FFS, the Long Dark Night and Life at Camp 517

Well its Day Five of the Camp 517 here in cold and snowy Boston –like that matters since I have only been outside the base camp for the ten minute trip to transfer to the camp from Boston Medical Center where I underwent FFS (Facial Feminization Surgery) on Thursday January 22nd. It is a procedure that will dramatically change my life- maybe more so than my upcoming GRS (Gender Reassignment Surgery) in May of this year. The latter will enable me to change the gender marker on such documents as my birth certificate, driver’s license and passport but what I went through last week changes the way I look as well as how others in society will view me. As long as my voice work continues no longer can I be made by those in society simply because my forehead or brows appear to be masculine for they have been redefined through the outstanding skills of Dr. Jeffrey Spiegel to be exceedingly feminine. While the GRS is very important in changing one’s gender to match your inner soul, in reality no one but a few people will ever see my genitalia however tons of people will see my face in public every single day interacting with the world for the remainder of my life.
As a result of the complicated surgery performed the forehead is now smooth and flat through grinding and contouring and packing and plastering and the brows are raised to accentuate my baby blues. My nose was redefined by the surgeon to fit the new forehead and brow, made smaller and turned up at the end a bit to flare the nostrils upward. Dr. Spiegel was happy with all the work but he was particularly pleased with his touches to the nose. At this point it is still hard to tell since it wrapped and shielded. It is the one piece of work I have not fully seen since it is shielded for a few more days. My lips are fuller and turned up toward the nose and my jaw line and neck are smoother and narrower and make my chin more defined and more contoured to that of a woman. Some of this has been difficult to see because of swelling but that will resolve in a couple more weeks. In time, I will be presentable but in months when things really settle down I will see the full effects of the work. Regardless, I will look different than I ever have and not as easily mistaken for the wrong gender anymore. There is no going back now and I did not want to. Despite the extensive pain and aftercare I would need I was so very calm as I walked into that hospital that Thursday morning – as calm as I had ever been for about to something as dramatic as I was about to do considering its consequences-both short and long term on my life. I had been at peace with this decision for months. I have found peace with myself and my life as who I truly am as a person…Melissa. Now I will look far more like the person I always saw myself as but hid away from so many for so long. If there were any of the old “shell fragments left they got clobbered by ball bats for sure. I had never been under anesthesia before in my life so I had no idea what to expect. I laid there in Preparation room as the IV was started and talked with nurse and two med students who were observing. They were curious about transgendered people and wanted to know more and neither had seen this surgery before. We had a wonderful chat about being transgendered, FFS, GRS and all kinds of issues. I remember answering some questions raised by the anesthesiologist and going over final plans with Dr. Spiegel and giving thumbs up after removing my contacts. I never remember even seeing the hallway to the operating room much less the operating room itself or counting or anything..…one minute its 7:45 am and the next I am back in recovery on same bed and its 3:30 PM although I did dream briefly about rainbow colors…..the next thing I know I am being awaked by the voice of the nurse …..”Melissa” ……
The “night of living hell” that followed is a night I shall always remember for as long as I live. That night was the period of time following my surgery and “awaking for the first time in recovering room lying on back with my head wrapped in bandages and a device that felt like my head had been placed in a tight vice. I could see a slit of white light from right eye and nothing from my left. Sounds around me included machines and nurses talking to others and doctors mumbling. My head hurt so much and drugs still dripped in my body. I was finally taken to my patient room and reunited with Paula and the dreadful, long, dreary night began. I would not have made it through that night BUT for the love and patience of my sweet Paula. My sweet, tender girl got me through that dreadfully long night! I slept maybe two hours that night between 4:30 PM and 6:30 AM- the point at which they finally came in to change the bandages. Paula said I fell right to sleep after the removed the binder and changed the dressing for a few more hours. How could I sleep? Wrapped so tightly I felt I would choke on the blood that dripped into my throat and made me gag and the binding so tight it made it hard to even swallow. With my mouth so dry and lips so swollen I could not suck fluids and pouring in anything in while I lay down caused me to spit it up and choke. Tears streamed down my battered face. I could not breathe due to the swelling and clogging of my restructured nose.
I only survived by Paula distracting me with talk, spooning me ice chips into my parched mouth, holding my hand and rubbing my feet with massages. I knew if I could just hold on until 6:30 AM in morning the staff would come and take off the extremely tighter binder. But13-14 hours was a long, dark and painful time. The minutes passed so slowly and I was lost in darkness. I begged for it to be 6:30 AM. It was the longest night of my life for sure. However, Paula’s love and devotion for me saved me that night and in the morning I felt so much better when they removed the restrictive binding I actually ate a good breakfast after dozing back to sleep for a while – a soft one for sure but a good one with eggs, applesauce juice and milk. I had survived the roughest night and each day thereafter was to get a little better. Paula helped get me ready after another round of food at lunch which including cream of chicken soup and pudding. Delicacies for sure !! Now, it was time to head to base camp…otherwise known as “Camp 517” for recovery. I named it in honor of our room number.
The recovery has been difficult though as I have not left the confines of “Camp 517” as I have affectionately renamed the fortress Paula and I have built here in our hotel suite nearby the hospital. I feel like some criminals on the run hiding out and holing up in some room somewhere to escape the search of law enforcement officials. Paula and I have built base camp here. We have food and water and our supplies seem to be holding up well. I have a vaporizer going 24/7 which keeps my passages open and after a few days I stop spitting up blood. By day three following the surgery I was even back to drinking my java which helped get me “regular” again along with some pills. One of the “great” side effects of anesthesia is that it produces a bit of clogging of the old pipes and I was under the stuff for about seven hours of work on the operating table. Food is cooked as needed as my hours have been irregular for sure as I slipped in and out of drug induced comas all through the days and nights sometimes sleeping at 2:00PM and wide awake at 3:30 AM. We occupy our time by reading books, magazines and playing cards (Paula and I have the longest running Gin Rummy game going in history) We watch TV or we catch up a bit on the computer or listen to music. I live a life this week of regular icings, soft foods, struggling with stitches in places you usually don’t find them, applying creams and lotions and resting. My schedule is so out of whack I am usually up by 3:30 in morning each night and walking around in my wrapped bruised and swollen head I look like I am in the walk of the zombies from some cheap horror B-movie. I hope each day I slowly spin out of this and feel better as the new face takes shape. It seems like that is happening but slowly…..
I also want to thank all my friends who have called and wished me well or left messages for me on the computer or e-mail or who have sent me cards and flowers. I have many wonderful friends and a few remnants of my old family who have supported me. There are others in my family I wish would call to wish me well but that is not to happen. Paula has been a wonderful nursemaid, getting ice from the ice machine, changing the dressings and helping me bathe and cooking some of the food as well as going out for some supplies. . She is the most loving person and her love is endless. Paula loves her friends, her family and she loves her girl Melissa and I know I would not have survived this process without her. She not only provided assistance but also her love and comfort. Time will heal the wounds and each day I get a little better. More ice, more rest, more medicine and another visit to the doctor await. Swelling and bruising dissipate and scars fade over time. Soon the world will see the “new” Melissa for the first time….. ..…however, she is the same girl that has always been there ….but now the world will see her more easily and the shell that once covered and hid her for so long was chiseled away at BMC at the hands of Dr. Spiegel and all the wonderful staff there, through the long, slow recovery at Camp 517 and the caring warmth of my love Paula.

Pictured above is me taken by Paula three hours after my long stint on the OR Table ..........thoughts include ..."how many rounds did she go with the champ?"..........."who awoke the mummies?" ............"Did anyone get the license of the semi, truck, train or bus that hit that poor girl?"....

Chiseling Stone(head)

Have you ever watched an artist take a block of stone and with chisels and hammers he or she is able to carve out a life–like face such as a bust of some President or other famous person? Out of this piece of this stone, the talented artist is able to create something of significance and grace to be viewed by the public. As I sit here in Boston and a couple days away from the FFS procedure that will radically alter my look and make my hard stone-like face into something that is a bit more presentable of a person who now lives their life happily as a woman, I am drawn to think of this analogy. The image of the stone is most appropriate for this lady for many reasons.

When I was back in my college days, which were probably my greatest period of repression of my inner essence and soul in my entire lifetime, I joined a fraternity like many young college males of that period. Fraternities were in a great revival period then following the release of “Animal House” that summer and one nearly got sick of the constant call for Toga parties. Let’s face it, all one needed was plenty of beer and alcohol (bring on the “Purple Jesus”-as the name implies the theory was that if you drank enough of it you would see Jesus) and some bed sheets and plenty of eight tracks (yes I know I am dating myself there) and you had a ready made party! The tradition in the fraternity was that many times you ended up with a nickname just as many of the characters in the movie did like Otter or Pluto. I was one of those fortunate souls who ended up with up one and I did not realize then it would be most appropriate today on the eve of my facial reconstruction. My fraternity nickname was “Stonehead”.

The name fit for many reasons. First, I was bit on the ‘stubborn side” as they say due to my family heritage. (Let’s face it- the Scotch and Germans are not known for their flexibility and a combination of both was indeed a fiery mixture for this young “lad”). Secondly, I was also know for my certain partaking of a substance that resembles oregano and came in baggies and was rolled or stuffed into a pipe. I think you get the drift here. I truly believe that my excessive drinking and partaking of substances during these years was the result of me drowning out the deep dark secret inside of me but that is another story. Finally, the name was also found appropriate one Sunday afternoon during our college fraternity’s intramural football game against our rival. I played middle linebacker on the team and my friend who had been given the name Bonehead played defensive tackle. Again, the rough and tough tumble of the game and the beer drinking that followed it for four years did wonders for covering up my deep dark secret that I hid from the world. On one play, Bonehead and I decided we were going to stick it to the runner from the rival team and we converged on him with full force and vigor. However, he eluded us at the last moment and instead Bonehead and I collided into each other head on and we knocked each other out cold on the field, Hence, the nickname was born in my Freshman year……Stonehead.

Well Stonehead is about to get chiseled by an artist of great skill and stature. Dr. Spiegel is one of the very few in this hemisphere who has perfected an FFS technique that gives femininity to a face especially in the area of contouring of the forehead and brow and my ugly mug is one that cries out for it for sure. I am sure much time will be spent on this area of Stonehead’s reconstruction trying to establish a feminine flow to area that now more closely resembles the young linebacker than the middle aged lady for sure. He plans to bring out my eyes which are one of the few nice features on my face. The extensive work on the brow and forehead also necessitates the reworking of my nose to fit my new brow and forehead. The work on the lower part of the face is not quite as extensive although the lipo on the neck and the mandible jaw contouring are some of the more difficult and painful procedures in this process. The final work will be augmenting and lifting my lips to give them a more feminine look.

All of this extensive work will be done while I am under anesthesia for the first time in my life. I was told I will drift off into sleep and it will seem like that I barely remember closing my eyes and drifting into lala land when I will find myself awaking in the recovery room looking more closely like Frankenstein’s monster than Melissa. For days I will drift in and out of sleep and crying out in a weak pathetic voice that my “nurse maid” Paula either get me more drugs or shoot me- based primarily I guess on whether the gun or the painkillers are closer for her! I will be bruised, swollen, battered, discolored, patched with stitches, wrapped and bound and withering in pain. I know I will test my love’s patience and let’s hope she forgets to pack any gun! Hopefully, some days later, things will calm down some and I will not look quite as bad and more like someone recovering from an attack with a Louisville Slugger than monster. In time, the stitches will be removed and through applications of creams and jells and much ice, I will be able to walk around in public and not scare people. Maybe a few weeks more and with some makeup I will take the form of average middle aged lady instead of Stonehead!

About the time I really getting it to look half way presentable it will be time to start preparing for another trip to another artist surgeon to reconstruct the other end of my body to conform with my inner soul and true essence as a female. Just as I get handle on this process and recovery it will be time for the finishing touch in augmenting my breasts to fit my body and the process completed physically. The spirit and the body will be one-but my journey will just begin again! I knew that the first six to seven months of the year would be a great physical challenge to me and I have been preparing my body for the same. The second half of the year and life beyond as Melissa will be as equaling challenging for me-but from a mental standpoint. I sometimes wonder and I think I am convinced that this test will be even more difficult than the physical changes to occur in the months ahead. I have some time to contemplate such in these recoveries and that is for sure. Get the chisels ready doctor ……….…Stonehead is about to arrive on your operating table and you have your work cut out for sure on this project! I will most definitely test your artistic abilities!!!

Resolve This!

Normally I would have posted this one last week but was so moved by the impact and significance of MILK and activism in our transgendered community, I delayed this one a week to post my thoughts and feelings on the film MILK. However, the turning of the New Year brings me to a point where I should evaluate my life and make some adjustments for the upcoming year. So here it goes …….my New Year’s resolutions for 2009 and they are not in any particular order but more just as they come to my mind.

1. I resolve to be more active in my community and supporting the movement of greater rights and dignity for those in the LGBT communities. I have been involved in the past but not to the extent I could be by any stretch. I want to be more supportive of the NCTE who works so diligently to promote the rights of transgendered community. I want to get involved with Trans Ohio beyond attending some events and writing an article or two. I would like to help in planning of the Trans Ohio Symposium this August, assist in lobbying legislators in Ohio to change the archaic laws regarding changing the birth certificates and gender marker on them even though I thankfully escaped this mess by being born one mile below the Ohio Rover in Kentucky. I also plan to attend with Paula in April the Transgendered Right Lobby Day sponsored by NCTE in Washington where I will work to lobby US Congressman and Senators to support the Hate Crimes bill, ENDA and other legislation to benefit the LGBT community. I am already in progress of setting up a meeting with my US Congressman (a conservative Republican from rural central Ohio) to try and sell him on this legislation I am sure his narrow mind and religious right wing upbringing will lead him to oppose with vigor. That shall not deter me one bit! I also plan to attend rallies where I can and stand with my sisters and brothers in the struggle for rights and dignity of the LGBT community.

2. I resolve to find a career that I love and that makes me want to spring out of bed each day and head off to work and one that provides some benefits and is more full time than I can do now in my piece meal contract work. I know the next six months will be a time of strive and trials for me as I push through two major operations that will radically alter my body to finally conform to my inner soul as a woman. The surgeries and recoveries will put a test on me as well helping Paula get through hers, but when all is done, I will no longer be trying to find work while needing all this time off for surgeries and recoveries. I can emerge as a stronger woman now focused on finding the position that brings joy as well as challenges for me and a steadier stream of income for sure. I have some talents and education as well as passion and with it will be a renewed vigor for new challenges in a career. Hopefully this year will see a recovery from some of the economic mess the current government regime has led our country into these past eight years. The man will go down as one of the worst Presidents to ever hold the office for sure.

3. I resolve to try to repair my relationships with my family who has tossed me into the wind for sure. Often those of us in the transgendered community are made to feel that we “abandoned our families” when in fact it is them who abandoned us. I can understand some anger and confusion and some time to search things out but being ostracized by our families simply because we came out after years of conflict and raging internal battles and told them who we really are as people is not right at all. I use to some conversation with my ex-wife although it was mostly bitter tirades by her but since the day of our divorce my e-mails have gone without response. I have never been told my children’s e-mail addresses and my written cards and letters go to them without any response. Gifts I send are never acknowledged. I am sometimes at a loss over what to do. I feel as if pieces of my heart have been torn out ….in a span of few short years I lost my father, mother and brother to deaths and my children and ex-wife to being cast aside like the past never happened. I must find a way to let time heal some things but I must find a way to reconnect with them for sure. They will find a different person both physically as well as emotionally and spiritually when they do in Melissa. However, the pieces belong back in my heart without question and we belong in each other’s lives.

4. I resolve to continue my spiritual journey. I have struggled for some time on this issue and now that I am out as transgendered it has become even more complex. I am a very open minded liberal thinking humanist/ Christian blend that seeks a place where friendship and love abounds and no one preaches at you but only makes you think out spirituality and the concepts of the Creator and Creation. I seek a place where all are welcomed even those with grave doubts. I seek a church that actively, openly and lovingly welcomes those of us from the LGBT communities and accepts us for who we are as people without condemning us for being such. Paula and I have begun the search and we have found some success. We were particularly impressed by the those at North Congregational UCC in Columbus which opens its doors freely to us and even has a special large exhibit in their hallway to the transgendered community featuring local and national people in the community and a tribute to those who have been victims of death and violence. I was very touched by this indeed.

5. I resolve to strengthen my love and relationship with Paula. I love waking up to her each day and the time we share together. We support each other and accept each other openly. Sometime this year we plan to celebrate our love in a commitment ceremony we hope to share with our friends. By the middle of the year both of us will have some new body parts that will clearly impact our intimacy and will take great patience and love to explore. She is my life and my love and we grow closer together each day. However, I believe we can never stop growing in our relationship for it to continue and I resolve to become more open to exploring and new ideas and to continue to share our thoughts and feelings and we move forward in our lives together.
Well there it is ….a big chunk of resolutions if I must say but all good ones in my quest to live my life to the fullest and with dignity, love, passion and a commitment to my community I am very much a part of in this life. I hope each of you find some things to strive for in this year and beyond and I wish all the peace and happiness to each of you in 2009 and for the many years to come afterward!

Harvey Milk, Closets, Fear and Transgendered Power

Paula and I just got back from viewing an evening out in which we dined at an Irish pub near the OSU campus and took in a movie. The diner was delightful as always love good food and Irish ale and Paula and I chatted about many things in our lives currently. However, despite the fact I love her company and good food and drink, all of that paled in comparison to the movie which we saw- MILK! If you have not seen this film you need to do so my friends! It is an extraordinary and powerful film about the life of Harvey Milk, the first gay man elected to a prominent position when he took office in 1978 in San Francisco. Sean Penn is fabulous in the role of Harvey Milk and clearly captures his essence as a human being. The film is sad at the end because of his tragic, premature death as the result of a man tormented by his own demons (It was suspected Milk’s killer who held the same elected position as that of Milk was a deeply closeted homosexual who tried to live a life of a traditional Irish catholic and “moral” life as a married man with children). The end is a perfect example of the dangers of putting handguns in the hands of mentally disturbed individuals filled with anger and repression and way too much testosterone!

Harvey Milk could have done so much more for the rights and dignity of people if he had not been tragically killed that morning in his own office along with the mayor of San Francisco at that time. The event came shortly after two major victories won by Milk and his allies- the defeat of proposition six which would have made it permissible to fire any school employee in California for being gay or simply supporting the rights of gays as well as the enactment of city wide ordinance protecting individuals from housing and employment discrimination based on one’s sexual orientation. This ordinance has since been amended to include and protect those of the transgendered community. Harvey Milk left a great legacy in the world and many have followed in his footsteps but most importantly he set the example for leadership and changes in our struggle for dignity and human rights.

What I admired most about him was his courage and there is part of the movie where in order to win the tide to defeat proposition six against the likes of a right wing religious zealot and “Nazi” Senator at that time supported, of course, by the likes of Anita Bryant and her “Godly inspired” crusade against rights for gay people. In order to win the vote against the tide of money and power displayed by the so called “Christians” Harvey Milk encouraged his friends and supporters to break down the doors of their own closets and come out to their families and friends as well as their employers so that people could know and connect with a gay person and find out that their sons and daughters and employees were simply people who were gay. According to Harvey Milk the greatest thing holding back the community was the fact that many lived in the closet and only by coming out and coming clean could the movement grow. Power ONLY comes from being free and without power nothing important can ever be accomplished. It takes great courage to let people who you work for and love and care about know who you really are as a person. That courage is what gives you power and with that power much can be accomplished. But courage is what brought about Harvey’s accomplishments personally as well in his movements and causes. It gave him and those that followed and supported him power. I will state this as bluntly as I can put it …… if the transgendered community does not show the same courage we will be left behind in the struggle for dignity and human rights that all people deserve!

So those of us who are transgendered in any way (crossdresser, transvestite, undefined transgendered, pre-op transsexual as well as post- op TS better heed the warning and get out of their damn closets and show some courage and take a voice in our community if we ever want to be able to accomplish anything in this society, achieve power and find ourselves victorious as Harvey and his followers did thirty years ago. The main problem is so many people in the transgendered community live in the closet, fearful of letting other human beings who supposedly love and care about them know about their true selves. So what if your friends desert you and so what if your family casts you aside like some weird freak. As Harvey Milk talks about in the movie….if your friends reject you- they were NOT really your friends and if your family rejects you THEY don’t deserve you! Some of them may later come around and that is great if they do- but do not let the fear of them rejecting you paralyze you and don’t let your family blackmail you into silence because they will cut you off if you come out and come clean. I know I was guilty of the same for so long. The day my ex-wife confronted me she awoke something in me and I decided I needed to come clean. She does not realize the long dormant activist she awoke inside me. Every person I told thereafter gave me more courage and more freedom. I lost friends and family like they were going out of style, BUT I hide from no one and I am truly free. With this freedom, power can come. Fear captures us as humans and the courage found deep inside all of us can overcome that fear and free our soul and our determination to bring about change.

As I have pointed out before transgendered people live in closets both prior to and after transition if they are TS. Cloak and stealth are just more ways to define closets and they keep us from moving forward in achieving rights and dignity for our community. Running and hiding from your past will only leave you without strength and courage and to be quite honest, true stealth and cloak are not really possible in today’s technology driven society. It is a myth! Just for shits and giggles, I used the internet to track down the past history and such for three of my transgendered friends who have transitioned and live fulltime as the men or women they are in their souls. It was done with little effort and almost zero cost. People you are only fooling yourself and no one else if you truly believe you can live in cloak or stealth. The problem in our community and why we will not likely prevail in achieving many of the goals that those in the lesbian and gay communities have and will achieve, is that society only sees a tip of the iceberg of our community and thinks we are a very small, minute group of freaks. Most of the community lies under the water- afraid to emerge from the comfort of the closet, stealth or cloak they have attempted to create in the murky waters below.

We are already a much smaller group than those of the gay and lesbian communities as it is and if most of our community remains hidden, then plain and simply we will find ourselves left out of society and existing with few if any rights and we will have no one to blame but ourselves! Someday someone will tear down your closet and you will be outed but when that day happens and you find yourself with little protections or rights don’t come crying to those who have come clean and let the world know who they really are- whether that be a man who likes to dress and express his feminine side on occasion or a post operative TS who lives life as a man or woman in a gender opposite that of their birth. I am not advocating running around and always announcing yourself to everyone but don’t play the game of denial to those who confront you. We have nothing to be ashamed of as transgendered people. So get out your closets and get living life without fear and with courage. You will feel empowered! Give up your stealth and cloak and be proud of who you are-even your past.

I know many post operative TS who try to pretend they have always been living life in their true gender despite transition. Everyone one of us in the TS community was born either male or female in our outer, genetic gender and we lived life for sometime this way as difficult as it may have been. We transitioned and now life in our true gender but we should not be ashamed of who we are or our past life. I will never be a genetic female no matter how much surgery I incur or hormone compounds I ingest. The very fact I was born genetically male and transitioned to live life as female because it is who I am as a human being means exactly this- I am a transgendered person! I am and always will be transgendered! If I deny who I am as a human being or the existence of part of my life in another gender, even as improper as that past life was to my soul, then I live in shame of who I am as human being. If we act like that in our community then how are we ever to achieve anything in our community or even individually. How are we ever going obtain power? Just as Harvey Milk did in encouraging his community to come out and be open we must do the same to let others know WE EXIST and that we are just people like everyone else: fathers, mothers, spouses, sons and daughters, lawyers, architects, doctors, teachers, bartenders, carpenters, truck drivers and every other profession under the sun- but people who just happen to be transgendered. When we do this we will not only find our personal freedom and power but we will find ourselves accomplishing so much more as a community. “Milk” is about a man’s accomplishments in life when he found his courage and passion for what he believed in and left the confines of his closet at age 40 to live a life without fear and even in his death his work and legacy carried on long afterward. Let’s hope we all find our courage as Harvey Milk did and get involved in moving our push for human rights and dignity forward as transgendered people. Tear down the closet doors and turn off the stealth and our power awaits us!