Not quite whole

Disclaimer:  Every so often there will be a post that is, in all likelihood, going to come off as whining and poor me esque.  I will always try to put a warning at the top, but I just need to vent and work through things sometimes.

I haven't had anyone specifically say that I am not enough of a man, or a man at all in a hurtful way.  I have plenty of people saying that though just because they are blissfully ignorant to my new journey.  But it kind of sucks when you are doing all that you can to be this person that you know you were always meant to be, and you let that idea sink in to your mind even an inch.  I can try as hard as I want for heteronormality, and just be with a woman but there will always be a piece that is not quite complete.  I wasn't born with the right parts so there is a piece of me that knows emotionally I will be an amazing partner, but in reality not being born with the right parts gives you this daunting feeling that you may fall short of physically pleasing your girlfriend or boyfriend the way that they may crave.

Believe it or not guys, typically, are actually shy and even sometimes nervous when they ask someone out.  Because I am not your typical guy under the hood I will have the added nervous factor of after getting a yes somewhere down the line I am going to have to say, "Oh and by the way I was actually born with a female's body."  Don't get me wrong if someone told me that I could restart this life but as a whole and complete guy I would say no, and that may sound stupid or you may not get it...but I would not be who I am today if I was born "right".  And yes I may have shortcomings, but who doesn't?  I can look at myself in the mirror and say life threw me lemons...but the lemonade doesn't taste all that bad or I can look at myself in the mirror and say I just got a booty call from life, apparently it wants to keep fucking me!  I am going to try and be positive about it cause after all I do actually like lemonade!

You are who you are, shortcomings and all.  I am proud to say that I am a transman, and quite frankly that gives me all the balls I need to be a REAL man!

Shots of T

So yesterday I had an appointment with a nurse and I learned how to do self injections of Testosterone.  Being that I had never once given myself an injection, and knowing that in the past all of my intramuscular injections that I have received were slightly painful I psyched myself up.  The nurse took me through all of the steps:

• Get Materials
• Testosterone bottle
• Sterile syringe and 2 sterile needles
• Alcohol wipes or cotton swabs with alcohol on them
• Hard plastic container (to dispose of the syringe and needles
• Wash your hands
• Fill syringe
• Clean the rubber stopper of the vial with an alcohol wipe and allow to dry
• Unwrap syringe and screw on needle
• Pull the plunger up to have the same amount of air as you will need medication
• Take off needle cover
• Insert the needle into the rubber stopper while the vial is upright
• Push plunger down to release the air into the vial (do not put air in the medication because it will cause bubbles)
• Turn the vial upside down and pull back on the plunger a tiny bit further than the prescribed amount
• Make sure that the tip of the needle is in the medication rather than in the air of the vial
• Look for air bubble, if there are any flick the syringe with your fingernail or a pen
• Adjust the plunger to the right dosage level
• Turn the vial upright and remove the needle by pulling the syringe straight up
• Replace needle cover
• Pull back on plunger to allow for some air to enter
• Screw off needle and replace with a new sterile needle
• The needle will be dull going through the rubber stopper so it is easier if you replace it with a new needle
• Push plunger up slowly and release any air
• Cleaning the injection sight
• Find a spot on the outside of your thigh and wipe it down with an alcohol swab
• Allow for the alcohol to dry
• Intramuscular Injection
• Remove the needle cover
• Hold needle an inch or so above the leg
• Take deep breathes (don't hyperventilate) and while breathing out dart the needle through the skin into the muscle
• With your non dominant hand hold on to the syringe, and with the dominant hand pull back on the plunger slightly
• If blood flows back into the syringe you must start over with new medication, syringe and needles
• If no blood appears slowly push down on the plunger to inject the medication
• After the syringe is empty hold it there for 10 seconds
• Remove needle and put an alcohol swab over the injection sight, put pressure on sight and if necessary place a band aid over it
• Clean up
• Put all used syringes, needles and empty drug containers into a resealable hard plastic container
• I am using an old detergent bottle

She taught me these steps and ended up saying I was one of the easiest people to teach, and the best part was that because I was doing the injecting and all that I could go at my own speed so it didn't hurt at all!  More to come soon!

P.S. Please do not just inject yourself without a doctor knowing and a nurse actually teaching you how to do it.  This is just in case people were wondering how to do it and so that I could give myself little reminders.

Trans Puberty

So for a little while I will be going through what I like to call trans puberty.  With that having been said there is going to be a physical side as well as an emotional side to that.  The emotional side I am already feeling the effects of.  One effect is the bathroom conundrum, when I am further along in the process that will no longer be an issue, now it is.  There is also the issue of fitting in.  During puberty everyone is trying to figure themselves out and learn exactly where they belong.  I was at a party the other night where in one room was all lesbians, then in the living room it was divided between heterosexual men and on the other side of the room heterosexual women.  Though I see myself as a man I did not really feel as though I fit into any of those groups.  Now on to the physical.  Once injections begin (finding out today if my insurance will cover at least some of the cost) my voice will be changing, and because the hormone levels will take a bit for my body to grow accustomed to them I may very well get a little bit of pizza face.

Puberty sucks, no matter what time you go through it...so give a little sympathy to those of us who have to go through it twice.

More to come soon!

Bathroom Conundrum

Two pictures; one has a figure standing at attention, and the other has a figure that looks as though it is wearing a cape.  Conventionally people know these as the signs for the male and female restrooms.  Bathrooms, their main purpose is obviously for you to free up space in your bladder and intestines but there are always people who choose to use the bathroom for other things.  Some people use it as a place to chat, powder their noses, some even use them to partake in some extracurricular activities.  Unfortunately 9 times out of 10 bathrooms are not unisex, they are multi-stalled beasts and for someone like me bathrooms can become daunting, uncomfortable and/or unsafe locations.

Being that I identify as male given a choice I will always use the male restroom.  Personally I have never had a problem, men are also a lot more oblivious or just don't care to observe those around them (at least in all the restrooms I have used) so you just go in and then out and you are all set.  Sometimes there are circumstances that prevent or make me shy away from using the bathroom in general.

There is a restaurant that I often frequent (and did before I came out as trans) so they know me as someone who uses the ladies restroom.  A fair amount of them are my friends and are also aware that I am beginning my transition so I don't think that it would be a problem using the other, but at the same time there are enough people that do not know me which complicates the situation.   So since I have come out I just avoid the restroom situation entirely.  But there are times when I just have to go, then what?  I can try and hold it which is an excellent way to get kidney disease.  On the other hand I could just leave, doesn't work so well when I just ordered food though.  My regular restaurant spot is in a shopping complex, so I can walk across the parking lot and use a shop's restrooms and then come all the way back.

There are plenty of places that I would rather have this entire thought process, walk 10 minutes out of my way and still might feel awkward using the bathroom.  I just want to use a bathroom like any other guy, if only it were that easy.  So now that I have whined on and on, just know that if you are out with a trans friend, or family member understand that there may be times where bathrooms might be a big issue.  Just give them a little bit of a break.

FAQs

Frequently Asked Questions:
     1)  What do you prefer to be called, Damien or Koty?

I don't really have a preference either way, the only thing that I ask is if you are introducing me to someone new or someone that I do not know I would prefer that you use Damien.  Now I will definitely not cut you out as a friend, and I will not act like an ass, I just wanted to state what my preference is.
I also do want to make it clear that I want you to feel comfortable calling me whatever it is you choose to call me, but if I introduce myself as either or ask you to sign me up as either please respect my wishes.


     2)  What about pronouns?

This sort of connects with something I have noticed recently.  There is not some magical date in the future when I will be anymore of a man.  You can either see me as a boy/man now or you can't.  Just because I don't have the parts of a cisgendered man does not make me any less of a man.  With that having been said I also completely understand if you do not always use masculine pronouns for me.  Yes, please all the effort that you make know that it is greatly appreciated but if you slip up it is completely understandable!  I know that there is also not a magical switch that you can flip to just call me masculine pronouns.  Do what you can, when you can.  It is a completely different story however if you are purposely just calling me by female pronouns for the hell of it...if that is the case I hope you have a wonderful life but I will no longer be a part of it!


     3)  What happens when you decide this isn't your path, or this isn't right for you, or when you realize    you made a horrible mistake!?

You can worry about me all you want, but I know that this is not a mistake.  This is something that I can only decide for myself.  I am seeing a therapist, he would not have helped me find an endocrinologist if he did not think this is right for me.  My endocrinologist would not have suggested that we start hormones within the next two weeks if she did not think that this is right for me.  Both of those doctors have experience with transgender issues (this is not their first rodeo).  And personally I have nothing that I can compare this situation to to try and help explain my choice.  There are choices in everybody's lives, now contrary to a lot of ignorant people my choice was not whether to be a man or a woman, because that was not a choice the answer is that biologically I was born a female but I know that to be untrue.  The choice I had was whether to live as the honest me or live a lie.  I chose to live the only me I could, the honest one.

Endocrinology

Yesterday was my very first endocrinology appointment, my therapist had sent the abbreviated version of my story/situation so she knew the long and short of it, but she also wanted to hear it from me.

For those of you who don't know, endocrinology is the study of the endocrine glands and pretty much everything that has to do with hormones.  So for someone like myself it is very important to find an endocrinologist who has experience and is very personable.  I am very happy and lucky to say that my endocrinologist not only is very personable, she has lots of experience with FtMs as well as MtFs, she greatly dislikes insurance companies, she wants the best for her patients and she also describes the biology of it in a very easy to understand manner.

Anyway, we went through my options...the first option is a drug that basically just shuts down the messages from the pituitary gland sending waves of estrogen and/or testosterone however that is a very expensive form of treatment pretty much reserved for millionaires or people who don't have to worry about their finances.  Not being either we talked about testosterone the hormone itself.  There are three ways to get it (at least from my hospital) and that is gel, patch or injection.  The gel and patch options are more expensive while the injections are the most cost effective.  With the gel you also run the risk of it not quite getting into your system, but we both decided that injection would be the best option for me.

When my first injection occurs I will be taught how to do them myself which means that I won't have to go to the doctor's office every two to three weeks (initially how we are starting my injection schedule) or even possible once every week (which would be a lower dosage just more often).  In the mean time she had me get some blood work done (mostly just testing my cholesterol and lipid profile because testosterone can greatly effect both of those things) and if all goes well with the results I will be able to start taking T in the next week or two!

A few things about Gender and Sex

There are a few terms that I would like to explain a bit more in depth:

• Gender Identity
• The gender that you know yourself to be in your head.  It is what is inside of you, the hormones that make you and how you interpret all that information.
• Gender Expression
• This is how you demonstrate your gender through actions, clothing, behavior and interactions.
• Biological Sex
• This is much more of a black and white with (much more information located in the) grey area in between: Women - XX Chromosomes, a vagina, ovaries, etc. Men - XY Chromosomes, penis, testes, etc. and Intersex - a combination of the two (this could have a blog of its own)
• Sexual Orientation
• Who you are attracted to based on their gender in relation to yours.

Gender identity, gender expression and biological sex can all be in alignment but for transgender people (transsexuals more specifically) they are not.  For example my sister's gender identity is female, her gender expression is on the more feminine side and her biological sex is that of a woman's.  For me my gender identity and expression are both masculine/male however my biological sex shows me as a female.  The biological sex is what I am working to change, the only thing that I believe is not able to be altered are my XX chromosomes.  

Now with all that having been said if you are dealing with someone who is transgender we have gay people and straight people in our ranks.  It is always respectful and at least in my eyes better to find out someone's sexual orientation based on their gender identity rather than their biological sex, since those two are not always in alignment.  I am heterosexual because my gender identity is male and I am attracted to females.  But it is very important to know this informations simply because sexual orientation doesn't change with your gender identity.  I like girls always have likes girls and will always like girls.  

You are who you are, you love who you love.  But most importantly remember love is blind, patient and always present when you need it, sometimes it is just a little harder to find.

Thanks for reading!