I finally have the chance to sit down and relax a bit and write my blog this week which is a bit delayed because I have spent the last eight days traveling and helping my partner Paula with her Gender Confirmation Surgery in New Hope Pa which also included a trachea shave. I spent five long days at the hospital (Lower Bucks Hospital) with her attempting to be the wonderful caregiver she was for me a couple months ago that is for sure. Care giving is a special talent and I am not as good with it as Paula is but I worked very hard at being the best I could be. Paula did not come through her procedures as well as I did due to some abdominal and dietary issues and more pain and a bit less strength on her part. However, as I write this blog she appears to be on the slow road to recovery and return to strength and in time a full healing from the dramatic undertaking she has undergone in her efforts to conform her body to her soul and essence!
Just like the week I spent at Lower Bucks Hospital Paula was accompanied by three other girls undergoing the process along with her under the skillful eye and hands of Dr. Christine McGinn. This week, in addition to Paula, was Dana a delightful lady from Maryland who works for Chase Bank, a young and pretty lawyer from the heart of the Bible belt in Keri from Raleigh- Durham NC and finally Renee, a company manager from Connecticut who was the same age as Paula. Dana was supported all week by her mother and sister who are very supportive of her and travelled from Florida to be with her and help her through this delightful but challenging endeavor! Renee had some girlfriends with her on the day of her surgery and she will have others throughout her week of recovery at the hotel. Paula of course has me and some local friends have stopped by too. Kari had her brother for 24 hours to get to the hotel from the hospital but no one for the week of her surgery and no one the week after her surgery. Her family has some issues with what she has done but she comes from a strict religious background and conservative Republican family so it is to be expected. I spent some time talking with each of them through the week and helping them where I could. Kari was alone so I tried to check on her often as was Renee after her surgery day. I got to find out about how their surgeries went and their lives and families as well as their life and journeys as transgendered individuals.
The stories we shared we not uncommon although we all have our own journey in this struggle to find peace as being who we are even if our anatomies needed adjustments to reflect that essence. Many common threads mixed in with a smattering of differences here and there and the range of ages. We all exchanged e-mails and phone numbers and I checked in with each of them each day while attending to Paula’s primary care. Dana had her mother and sister with her who have done quite well in adjusting to having another daughter and new sister. They were quite pleasant people to meet and my primary discussions were with Dana on what was to come in her progress and recovery having been down this road only a few short months ago. I also discussed this with Kari and Renee as well as they were curious as to what was to come and how I progressed after mine. Renee and I had a great discussion on how transgendered people are viewed by Native Americans since she is part Native American. We are revered in their culture and become the elders and respective spiritual leaders in the tribes. Wow- what a radical concept being viewed as something above a third class citizen! Kari and I had an interesting political discussion in as much as she is pretty conservative Republican like any good Baptist from the south and I am of course a liberal. I respected her opinions and defended mine as well as it should be but there was no animosity whatsoever. Kari has no one to get her food, supplies or take her to the doctor’s office for follow up examinations and consults. So I assumed those duties happily. She is my sister and I care about her and all of us in this community.
One of the nurses on the floor, and by the way they were all the same delightful people I had during my stay on the wing affectionately known as the “tranny wing”, asked me one day as I was coming out of Kari’s room after she looked up on her computer something for Dana as I was shuttling it between the two of them “how do you know these other girls? She knew I was there with Paula but did not know what my connection was to Kari, Renee and Dana. My connection to these girls as well as the sisters who visited Paula after supporting me during my process (Terry and Alice) and Kate and Lindsey who came over to visit with Paula is that they are my sisters! Sometimes those that are outside our community do not understand why we connect like we do even though we have no relationship to the other girl. We are connected by a common thread and bond that flows between all of us. We face many of the same challenges and rejections that flow our way from society, work and families as former identified (by outsiders) as “male” due to the wrong parts who transition to live as the women who we are – a concept that still completely blows the average male’s mind! We see another sister who is going through the same emotions, struggles, therapies, surgeries and such as part of our transitional process. Put six or seven of us together in one place and we will generally interact with the others for support and understanding and confirmation of who we are as people. We share our experiences and triumphs and tragedies and we grow from each other as people. Essentially we are one big sorority of sisters who are bound together by the dark and troubled secrets that kept our true selves wrapped tightly in a shell that never fit who we were as people. We are a sorority of support and understanding and love which helps each of us grow and each week or month I meet another girl on her journey and we connect as sisters held together by this bond. It is good to be part of this sorority and we are members of it for life.
