Kidmageddon: Day 3

Today was incredibly scorchio: some say it's the hottest day of the year so far, with temperatures well in excess of 30 deg C. Which to me, as a South African, is pretty fricken hilarious because every day was above 30 deg C for 8 months of the year when I lived there, but here in the UK we also have ridiculous levels of humidity to deal with so it's much harder to deal with that kind of heat.

Anyway, I started the day by heading to the gym nice & early, again to avoid the worst of the day's heat. I needn't have rushed, because there was an odd mist in our area today that didn't lift until lunchtime, and it kept things nice & cool at the gym. Of course, once the mist did lift the temperature skyrocketed very quickly indeed, and when I disappeared out to our local corner shop towards the end of the afternoon it was so hot I thought my eyeballs might melt.

Ahem. OK, so another hour of lying to the recumbent bike at the gym allowed me to burn another 300+ calories (yay!) but I decided to undo all that good work later on in the evening by having not one, but two scones with jam & cream. Well, it's my summer 'holiday' and I am the boss of me, so I decided I needed the treat.

Of course, when I got up this morning it had been announced that the Duchess of Cambridge had been admitted to hospital in labour, so I turned on the telly and had a good laugh at a bunch of talking heads standing outside buildings where nothing was happening, saying "Yes, the Duchess has gone into labour, but it could be hours until we hear anything! Over to Sian in the studio". Sian: "In case you haven't heard, the Duchess has gone into labour and we're going to talk about nothing else all day. Over to Joe outside Buck House" and so on & so on as they passed the story between each other, trying to drag it out for all it was worth.

It reminded me of Clarence Keyter's infamous coverage of Nelson Mandela's release from prison. Poor old Clarence was an Afrikaans newsreader who was roped in by the SABC to stand around outdoors for several hours, trying to talk to the world about the momentous event of Mandela's release from prison, when he really didn't have a great deal to say. It was really, really awkward to watch because there's only so much you can say about the old scoundrel; and I could be wrong but it didn't look like Clarence had done enough homework to be able to fill about 4 hours of talking about one man. (Heck, I doubt anyone could do enough homework for that!) It was cringeworthy stuff, and so was the performance of the British media today. I did have to LOL though when people started tweeting & texting the BBC to tell them to report the other news of the day instead of bumbling around outside the hospital with nothing new to add to the story; the Beeb's presenters took it on the chin and responded with good-natured humour, which was more than Clarence managed.

Anyway, I didn't watch a movie per se today, but instead I logged in to 4OD and finally got round to watching My Transsexual Summer, the documentary series I missed last year but that has had a lasting effect on my life. A lasting effect, that is, because a lot of trans* people watched that particular documentary last year and as a result they finally came out to their families & approached their doctors to begin their transition... leading to a massive backlog of patients that the Gender Clinics in the UK are still struggling to get through. They've been inundated with new cases, which not only makes things difficult for all those new people trying to get in to see someone, but it also makes things difficult for existing patients who are now having to wait longer & longer between appointments, because services are just so stretched.

Not that I begrudge those people for seeking assistance at the same time as me. It's just unfortunate and inconvenient that we're all competing for the same limited resources at the same time, which is causing us all to have to wait unacceptably long times to get on with the difficult business of transitioning.

It took me just shy of four hours to watch the whole series and I could relate so much to what almost everyone on the show was saying. I also had a couple of triggering, teary moments, such as when Sarah explained how she'd always been uncomfortable with cameras or mirrors because they show an image of her that doesn't agree with how she sees herself. I so understand what she means there: this has been a problem for me for more than 30 years now and one of the reasons why I'm looking forward to medically transitioning is because I'd love to be able to look in a mirror or even look at my own body when I bath myself, without feeling like I want to burst into tears because of what I see there.

Hmm... so after that light entertainment I spent a couple of hours playing games on my iPad, before making a stir-fry for my evening meal, once again washed down with just enough wine to take the edge off the day, then I turned on the telly to hear that the Duchess of Cambridge had delivered a son. Yay! So then I got to have a good laugh at a bunch of talking heads standing outside buildings where nothing was happening, saying "Yes, the Duchess has had a baby boy weighing 8 pounds 6 ounces, but it could be some time until we know his name! Over to Sian in the studio". Sian: "In case you haven't heard, the Duchess has had a baby boy. Over to Joe outside Buck House." and so on & so on as they tried to drag out the story by repeating the same details over & over again. I think you'd have to be a Teletubby - or perhaps Dory from Finding Nemo - to enjoy having the same details repeated every few seconds, each time by a different talking head.

Then I spent some time playing on my iPad before scribbling down today's blog entries.

Anyway, congrats to the Cambridges. And congrats to the Queen who doesn't have to worry about them trying to squeeze the name 'Diana' in there somewhere. (I rather suspect he'll be named George).

Kidmageddon: Day 2

So on Sunday, the second day of my kids' holiday without me, I woke up nice & early and decided to take advantage of that opportunity to go to the gym early in the morning before the sun heated it up to unbearable levels. I dunno what the problem is at the gym, but they seem allergic to using their aircon system so it often gets ridiculously hot in there, making it difficult for me to exercise.

Well, it turns out that the gym is not only blissfully quiet at 8am on a Sunday, but it's also nicely chilled. The cheap bastards seem to be using their aircon at last (pity it takes a heatwave to convince them to turn it on!) so I spent a nice, relaxing hour perving over Quinto on Heroes on my iPhone whilst cycling on a recumbent bike. For this particular workout I have to lie to the machine, because the Fat Burn workout I do is based on a certain percentage of your maximum heart rate according to your age, but if I tell it my real age there is absolutely no challenge to it whatsoever, to the point where I might as well sit on the sofa eating bon-bons for that hour. So instead, I tell the machine that I'm 19 years old so that I can work up a sweat without getting out of breath, and after an hour at that level of intensity I feel like I haven't been wasting my time.

After the gym I went home for a couple of hours before popping out to do a spot of shopping. I got some laundry done and did the dishes (yay! domestication!) and then spent the afternoon trying to figure out whether I should sleep, play a game or watch TV. TV won out when I found The Rocky Horror Picture Show in my DVD collection and decided to watch it.

I'll never forget the first time I saw Rocky Horror; I was 13 years old and had slept over at my friend's house the night before. Her parents are a bit weird* - ok, her whole family is a bit weird - and they'd hired Rocky Horror on video because (I think) it had just been unbanned, but anyway they wanted to watch it and they didn't have any problems with their kids - or other families' kids - watching it too.

So poor, innocent little me sat there at age 13 watching this incredible thing on the telly. To be perfectly honest, I didn't quite make the link between the trans* stuff on the screen and my own trans* feelings (mainly, I think, because all the gender-bending stuff in the movie seemed to be about yearning to be female), but that refrain from the song at the end - "Don't dream it... be it" - made a huge impression on me and I stored it at the back of my mind for many years, where it would eventually come to haunt me. Huh, as I recall, later on that day whilst still reeling from the hypersexuality and genderbendery I'd just seen at my friend's house, I slammed my left thumb in the car door, severely and permanently damaging my nail. Yeah, that was a very memorable day all round.

So anyway, I watched it again on Sunday night - as a fully out, transitioning trans man. I cried at certain points, and found other points very inspiring. All-in-all, it was like visiting an old friend.

By the time I'd finished watching the movie it'd become too late for me to have a snooze, so I made pizza & washed it down with some wine. Then spent the rest of the evening chillin', watching crap TV until I eventually went to bed.


* Her dad was a pornographer, and her mother was a Nana Mouskouri impersonator. Yup. I had some awesome childhood friends.

Kidmageddon: Day 1

Okay, so Saturday 20 July was the first day of Hubby's holiday with the kids, but without me.

Both kids came to my room and woke me up to say goodbye. I'm pretty sure I got a cuddle out of each of them, but to be honest my brain was pretty frazzled (on account of it being ludicrously early, and of me having had a suitable amount of wine the previous night to help me cope with my rather significant distress). They asked whether they should text me and I asked them to do so every day, then I wished them well, asked them if they'd packed all the important stuff, and they went on their way.

So-called Hubby didn't bother to say goodbye to me. Probably because he feels so guilty about what he's done that he can't stand the recriminations he so richly deserves. (As an aside: he said that he'd spend the entire week with the kids pretending to be happy & enjoying himself so that they wouldn't see how much it's upsetting him that I'm not there. Yeah. Well, arsehole - you should've thought about that before organising a holiday without me, shouldn't you???)

So I've resolved to do as much as possible for myself to try to keep my spirits up while they're away. On Saturday, I caught the bus into town (remember that mention of having drunk wine the night before? Hic!) and spent a couple of hours mooching around town, mainly looking for birthday presents for one of my daughters whose birthday is around the corner. I found her a couple of nice things, and then I spent a bit of time buying myself a couple of nice things.

I bought a couple of LGBT T-Shirts from American Apparel (and fuck only knows where I'm going to stash those so that they don't get Hubby's panties in a bunch when he comes back; my Gay Pride flags have been in the boot of my car for a month because I haven't figured out where to stash them in the house); I had a nice lunch at a posh eaterie that my kids always resist visiting because they're such picky buggers; and then I went to an - ahem - adult shop where I bought a few adult things to play with, because isn't that the most fun you can have when you're on your own and the kids aren't around the house? Apart from walking around in your undies, that is (and yes, I've been doing that too!).

Then on Saturday evening I relaxed by watching Beetlejuice - a movie I loved as a teenager but haven't seen for several years. Then I retired to enjoy the treats I'd bought for myself during the day.

So yes, I managed to do a couple of nice things for myself on Saturday. After all, nobody else is treating me like a human being, so I might as well do it myself, mightn't I?

Insult to injury

I've been struggling to cope these past few weeks.

After Hubby's little bombshell about taking my kids away for a family holiday to which I was not invited, I had a nice little breakdown. It got so bad that I became suicidal and the police were actually called to restore some calm & sanity into our household. I just can't cope with the fact that the fucking arsehole I married is deliberately trying to take my kids away from me. It's perfectly clear that he thinks I'm no longer suitable as a parent (because being trans is so embarrassing, and nobody wants the poor kids to suffer the awful fate of being embarrassed, do they?) so he's lining himself up to be their sole parent, supported by his own parents.

I'm made to feel like a complete & utter outsider in my own family; like I'm no longer welcome in my own home. And to tell you the truth, he and my children have been making me feel this way for a whole year now, non-stop. How long can anyone cope with that kind of trauma before something has to give?

Well, something did give. 

I'm due to have (probably) my most promising Gender Clinic appointment in a few days' time, in which I'll finally get to see the doctor who will prescribe my hormones and refer me for the surgeries I so desperately need. I should be looking forward to this, and I am looking forward to this... but my family has cast a huge, enormous, unnecessary shadow over the whole thing.

To help me prepare for this appointment my Gender Therapist asked my GP to perform a huge series of blood tests a couple of weeks ago, to give the GIC doctor a set of baselines that he could use as a comparison when checking my hormone (and other) levels after I start testosterone. Well, one of the results - prolactin - came back ridiculously high; so high that my GP rang me and asked me to come back for another test, because prolactin results that high are usually indicative of a tumour.

I did some research because I was pretty darn worried about what might be happening in my body... and it turns out that high prolactin levels are usually caused by one two things: a) a tumour of the pituitary gland; or b) severe depression, which can cause dopamine levels to drop (dopamine keeps prolactin levels low - if you're not producing enough dopamine, your prolactin level will rise).

So I went home that night and had a heart-to-heart with Hubby, telling him about my dangerously high hormone level and that it might be either cancer or depression... but either way, I really needed the family to cut me some slack for a week or two until I could get my levels re-tested, so that we could figure out what's causing it. You see, my family has been picking on me relentlessly, making sure I know that it's absolutely not acceptable for me to be trans and that I deserve to be punished for throwing their lives into disarray by attempting to finally live my life truthfully and correctly.

To their credit, the family did cut me a bit of slack for a week or so, apart from the odd little slip, and as such I felt almost normal again for the first time in several months. My mood lifted, I found it easier to cope with life's little niggles, and for the first time in ages I didn't feel generally down. I had my prolactin levels retested... and wouldn't you know, after two weeks of not being picked on my my family my prolactin level halved.

My doctor and I were hugely relieved. This indicates that I probably don't have a tumor, and that it was just depression causing this. OK, severe depression is not to be sneezed at, but at least it isn't a tumour! So I told Hubby that night that I was in the clear for cancer but that I'm clearly so badly depressed that it's showing up in my blood chemistry, so I need the family to do whatever they can to stop making me feel so goddamn awful on a daily basis.

As a result, my kids were going quite a bit easier on me.  Most of the really vicious attacks I suffer tend to come from my eldest daughter, who is at a very difficult age. Somehow she managed to rein in most of the bile, and my life actually seemed to be getting a bit better. I was hopeful that if we could keep this up, we could actually return to some measure of normality in our lives... and my brain chemistry could start correcting itself so I don't have to feel so fucking suicidal all the time.

But Hubby wasn't done tormenting me yet. Oh, no - not at all. He had yet another major trauma for me, just because he felt like being a fucking dick. That's the point at which he revealed that he wanted to take my kids away from me for a week, without my consent or prior knowledge.

He's doing this deliberately. He's doing everything he can to alienate me from my own family and it's tearing me apart. I hate him so much now, and I deeply, deeply regret having been stupid enough to marry him. I should've just used him to get the kids and then kicked him to the kerb when his behavour started to deteriorate... although in all fairness, if I'd done that I wouldn't have had my second child, because he started being a dick during my first pregnancy. When I first met him he seemed like a nice guy, but he's turned into such an oxygen thief over the years that I can no longer stand the fact that he's on the same planet as me.

So after my breakdown I was surprisingly OK for a couple of days. I seemed unusually calm and unemotional, and it took me four days to figure out why I've become so calm about the whole damn thing. It isn't that I've accepted it; rather, I'm just using the tricks I learned growing up trans to compartmentalise & push aside the deep pain I feel about this situation, so that I can just ignore it and attempt to live as normally as possible. Isn't it amazing what sort of tools you can gain because you grew up having to hide your gender dysphoria and the pain that it causes you?

He took the kids away on Saturday. And they're having a fantastic time. Without me. Fucking A.

I don't want him back in my house again.

When 'family' doesn't include me

So last night, completely out of the blue, Hubby decided to drop a bombshell on me.

Before I describe said bombshell, I'd like to point out that we have tentatively agreed to continue living in the same house until our kids have left school, which will be several years from now. We agreed that it might become difficult for us to remain sleeping in the same bedroom, let alone the same bed (to which I helpfully suggested that he's welcome to sleep in the shed any time he likes!) so there's a very good chance that one of us may move out within the next year or so. But we agreed that that person would move somewhere close by so that we can continue sharing joint custody of our kids with as little disruption to their lives as possible. The bottom line is: we're trying to continue functioning as a family unit until the kids leave school.

With that in mind... imagine my distress last night when Hubby announced out of the blue that he'd decided to book a family holiday in a couple of weeks' time... but I'm not invited.

Let those words sink in. A family holiday. With one very important member of the family deliberately and specifically excluded.

To say I was furious would be the understatement of the century. I was absolutely incandescent.

This is the third time he's done something like this to me, i.e. arranged something special for the family whilst deliberately excluding me. The first time was last Xmas, when he announced that he'd be taking our kids to see his parents on Xmas morning but that I wasn't welcome to accompany them. The second time was over Easter, when he did exactly the same thing. The third time's the charm though, and instead of simply being hurt like I was the previous two times, I turned my pain outwards and pushed it back towards its source: him. 

I tackled him on various levels:

• That it is completely unacceptable, especially in light of the fact that we're doing our best to function as a cohesive family unit, for him to exclude me from a family get-together.
• That I'm utterly astonished at how he can think it's OK to treat me in this way, considering how upset I was at Xmas and Easter when he did something similar. He is repeatedly hurting me in exactly the same ways.
• That he really hasn't thought this through and hasn't considered the big picture, because I'm furious beyond belief at his decision and how does he think our kids will react to the news when they see how hurt and angry I am at the way he's treating me? (it's impossible for me to hide this)
• That he has absolutely no right to make unilateral decisions regarding our children and then inform me about them after the fact (or more commonly, for me to find out from the kids themselves). I am as much their parent as he is and I demand to be consulted on all important decisions.
• That he has put me in an impossible situation, because although he requires my consent to take the kids anywhere for an extended period (such as on holiday), he's made it impossible for me to withhold that consent without looking like 'the bad guy' in front of our kids. Because if I do so, I'm the one who ruined their holiday.

I told him that it isn't rocket science: all he has to do is talk to me before making any decisions regarding the kids. That's it. Simple, eh?

A year ago I would've just adopted the victim mentality: "Why does he always treat me this way?". But what's interesting about last night's little extravaganza is that I had the courage to call him on his bullshit and make him take responsibility for his actions. In the end, after calming down the kids, he said to me: "Boy, I'm really shit at this, aren't I?".

To which I could only - wholeheartedly - agree.

London Pride 2013

Warning: one of the pics might be slightly NSFW

On Saturday 29 June, I travelled to London with my friend Jayne and her dog, 'Poopie', to march in the Pride in London Parade, along with half a million other LGBT people & our allies.

From left to right: Jayne, 'Poopie' and FTM Diaries.

There were some incredibly diverse groups participating in the parade. Amongst them were big corporations such as Google, Tesco, BP, Microsoft and Facebook; public organisations such as the British Armed Forces, the Environment Agency and ambulance, fire & police services; and religious groups including Christians Together At Pride, Imaan (LGBT Muslim Support Group), Keshet (LGBT Jews) and not forgetting GALHA (LGBT Humanists).

The atmosphere was wonderful: everyone was in a good mood, from the participants, to the stewards, to the police, to the people who turned up to cheer us on. And the people who were cheering us on were wonderfully varied. Sure, there were plenty of LGBT people of all ages, shapes & sizes cheering us from the sidelines... but there were plenty of people from other walks of life too. My favourites were an elderly (straight) couple cheering enthusiastically as we passed them... and this wonderful Muslim mother in a hijab whose son was covered in LGBT stickers, including two LGBT Humanist stickers (if that doesn't give you hope for the future of this country, I don't know what will):

Hope for the future?

This enterprising participant found a unique answer to that age-old question of 'how will we find each other in this crowd?' (his partner was dressed similarly):

How to spot someone in a crowd...

And this character was the living embodiment of an old South African expression of surprise from back in the 1990s - "Oh, my fucking hat!". Yes, those are dozens of inflated condoms:

Love that hat!

The theme of the day was 'love and marriage', because many of us have been pushing the British Government to fully legalise same-sex marriage. So for me, the absolute highlight of the day was when a lesbian couple with whom we were marching got engaged during the parade. What a perfect day to propose! I'm sure they'll remember it for the rest of their lives.

We had a great time walking through London for several hours, and what really astonished me was the huge numbers of people who took time out of their day to stand at the sidelines and make us feel welcome. It was a brilliant day out and I'm looking forward to my next Pride in a couple of weeks' time.  

But one thing struck me when I got back home: my family was a little put out by the fact that I'd gone off & spent some money on something entirely for myself. I haven't told them exactly what I was doing in London (although I think they might have guessed) because of the hostility & negativity I encounter when I do anything to honour my LGBT identity. London was such a refreshing change from the casual malice I tend to face at home. 

Isn't it strange that I needed to travel more than 100 miles, and be surrounded by hundreds of thousands of total strangers, in order to feel at home - and when I returned to the place where I live I felt like an outsider again?

© All pics & text copyright FTM Diaries 2013.