Tag: transitioning

Resting Wednesday

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, CRPS, depression, FTM, gender dysphoria, mood disorders, recurrent major depressive disorder, transgender

Resting Wednesday

I did too much walking yesterday as my legs are sore today. I woke up late because I didn’t want to get up right away. I was tired because I again woke up in the middle of the night. I stayed up till 230 and then went back to sleep. My bladder kept giving me mixed messages when my 2nd med alarm went off, which reminds me I still need to give myself the T shot. I was getting urges and then I would get nothing. So strange. I finally got up around noon after the pre-op anesthesia called me. They called me an hour early and that is ok with me. They give me a list of medications/vitamins that I am not to take the day of surgery. The day I have surgery I am to have my T shot but I will have to give it when I am home from the procedure or the next day. Seeing as I am probably going to be home in the evening and I might not be too with it, I will probably give it the next day.

My aunt was over the house when I got up for my first cup of coffee. I told her I was having a hysterectomy and like my mother, she doesn’t understand why I am having it. She said it was on the inside so no one sees it and I told her that isn’t the point. I don’t want to worry about suddenly getting a period or what not. It is bad enough I am getting cramps and don’t know if they are bladder or uterine in nature.

I am keeping track of how many catheters I use in a day. I have three boxes left and I am not sure if that is enough. I seemed to have gone through a box quickly. It will be important to know because then I can have the NP adjust the amount on my next order for catheters. I sent my pcp a message asking if he got in touch with the surgeon about post op pain management. I want to make sure things are squared away now before the procedure. Just got a response and things will be taken cared of. I am so relieved. I was so worried there was going to be a hassle. But things have been worked out and I will get the pain meds I need for post op. I am so happy right now.

I am writing this in my kitchen as I wanted to have a cup of coffee while I wrote. It has been nice sitting in a chair while writing. Tomorrow I am going grocery shopping with my cousin. I just need to get rice and some more Gatorade. Maybe some more water too. It is kind of stuffy in the kitchen but there is a breeze coming in that is cool. I normally write my blog in my room. I wanted a change of scenery today. I took out a burger for dinner. Last night I had one with Swiss cheese and habanero honey mustard and it was so good. I might have a black bean burger for dinner though. I don’t know. It will be a burger either way.

I emptied my recycling today. Tomorrow is trash day so I wanted to take it downstairs. It caused a flare of my ankle. I am trying to avoid taking a nap, which is why I had the coffee and am sitting in my kitchen writing. I just feel so fed up. I have been in pain nearly every single day for the past two months. Always my ankle throbbing. Some days I can ignore it but days like today when I am tired it is hard to ignore. I start thinking bad thoughts. I think I will be better off dead. My thoughts just stay there. I haven’t gone to the planning of my death in some time. I am not that hopeless. I find that hope has a lot to do with my suicidal thinking. It can either be a passing thought or more invasive.

Wednesday’s Musings

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, chronic physical pain, FTM, gender dysphoria, mood disorders, PTSD, transgender

Wednesday’s musings

I had a hard session in therapy Monday. We talked about mourning my mother for not being the mother I needed. It was hard realizing this is what I have to do to get past all these negative emotions I have about my mother. Right now she is in the hospital with either pneumonia or fluid around her heart and lungs and I just can’t deal. I was worried when she wasn’t up when I got up this morning but I didn’t think she had pneumonia. Her sugars were extremely high yesterday, so high that her monitor couldn’t give a number. I care for her as another human being but it is hard when I don’t get respect. The hospital called me to get her medication list and I was deadnamed and I am sure misgendered as well. I was probably called daughter as well. It’s things like this that hurt so much.

I also talked about the weight clinic and how my weight is keeping me from completing my transition. I wrote this on Twitter the other night: “In a frank mood right now. Kind of depressed and suicidal. All because I am a woman who desperately wants to be a man. I’ve dreamt of the day I would get these fucking things off my chest but b/c of a BMI I can’t have surgery. Which leaves me feeling suicidal. People always talk about saving trans lives but they never look at what is in the way of transitioning. I need to be a certain weight for me to be who I am. Totally sexist and discriminatory. I have weight issues and body issues. Going to a weight clinic seems shameful to me. Which only adds to me calling me a fat fuck who should die. Going to a weight clinic is not going to solve the BMI issue when losing weight already fucks with my head. Need to lose weight shit I will starve myself to that end before going to a clinic. And who’s to say once I lose the weight there won’t be another issue to prevent me from being a man? But apparently I can get my uterus out without a problem. Breasts seem to be an issue all the time. I just don’t know if my suicidality will end up killing me before I am a certain BMI.”

It fricken sucks that a number is keeping me from transitioning to a man. I told my therapist I would have my pcp make the referral to the weight clinic and see what they say. She reiterated to me that they are not my family and so wouldn’t abuse or shame me. I am so scared of doing this because of these reasons. I hope that I don’t have to become a salad eater to lose the weight I need to lose. I can only eat salad with a ton of dressing on it. I really like spinach salads but my mother always ends up boiling the spinach on me no matter how many times I tell her not to. She drives me crazy.

I have a UTI that I am waiting to be treated for. I hope they will treat me. I am going to call in a half hour if they don’t call me first. I need to know because peeing hurts so bad and I am going every two fricken hours. I feel so depressed about this. I have been in pain with this infection for the past ten days and I am sick of it. I called my doctor and am waiting for him to respond. I hate waiting. I really do.

Don’t Call Me Daughter 5

by Midnight Demon, posted in FTM, transgender

Don’t call me daughter 5

Apparently this is a blog I frequent write whenever I am misgendered. And this week is no exception. Monday after therapy I was talking with my mother and I don’t know how it came up but she said I was her “daughter”. I said I am her son. I said it multiple times and she kept on saying like a child that no, I was her daughter. Then she said something that cemented the deal by saying I will always be her first born daughter. I tried to convey how hurt I was but I couldn’t find the words. After a few minutes she had the audacity to say “change is hard”. Yeah right. Talk about mixed messages.

I was very upset and I reached out to social media like I always do when I need support. One person told me that I needed therapy. Another couple of friends said that it was a generational thing with my mother and to “ignore” her. What I don’t understand is how a parent can do this to their child. I never wanted to be a parent for a lot of reasons, being male is one of them. If a partner should have children, I will gladly see them as my own and love them as much as I love my partner. But right now I am single so I don’t have to worry about that. I like being single even if it is lonely at times.

I digress. I got some support from my online friends. It was not enough to keep the suicidal ideation away. I texted my therapist what had happened and I was thinking of taking some pills. Told her I was going to do the safety plan instead and she agreed. It has been a struggle living with my mother the past few days. I don’t want to deal with her at all but I know that if I give her the silent treatment that is only going to cause more problems. I just been staying in my room. Today I plan on taking a walk before picking up my prescription just to get out of the house and do some physical rehab because I am so deconditioned from my past surgeries. I am seven months post op and am still recovering.

My therapist and I talked about how hurtful my mother was and she just said that it was basically wrong and unfortunate that she is this way. I have tried not to take it personally but it is so damn hard. In Dec, my mother got Covid and I didn’t know if she was going to survive or not. She had a lot of medical issues and I wasn’t sure when she would be coming home again. It put it in perspective that she wasn’t going to be around forever and all I want is for her to call me son. Now I realize that is never going to happen. She is never going to be proud of me for being transgender, she may even feel ashamed of me. I don’t know. I rather not know if that is true. I know that to the healthcare workers that come to the house she still calls me “daughter” and “she” when addressing me.

I feel that no matter how much the testosterone changes my face nor how much facial hair I have, I still will not be seen as a he. It is so fucking painful to have a parent reject you like this. Wed was Trans Visibility Day and I got really suicidal. I felt worthless because I don’t have a mother basically. It is so hard. I feel like a black sheep. I texted my baby sister this and got her support. I don’t have the support of my middle sister. My middle sister and I don’t get along too well. It depends on her mood on whether she will call me a he or she. There have been times where both my sister and mother will call me a “whatever”. That hurts more than anything. I take it silently because I am too hurt to fight back. Part of me just wants to die because then I don’t have to deal with this. But I have my nieces and nephew to think about. I love them dearly and they love me and accept me for who I am. It has been a saving grace to hear my nephew call me a he to my mother. I think about survivor loss all the time whenever I become really suicidal and how it will affect my “kids”. How my kids will handle my death has been a huge preventative measure whenever I am suicidal and don’t have severe constriction. They love me unconditionally and it is the purest love. I have watched them grow up from being babies and it has been such a privilege.

This weekend is Easter. It is my least favorite holiday. I am not looking forward to a family gathering. But I will show up to eat. These days I haven’t been eating right. I usually just have breakfast and won’t eat the rest of the day. Appetite is just not there. The depression this whole thing has caused me is unreal. I don’t think an antidepressant will help. I still take it though.

tough painful week

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, CRPS, depression, mood disorders

Tough painful week

I’ve had a rough week both physically and emotionally. Monday I semi said goodbye to my psych of 26 years. She still wants to care for me so when she finds another home, she will call me. She is not sure where she will be as she has not thought that far. I totally understand that. I figure it might be a few months but in the meantime I will still be in contact with her either through phone or email. I started having side effects of my mood stabilizer, which is really bad timing as I am not currently under direct care of a psychiatrist. My psych is trying to push seeing someone faster. My pcp’s social worker is also trying to get me to see a gender affirming psych that is joining the clinic. I just had bloods drawn for a level as last time I was barely therapeutic. I am having double vision and just to make sure there isn’t something wrong with my eyes, I am seeing my eye doc next week.

I had PT which was sort of good. On Saturday, I did some stuff around my room. Sunday I did a little more even though my back didn’t like it. Monday I was okay until I was coming home from my psych’s appointment. Back flared up terribly. I was still hurting when I saw my PT on Tuesday. She gave me some decompressing exercises to do. I was really hurting past few days as I have been having pain go down my leg and the pain was near my spine yesterday when I was coming home from the therapist appointment.

The therapist appointment went well. I found out what kind of therapist she is and I think it is going to work out. She loves the Sox and we both have the same favorite player, though she is a lot more obsessive than I am about him!! At one point, I thought she was going to jump down my throat when I was criticizing him and she stopped me before I could say anything. Yikes! I have my next appointment with her the week after next. She is a CBT therapist but also has some DBT stuff. I am going to bring her my copy of Craig Bryan’s CBT for suicide attempters and see if she is receptive to it. If she isn’t, then I guess that will be okay and we can go from there. I will have a hard time with it though as I feel like I have all these things that could possibly help me with my suicidality but I don’t have a therapist to go along with it and it frustrates the hell out of me! I did ask her if she would turn me away and she said no. I was relieved to hear this. Maybe she will work out after all.

My sister had sent me texts Wed saying she wanted to take my stuff upstairs today. I told her no as I knew I would be hurting as I have all week. Fortunately, she decided to go to the beach so I didn’t have to deal with her. We haven’t really spoken kind words to each other since she moved in. I really don’t care as she really hasn’t been there and doesn’t understand anything I have been going through since I have been on disability. I really don’t see this changing. Maybe when the work on the house is done with but certainly not right now.

A couple of hours ago, I used the bathroom. I normally don’t really look in the mirror as I hate my face. Today I did and much to my surprise, I have darker hair around my jawline! The fuzz is becoming darker. I was so excited. I knew I had to post transition pics, which I did on Instagram and facebook. I kind of did on Twitter, too, though didn’t give as big a description. Kind of hard to do when you only have 240 characters. I just sent it out to a couple of people that want to keep track of my transition. I hope when my T gets increased next week, the facial hair will come in faster and darker. I would love to come downstairs one morning and shock the hell out of my mother with a beard. I am not sure she knows I am on T. I sure as hell didn’t tell her. I am not sure if she asked my sisters or if my sisters told her. She hasn’t said a word to me about anything. I have mentioned that I will be having my breasts removed. She didn’t seem to like that at all. Yet she wants me to be “happy.” I don’t think I can ever be happy as I don’t know what the hell it is. I rather be content but the way things are going, I doubt that will ever happen. I forced myself to shower because some icky water fell on me. I have this thing that turns musty smells to water and the container fell on me. I had to shower. I was hurting afterwards. My back wanted to kill me. I started getting suicidal thoughts again. I have been having them on and off since being discharged from the hospital. They haven’t been really bad like they were. I have thought on a few occasions to end it and started to plan it but once the pain backed off, so did the planning. I just wish something helped with the flares. Since changing my meds to something else, nothing has worked for the flares. The 24/7 pain has been lowered. I wake up with a 2 or 3 but sometimes if I have more than a few days activity, I will have ankle/foot pain that is more than I can bear. I haven’t been able to find something to help ease that pain. Distraction works but only to a point. I could watch a movie but soon as that movie is over, the pain returns, sometimes worse than what it was before I started watching the movie. Last night I did five cryptograms. It was really cool as I really miss doing them. I started to remember the hacks. Some were really too difficult for me so had to go to a new puzzle. One quote was perfect for my psych so I sent it to her. I also sent her the transition pics and the excitement about growing in a beard. I half want to shave the stuff off just to see if it would grow back thicker but my friends told me to leave it alone. Hair under my chin is growing more together. Just wish it was in the middle of my chin. There is still a bare spot.

Guess that is all for today. Not sure if I will post over the weekend. It has been difficult finding my words lately, hence the spotty posts. Thanks for reading and understanding.