Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Getting closer

Well it's been a fairly busy week and it only gets more interesting the next few days.  My wife J is on a 3 day on 3 day off rotation and this is day 3 of that.  The last couple of days she's went in early so with drive time it's been nearly 16 hour days for her which stinks since that means I haven't seen much of her as even though she wants to spend time when she gets home that time is better spent eating and getting to bed.

As for me, it's a short work week, I'm on vacation starting at 5pm today until Tuesday morning so today hasn't been very productive; truthfully nor was yesterday as I had a therapist appointment so the time to get ready for that, drive to see her (about 40 minutes each way), spent the nearly hour there, and then lunch with M on the way back took a large chunk of the day.

The therapist appointment went more or less how they have for the last year or so; general chatting on how things are since I'm only seeing her about every 2-3 months now, but the subject of my Orchiectomy came up as even though I don't technically need a letter from her for it I asked her for one anyway.  Partially because I'm still agitated over the affidavit for my gender change - I disagree with her reasons for not signing it and I think I've detailed those reasons and my opposing viewpoint earlier in the blog.  I consider this surgery to be an "irreversible change" - they can't exactly put them back - and I personally see it as an affirmation of sorts that I can't/won't go back to being male ever again; but I digress.  The letter is (IMO) overly detailed, just like my HRT letter was and she had a couple of typos that had to be fixed so that ate up a good 10+ minutes of the time.  Just as well as really I don't have a whole lot to discuss at the moment, things are going well and I mainly continue to see her as I know I want SRS at some point and will need her (and another) letter and there is some cathartic about being able to go talk to somebody who's an unbiased sometimes.  But enough about that.

I'm guessing J won't be home until a good 9pm tonight and we need to get her fed and ideally have her help me with some body hair (mostly my back) as I want to look nice tomorrow.  She has a few errands in the morning, but we're going out for a Valentine's Day Lunch since we'll be on the road on the 14th.  I've never been big on Valentine's Day, but it will be nice to get out together and have a good time.  Of course it will be short lived as once we get back home we need to get packed for the trip up to see Dr. Arnkoff.

Regarding the good Doctor; I've read nothing but positive experiences about him, but I will say his communication skills are a touch lacking.  If you're going to commit to calling somebody then *DO IT*, don't forget - he's done that 2-3 times to me in the last couple of weeks while I've been arranging things.  Hopefully his technique is better than his communication skills.  I mean, we're getting ready to drive a good 600 miles each way for him to cut out my testicles while I'm awake and I'm paying him $2500 for doing it.  I won't lie, I've had a second thought or two along the way; but not anymore.  Getting the cashier's check for him today, I thought long and hard and made sure this was what I wanted and it is.

Our intention is to leave *early* on Friday morning (and I mean probably 3am) as we lose a hour on the trip and even though Google say's it's a 9 hour drive we'll need at least one stop for gas and we'll want to eat at some point.  I'd like to get up there as close to 3pm as possible since that's check-in at the hotel.  The hotel is about 6 miles from his office and I thought once we're checked in we can drive down there to see where exactly it's at since it'll be at 6am on Saturday so I'm assuming it'll still be dark.  From there maybe a trip to Wal-Mart and/or the nearby mall to kill some time, hopefully a decent dinner; although with it being both Friday and Valentine's Day we may end up at McDonald's. :)

Then I guess I'll try and sleep - we'll need to be up *early* for me to get ready; but I'm not sure how well I'll sleep anyway.  He says it's a quick procedure; maybe a hour there total and half of that is dealing with paperwork, etc.  From there I guess it will be a trip across the parking lot to Walgreens to get my prescriptions filled - a pain medicine and an antibiotic and then assuming I'm not in too much pain yet perhaps breakfast - if I am I guess it'll be back to the hotel so I can start suffering in private.  Then it's a matter of killing the night away with J.

On Sunday we're heading back, but only halfway.  We're spending the night around Indianapolis so that I don't have to spent 10+ hours in the car at once.  This will break it up into about half.  The hotel I picked is right off of the highway - and there is again a Wal-Mart and plenty of restaurants so hopefully I'm feeling up to at least a decent dinner with J since I'm sure she'll deserve it at that point.

Then we'll head home on Monday - we'll want to avoid the rush hour both in Indianapolis and back here so I'm hoping to depart between 10am and 11am as with the time change that should put as back around 2pm-3pm give or take - maybe a hour later if we have to stop; but unless I need to I think we can make it without doing that.

As it stands I go back to work on Tuesday; although since I work from home I don't see it as a big deal - I guess if it is then I can take another day, but I hate to since even if I do I know I'll end up working one way or the other.  As J is on vacation the balance of the week perhaps we can find time to do something nice, but I guess that depends on how I feel and how much of me she can put up with. :)

I guess I should cut this short now, but before I do I have shared a couple of albums on Imgur.  One is a "timeline" of photos over the last 19 months or so of my transition and the other is simply two pictures - one from my first outing and one from last November as a comparison.  I'll never be as nice looking as I'd like, but looking at those two together I've come a long way and I can be happy with who I am and how I look. :)  Links are below:

Comparison:  Comparison At 16 Months

Full Timeline:  Full Timeline

- M

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