TAG-01

I began my stay in the hospital today. The first day for a planned operation is really boring. They just poke about your person and stick various needles in your flesh. I am again in a room with three other women. I tried to reserve a double room ahead of time, but they are so full that I am not able to get into a double right away. Somehow I doubt I will be here long enough until a double opens up. I am with two younger and one older woman. One of the younger ones has been puking all day long, and bitching about the docs constantly. She has finally fallen asleep and I hope she stays that way all night. I am trying to pass the time by chatting on skype with the nun0. I have internet access this time, so I am hoping to be able to blog as much as possible to make this ordeal go by as quickly as possible. I went through hell last time I was here, so I know what to expect and I hope with this knowledge it will be a bit easier this time. Internet access is free, but I have to go to the front desk every 24 hours to renew it. After surgery I am not sure how long it will take before I am on my feet again, so I may have to wait until Saturday to surface again online.

So on to nuts and bolts…if you don’t want to read the gory details, this is your last chance to tune out.

Some surgeons prefer a one step surgery, and others prefer to perform a two step procedure. Obviously in the one step procedure they re-arrange everything on one shot. With the two step, the first is more or less to “rough it in” which means to re-arrange the pieces leaving as much tissue as possible as reserve should complications occur. The second step is usually optional, often performed like in my case to make the neo-vagina look more aesthetically correct. I will be having a mons pubis plastic, labia majora reduction, and possibly having the urethra shortened. The mons pubis plastic will create the “venus mound” and also provide the clitoral hood to protect the ever so sensitive clitoris. As it is now my labia just form two vertical ridges of flesh without coming together at all above the clitoris. The labia majora are long enough to cover it most of the time, but they are long enough to make it look like I have given birth to four or five children. Hence the labia mjora reduction procedure. The labia minora and majora are formed using the scrotal tissue, since it is relatively the same as labial tissue. They leave them extra long to facilitate skin grafting should some of the vaginal tissue die off post operative. I was lucky to have no problems with healing. The shortening of the urethra will be decided during the surgery tomorrow morning. If it was a purely aesthetic problem, I would leave it as it is, but if it grows more I stand the chance of it peeking out of my shortened labia and therefore rubbing on my panties. And also when I am sexually aroused the tissue around it swells quite a bit and it looks like the stump of my penis coming out. It was a bit disturbing at first, but I am used to it now, after all it is a part of me. If I was with a male partner they would probably find it really disturbing, but otherwise since I don’t produce mucous there, there really is no other physical indication that I am aroused. That was really the only advantageous part of having it in the first place.

I was reading in my charts today the text description of my first surgery. The surgeon wrote that the bulb of spongiosum tissue at the base of my former member formerly known as my penis was abnormally large. They also found that my prostate is abnormally small. Funny my body is.

So now, a year later almost to the day, I am back here in the Markus Krankenhaus in Frankfurt-Ginnheim. Tomorrow’s surgery should be a cake walk compared to the first surgery. Having to stay immobile for five days really drove me nuts. Plus I was having withdrawals from nicotine and they wouldn’t administer my hormones either. I was really fucked at one point. I feel kind of bad about being such a baby last time. I am hoping things will go much better, since I am better prepared. Although I have no one here to help me this time, nun0 really held me together last time, I have lots of things to keep me occupied. I have lots of films on my laptop, lots of magazines, a couple of books, and sketching materials for designing some outfits. I was hoping to have internet access so that I can copy some pics from various pattern websites and make design boards with paint shop. I also have my external HD with me so that I can try to start sorting and editing my many scribblings that never made it on my blog. I have written so much that I have just kept for myself. Its time they see the light of day. I think I will have a chamomile tea and start watching a movie.

slacker

My lack of posting demonstrates my disinterest in ever becoming a serious writer. I just went looking back over the past two years' posts for the month of June. This same weekend last year I passed my 5th Kyu test in Aïkido. Tomorrow I will participate in a two hour seminar from 10 to 12 and then immediately following will be the testing again. I participated in the seminar today for two hours, the whole time spent sweating uncontrollably due to the humidity and the lingering effects of the cold I had this week. I had planned on being tested today, but it didn't happen because there were so many people from Mainz and elsewhere that wanted to test also.

The Sensei gives priority to the people that come from a distance so that they don't have to come back again tomorrow. I think after all was said and done, three of us from the dojo have to wait until tomorrow, out of about 20 that were tested. I was really impressed with the proficiency of the 1st Kyu's. At that level you have to know all of the techniques for every attack. I hope to become that good someday as well. I saw a lot of techniques in their performance that I had only seen in sessions on Sunday and wednesday evenings last summer.

I used to practice six days a week back then. I decided after my srs that I would be happy practicing three times a week. Although three days seemed to be enough, I noticed in practicing intensively in preparation for the test that I wasn't quite in the shape that I need to be in. I am going with my gf to the south of France for a week of Aïkido in late July. I want to be in top shape when I go there to practice. I have been thinking about how my body felt a year ago, and luckily it has greatly improved in flexibility and endurance. I remember having to sleep on my back with pillows under my knees to keep them bent because that was the position that was the least painful. I think that I had to do that the friday evening before the saturday testing so that I could sleep for the pain. I remember thinking that I overdid it and wouldn't make it to test. I don't have knee pain anymore, but I have been damaging my feet alot.

The problem with the feet is an ancient one, and I have finally decided to treat them myself. I have always had flat feet and in the past few years I have developed an occaisional burning pain in the third and fourth toes on my left foot. I went a little bit overboard with the high heels without any kind of forefoot padding. That led to an inflammation of the very same nerve that was causing the pain in my toes. The condition is Morton's Neuroma and was very painful at its worst. It feels a bit like walking over a long round stone under the ball of the foot.

I miss being able to wear my many pairs of heels. That is partly what drove me to search out the options for corrective insoles. I have been wearing them every day for two weeks and the difference is clear. The pain from the neuroma is almost gone and I think that if I can find the right padding, I can try wearing the heels again. But I am glad that my foot is healing on its own without the need for any medication or surgery. The old way of dealing with my condition was to remove the nerve surgically. I guess they do that in the teeth as well, but I can't imagine giving up feeling in two toes. I need to find the balance of footwear that enables my feet to stay healthy.

I have been practicing lots of Aïkido techniques that are performed in an upright kneeling position. This is obviously hard on the knees and the toes. I was able to maneuver better in the colder months of the year becasue my feet tended to be dryer and not "stick" to the mat. I wonder if I could try some powder or wear open footwear before parctice. I think though that with the amount that I sweat I will not find anything that will keep them dry. Part of the problem could be that my legs are just worn out from too much practice. I always try to knuckle down and make it through the suwari waza tecniques. There are a couple of people that I practice with that I feel like I am able to flow better with. I think in a couple of years that I will achieve the reveered hakama level, but that is just a milestone on the longer road to harmony with nature. I hope to be still practicing when I am old and gray.

Oh yeah the aquanun is coming to stay with me for the month of July! YaaaaaaaaaY! <3

body single

I have been sewing clothing for myself continuously since just before I went into hospital for surgery. I am proud of my stamina. I think partly my improved body image has something to do with it. I have cut back on practicing aïkido since I started again after recovering from surgery. I am practicing regularly on Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays. I have been wanting to go on Wednesdays and Sundays as well, but I usually work late on Wednesdays and Sundays I am just plain too lazy to go out of the apartment. Lazy isn’t quite correct, well maybe. I am usually working on a garment and I like to take a catnap in the afternoon to get some extra rest in between. It seems that practicing three days a week corresponds to my exercise needs relative to my nutritional intake. I love aïkido. I am so thankful to my gf for introducing me to it. Domo arigato baba. My body has continually changed since taking hormones, and to think of it, I started taking them back in March of 2005. I have been on them for four years now, and next week will be my third anniversary of my coming out to my work colleagues, and subsequently my step into living fulltime. Yay for milestones. I am 99 percent satisfied and happy with my decision to transition.

There are some negative things that were expected to happen that have come to pass. One example that I can think of difficulty finding a job. I have been on five or six interviews in the Netherlands that turned out that I was either offered a ridiculously low salary, or told that my qualifications didn’t match their needs. I will continue looking, but I am slowly starting to think that I have to expand my search beyond just the Netherlands. I think that my qualifications are just fine, and I usually told so in the actual interview, but when it comes down to it, I suspect that if there are two candidates and one is me that they will choose the other simply because I am likely seen as a liability. “How can we put this person in front of a customer?” rings in my ears. I will keep looking though.

My bottom has become bigger and rounder and I actually have a good set of hips going on, and in combination with my 31 inch waist, I have a slim build with some nice curves now. I can’t hardly imagine now that I used to have a 34 inch waist. I have lost quite a bit of muscle mass in my arms, but the rest has not changed so much. I have an almost flat abdomen with softly defined abs. I am not sure if I just had low expectations for my physical changes, but my body looks better than I ever expected it could. I am fortunate that my metabolism, if it hasn’t changed at all, has become faster. My weight is still hovering between 155 and 160 pounds, depending where I am on my cycle.

I have been making lots of skirts and blouses to go with them. I have made five skirts and four blouses so far. I am currently working on a pink duchesse high waisted pencil skirt, the blouse is already finished but I am having trouble with motivation to finish the skirt. I really enjoy wearing the little outfits I have made for myself. I am building quite a collection of pumps. Shoe addiction is a terrible affliction on my wallet. High femme suits me just fine. If I could or had to dress in finer clothing all the time I wouldn’t have any problem with it. My feet might beg to differ, but as long as I have it, I am going to get as much mileage out my body as I can. I have waited most of my life thus far to be able to be exactly the person I am now, in body and mind. When I think back on all the things that I used to sew for myself that never fit right, my taste has not changed in clothing. My sewing skills have become almost professional level I think. I am continually improving my skills through practice. I getting a better feel for finer fabrics, some are quite difficult indeed.

Even though I haven’t been posting much at all, I have been writing all along and just saving the posts in a folder. Some of what I have been writing is meant just for me, but the mass would need to be sorted and sanitized if I were to post it retrospectively. I am not sure I have time to do it. I am hungry now so I am going to cook something.

belt broke

Im on the flight to Detroit for my 2008 holiday trip. I will be arriving in detroit at 2pm. I have made it through six hours so far, and it wasn’t too bad. There is always some people that insist on leaving the window shade up even though the light coming in is often blinding, and there isn’t really anything to see anyway. I tried to sleep for a bit, but I couldn’t due to the cries of screaming babes and the blinding light. Plus my seat wont recline more than a couple of degrees. Sucky. At least everything went quickly and easily once I arrived at the airport. Getting there was a bit of a problem. Helmi picked me up a couple of minutes later than planned because of heavy traffic, which was good for me because I am always late anyway. We got about two-thirds of the way to the airport on the autobahn and then helmi’s car started to sputter and almost stall. Luckily there was a rest area in another 500 meters. We stopped and he then checked under the hood and found that the two week old fan belt had disintegrated. We were going nowhere fast. He rattled off a number of a mobile phone information service that I called for the number of a taxi service. Stupid me, I didn’t realize that we were past Langen, and I asked for a taxi from Darmstadt. In the end the taxi picked me up within ten minutes and dropped me at the airport within another ten minutes, and it cost 50 euro. Shit.

I got to the terminal to check my baggage with an hour and twenty minutes till takeoff. I checked in online yesterday and therefore was hoping that the airlines had finally set up a separate baggage drop off for those who have been checked in online. I was just complaining to Helmi before we broke down that they didn’t have such a counter in Ffm. They actually had a counter for the baggage drop off and all I had to do is switch my makeup bag from my carry-on to my suitcase and drop the suitcase on the belt. It was so quick and easy that I was a bit dazed and wondering if I was dreaming. It was reality alright, which was really nice for a change. The line was really long to do the normal check-in and I would have been cutting it very close had I had to wait in that line. I then proceeded to roll a couple of smokes and then went outside to smoke and call helmi to tell him everything was going to be ok.

At Fraport in the past they have had double layered security, which was an incredible pain in the ass, having to remove shoes and belts not once, but twice. In Amsterdam Schiphol they had three checkpoints. That really sucked. But today it was very easy, no security after the customs, and only then once at the gate. I stopped at the swarosky crystal store on the way to the gate to pick up a little something for Allison, since she always puts me up at her place and I feel bad because I usually don’t get her anything to show my appreciation. This time I did. I got her a nice purple crystal butterfly with sparkling stones pendant. I got the cherry earrings and necklace for myself. I couldn’t resist.

I was lucky enough to get on the flight on time and also to sit near a nice young woman. I was a bit worried as I was walking to my seat because there are usually lots of male soldiers flying home and I was hoping not to have to sit with one. Not because they are soldiers, but because I don’t think that many men would be very sympathetic towards me, not as many as women anyway. My legs are starting to feel a bit sore and I think I might get up to go pee in a few minutes. Two hours to go.

I have been on the fence lately about purchasing a new laptop. I am not so happy with the portability of the thinkpad R61i that I bought last year around this time. It is way too heavy and bulky and I actually wanted something that I can throw in my handbag and take with me very easily. I have also been thinking more about having the hair transplants performed in Nuremberg to fix my hairline. I would recoup some of my money if I sell my current thinkpad on ebay or something. But I tend not to bring my laptop anywhere unless I absolutely need it, because it is so unwieldy. I need to wait a couple of days to see how much money I will be getting from work this month before I decide what to do. I am supposed to be getting reimbursed for this flight and also for my tax preparation fees. The flight is taxable as income, but the tax preparation fees are not. I also need to think about possibly moving soon and whether I will have to pay for the transport of my storage from michigan to massachusetts, and also general moving expenses. There are some uncertainties about the next few months. I am concentrating on looking for a job again, and am planning on beginning a more aggressive search after the new year.

I had an interview in Luebeck in the north of germany last week. It went extremely well I felt, and the man that I interviewed with seemed enthusiastic about meeting with me for the next round in Amsterdam. The company designs dredges and the ships that operate them. They have an office in Luebeck and in Amsterdam. The interviewer promised that he would contact me this week to set up another interview, as we had discussed possibly meeting again on the fifth of January in Amsterdam because I will be there anyway. It seems as though it would be an interesting job, depending on what they would have me doing of course. He told me that they have an excess of work and not enough people. So we will see.

In the days before going on the interview I planned on finishing making the wool trench coat that I had started when I was in the hospital for my SRS. I finally finished it on Saturday night just before the tranny meeting in Neu Isenburg. I wore it with a new black satin high waisted pencil skirt that I had made before I went in the hospital. I had a plan for what exactly I wanted to wear to the interview, and it was just a question of producing the pieces. The burgundy red pumps and the black waist belt I had already. I just needed to make the matching pencil skirt and blouse. I started working on the pencil skirt on sunday morning and I finished it on monday in the morning. Then I started immediately on the blouse. The blouse has flounces on either side of the collar and front band, and also a tie collar. I will post a couple of photos taken by helmi of me on the evening after the interview. I finished the blouse in time to get on the train in the afternoon on the day before the interview. I had to only sew the buttons on the sleeve cuffs and the front band, which I was able to complete on the train between Frankfurt and Hamburg.

I was very proud of myself that I was able to achieve my goals for my presentation at the interview. As a result, I felt very confident, relaxed, and powerful. I both felt and looked good. I was expressing myself as I had always dreamed I could. I know it more or less comes down to clothing, but clothing and fashion is a very big part of who I am as a person. I am very visually driven, and for me it is really in the details. I kinda looked like a seventies secretary, but with an up to date and perhaps also a fashion-forward look. I ended up making it back home in time to meet with helmi for a few minutes before I went to the company Christmas party at a restaurant similar to Mongolian barbecue. I felt like a star at the dinner, even though I noticed some strangers clocking me and whispering and really obviously turning to look at me. I stared right at the girl that had to clue in her male friends at the table with her of my presence. I don’t care if people clock me, I am not hiding anything, but please don’t act like a child, and as if I wouldn’t notice such blatancy. Woteva, I know I looked better than she did, and she has been a girl probably all her life.

I am becoming a fiend for pumps. Ever since I have found that I can fit into Clarks shoes in a size 8, I have been buying them all up. I now am the happy owner of five pairs. I have learned a lot about buying and wearing pumps over the past several months. I am actually able to walk easier and more naturally with an 8cm (3.5 inch) heel than with a shorter 5cm (2 inch) heel. It is strange, but I tested it a couple of times and it seems to hold true. Also the pumps seem to fit differently at different times of the month. I assume it has something to do with my hormone cycle and more specifically with the water retention. I am so happy that I have taught myself how to walk naturally in heels. It was a goal that I thought I could never achieve, but after some practice at home in the evenings, I have it down now. I want to get some stilletto heels eventually to wear with the little black dress too. I am becoming super femme, or maybe at least high femme and I like it. I look at it this way, if I am going to be stared at, I may as well give them really something to stare at. I must admit it does somewhat clash with my feminist values.

auslaufmodell

There is some sort of strange string bean model that is sitting a few seats away facing me and a pair of giggling turkish princesses too. I am more of a woman than all of them put together. The turkish princess right in front of me looks like she is scratching her pussy with her inch long fingernails. gross! At least when I need to scratch my pussy I have enough sense to go to the bathroom.

Well I survived my surgery and all is healing as well as can be expected. I didn’t manage to totally quit smoking unfortunately. I’m a bit disappointed with myself that I wasn’t able to do it. I at least didn’t smoke at all while I was in the hospital, and I didn’t start again until several days after coming home. I have noticed that I have reduced the daily amount that I smoke relative to how much I used to smoke. I do still want to try to quit totally. I should plan it and stick with it. I feel somehow that the next time will be easier. I have to want not to smoke anymore for it to work.

I’m sitting here writing this on the ICE going to meet my love in Amsterdam for the weekend. I have a job interview tomorrow in Rotterdam. I decided to make it worth my while by traveling stressed tonight, since they wanted me to come earlier than if I traveled tomorrow. My only hope is that it turns out to be more than just a possibility, and perhaps lead to something real.

I am skeptical that I will ever find a new job because of my transsexuality. In a perfect world I would be evaluated based on my experience and expertise, and not on my gender expression. I am expecting it to take a long time until I eventually find a company that is willing to take the perceived risk to hire me. I just hope it is a job that I actually want. My main priority right now is to make sure that I continue to heal well and then the job search comes secondary. I want to move to the Netherlands to be closer to my gnun. I love her so much. I just hope I can stand the dutchies though.

I had a telephone interview for a job in Switzerland to be an onsite engineer for an American company that has partnered with a Swiss company to provide them with manufacturing capacity. The Swiss company develops and produces photovoltaic material for solar collectors. I spoke with people from their office in Plano Texas. The interview lasted for a full hour and I was able to satisfactorily answer all of their questions. I had a good feeling afterwards, but I have not heard anything from them or the headhunter that set all of it up. They even subjected me to two online psychological evaluations. Some of the questions were relatively insulting; such as “did you ever steal as a child?” and the last question on the last one was “some of my answers on this questionnaire are not 100% honest.” I think tests or evaluations like that are total bullshit, but one must endure some ridiculous things to get a job these days. The problem with this one is that the position in Switzerland will only last from 12 to 18 months, and then I would have to move to either their office in Austria or Czech Republic. Also there may be some resistance to give up information so that I would be able to perform my duties. I would be the engineering middle(wo)man between the Swiss and the Americans. They are expecting that the partnership will generate 350 to 400 million dollars worth of revenue for them. The manufacturing plant is in Singapore, which I am not so crazy about being a part of the exploitation of cheap labor. I’m not sure about this one. I will probably receive some feedback in the next couple of days.

The interview tomorrow is for a staffing firm that provides bodies for offshore, maritime, and tunnel boring companies. They are interested in me because of my international and German experience. I will be meeting with one man and one woman tomorrow at their office in rottingdam at ten a.m. I really hope that it turns out to be worth my effort to meet them when they wanted and for the amount of time they requested. I hope I am not met with disappointment like I was at a couple of other interviews in the Netherlands. I will try to put my best face forward and hope for the best and act as if I don’t need their job. In reality I don’t because I am still gainfully employed, for the moment anyway. If it comes down to a discussion about my gender, I hope it stays on a professional level. If it turns ugly I will just thank them for their time and take my leave of them. I will not let anyone disrespect me and sit there and take it.

I have been taking on much more responsibility at work these days because I agreed to be the replacement for my supervisor when he is not in the office for whatever reason. I have also temporarily taken over the responsibility for moving a project further while Helmi is sick. The schedule is quickly running away on us and I have to hit it hard on Monday when I am back in the office. I am able to deal with the stress ok so far, and thankfully I only have three more weeks and then I am off for five weeks again. I am really looking forward to enjoying myself over those weeks. I am sure that I will be ready for a break when I reach that point, if this first week back at work is any indication of how the rest will go.

I have my six week examination on this coming Monday, even though it will have been seven weeks since surgery. I am very happy with the results of my surgery, even though I was a bit disappointed at first. I think that the lack of hormones had a very serious effect on my perception of things.

closer

I find myself in the last days or hours as it may be before my genital surgery. I will be going into the hospital on Monday morning for tests and surgery preparation. The surgery will be performed early Tuesday morning. I am so happy the day has finally arrived. I am calmly excited about the surgery. I know that it will be a painful healing process that will take several weeks. I have everything I need to take care already finished and I will be resting a lot in the next couple of days. I am so thankful my girlfriend will be able to spend three weeks with me during this difficult time. I was hoping not to have to go through this alone, and thankfully I won’t have to. She is so kind and loving to make such a sacrifice for me. I am really looking forward to her being with me. We have been becoming closer than ever in the last several weeks.

I began to get ill last week while I was on a business trip to the Netherlands. I was sitting in the back of the car when I began to feel very nauseous and slightly dizzy. From that point on, all week I was feeling a bit nauseous here and there, and then on the weekend I came down with a cold. And of course I promised to have several things finished and ordered before I finished this week at work. I assume the stress didn’t help with my health matters. I went home sick on Tuesday and stayed home on Wednesday completely. I felt better yesterday, but I think it might not have been such a good idea to go to sword and aikido practice last night. I got a lot out of the practices, but I think I should have saved my energy to get well. I was able to get things at work to the point where I could leave at a decent time today thanks to the help I received from my colleagues. I was wondering if the nausea I was and still partially experiencing is from my dying or dead testicles. The other thought I had was that I may be having problems with candida yeast again. The symptoms seem a bit too similar to those problems that I had last year around this time. I cannot be sure what it is, so I am just going to try to get as much rest as possible in the next couple of days, in hopes of being reasonably well for surgery.

I have been feeling very feminine in the past couple of months. I suspect it may have to do with surgery coming, or maybe it is the backlash from me altering my beauty regimen in response to the complaints of my girlfriend. I had stopped wearing makeup every day, and I was not dressing nice like I had last winter. I think this time has helped me to temper further the amount of time I spend on how I look. I have begun to wear makeup only on special occasions and when I will be meeting with customers. There is a woman that works at a company on the same campus as me, and I would see her usually at lunch in the cafeteria. I would get secretly very jealous of how she presented herself and became disappointed that I had let myself and my wardrobe go. I couldn’t even dress nice like that if I wanted to simply because I don’t have any clothes like that. She is almost always wearing a skirt with a nice blouse and pumps, very classic and almost exactly how I want to dress.

When I first came out at work I was dressed always relatively nice, wearing either things I had made myself or store bought. I became inspired by seeing that girl, and now I have a whole new wardrobe planned to make while I am recovering from surgery. I have prepared a few pencil skirt patterns, in the latest high waist style and also bought some nice flannels to make them out of. I also am planning on making blouses out of satin, crepe de chine and cotton shirting. I have also had relatively good luck with finding several pairs of pumps in my size in different styles and colors. This season my shoe of choice is clarks. Over the past couple of months I have been trying on many pairs of shoes to get a feel for how they should fit. I learned a very important lesson when I visited a customer earlier this month about the correct fit of pumps. I noticed through all of this that my left foot is a half size smaller that my right. Noticing this difference has been a big help in determining the correct fit. The problem I encountered at the customer was that I was walking out of the right shoe, and then as soon as I corrected that with the insoles I brought with me, I began to walk out of the left one as well. That was a very embarrassing and not to mention painful experience I do not intend to repeat.

I figured out that the right shoe should fit relatively snugly in the toe box and at the heel. The left shoe I can add a half insole to help that foot fit better. I had thought at first that having plenty of room was a good thing and that trying them on in the evening after work made sense. I know now that neither are totally correct. I guess if the shoe will only be worn at night then that would hold true, but I also realized that I will be wearing the shoes mostly for work and that means wearing them starting in the morning when my foot is at its smallest. I also realized that if the shoe is loose in the morning, the problems caused by rubbing or walking out of them will cause my feet to swell and tire quickly, only exacerbating the problems. Heels are not really made to be comfortable, so I have come to the conclusion that if I want to wear them, I will have to deal with a bit of pain. Minimizing the pain, or limiting it to my feet being tired, instead of pain from chafing, blisters, and birds eyes is a decent tradeoff. Trying on shoes only in the evening is not the complete solution as most would have you believe. I have also determined my maximum heel height, 70 mm. Over 70 mm I cannot walk correctly. I am tall enough already anyway. I have been training myself to walk in heels at night by putting them on and wearing them around the apartment for a few hours at a time.

I have mentioned many times here that I had a definite vision of myself as a woman and I really feel the need to live that vision, because I am able to if I just work at it sensibly. The skirts and blouses that I am planning on making during my recovery are somewhat simple to construct, and energy permitting I could make one each per day. I will be in hospital for two weeks after surgery, and then four weeks at home. I assume that after the first week at home I will be able to sit for a reasonable amount of time at my sewing machine. I will obviously have to see how it goes, and try not to push it if it doesn’t work. I am happy that I have the creative energy to sew once again. Most of what I have picked to make are timeless pieces that will hopefully bridge seasons. I am also very happy that my body has changed to the point where I don’t really have to do much pattern alterations to end up with a good fit. I actually have a discernable waist, hips and ass. The slimming of my waist has helped my hips and butt become shapelier, although both could be a tad bit larger. There is enough o work with though. I have selected styles that will further accentuate my barely there curves. Smart accessories like the perfect belt help too. I caved in and bought a pair of burgundy red pumps which seems to be popular color for this fall-winter season. They are of a classic style, so I am not so worried about not being able to wear them after this season. I wanted to buy a brown pair of pumps, but I had no luck. I guess the burgundy red is the new brown for this season, or at least which is what I have been telling myself to ease the guilt. On the other hand, I haven’t spent any money on clothes or shoes in almost a year. I can afford to let myself indulge a bit, and besides, I have been buying staple items or investments in my presentation.

I like dressing up in nicer clothes, and it also makes me feel good about myself. The confidence I feel when I am all put together is amazing. I suppose part of it is satisfying my ego, which I have been slowly letting go of through practicing aikido.

cut 5Q

A lot of things seem to be coming together at the moment, and they are all positive. I achieved my 5^th Kyu Aikikai today. The Sensei had three comments; I messed up the entrance to shomen uchi Ikkyo, I didn’t put my feet up on my toes for nikkyo, and the most famous one: my posture needs work. The posture comment was to be expected. I was reluctant to take the test, but eventually after so many people asking me if I was going to test, I gave in to the pressure. Our Sensei asked me twice, and I assumed after the second time she would keep asking until I said yes, out of respect I decided to do it. I am glad in a way that I did it, because I learned a lot of the aikido language. I wish that I could get more spiritually from it other than what I bring myself to where I practice daily. I get the spiritual learning from the outlaw school that I participate in now and again. I feel very good about myself and feel like I am on the road to harmony with myself. I can feel it happening and it feels amazingly calming.

On to the next topic, on my birthday I received the letter from my health insurance regarding the approval of the coverage of my sexual reassignment surgery. I just have to write a short letter and send a copy of the document to the surgeon to obtain an appointment. When I last spoke with the doc, he told me the waiting time is between four to six months. It may happen still this year that I finally get fixed. I almost did a total flip out when I opened the letter. I was hoping the answer would come before my birthday, and it is extra nice that it came when it did. The health insurance also decided to reimburse me for the cost of the psych evaluation. That money is my very thin safety net. I also got my vacation payment from work this month, so things are looking up again financially.

I found the letter in my mailbox as the aquanun and I returned to my place from France. She treated me to an aikido seminar in Paris for my birthday. My sweet kR0K. I rented a car from the motor pool at work and we drove there on Friday during the day so that we could start the seminar on time. We had a very romantic drive through the French countryside through the champagne region. We arrived around three and went to find the hotel. The hotel was no great shakes, but we only really needed a place to sleep since we would be busy with aikido the whole time. I wish that we could have done some touristy things, but in the end there was no time. My legs were toast by Saturday night, and I still had Sunday to make it through. I made it though, luckily.

more to com….

aikicherrini

Life has been rather hectic lately for lidl cherrini. I have been trying to work more hours, and to accomplish that I have been getting up earlier. I’m also trying to help myself to be able to get up early by going to bed somewhat earlier. It doesn’t always happen, but I am working on it. I have been practicing aikido in the evening on Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays. Practicing aikido is sometimes a good workout; sometimes it is not so heavy. I have also been working on getting my taxes done for calendar year 2006, and then after I will get the 2007 taxes done. That is just the German taxes, though. I still have to get my taxes done for 2005, 2006 and 2007 for the states. My company supports the tax preparer fees, but it is not enough to cover all the costs. I have been also slowly working on my bike to try to get it back into shape. I bought and mounted a new light generator, and yesterday I fixed the right pedal crank pin. Now my pedal cranks are 180 degrees apart again. I still need to grease the chain and pump up the tires. I have also been working with my therapist and psychiatrist to get my psychological evaluation together for submittal to my health insurance.

I received the psychological evaluation on Friday the 14^th along with a bill for 750 euro. Then yesterday I received another bill from the psychiatrist for 1180 euro. I’m hoping my health insurance will reimburse me for the bills. If not I will be hosed for a couple of months financially. I also paid for translations that cost me 450 euro. I could have bought a used car for that money. oh well. Instead of getting depressed about my finances, I am trying to look at it as a positive that the document is finally finished and in my hands. I will deal with my health insurance tomorrow, and I hope it will go well. I should not be financially so stressed, but I guess the xmas holiday spending is taking its toll finally. After the first of the year all of my insurance and contracts renew, and with that comes the yearly fee. I had always chosen to pay it all at once just to have it out of the way and to not have to think about it anymore. January is always an expensive month.

The practice of aikido is very slowly getting my body into shape. After each practice, the strains and joint pain are becoming less and less. I got up early this morning and spoke with my Kr0k and then I went to the dojo. There was a group of people that were sitting in the lobby of the dojo drinking coffee and chatting. I assume that was the theater group Anita sensei spoke of. I had written a list of warm-up exercises to practice with little stick figures as reminders of how the movement is done. I started by expressing my gratitude to the shrine in the dojo. The first exercise was to run around the tatami three times. Then I went to the sunny end of the tatami and practiced a lot of stretches. I don’t feel that we warm up sufficiently at the regular practice sessions that I go to, and there isn’t any time between the classes to do it. I guess I could try to do it before at home, but I don’t always have time for anything other than grabbing my gi and running out the door.

I have not been practicing katsugen undo much in the past week. The aquanun was here last Sunday thru Thursday. We were able to practice aikido together and then afterwards we did katsugen undo together. I was able to clear my mind so much easier with her there. I sometimes have trouble keeping my mind focused on nothingness and feeling everything when I am alone doing k-u. I practiced some movements that we did in the last week, and then I practiced rolling. I can roll much better forwards than I can backwards. The rolls are simply the reverse of the other, but the body inertia is different somehow. I would have thought the forwards rolls would be difficult because of having to use your arm to direct the line of contact with the tatami. I worked out the line up to the point of my shoulder, but I fall apart after that point.

I will have to ask Anita sensei if she can show me a technique to practice for the backwards roll follow through. I am glad I went to the dojo today. I was alone and able to do the movements at my own pace. I practiced katsugen undo also afterwards. I can’t wait for the next opportunity to go to visit my company’s headquarters in Kyoto. It would make me feel really nice to be able to work as well as practice aikido there. I used to not like the hierarchy and structure of the Japanese working culture, but through practicing aikido my perception of it is not so oppressive anymore. I can somehow understand them a bit better now. I was hoping that I would maybe see some of the Japanese that work here at the dojo, but it is mostly all Germans. There has to be some people at the headquarters that practice. I found a dojo online in Kyoto somewhere, g-earth couldn’t find it though. It is a goal of mine to practice aikido somewhere in Japan in the future. I have been having an obsessive fantasy about getting a position at the headquarters just so I can practice aikido in Japan.

I guess I should not expect to become a samurai overnight. Such things just take time and perseverance. If for nothing else, I am able to go somewhere after working all day where I can shut out everything else and practice movements that make me feel good. I feel more balanced because of it. I feel more peaceful and calm in everyday situations, and therefore the stress doesn’t really get to me as it had in the past.

I wanna bake biscotti today and perhaps also get some sewing going too.

frankreich

I’m on the ICE on the trip back from hamsterdam again. This weekend went by way to fast. I arrived on Friday night at 23.40 and then tracked the KR0c back to her lair and she made some cherrini bait. Cherrini didn’t go for the bait at first, but in the end, her hunger would not go unsatisfied. We finally fell asleep at about 3.30 am. I slept until noon and awoke to find the aquanun slipped away while I slumbered. She had to work, so I found out later when she came back home for a late breakfast. I had an egg with fried cauliflower and saatenbrot toast with almond butter. The kR0C had eggs with some green stuff fried beside it. I’m not sure what to make of her eating habits sometimes.

The nUN0I went back to work and I got showered and put on makeup. I burned the skin around and under my brows. I colored them on Friday morning before work and I think I put either too much developer drops or the skin was too clean. I think that it is recommended to color them in the morning after not washing the skin, so that the natural oils and moisturizers act to protect the skin from irritation. My brow area over both eyes is red and at times really itchy. I have never had this problem before, and it is really bad. I’ll have to be much more careful next time. Just writing about it is making me itch. I finished getting ready and went to do some shopping on the walk to meet the nUnO1 at work. I stopped for a quick coffee and then bought some purple animomi flowers at the bloemenmarkt, and then I went to Lush to get more soak and float shampoo to help with my scalp problems.

I arrived at paradise and the kRoC let me in to wait for her to be finished setting up the vj. We left to go to the vrankrijk to meet anus to set up the beamer and everything for later after the bands were finished. She was invited to vj with the dj after the bands were finished. As we were enjoying a bier and salted almonds, one of the organizers said to me, “so aquanun told me that you wanted to help out tonight?” I said, yeah sure, of course. My fiancé had volunteered me to work without telling me, and I had to find it out from the organizer even. No worries, I didn’t mind, she had to go back to work for a couple of hours anyway. We left and went back home to have some dinner. We both went back to the place and then separated. I was asked to collect glasses for the bar. I felt a bit uncomfortable at first because people were not so easy with letting me through the crowd to get the empties. I eventually got into it and everything went fine. Once the crowd saw what I was doing, they began to let me through easily and also put their empties on the stack. I’m proud of myself since I didn’t break any. I met a great number of the people in the KrOc’s circle of friends. It seemed everyone was having a nice night. I was too. I met lots of people that said they heard of me, but I hadn’t heard of them. She knows so many people. One woman introduced herself to me, and although she looked very familiar, I for sure hadn’t met her before. This morning I found that she was an identical twin of one of the organizers. That kinda tripped me out a bit.

This trip and the last one were both relatively hectic, with the aikido workshop last time and the vrankrijk party this time. The party last night was a benefit for Ladyfest in Rotterdam in the summer. There were four bands and el bandita and her girlfriend spinning in between bands. It was nice to be amongst a lot of feminist women and some were queer too I’m sure. I had to become like a cat to maneuver between all the people in the crowd whilst carrying lots of very breakable glass. I had fun and told the kRoc that it is ok to volunteer me to do stuff there if there is another occasion that I will be in town for.

We have such wonderful lovemaking together and are so into each other. I feel as though I am finally getting my life together, or maybe that things are just fitting better now? It makes me feel good woteva it is. With the aikido practice and katsugen undo together I am able to accomplish both physical and mental conditioning. Both combined have given me a new feeling of vitality and energy. I feel as though that the time was exactly right to begin practicing them both. I am also trying to make an effort to organize all my belongings in my apartment. I began sorting my clothes, and when I am through with that I will work on organizing my shoes. I have bought countless pairs of relatively expensive and good quality shoes that didn’t end up fitting right. I am contemplating selling them on ebay, to at least try to get some of the money that I spent on them back somehow. After the shoes, then I want to tackle my sewing supplies and fabrics. I am planning on making an inventory list in excel so that I can actually know what I have without searching through everything to find what I need. I will also have to contemplate what to do about renovating my apartment in anticipation of eventually moving out. I want to do what I can when I can to prevent having to do everything all at once, not to mention the money outlay.

I feel better now than I have felt for a very long time. I just don’t know how I will get everything done. It seems as though I have very little time to just sit around and do nothing. Work also promises to become a lot more demanding in the next bit of time. I am finishing the first project for vw and the next one has already started. The climate at work is rather bad at the moment, but I am remarkably better able to deal with it and not let it get me down so much as it has in the past. I did notice last week that after standing in between two people arguing and yelling at each other, I couldn’t help but absorb some of their negative energy. I tried to cleanse myself of it after lunch so that it didn’t ruin the rest of my day, but I guess I wasn’t strong enough to be able to do it yet. I felt not so nice that evening, and I should have practiced K-U but I had to work on organizing my paperwork for preparing my taxes. The next day I felt better again, except for learning that others had decided that I should go to Kassel the next day. Management by surprise is the best, trust me, it really keeps one on their toes. I feel much clearer mentally, which is a nice feeling to have. I am trying to use my positive energy to find balance within my life, and between my body and mind.

I am going to attempt to get into bed at a decent time tonight, as I must wash my hair in the morning and vw is supposed to be coming for the entire day to see the machine that I designed for them. The assembly went off without any major problems, and they were able to run it without problem up to 5000 revolutions per minute when I left on friday to go home. I hope they were able to get the rest of the program to run over the weekend. The machine is designed to be run at a maximum speed of 8000 rpm. I will be interested to find out how things went tomorrow. I hope everything stayed together. I am proud of myself that the machine was able to be run at relatively high speed immediately after being final assembled. I feel as though I met the challenge that I was presented with, and the challenge was not only the design itself, but also the negative milieu that I was forced to design it in. I am a strong woman, and I am finally beginning to realize it.

irrationalization

I think these people are going to try to kick me out of my seats. I am being a bit greedy by hogging a whole table and four seats. They did it. oki. I am going to just ignore them. The two guys sat across from me and left the woman that they are with in a row of two seats alone. Not very nice to me. I can’t even stretch my fucking legs. Bastards! There are a lot of obnoxious people on this train that are already irritating me and we are only ten minutes into the journey. Sucky. I hope they get out in Koeln. It would seem these people don’t make it out much. The people on the other side of the aisle left the table free and the guys looked over and thought about moving but decided to stay and bother me. I moved so that I could at least stretch my legs. I have given them enough press already. I walked by a group of obviously American guys that were being really obnoxious. I don’t understand why Americans in Europe always seem to speak a lot louder and therefore automatically stand out. I think it is done on purpose to somehow let everyone in earshot to

I wish I would have had time to get some dinner. I’m really hungry. Thankfully I have lots of biscotti with me to munch on. I just hope there is some left when I get to hamsterdam. I have also two loaves of saatenbrot with me that I bought to feed the Kr0c with. She wants to chew on me real bad, and I am looking forward to it.

I’m listening to the beasties and it is giving me a bad attitude. I am wearing my black Katzenjammer Kabaret baby-T with a black city denim mini and striped over knee socks that the aQuanUn gave me with purple tights underneath, and to complete the look my black vogs boots. I feel nice and sexy and hope the kRoC likes it too. I’m fairly certain she will.

Oki, I just had to change trains completely. The first train out of Ffm was a total mess and then on the way to koeln the toilets stopped working completely. The Deutsche Bahn is really getting bad. At leas this time I didn’t have to stand in wind and rain in the middle of nowhere. I even had time to have a smoke in between. It was a hassle, but at least we left koeln on time even with the switch. The loud Americans as it turns out are more than likely soldiers. I have a feeling they will be looking at me every time one of them goes to get a bier or to the toilet. I’ve been through it before. maybe I should show some leg just to make it interesting for them.

I participated in my first aikido for beginner’s session last night with christiane. It was nice, and Anita sensei was very friendly and helpful. She asked me if I had done any aikido before, I confirmed, and she said that she could tell by how I was able to do the backwards rolling fall. I felt like I did in fact learn something at the workshop, and I felt more relaxed and therefore was able to really get the flow of the movements. I guess my Ki was flowing well. The partners that I practiced with were nice and concentrated as well. I took the chance and washed my new keikogi and let it air dry overnight. It shrunk quite a bit and ended up fitting relatively well. I just need to learn to tie my belt tighter so it doesn’t move and also fix my pants so that they don’t fall down. I ended sweating a bit which felt nice as well. Somehow I was able to sit in the kneeling position without a problem. I will go again on Monday night possibly also christiane will come too. I plan on going to practice at least three times a week, maybe more. I’ll see what is possible. It seems according to the schedule that I was given yesterday, that there are beginners sessions every weeknight. The schedule on the internet is more limited than the flyer she gave us last night. If it is true, that will be nice, since I may have other obligations, like psychotherapy for instance.

survival kit

I survived yet another electrolysis session. She was rushing to get me finished because she didn’t plan enough time to be thorough. And as a consequence caused me more pain than normal. I also wanted to do my chest and around my areola but she told me she wouldn’t have time. It stung a bit when I thought about the last week walking around with relatively long hair, although scarce, but still noticeable at close proximity, between my breasts. I made sure to tell her to plan enough time next treatment to do my other areas.

I went to an aikido workshop last weekend in hamsterdam. The program was basically aikido for 1.5 hours, a 20 minute break, and then katsugen undo for 1.5 hours. The aikido was difficult on my body, especially my feet and knees. I was not used to having to sit in a kneeling position so therefore the skin on the tops of my feet and knees were raw and the muscles and tendons stretched too far. The katsugen undo was the main reason I went to the workshop. I made it through all of it without missing anything, so I have a nice sense of accomplishment. I should since it all brought me close to death and I survived it.

I was warned to be cautious with the katsugen undo because it has the potential to work against my transition. I did four sessions over the weekend and also in the past two nights here in my living room. I’m not totally sure if what I am feeling is from the katsugen undo already, but I seem to have a new approach to stressful situations. I have had three separate instances this week where someone called me totally stressed out and started to lay some shit on me. I was able somehow to shield myself from their projection. I was able to stay calm and cooperative and reassuring that we are doing the best we can and that it will work out. I don’t seriously think it will all work out, but I try to be positive anyway. I am able to accept things better, and to therefore not get stressed about things I cannot influence. I feel more of a sense of calm and peacefulness, and clarity that is scaring me.

for the first couple of days after the workshop I was wondering if I would continue the aikido. The katsugen undo I will continue for sure, as long as I don’t notice any problems. I decided yesterday that I would continue with the aikido, and tonight I realized why. aikido and katsugen undo seem to belong together somehow. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be part of a system that has masters one must answer to. I like to look at it as a teacher-student relationship, and not necessarily as an authority or dominate-submissive relationship. The focus was on feeling rather than thinking. Between my new found good health and now katsugen undo too, I feel so good and have so much energy.

There are lots of things I need to get accomplished so I am not going to have much free time or the next foreseeable future. I am thinking I might try to go to aikido three times a week and do katsugen undo when I have time in the evening or morning. I ordered a training kimono online yesterday from a place in Ffm. christi told me that she wanted to try aikido the last time I saw her. I want to get in touch with her this weekend to tell her my plans and to see if she still wants to do it. Even if she decides not to do it, I will continue. I am thankful for my girlfriend, that she has shown me the way. Grazie amore mio dolce.

I would like to write more but I have to cook dinner, eat, write two emails, and finish writing a script for the product line manager on the dual clutch machine I designed for vw. He will be reading my text in a video tomorrow with the machine that he knows nothing about. I guess he doesn’t have to when he has lackeys around like me. The original due date on the writing wasn’t until first week in march, then it was the 27^th, and this morning it became today. I started writing it at about noon and had to leave at four thirty with three quarters of a page. I need to write about the test procedures that the customer plans to perform with the machine. I should be really stressed but I am not, and that feels nice.

don’t let me forget to write about the ambulance mafia experience. ciao!

autostadt

I am on a train to wolfsburg to visit VW with Fredi and Thilo. The last train we were on had a wifi hotspot. It didn’t work so well though and is really expensive. I think I will check into whether or not my internet service at home has the option to log on to the hotspots, because it is the same provider. I have the feeling it would end up being expensive and not very good quality. I want to check into I though just to see.

This is going to be a long day. I got up at 5.15 am and was at the bahnhof at 7.15 am, our train departed at 7.23 am. We will arrive in wolfsburg at 10.15 am, then we will be at VW werk for lunch and meetings and then our train home departs at 16.55. We will be back in darmstadt at 20.30. I hope we will make our train to go home on time. Fredi is always animated and very talkative, I am used to it, I just hope the rest today can hang.

I brought my laptop so that I could write while I have the idle time on the train. I also read through my psych evaluation this morning. I will have to read it a couple more times before I can really comprehend it. I understood what everything was that they wrote, but the general theme I need to understand better. It seems as though they may have sort of tailored my answers into a prescribed model of a classic genuine transsexual. There are lots of inaccuracies that I will have to correct. My sexual history at first seemed incorrect, but now that I have read the rest, I think their focus on my contextual homosexuality was just setting up a premise for their later conclusions. I will probably correct the factual mistakes and then try to discuss with them if there is a strategy to their formulation of the document. I can say that the results and conclusions and recommendations are all positive and hopefully will be enough to get me approved for the insurance to pay for my surgery.

I was just standing outside the wolfsburg bahnhof smoking and there was a blonde girl there also smoking. She reminded me of sophia with her platinum hair and the color of her skin. I was reminded of how envious of the girls that I dated I was. I liked being with them and found it comforting, but I always harbored jealousy or envy that they were born female and I wasn’t. I loved it when they dressed up nice to go out somewhere, but that was when my jealousy would peak. I wanted so badly to be able to put on that stereotypical little black dress with nice stockings and heels and to look and feel elegant. I wanted to be the arm candy.

Even though it is sometimes difficult to come to terms with my gender transition, I am very glad that I finally decided to get off my dead ass and to do something constructive about it. Now I am the arm candy like I always wanted to be. The way I feel now goes beyond the mere cliché of arm candy though. When I dress up wearing a dress and stockings, rarely heels, I feel so nice and sexy and elegant. I enjoy the feeling that I get when I feel like I am all put together. The feeling is sort of confirmation for me that I am a female in spirit, and now also in body as well, or real close anyway.

It’s difficult to explain the way living as a female makes me feel. I have for most of my life secretly envied other females for simply being female. I wanted to be female so badly, it was just about killing me inside. In retrospect, I wonder why I didn’t act on the desire sooner. I knew it for years that I was a transsexual. Perhaps fear was the stifling factor. It seems ridiculous to me now that I somehow tried to live with such feelings, even knowing full well that they were not ever going to go away. I have the feeling that I have already covered this ground perhaps many times in the past on this blog. But a coherent description or explanation of my exact feelings eludes me. It has always been difficult for me to put into words how I feel, but I definitely think trying helps a lot.

I took way too much time away from my writing; it has become very obvious to me. I miss the dialog that I have with myself and how it helps me to understand what goes on in my life and the world around me. I will try to keep this going at the frequency that I used to blog in the beginning. It is also an incentive that my nUN01 thoroughly enjoys reading my writing. So I will try to keep on track.

The visit at vw went well, we actually got out of there earlier than planned, an extra bonus. I got to see the machines that I designed that are in the process of being installed. They look nice and clean and new. After a week of running tests they will turn all grey after being covered with a fine fog of transmission oil and dust. I was warned today that I will probably have to go to kassel again to visit vw there, where the other test machines are being installed. They want to change the design of the cable canals that are already installed. A bit late I think. They will have to pay for that one for sure. I have developed and aversion to visiting the customers in kassel. One of them did send an email with praise for me that I listen to them and I am flexible and oriented on their needs. To me customer satisfaction and their trust in my abilities are my main objectives in designing my machines.

I need to make some more jeans. I want to design some nice cropped pairs and also some flared and some with cargo pockets. I like all the skirts that I have made recently, but I also want to make a pencil skirt. I think that would make me feel extra sexy. I am sick of having to wear the control shorts that I use to bind my genitals. I only need to wear it when I wear a skirt because it flattens the area of where a bulge could show. It’s very restrictive and to look at me when I am wearing it, it looks and feels as though I don’t have any external genitalia. I tuck my oversized clit (penis) and labia (scrotum) between my legs and the testes go into little pockets above my penis. All very neat and tidy. Just like the transmen burn their breast binders after having their breasts removed, I will burn my control shorts after I have surgery. I can’t wait for that day to come, and it should come soon.

man am I in love…

evaluation obscura

I went to Ffm today to meet with my therapist to submit the paperwork that I had to collect. I had a letter from my endocrinologist, urologist, physician, self assessment, and the letter I sent to my extended family. I had to have the self assessment and the family letter translated into german by a woman in vienna. german always reads a bit cold to me, no matter how well it is written. She did a good job, but it is costing me a lot. I probably should have got a second opinion on the cost. Oh well, what’s done is done. I will know better next time. Both versions will be submitted.

He handed me a copy of the report to read and give feedback on. I had to refresh his memory about the amount of time it could take until I have srs from the point the evaluation is submitted. The timing of course depends on a positive judgment by the MDK. 12 months worst case. He seemed a bit too convinced that I will get approval, he started telling me how often I should visit with a shrink after surgery as if it was already in the bag. I just want the paperwork to be submitted already. The time that it will take to get a yay or a nay from the MDK is also stressful waiting time. I should start to prepare myself for a possible negative answer. I’m not quite sure what plan b looks like yet, but I had better come up with something.

We started discussing why I have been down in the dumps lately. I tried to explain to him that I feel like parts of my life are in a static state. I told him I became depressed after I returned to work after vacation. Being hit with the raging chaos at work, further delays by him, winter grayness, and relationship ripples were on my mind. I tried again to make him understand that my mobility is greatly limited if I want to continue with the health insurance route I am derailed on. I will begin to plan my future once I have a surgery date. Since I have no control of the timing, I have to sit and try to wait patiently. I don’t like very much not being able to plan my life. I got frustrated and started tearing up, so I changed the subject to my physical healthcare problems. Something positive in my life at least to talk about other than the NUn01. I knew before going there that I wouldn’t be able to get through to him, I tried anyway and then gave up. It wasn’t worth me getting upset about something I can nothing about.

I began reading the evaluation and became irritated that there were so many errors in my biographical information, not limited to simple in context math mistakes. For example, my father’s birth year was incorrect, but the year he died and his age were correct. If you are able to do simple subtraction in your head you can easily notice the numbers don’t work out. Reading my sexual history made me angry too. It seemed they focused way too much on the homosexual experiences that I had before transition. They just kinda breezed over my heterosexual experiences as if they were a trivial note. If you would have asked me back then how I identified back then, I would have said heterosexual in theory, but bisexual in behavior. I still contend that the only times I ever did anything with men was when I was cross-dressed, and there was a reason for that. I knew they would want to treat me like a female and want to have sex with me as an exchange for their affection. I guess that was my only outlet where I could receive affirmation of my inner feelings. You can believe me if I had the choice to be with a woman in that situation I would have preferred it. I usually felt disgusted with myself after doing something sexually with men. I did get aroused, but I think that when one has testosterone coursing through their viens, sex is sex. It doesn’t matter with who or what, as long as the desire has been satisfied. I have always had a guilty feeling about the men I had sex with because it never felt entirely right to me. I had always felt entirely comfortable with most of the women I had relationships with. The closest thing that I ever had with anyone remotely male in terms of a period of time longer than a night was with rita. She doesn’t count though because she was like me. I have always been a girl who fancies other girls. I will have to write a more accurate account of my sexual history for them and correct all the factual mistakes.

On a different theme, there is a pet peeve of mine that I have been meaning to get out. I get very irritated when I see someone wearing an obviously expensive suit jacket, and you can tell it is expensive by the maker’s label still basted on the sleeve. People that buy expensive suit jackets that don’t know enough that the label comes off before wearing are too ignorant to deserve wearing such a quality garment. I feel better that I got that off my chest.