I don’t know if I was prophetic or ironic, but the birthday card I just received from Mom read:
Dream big. Really big.
Do not settle for small wishes on your birthday.
If only she knew… Actually she will know all too soon, since I plan on having The Talk with her tomorrow. Working with my therapist last week, I finally admitted how much that scares me — Mom is really the only family member I care about (my brother let his wife push me and Mom out of their lives, and I don’t care for my other wingnut relatives). In some ways it’s less scary than coming out to HR, since while I can live without family origin, I couldn’t live without a job. But still….
Though for me the worse case scenario isn’t that she cuts me off, but rather there’s six months of trench warfare over my transition during the next six months. Neither of which is likely to happen, but you never know. She’s seemed supportive, but we’re a Scandinavian-German family where a lot goes unsaid. And obviously it affects how people see her in a way that my bigendered living hasn’t.
On some happier notes:
I got a facial this weekend and the salon owner, who I’ve known for years, exclaimed that my skin is now so soft that it feels like a woman’s skin. I’ve thought that my skin has felt considerably soften, but it was nice to get confirmation from a trained esthetician.
This week also marked 75 hours of electrolysis, my upper lip, chin and cheeks are all cleared, except for the inevitable regrowth, which fortunately is sparse, light, and fine, so you can’t see it, even if feeling it drives me crazy. So it’s really only the neck and under the jaw that have yet to have an initial clearing. For whatever reason, my electrologist was eager for me to due an extra session over the weekend before she takes off on vacation this week, saying she was really committed to the project. Not sure if that means she thinks we’re rapidly approaching the point where my entire face will have reach initial clearance. Maude I hope so, since I really, really hate having to let it grow during the week — the downside of my beard having gone white is that it’s hard for her to see it. I suspect no one actually notices, but I definitely notice how furry my neck looks by the end of the week.
Saw the hormone doctor Thursday and he doubled my estrogen dosage again, so hopefully I’ll start seeing some more significant effects.
While I was there, I also mentioned that eventually I’d need the physician’s letter for my legal name/gender change. I honestly was expecting to just have a quick discussion about when he would be willing to do so, but much to my surprise he wrote one of the spot. So theoretically — no, in actuality — I could go to the courthouse tomorrow and start the paperwork. I don’t know why but that actually messed with my head a bit. Guess it’s another one of those “shit’s getting real, real fast” moments.
Mostly I’m a bit exhausted at this point. June was really stressful for a variety of reasons, and in particular there were some significant fires at work last week, although the good side is that people are starting to realize just how overbooked I am. Something I need to talk to my manager tomorrow when he’s back from vacation, since I’m supposed to take on yet another project, and it looks like the fire drills are going to continue for the next couple weeks.
Unfortunately, the long weekend isn’t really recharging me. Partly, I ended up getting sick after pulling an all-nighter on Wednesday. Partly the stress about the upcoming discussion with Mom. Partly this weekend has been reminder that along with transition I need to make more life changes around building up a social life that’s not 30 miles away. Though it’s a bit of Catch-22, since part of me is reluctant to work hard on establishing new friendships while I’m still in transition, and partly I just don’t have a lot of energy to deal with non-transition stuff at the moment. Hopefully once I’ve talked with Mom about whether, or when, I need to make a trip down to OC to talk to her face-to-face, I can schedule a long weekend out of town to help me recharge.