We are officially 6 weeks in to Shaun's transition with testosterone. Other people are amazed at the changes they are seeing, which is weird because I don't really see it much at all. I guess because I'm so close to it and see him every day that the tiny day to day changes just change to the new "normal". He went in to see the doc and said she was really amazed at the differences already. Most days I do okay. I have my moments. Yesterday morning he told me he found other transmasculine folks who were on testosterone but still identified as non-binary. I kind of went off on a tangent. I mean nothing against what he was saying but let's be honest. In the PC climate, I can wear a dress, high heels and full make up and if I tell you I'm a transman named Jim, you have to respect that and just call me whatever I label myself as, so this is not something based, in any way, on logic or anything really definitive. It's just whatever you want to be called and I roll with it out of respect. I don't understand any of it and would laugh in the face of anyone else who claimed to. "Transgender" is like saying "Autistic". I mean it can mean a lot of different looking things that are all lumped into a very general category. Also from what research I've been doing, a transgender person changes their mind over time about what needs to be done for them to feel comfortable in their own skin. They may identify one way and a year or 5 later it's something totally different. I mean that's valid, but also makes any kind of predictable category impossible. It's just go with the flow... and I think that's probably a good general lesson in life and finding happiness in it. Let go of rigidity and go with the flow.
I've recently cut all my hair off, shorter than I've ever had it and bleaching it pure white. I love it so fucking much and don't even care if Shaun likes it or not. I fully realize it's part of my existential crisis but it helps me feel less invisible. I'll likely keep my hair short. Besides making me more visible to my peeps, it's just more practical in so many ways.
I'm doing an extra shift tonight at work which is something I rarely do. As long as I make enough money to live comfortably, I don't desire to work more to get more money. I enjoy being at home and/or spending time with Shaun. My bosses are always bugging me to work extra and I find different ways to tell them no... but... seeing as how I just spent the weekend at the beach house they bought for employees to use and I'm coming up on a nurse appreciation party complete with drinks, food and swag, I thought I'd toss them a bone.
I'm working with the type of kid I have never liked working with and that's what I refer to as a "veggie kid". The kind of kids that have severe permanent brain damage and remain in a vegetative state laying in a bed, unable to communicate, eat or breathe on their own. It hits too close to home for me since my own son was a veggie kid and at first I had the "I love you no matter what" soapbox that might make me seem like a selfless person but over time, watching him suffer in his malfunctioning meat sack, I concluded that it was, in fact, very selfish of me to keep him alive indefinitely, which I could have. But then I thought about what happens when I die, which might not even be when I'm old. Who would take care of him? After that his dad and I refused to take him to the hospital anymore and just waited for him to get sick so we could let him go. His death was horrific. He essentially slowly suffocated and it took hours of him panicking. I still get angry about it, knowing that I could have let him easily drift off to sleep and have a comfortable death with a good dose of morphine but no. That would have made me a cold hearted murderer. Much better to just watch a little baby gasp and flail for hours and hours trying to breathe. I called up my hospice team and made them sit with me and watch him suffer until he died. If I had to watch that so could they. His nurse told me that it was the first time he ever witnessed that and it changed forever how he treated his pediatric hospice patients. Good.
Anyway, I kind of went off on a tangent there. So I've always tried to avoid the veggie kids as I would feel... triggered, I guess is the best word to use. Now you know why. For some reason though, which I'm not sure is good, bad or indifferent, I don't feel triggered by it this time. Now sure if it's a permanent change or just right now but I don't feel weird about it. I'm just taking care of the kid, doing my job, talking to him and trying to give him a sense of peace and kindness as much as I can. There's no baggage attached, which is nice. It's just odd because I think it's the first time I haven't felt any baggage with a kid like this.
I'm still research ayahuasca and the possibilities of going to Peru to take a healing journey with my cuz. I did read on one website a huge laundry list of meds you have to stop taking and foods you have to stop eating weeks before going. That did alarm me. I'm not sure if I'd have to stop my antidepressants but the thought of that scares the shit out of me. I'm not sure how long I'd be able to function without them. Last time was really not good. I don't think Shaun would be too keen on that either. Also you can't take any allergy meds supposedly and while I'd survive, I'm not sure Shaun would. It's just something I need to learn more about and make sure I don't go into something blindly and end up a veggie myself.
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