tiny base in reality, he knew were not right because the wrong ones got applied to him, and thereafter, people would not change their mind about him except from 'hey, a person' to 'hey, a wierdo.'

Then when the boy was twenty-two, he discovered a forum on the internet full of queers, who all seemed very nice, and as the boy was in his first adult relationship with a guy and was depressed and lonely all the time, but had no-one to talk to about it as he didn't like talking about his internal stuff, he spent time making friends on the forum. One day, he discovered this word called 'Genderqueer' and he thought perhaps that was what he was, but it didn't fit. He also discovered these things called 'Binders' and begged his mother to help him buy one as an early birthday present - he couldn't afford it himself. As soon as he got the binder he never took it off - he could wear normal, fitting clothing! He could go out in public! He could enjoy himself!

Before the binder arrived, the boy slicked his long hair back into a ponytail, borrowed a shirt from a mate, and bound his chest with a scarf and a chunk of cardboard, and went to a Rave. He told his friends he was 'in drag' and to call him Eamon, which they tried to do, but messed up. He enjoyed being perceived as himself in the smoky rave, even being thrown out of the ladies loos by the security guys, and dancing with some hot girls, and drinking other people's drinks (he didn't know this at the time, his friend was bringing them to him, they found out when suddenly they looked at one another across the dancefloor and they were both gurning - clearly they had drunken something that was spiked!).

This changed everything for the boy. He realised very fast just how much of his depression was due to his hatred of his own body, and how other people initially perceived him, how he never fit in with ladies because he was not like them, how he never got accepted with the guys because he looked like a girl, how he was no good at talking to people because he never got practice. He realised that he had to look like himself or he'd just have to start hurting himself again, and that had taken him a long time and a promise (he never broke promises) to stop doing.

After his first binder arrived, and allowed him to wear fitting clothing (albeit in several layers to hide the prominent edging on the binder) he realised there was no way he could go on pretending to be 'okay'. He had recently met some transguys and transgirls via the forum, and he paid a lot of attention to what they were saying, and it was all so close to home that he wanted to cry; in part because there were so many people suffering like he had, and some much worse, but also because he learned about medical transition, and how his puberty could have been stopped if he'd just known it was possible and asked.

Now, the boy is a boy. He still doesn't look how he wanted - he gets told he looks like an underage gay boy, which is nice but not quite there. He's waiting for doctors appointments and things, and is both happier and more depressed than he's ever been in his life. Especially since his friends, work, and family are all fine with it, and are making an amazing effort to support him and switch pronouns and names. His Dad chose his middle name, and his Mother chose his first name, and he feels almost whole and right.

These days, the boy is slowly coming out of his shell and socialising and going to parties and things. It's very fun, and a bit daunting because he gets kicked out of both bathrooms, but generally a good rush. He likes that he seems to present well, especially as drinking lowers his voice a little, and loud music means he has to project more, which further deepens his tone. Also drunk guys are more likely to accept him without question, he's found - all good things. He's yet to get over his own disconnection with his body and learn to dance, though!

Most days, if he's alone, he's pretty depressed - he can't stop his brain going on and on. But he pretends to be okay, because giving in and admitting how depressed he is, or talking it over with someone, makes it so much worse. And he hates talking about his feelings. He vents a lot on his blog, and hopes he doesn't inflict his sadness on anyone, because he knows he's a very lucky guy, and that it's mostly just general dysphoria and impatience.

One Night can Change My Outlook

Okay, so I'm in a much better mood today.

Last night I was having a wash and someone knocked at the door.

So I scurried to get covered and answered it, and it was the (rather attractive) guy from upstairs. They're having a party, he says, you should come up. Maybe.. In a bit.. I say. He says no, no, you gotta come up. So I says that I'm naked and such but okay I'll be up in a bit.

I went and dunked my head and shampooed and started rinsing and then the door goes again.

This time I'm dripping water and I can't see (no glasses) but I recognise the girl who used to live with the guy upstairs anyway. She comes in. I scurry around protecting my modesty and female-bodiedness and drying off and saying goodnight to my sexy girl in Sheffield.

I eventually send her off with promises to be up in a little while, finish saying goodnight to my gorgeous girl via Skype (of course she has to go and tease me and get me all hot and bothered!) and head up there.

I meet a bunch of guys, two of whom are quite attractive (the birthday boy, and the guy from upstairs) and a load of nice girls. I feel out of place, but enjoy the fact that they're playing ancient Eminem albums to which (thanks to my little brother) I know most of the words and tune. After a little while, I feel more like a member than that-weird-guy-from-downstairs. I have a good time. I chat to some of the guys. I have the girl from up there dancing pressed against me. I wonder what she thinks of my packer, and if she'd think it was real if she didn't already know. We headfuck the guy a little, by telling him about my 'willy'. He thinks I've had an operation, but also thinks that that would be fast. I make him come into the empty room and feel it. It's quite sexy to have another man put his hand down your trousers. He still thinks I've had an operation, at first, but I tell him it's silicone. He looks relieved. I feel greatly amused.

At one point, most of us blokes were standing in the kitchen (cooler in there) and drinking, and talking about weights and age and booze and such. I am the oldest person there, but only by a year. It's unimportant. The guy from upstairs is topless and I want to pull him against me and enjoy a cuddle, but I don't want him to look like a queer in front of his mates (though it was a very, very homoerotic party, there was a lot of humping bums and slapping and groins-in-other-guys-who-have-sat-downs-faces). He sidles up to me a little at one point, looks up from under his hair with that ridiculously hot half-smile, and says "You're passing."

I feel fucking amazing, because I know I am, but also because this guy knows how much of a big deal it is. I feel joyful in this kind of company. And despite having had half of a very drunken threesome with him and his (now ex) girl, he still treats me as a bloke and never messes pronouns up. Amusingly, she does still mess pronouns up. You'd think it'd be the other way around!

But anyway;

I passed.

Completely.

Apart from my age.

There was one guy who thought I was sixteen.

But he didn't think I was trans, or a butch dyke, or a 'girl' in any way shape or form.

I now believe people who tell me my voice is androgynous. Thanks for trying to give me that confidence, guys, you have no idea how much more I'll trust you now that I know you were right.

It was fucking amazing for my ego! I feel amazing. :)

Can't wait for my provisional so I have ID!

And it's the thirteenth today - only sixteen days (maximum) until my psych appointment.

I'm finally cheering up, I'm feeling mostly positive.

I also feel depressed as fuck when I think that I'm probably not going to get treatment for a while, but I've made the decision to buy some for myself for Christmas if it's still not sorted through the NHS, and it helps me ignore that big black cloud that's telling me to go to bed and not get back up.

It's a really fucking bad day.
The kind of day when I chainsmoke because I'm not allowed to cut myself.
The kind of day when I get close to breaking that promise.
I just want to cut them off and stop thinking even if it means deafeningly loud music or bashing my head off a wall.

Fuck, why is it taking so long to get this sorted?!

Ohnoes

I went to the barbers.

As usual he didn't listen - people who cut my hair never do! - and now I think I look a prat.

Nevermind. Surely someone I know can teach me how to make this look okay..

Off down the beach with my sister in a little while. Then tonight I have a mate coming over, and he's pretty stylish, so mebbe he can help..

Update: Here's a picture.

Quickie

I'm having a bad day, but a tiny bit of positivity; I asked the FTM-UK Yahoo Group some questions...

I've been spending a lot of time lately looking at top surgery options, and I like peri-areolar surgery, but I expect that it's only possible with smaller chests?

Can anyone give me information on this?

Additionally, I was wondering if (on the NHS) you get to have a choice of surgeon and method (where possible ofc).


Also a quick moan - this is taking forever! My appointment with the local mental health team (grumble-youcallingmecrazy?-grumble) isn't until the end of -September-.
Seriously, this is long and long and nothing has been done! My first appt was just me saying I wanted it, then that GP moved practice so I had to have another appointment going over all the same ground because despite my request upon making the appt she did NOT read over the notes Then she spent ages referring me to this psych clinic, who didn't call me for a month, then sent me an appointment almost two months away! I've waitied one month but this is doing my nut in. Is there anything I can do? How can I move the appointment forward? Should I just tell them how much it's getting to me? Should I even have been referred to the mental health clinic? It's really getting me down..

I've already had a load of useful responses including a message last night suggesting I call and explain how much it's getting to me and ask to be put on the cancellations list. Which I did this morning at 9:06am. So, a tiny bit of positivity.. I'll leave the moaning out of this post, maybe add a rant tonight..