Another Trip to the Doctor

Image from the Jessie Hart Archives

Today, I needed to go to a follow up appointment to the  doctor's office. 

You regulars know, I am a transgender veteran and take advantage of the Veteran's Administration health care system. I know over the years, I have heard from many trans vets with differing ideas on how they were received in the system. 

During the earliest days in the system (approximately ten years ago) I felt as if I was the teacher in the system and that most all of my providers knew nothing about trans people at all. Fortunately, over the years my perceived ideas of how I was treated started to change. So much so, the Cincinnati metro VA hospital as a whole began to solicit ideas on how they could improve their service to the LGBTQ community, especially the trans population they serve. It worked, because I saw a big improvement in even the most backward sattelite clinic I had ever been to. Which happened to be the closest to me.

In the past, it is the clinic where a receptionist basically out and out refused not to call me sir. It was so bad, I was almost to the point of filing an official complaint if she was still there when I went back, which she wasn't. I haven't seen her since and everyone else has been nice to me. To be clear, there are several ways of respect I expect to be shown. One of which is to use no gender markers what so ever when it comes to referring to me such as "he or she or sir or ma'am." Or just refer to me as my first name which is cool also.

This morning all went well with everybody except with one person. The receptionists I checked in and out with didn't mis-gender me at all and were very pleasant as was everybody else. So much so, one of the dermatologists who was checking a spot on my face complimented me on my makeup. In addition, my actual appointment with my primary provider went off as it usually does...very well and she treated me with respect. 

The only problem moment came (and there always seems to be one) was when I was being escorted into what I call the vampire's home, where I had my blood labs taken. Primarily because my endocrinologist always wants to see a reading of my estradiol levels.  When we entered the room, she announces me as "Mr. Hart." I was quickly shocked when she did so but I recovered in a hurry and corrected her and she changed her greeting to "Ms.  Hart" which I was satisfied with.

The most important point of course is how all the labs and reports come back on my health. As far as the spot on my face goes, they took pictures to send down to the main Cincinnati VA hospital for them to take a look at. The results probably will take a couple days to come back. 

I have always said, my most precious possession is my health and how I am treated as a transgender woman is just icing on the cake.  

Facing Medical Care as a Trans Person

Image from Anton on UnSplash

Perhaps I should lead this post off with medical care as referring to myself as a "pre-opt" transgender woman. Since I have never had any of the gender affirming surgeries so appealing to more and more trans women, when I go to the hospital for any sort of a procedure I face the reality of being called a "biological male" as one gruff nurse called me years ago. At this point of my life, not undergoing any major surgeries at all is my final decision and I am sticking to it. For any number of reasons, having a vagina has never been that important to me to define my gender which resides firmly in my brain. 

Regardless I will face another gauntlet of doctors and nurses when Monday I go in for yet another colonoscopy. Which, if you have been through one, you know the prep work and fasting you have to go through is much worse than the actual procedure which is done under anesthesia. 

The last one I had was a year ago and the doctors found enough potential problems to schedule me another fun filled visit in a year. This time (again) I will have the work done at the Cincinnati Veteran's Hospital so I will be interested to see if there is any progress in how they handle transgender patients. The last time, I encountered one in-take nurse who couldn't or wouldn't attempt to use the correct pronouns with me. Even though I am listed as female on on my paperwork at the VA, she called me "Sir". I know in the last year, the VA has made a concerted effort to educate their staff in Cincinnati in the proper pronoun use, all the way to having a question specifically for transgender patients when you are visiting. I have seen improvement in past visits.  

Another problem I have is, because once I have arrived to when the procedure is about to happen, I am so hungry and sleep deprived from the prescribed prep (as well as being a little scared) I just want the whole deal to be over with. Call me anything you want, just get me out of there. By the way, my fear doesn't come from going through the operation itself which I barely feel, it comes from getting the results. Last year, the doctor cut out a polyp growing in my intestine which fortunately turned out to be non-cancerous.  Hopefully, I will receive a clean bill of health for at least another year. Even though I know the prep and procedure isn't the most pleasant thing in the world to go through, the fear of having any sort of colon cancer is much worse. 

Also if you are familiar with the colonoscopy prep, in addition to fasting, the remainder revolves a day and a half of a rapid "clean out" of my intestines'. In other words, the toilet will become my best friend on the next couple of days so I may not feel like posting. 

With any luck, I will be back soon with an update.   

  

Why When How

Image from Simon Secci on
Unsplash

It's been awhile but every now and then someone asks me how I knew I was transgender. 

The question should be when did I accept the fact I always knew deep down but refused to accept...I was born to be feminine and could not rest until I achieved my goal. In fact, I tried to hide my goal from myself for the largest part of my life.

Even though I was forced to pursue such ultra macho activities such as playing sports, working on cars and completing my military obligations, I made it through. Like so many others, I was drafted into the Army but ended up serving three years instead of two to have a better chance of not going to Vietnam to war. I was honorably discharged in 1975 and would proceed to become a father for the first and only time in 1976. Through it all, I tried my best to ignore my biggest inner truth by trying to drink and run away from the fact I was transgender. 

When I gave my male self his best shot to succeed the more I became increasingly miserable. All the drunken nights did nothing to relieve my gender tension the next day. The only time it did help was when I came out to a close group of friends as a transvestite as a cross dresser was known back in those days. Fortunately for the rest of my Army "career" nobody outed me any further which would have resulted in an immediate dishonorable discharge.

As October and another Halloween is upon us, it is time to focus in on how important the day was to become to me. Halloween proved to be the beginning of my "when" on my path to coming out as a transgender woman. As I will pass along in future Cyrsti's Condo posts, I will detail how important Halloween became to me. In the meantime when started to become so real when I was thinking about my future and how it meshed with the possibility I was transgender. Even though I was working on the when, I still didn't have much of an idea of why I was facing my gender issues at all. At the time I was subjected to extreme bouts of gender dysphoria when sometimes the mirror showed me my old male self and others when it showed me glimpses of my inner feminine self. 

As I moved on, the "how" of what I was trying to accomplish began to weigh heavily on me. After all, I had a lot to potentially lose if I attempted a male to female gender transition. What about my family, friends and finances when my life faced such a radical change. To say the least, the how was very intimidating. What happened was the doors to change opened wide due to lifestyle changes I could in no way predict.

In the short space of two years, my second wife suddenly passed away. Since she was the major force in not starting hormone replacement therapy, I could now research if I could do it. Ironically, soon after I was approved health wise by a doctor, the Veterans' Administration healthcare system which I was a part of began to approve and administer hormones to trans veterans. As far as family went, my only daughter became my biggest ally while I lost all contact with my only brother. And the final how took care of itself when I was able to take advantage of early Social Security retirement. So I didn't have to worry about coming out at work. So almost all the why, when and how's were in place, except the why which I have never quite figured out to this day. Truthfully, I probably never will. 

The whole gender process was just something I was born with and should have come to grips with much earlier in life. If I did, I could have saved myself countless hours of stress and thoughts over why I had to be the one who was different. Once I arrived with the knowledge I was different, I embraced it all and moved on to a better future. 

Finally, I don't say it nearly enough but thanks to all of you who read and comment on all of my posts. Your participation makes it all worthwhile to me.