December 3, 2007

Progress!

Posted in surgery, transgender at 2:19 am by Michael

It seems so strange to think that a week ago at this time we were just arriving here at Cocoon house after our super wacky airline adventure. Now, here I am, and all the surgery is done, and I’m feeling nearly human again.

The results of the surgery on my chest are great, and I’m not having any pain at all. I have no problems lifting up my arms or with mobility at all. Less than a week post-op on that, its pretty fantastic.

Clearly, still a ways to go on the face. 

But, I felt like there was tons of progress today. I put in my contacts (but I don’t dare take them out yet – maybe tomorrow night, I created some extra bruising on the way in the first time). As I wrote about earlier, I got the best hairwash ever… and was even able to take a shower on my own (but no getting my face wet yet). Anh I’ve learned besides being the love of my life, is a rockstar at making milkshakes. (Oh, sorry, time for an aside. Being born in Boston, but growing up mostly in RI, there’s a whole complex terminology about milk+flavor+ice cream that varies regionally, and can take up entire family gatherings with debate. So, I can’t simply use the word “milkshake” and let it pass without futher ado. Since blogging is all about “ado”, here we go. In RI, a “milkshake” is milk + flavoring. In fact, the state drink of RI is a “Coffee Milk”, made with milk and Autocrat coffee syrup. Yes, it true you can get a “Chocolate Milk” which would be milk + chocolate syrup. Other variations include strawberry milk, but that’s an aberration. All of these things would be rightfully called “milkshakes”. Now, if you happened to want some ice cream in with that, you need to specify how much. A “Cabinet” has some (drinkable with a straw before it melts), but a “Frappe” has more (initially not straw-able). However, cross the line into Massachusetts, and milkshake now has ice cream, and the distinction between cabinet and milkshake is lost on me. So, from a RI point-of-view, what Anh made for me was a Cabinet (not to thick, drinkable initially). End of aside. 🙂 )

Anyway, the breakthrough today was how normal I felt. Even with the crazy face dressings still on, I felt normal – I felt like me.

I look forward to the day soon, and I hope really soon that all this trans-stuff is just over, and we live our lives as a family (and a great one!), and we do all the stuff we did before and life is just great (because it was before!). I saw that day coming today. I felt it, and I saw it in Anh too, and that was the best feeling ever. I guess that was the whole point, huh? Being true to myself, and living my life as I felt inside…

Today was a good day.

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