I think everyone, or at least almost everyone has fear(s) of some sort. Some are more common that others such as Acrophobia, which is the fear of heights (which I have among other things), some not so common such as Xanthophobia - which is the fear of the color yellow - as to why I know that, well I don't know since I don't have that one. :) Many of those fears are easily managed, for example my fear of heights - well I tend to not go anywhere high. Others, well those tend to be harder.
I have one particular fear that has come up since my transition - I initially didn't understand why, but recently I connected the dots and now I know. That fear is if (when?) my mind starts to go. I have no idea what my IQ truly is, but I was accepted into MENSA which by their standards is the top 2%. In times past I took a lot of pride in that and it fed my ego; but since my decision to transition, that's waned. Perhaps it was the fact that there are so many things about being a woman I don't know and don't understand well - such as makeup; perhaps it was simply me wanting to be a better person, most likely I guess it's a combination of things.
The thing is, it's not about me losing my mental acuity, that would probably bother me a bit, but I can live with that. What I truly fear is losing the memories that are precious to me. As I said above, I recently connected the dots on why this has suddenly become so troubling to me and looking back it was when J spent the better part of that 8 weeks out of town for her training. I've always loved her, but during those 8 weeks, I finally realized just how much I loved her and how special she is. We've always had our good times and our bad times; but since then the good times have become so much more common and so much better, the bad have become so much more infrequent and much less of an issue. I now cherish the moments I have with her and the memories of those moments.
I had been keeping this to myself as thinking about that happening seems to almost instantly bring the tears on, in fact that's what's happening as I type this - and it's hard to type through teary eyes. If I started to cry about it in front of her, I tried to chalk it up to the hormones, but reality is that my dosage has been stable for a while and even though I've been more emotional since the orchiectomy (at least after the first week post-op); this has been going on since well before that. I'm sure she at least had an idea that there was more to it than I was letting on, but took me at my word and didn't overly press the issue. However, the other day it finally came out. Actually it was the day we finally came the rest of the way home from our trip for my surgery. We had stopped for lunch about 30 minutes from home at a BBQ place. It was early afternoon, pretty much halfway between lunch and dinner so it was really quiet with only maybe three tables occupied and we were spread out pretty good.
I've been trying to get photos of her when we are doing things that I really want to remember. While I do it at home as well as when we are out; more often than not when we are out it's when we're eating. It's not really intentional that I do it then; it's simply practical. We're usually sitting across from one another and I usually have my phone sitting on the table next to me. When I went to do it that day she again asked why I was getting a picture of her "stuffing her face" (or something to that effect - I don't remember the exact phrase) and I finally felt I should come clean. I explained to her how much I cherish the time we've been spending together and if/when my memories ever start to go I thought perhaps those pictures would help me keep hold of those memories. Maybe I've seen one too many movies (50 First Dates for example), maybe I'm just being silly, but I never want to let those memories slip away and if there is any chance those photos could help then I'm going to keep taking them.
J was so sweet and understanding as I started crying about and said the sweetest things to me. She's always so supportive, but the level of understanding she showed me that day meant more than she can imagine. With all the things to possibly worry about, this might seem silly to a lot of people; but it's important to me and she understood that and made me feel better. Thinking about it still brings me to tears, such as now talking about it, or even last night when we went out to dinner and I got a nice picture of her eating a piece of lobster. The memory there was her telling me the ones I recently made at home were better; and maybe they were, but probably not - but the fact that she told me they were meant so much to me, more than I admitted to her and it made it a memory I want to keep forever. So now I have yet another precious photo to add to the collection.
I'm not sure that I really had a point here at all, which is probably out of the norm for me, but I thought I'd feel better if I wrote this down - I'm not sure that I do or not; but at least I gave it a shot.
- M
No comments:
Post a Comment