Good news

My face is clearing up! I've noticed a conciderable difference from the last picture I posted 8 days ago. I also got a haircut which makes me look less greasy in general. I had a little bit of a cold this week so I've had to force myself to lay low. I feel much better today than yesterday, so that's a plus. Next tuesday I have chemo, which is always a good time.
Yesterday I stumbled across this frightening article. (I say frightening because it brings up so many issues, both medically and emotionally, that are hard for anyone to wrap their minds around.) I wasn't going to comment on it, but I feel like I'm posting it so I should.

Pregnant Transman

So what do I think?

It's difficult for me because I want to say good for him. Way to be secure enough with who you are enough to defy every gender boundry known. However, I can't do that. Knowing what I know about the effects of testosterone on a female's reproductive system, I am astounded that his eggs were able to be inseminated. I was reading that there has been countless studies about the effect of testosterone on a fetus and the findings aren't good. More likely than not the child will be intersexed, first of all, among other abnormalities. Psychologically and physically I can't imagine being on testosterone for 8 years, going off it, and having the hormonal influx of a pregnant woman. This situation brings up so many ethical questions as well. Okay, so now we've proven that a "man" can give birth. But should we do it? As someone said in a group I'm in, will the child have to find out in school that humans aren't like seahorses and it's the female of the species that usually give birth? Does his name go on the birth certificate as the mother, and if so, where does his wive's name go? Here we are, questioning the gender markers of simple words such as mother and father. Because technically this man is the mother, because the mother gives birth in our society and therefore has maternal rights.
I'm giving myself a headache ;P
Okay, so I'm going to play my own devil's advocate. I mentioned before that the years of testosterone probably messed up his reproductive system enough to cause birth defects. In a heterosexual "normal" birth, women encounter possibilities for birth defects all the time, whether she's a smoker, it runs in the family, they found the gene for Downs Syndrome, etc. So am I advocating that these women shouldn't give birth? No. These women also don't identify as men, which is what I struggle with.
I identify as a transman. What does that mean? I was born with a female body and I am taking testosterone to correct my hormones. My brain is wired as male. I present myself as male and live my life as such. Men are not wired to have babies, therefore I consider myself not wired to have babies. I did not harvest any of my eggs before beginning hormone treatment and I don't regret that.
This entire issue is much bigger than "Society says women have babies and men don't," because it's not just society: It's science. It's nature. I'm all for being liberal and to each his own, but I have a hard time wrapping my mind around something that literally flips everything on it's head. I think a lot of transpeople are afraid that this situation will do bad things for the community, and people will think "LOOK! They can procreate now! Now they can make more of themselves and TAKE OVER!!" I'm all for pushing the envelope, but when is it too far? I'd love any opinions on this matter because obviously it's taking up a lot of my brain.
And to Thomas Beatie, Congratulations on your baby. I hope everything works out and she is happy and healthy. I'm sure you will make a great parent.

Acne

This is the state of my face from the prednisone. I actually didn't think it was this bad until I took the picture. I have a prescription cream, however like most creams the fine print told me it may not start working for 6 weeks. I can handle the body acne, but the face? C'mon! Damn you, steriods!

I'm such a bad blog updater

Hello and welcome back to As the Tranny Turns! When we last left Sean, he was pumped up on prednisone and wallowing in self pity and loneliness. His mother, the Janet, convinced of his impending death, made herself a nuisance. And now to our show!

The Testosterone Files

I think I mentioned before that my doctor had me discontinue use of testosterone while I was in the hospital. This was done not because the T has anything to do with me being sick, but because testosterone and prednisone are similar structured drugs and he wanted to make sure that we weren't flooding my system. I was off testosterone for about a month and then was able to continue hormone therapy. It's been about a month since continuing and I feel fine. My voice is still a little squeaky from the off/on action.

Facial hair is pouring in. The prednisone has given me HORRIBLE acne which makes me petrified to shave. I'm not quite a monkey yet, but I'm getting there.

Last weekend I went to Worcester to volunteer at the St. Patricks Day Parade with my mother. She's on the committee and I used to help out every year. Then I began my transition, so last year I didn't go. I was nervous because my mother didn't really tell anyone. And she still talks about her "daughter." However, I pass well enough that everyone, whether they had been told her not, saw me and treated me as male. I was also working away from my mother all day which makes it 100% easier. It's her slips and pronouns that tip people off. I had such a good day being myself and helping to run the awards (anyone who has programmed with me in the past, thing battle of the bands judging on crack with old people). Afterwards I told my mom how nice it was when people didn't know and just got to know me for me. She was like, well they knew, and I was like, trust me, if they knew they forgot because they did not know I used to be a girl. I think it's hard for her to imagine someone not knowing because she looks at me and sees a girl. She hates the facial hair - almost as much as she hates my body hair. Last summer she told me she hated hair "even on real men." Thanks mom ;P

The Medical Front

March 4th I had my first round of cyclophosphamide. My mother insisted on taking me. We got lost on the way and were 20 minutes late, but luckily we were going to be there for 6 hours so it didn't really matter. Basically I sit for 6 hours and get a low dose of chemotherapy to treat the lupus. I also get flushed with a LOT of saline fluid and receive a medication that shields the kidney from damage from the chemo. This medication has to be given 4 hours apart, which is why I am there for so long. The day wasn't as long as I had anticipated, although I had taken my adderall and did puzzles all day. They have volunteers that used to be patients there and they come by with drinks, snacks, and lunch. My mother makes a big deal about me getting chemo but i really don't see it as a big deal. I don't even get any side effects from it, except extreme fatigue the next day. My rheumotologist came up so I could sign the consent form and he seems to think that I won't even need the full 6 months of treatment. My levels are looking good and the kidney function has gone up. My next chemo is April 1st, which my mother is attending, After that I told her that I'm doing it by myself. Honestly I don't mind people coming with me. Just not here. She puts additional stress on me and I need to learn to say no to her. I'm not twelve anymore and I don't think she understands that. I get that I'm her kid and that this is a scary time for her, but if her being crazy Janet is impacting my recovery, she's not helping. I was lucky enough to get all three of my next doctor appointments on the same day, which I mentioned to her in passing. I got a text from her saying that she could go with me if I wanted. I told her that, No, I'm good. Haven't heard from her since ;P I'm trying to let her be as involved as I can without driving me crazy.

Other happenings

I'm become best friends with the Pollard Memorial Library of Lowell. I went yesterday and read the entire recent issue of Time. I've discovered audio books. When I was in Boston last week I listened to The Pearl by John Steinbeck. By the end of the day just by listening to my ipod I had read an entire book. Next I'm going to see how Stephen King's The Colorado Kid translates into audio. I've been reading a lot of different books including poetry. I've also been writing in my paper and pen journal, which I take with me everywhere. It has it's own spot in my backpack. I write anything and everything.

I'm addicted to Subway. There is a Subway right near the library. They have daily sandwich specials, a value meal with chips and a drink for $3.99. I have the sandwiches of the day memorized. I usually hang out in Subway for an hour when I go, eating and writing, writing and eating. Mostly writing because the 6 inch sub doesn't last long.

I found lately that I have to be careful with how much energy I'm using. Usually when I get back from the library I'm exhausted. This Wednesday I forced myself to stay in the house and do nothing. I was miserable all day because I was bored. And when I'm bored I tend to eat everything in the house from the prednisone. I think I need to work out some sort of a schedule for myself. I'm thinking of working in some concrete writing time that will force me to write, or at least sketch out something to write.

Until next time, thank you for watching As the Tranny Turns!

This sounds about right

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Oxycodone and Cyclophosphamide

I started writing again. Nothing impressive, just some character development and a little storyline. Last week I wrote a little bit in McDonalds, which was actually a great place to write. My hand has been cramping up from my bad joints so unfortunately I had to stop. I also started a sort of journal, mostly of doctors appointments and train rides.
My back has been bothering me so everyonce in awhile I pop an oxycodone at night. As I did tonight. The only problem with this is that I become a little loopy yet really clear-headed. And my back stops hurting.
Had an appointment with the kidney doctor yesterday. Lab work shows the damage to my kidneys is being repaired. He told me that the doctors understand that the next 6 months are going to suck for me because of all the medication and I'm going to feel pretty bad most of time. He's hoping after the initial 6 months they can go easier on me, but from what he said I'm going to be on treatment for quite some time.
It's time for my second treatment of cyclophosphamide, which is an IV chemo that is used to treat cancer and autoimmune diseases. My appointment is tuesday at 10 and my mother is coming with me. Yes, Janet is coming to the doctor. That should be a children's book. She really wants to come. The last time I saw her she was convinced I was dying, so I figure it could be good for both of us. First of all, I save money because she's driving in and secondly I don't have to go to the first appointment by myself. I'll be receiving the treatment for 6 hours. But I get a bag lunch. Woo! ;P
Today was a really tired day. I did errands in the morning and by 1pm I took a 2 hour nap. I'm still exhausted and will probably go to bed soon. I'm currently reading 3 books. I should finish one soon.

Thats all for now. I'm sure I'm missing something. Next time, then.

Bloody knees and old men

I've been thinking that it may be therapeutic for me to update my blog more often. I want to start writing again because as many of you know it is damn near impossible for my ADHD brain to put thoughts on paper. And impossible if I wait too long.

Thursday I had a doctor’s appointment with my primary care, Kevin. Off I go early in the day to kill two birds with one stone. 1) I have the original appointment and 2) I have to get my blood work done at Beth Israel anyway. On the way to catch the bus I manage to slide (literally holding onto the railing) down my stairs and, just when I thought I was fine, slipped on the ice at the bottom. Afraid to miss my train, I leave anyway and try to deal with the blood using my glove. Unfortunately I was wearing khakis and my blood is a little bit thinner than normal, so I continued my day with a bloodbath on my left knee. Needless to say nobody messed with me ;)

One of the side effects of the 60mg of prednisone I take daily is that I eat all the time. It's really annoying and something I have to watch out for. However considering I lost 12lbs in one month not many people seem to be too concerned about it. There is a food court right near Beth Israel and I had been daydreaming about a foot long subway sandwich for days. After getting my sandwich, chips, and some root beer and gaping at the ridiculous price (Almost $10! ARE YOU SERIOUS??) I put half the sandwich away for later and ate lunch. Right as I finished I got a phone call.

It's the lady from social security inquiring about my online disability form. I explained to her that I was going to make an appointment, but she said she only works on these claims Tues and Thurs and next week she would be on vacation. Right now it is! I was on the phone with truly and nice woman, probably around my age for one hour and 13 minutes in a food court answering questions from my ENTIRE 10 years of work history to if I hide money under my mattress. The best thing about this is that I should be getting a packet in the mail that I can sign, send back, and get this process rolling. The bad news is that it normally takes 3-4 months for a medical decision to be made and there is a very good chance of getting denied and having to appeal it. Ugh.

After the phone call ends (and my phone starts to die) I realize I have less than an hour to get my blood taken and get to Back Bay (for anyone who knows where Beth Israel is, this is a little bit of a hike.) Oh, and my knee is killing me from the earlier spill. So I power limp to get my blood taken, give my urine, let the tech ooh and sigh at the state of my bruised veins, and power limp back to the T stop. I got to Downtown Station to switch to the orange line at 3:16. My appointment is at 3:20. I called the doctor’s office to let them know I would be late.

I roll into the office 10 minutes late and am told that I have to call my insurance company because I never officially switched my primary care to Kevin. Apparently Network Health just gave me a random doctor in Worcester because I used my mother's address. So I get on the line and I can't hear the woman, then I go on hold. Well of course at that time my doctor is ready. So I hang up.

This was the first time since I was in the hospital that I got to see my doctor so that was nice. He told me that when he first looked at the chest x-ray from before he hoped my body would bounce back from it. This made me think it was altogether way worse than I thought. He seemed pleased with the way my body was functioning, how everything sounded, and the way I was responding to the meds. He also has been doing a lot of research on the effects of T and lupus and can't find any. Apparently him and the coordinator of the Transgender program at Fenway will be working on an entry for the journal and be presenting it at a conference. I think that's awesome. He sees no reason why we can't continue the hormones but I guess the steroids have a similar structure so he just wants to make sure the steroids and T won't kill me ;P He said we waited this long a few more days won't kill me. He's concerned about the emotional and physical withdrawal of the T. I've been off it for about a month now. He also told me to be careful if I start thinking people are following me or if people on TV are talking to me. Like if Howie Mandel offers a million dollars just to me. Prednisone is creepy shit.

After getting my blood taken for the 2nd time in a few hours (he wanted to check my glucose because I was complaining of sugar level issues due to the prednisone and how they were giving me insulin in the hospital) and getting a shot of vitamin B-12 I get back on the phone with the insurance. Apparently my request went through the first time. Sweet.

It's funny thinking of this as a long weekend because now every weekend is long to me. I went to the library last week and got a library card so I could take out books. I've never been in a situation where I literally have nothing to do. This morning I cleaned the bathroom from top to bottom. My cat didn't know there was water in the tub and, as I was washing off the rubber duckies, he wanted to play and jumped in. I don't think he'll make that mistake again. I'm also having trouble, as mentioned before, with eating everything in sight. Another thing that makes this difficult is that I can't tell if it's all from the prednisone or if I'm eating because I'm bored. I think it's a mix.

I'm also very limited by the amount of physical activity I can do. Yesterday in the AM I walked just under half an hour to the grocery store, shopped, and then walked the same distance back with a backpack filled with food. Back in my normal healthy days that wouldn't have fazed me but it completely knocked me out. In bed by 10. I'm going to have to figure out things that I can do that are low energy, or something I can do outside a few times a week.

And then I think about the monthly doses of cyclaphosamine (essentially a low low dose of chemo for my kidneys.) Because the only one I've had I was in the hospital and literally up all night and hallucinating, I don't know how this is going to affect my energy. I'm very concerned about becoming a shut in and depressed. The only think I miss about UPS is the social atmosphere I had on a daily basis. I know I'm not the most social person in the world, but I really want to work on that. Especially now when my day is built around my cat's eating habits.

The New Hampshire Telegraph has been publishing a series called In Transition on the transgender community on the front page of the Sunday paper. I just read the second installment today and I think they are doing a good job. They have been focusing on male - to - female transfolks and even did a story on a therapy group they have. In my experience it is much harder for an mtf to transition both physically and into society. They also posted an article that focused on why some psychiatrists believe that gender identity disorder is a legitimate mental illness and should be treated as one, that is we should be treated mentally and be taught to be comfortable in the bodies we were born in. It also talked about religious persons saying that God specifically said man and woman and to reject the sex God gave you is to reject God. Well, I've come to terms with the fact that there is no way I would ever be comfortable in a female body. If my doctor told me I could never take T again I would be devastated but I would also be grateful for the time I had and try to live my life as a man as normally as possible. It's not like I'd be like, well I gave that one a try, bring on the dresses!

This is a really long post, so I'm going to stop talking now :)


PS - I just looked at the title of the entry and noticed I forgot to mention the old man. When I was walking to the grocery store yesterday I came across an old man stranded behind some ice on the sidewalk. He asked if I could help him and of course I did. I told him to be careful of the ice. He told me thank you and that he hoped I never got old. It made me smile.

Sitting and... sitting

I've been out of the hospital for a week and my energy level is improving. I quit my job at UPS because of the health concerns posed by this recent diagnosis. On Wednesday I had an appointment with the Rheumatologist, who is the nicest little Asian man. He essentially just went over my diagnosis and made sure nothing new had popped up. It was actually worse than I was aware, being stage 4 kidney involvement aka kidney failure. I've been told that it is all reversible. I also received the pneumonia vaccine and the flu shot (now that I am immunocompromised and all.)
I'm on a type of extremely aggressive treatment for the kidney damage called cyclophosphamide. It's a low dose of chemotherapy that I get once a month for at least the next 6 months intravenously. One week and two weeks after this is also after to get my blood taken and urinalysis. Having gotten this before I was discharged from the hospital, after my appointment I went to get the labs run. Unfortunately I didn't know about the urine and I had to pee really bad so I got rid of it prematurely.
I think the woman who took my blood came over on a Viking ship. She was a big woman with a very thick, almost Nordic accent. She apologized for her broken English but then started cooing at me like a puppy when she saw how bruised my arms were from prior blood work. Having this woman coo "Oh your poor boo boo!" was the highlight of my day. Well, until I asked her what to do if I couldn't produce any urine. She looked confused and slowly tried to tell me how to pee in the cup. I interrupted her and let her know that I was dry. She told me to try anyway or come back another day. So I left with the cup.
I went to see my therapist on Friday. Because of the nature of my illness and all the drs appointments and treatment it has been advised that I can't work. Great. So now I'm all stressed out because I have 0 income and have to go to the social security office to file for disability. Any normal person could file online, however I never changed the name on my social security card so all my information would be invalid. I'm trying not to worry too much about it. I'll just go on Monday, explain my situation, and see what they say.
The hardest part for me right now is not going crazy from boredom. At some point if it looks like the disability thing is going to go through I need to figure out what I'm going to do with my life without having a job. I can only clean the house so much and my myspace profile can't be updated everyday. Its frustrating feeling like my health has tripped me up once again. But at least this time I know I have to listen to my body or it'll get worse.
The high levels of prednisone I'm on make me really hungry. I can eat and a eat and eat and really never get full. But then I can't tell if I'm hungry or I'm eating because I'm bored. Whine whine whine ;P
Oh yes, and because of the treatment consisting of steroids it's been three weeks since my last shot of testosterone. I need to make an appointment with my doctor so we can sit down and figure out what the best course of action is. According to my therapist (who works with my doctor) he said that my diagnosis is really the best we could have asked for, so that's good.
I guess I'll just see what happens and try not to worry too much.