There are lots of important dates and milestones in any of our lives. Some we have little control over such as the date of our birth or in many/most cases the date of our death. Others, well we get to chose those - things such as getting married, getting a drivers license, starting work, and so on. Now with those things we not only get to chose the date(s), but we get to chose if we undertake those things, though working is something very few can avoid. :)
I've got plenty of important dates in my life beyond the ones I mentioned above. The birth of my daughter P, the date I proposed to J, the date J and I finally got married, and so on. Those dates are important enough to me that I remember the exact date (month/day/year) of them. Other dates, while still important to me - well I know loosely when they happened. I know for example that M and I were married in 1993, actually I know the full date since our "anniversary" as the day prior to my birthday, but it's only because of that; I know that we were divorced in 2004, but despite being able to look the date up I don't know exactly when it was. I know loosely when I got my license (it was after football season ended my junior year of high school), I know the month/year that we closed on our house, and I know approximately what year(s) we got each of our cats. All of those dates are important, just some more important than others and those are the ones I do tend to recall the exact date(s) of.
When it comes to transitioning - be it my own or I believe most anyone's - there are plenty of dates and/or milestones in the process. Some of these are more important than others, though I suspect that each of us has our own ideas about which ones are those "more important ones". :) Even for myself I've found that some dates have become less and less important over time, while others are just as (if not more) significant than they originally were.
As an example, I know the date that I decided I wanted to transition and that I talked to J about it - June 29th, 2012; although the "seeds were sown" over the few days prior to that. That date will probably always stick with me. On the other hand, while I know the date I started HRT was December 19th, 2012 (well technically the 20th as I didn't pick up the prescription until the next day) - I wasn't entirely sure of the exact date and had to look it up to confirm it. I *knew* it was December 2012 for sure and I knew it was towards the end of the month, but I simply wasn't 100% of the 19th. I'm guessing given a little more time that I'll forget the "19th" and perhaps eventually even the December and/or 2012 parts of it. For some neither of the two dates I've mentioned may be things they would even make an effort to remember, for others they might mark both dates on the calendar, and for some perhaps they are like me in that the decision date was simply more important than the HRT date.
I think the difference to me is that I considering starting HRT more of a "milestone" so to speak than anything. It's sort of like using the "ladies room" - I vividly recall several experiences in that regard. The first time was at brunch with J and M at a local casino. The first time I did so completely by myself, it was at the medical building where I see Dr. Swenson. And the first time that I do so without even really thinking about it was at lunch with J and M at a local pizza place not all that long ago. While I'm sure I could look up those dates from blog posts; or in the case of Dr. Swenson, my discharge paperwork; the dates aren't really important to me, but rather the fact that I did those things. The same goes for when I consider myself going "full-time", again I could probably find the date, or get it from my therapist since it was the day after a visit with her, but the actual date isn't important to me, but rather that I crossed that off of my "list" of things I needed/wanted to do. Not all "milestones" will be dates that I eventually forget - my orchiectomy (February 15th, 2014) probably being one of those, but in that case it's simply because it was the day after Valentine's day which will cause it to stick in my mind; but even more because J and I had such a wonderful few days together so the whole trip will stick with me.
I'm not really sure what my point was here or that I even really had one. What actually caused me to write about this was a post that J has been working on for the better part of two months (perhaps she'll finish it at some point <G>) and she mentioned dates in it and how she's not very good with them. Well sweetie, all kidding aside, I don't recall as many dates as you think - at least not without looking some of them up - I just like to have a little fun with you sometimes. :)
- M
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