November 27, 2007
Progress!
For more than the past year, I’ve been running (with Anh, then with Anh and Samwich (me pushing) from three to six miles, on average, at between four and seven times a day. There were months that went past in the spring where I wouldn’t skip a day for six to eight weeks.
Here’s the payoff: less than 24 hours post surgery, I was up and walking around the block – multiple times. We walked a couple blocks to a small café here this morning, then went around two blocks, because I was feeling pretty good, and it was a good way to keep Samwich sleeping (he loves to fall asleep in his stroller).
I have to tell you, a cup of coffee and a english muffin with bacon and cheese never tasted so good – yum!
Right now, I have drains in, which makes my chest look kind of odd – there’s the regular chest-y area, then two large catch drains, with thin tubing under the skin. They work in an interesting way. They are like squeeze balls with stoppers, with tubes coming out. You open the stopper, squeeze the ball, the close the stopper. This creates a vacuum, removing excess fluid. After a few hours, some liquid fills the reservoir – you open the stopper, drain it, then repeat. The flow on this has gone to basically nothing, which is great.
Today, Trish, one of the proprietors here at Cocoon house (who is also an OR nurse for Dr. O) who was there for my surgery stopped by to check in on us. First off, she’s ultra nice. (Beyond super nice – ultra nice). She was there to greet me yesterday pre-op, and was in the room for surgery. She said that I might have extra drainage because of my pre-existing chest issue from surgery twenty years ago. Adhesions and all that. I guess it was more work than usual to get the implants in place given the scarring. However, looks like the extra drainage isn’t coming to pass. Nevertheless, these drains get removed on Thursday when I’m in surgery #2. Trish also said that my new breasts were “fabulous”. We’ll see! (She’s seen them, I haven’t – because she saw them pre-wrap.)
I’ve been able to cut down on the pain meds, and have generally felt like a person today. Yesterday is a blur. The entry post surgery on the blog was a mess. I couldn’t type. Took forever, and I’m sure there are plenty of errors.
I continue to get calls, email and IMs of support, both from friends, and most surprisingly from strangers, or people who I only met once or twice. My faith in (most) of humanity, if not restored, is at least boosted. You folks, and you know who you are, rock! You made my day.
We had dinner tonight with Anh’s brother James, at Absinthe (the cab ride there was painful – bumpy and too much start/stop) (http://www.absinthe.com/), which is fast becoming my fave place in SFO – both for lunch and dinner. We had onion soup, a frisee salad, beef cheeks, and a killer steak. For sides, brussel sprouts with the best bacon ever “Neuski’s”, and also fries. I’ve not had a bad dish there.
What blog entry would be complete without some trans stuff, huh? Since I’ve been here, except on the flight down, I’ve dressed like Megan the whole time. I didn’t even bring Michael clothes. Today, we’ve gone out a couple times dressed like Megan. I just feel normal! I changed my IM to Megan today. Anh calls me Megan and “she” basically the whole time, even to me. It’s taking a bit longer for others to get there, but that’s totally 100% ok. Changing overnight is hard.
And, a first for me, at the restaurant tonight, I used the women’s room (both times). No, I didn’t stand up. 🙂
Progress… and mostly coherent progress at that!
M( ) 
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