Did I Do It Right

 

JJ Hart

As I slowly made my way through the process of recovering in the hospital from pneumonia, I had a lot of time to think about the gender decisions I had made during my life.

The first time came as I was being checked in in the emergency room, I had a chance to watch the older ambulance driver flirt with the attending nurses in the hospital. As I did, I wondered how it would have been if I had not suffered from any gender dysphoria in my life at all. What sort of a male life could I have lived without all the distractions I had. I also knew as a male, I did my share of flirting with women too.

Then, when I was really feeling sorry for myself as I had to expose my male nakedness to the nurses when they took care of me in bed, I wondered if I had actually taken the measures to have more gender realignment surgeries. Did taking the easy way out come back to haunt me. Because I decided against having any surgeries at all. My gender was always between my ears and not between my legs as I had decided. Plus, I was successfully beginning to build a life as a transgender woman as I was, so why fool with success. Every turn I made on my gender path presented me with an opportunity to face a different challenge, even though most of them terrified me. As I moved forward into a feminine world, my main goal remained just to do it right. Humans rarely get a chance to do their lives over, and I better not screw up my chance at mine.

As I lay in the hospital bed thinking what I would have done differently, the answer came back to me loud and clear. Nothing I could have done different would have helped me except maybe coming out of my gender closet into the world quicker. But even that idea had strings attached because the world back then was a totally different place. In many ways, it was a softer, gentler place for transfeminine people to exist in but in other ways, just as difficult. Perhaps too, it could have been just my perception of the world because the whole process was new to me at the time.

Did I do it right? Who is to say what is right from wrong when it comes to a gender transition. Some have intricate surgeries and some don’t is just the beginning of all the differences in the paths we can take. And surprisingly there is no right or wrong answer. Which is the conclusion I came up to as I laid in my hospital bed awaiting my next challenge to my gender. Thankfully, most of the staff just didn’t seem to care. I was just another face in the crowd to them.

My next challenge is to totally rid myself of all the vestiges of this crummy disease. I am still fighting a bad cough as well as a stopped-up nose, so life could be worse. My blood pressure also has been running too low, so I am monitoring that.

Enough whining, I am happy to be home where I can truly rest. At least I know I did that part right.

 

Vacation Time

Crosswell Tour Bus from Cincinnati. 

It’s vacation time again, so I will be missing in action for the next ten days or so, with no posts.

My wife Liz and I are heading to the Amelia Island area of Florida, and for what I understand, are taking the cold weather of Ohio with us.

Our big problem will be navigating the severe winter weather in the south in places such as Tennessee and Georgia in a big tour bus. In order to miss much of the bad weather (I hope) the departure time has already been moved up a day, since the storm is not supposed to hit Ohio Saturday afternoon or evening.

I cannot believe our bad luck with weather because last year around the same time we went on a tour to the Florida Keys and needed to drive through a mixture of snow and ice for part of the way down there. I thought at the time that surely the same thing would not happen again. Not only is it similar, but it is also almost identical as we are headed directly for another Arctic plunge in temperatures around here in Cincinnati along with a foot of possible snow.

One way or another, we are packed and ready to go on another adventure. At least this time, I don’t have to worry about something petty like using the right restroom when driving will be my biggest concern. At least, I don’t have to drive it. Plus, my flu and covid vaccines are current so I hope I don’t have a recurrence of me ending up in a Georgia hospital for three days with covid and having to have my daughter come down and pick us up.

As always, I will try to have a few pictures to share and hope to see you all again when I return because without you, none of this is possible. 

Acceptance...all that And More

 

JJ Hart.

Just a short post this morning since I was out and about with my wife Liz to medical appointments and more.

This morning, I got up early to go with my wife Liz to her doctor’s office appointment. Per norm, I did not expect much interaction with the public since we were going at such an early hour. So, I could keep my feminine prep to a minimum.

I kept my prep to a close shave and brushed my hair along with leggings and sweatshirt top and I was ready to go. With my rain boots along with the wrap my daughter got me for my birthday to keep the cold wet away. As Liz went to the receptionist at the hospital to be checked in, I grabbed a nearby seat to sit and wait, and the receptionist very much ignored me one way or another. I was off to a good start as all of the other people who followed us into the large waiting room were off in their own world and ignored me also.

As I was playing on my phone as I waited for Liz, I began to think about how far that I have come over the years when it comes to being accepted as me, as my true self. I used to obsess on my appearance when I went out and about at all, until I noticed I was the only woman doing it. Gender acceptance was as important to me then but was still somehow different. These days, my acceptance level seems to be at an all time high which is great for my continued confidence as a transgender woman.  I will certainly need all that I can get when Liz and I take off again for another extended vacation south from Ohio in the latter part of January. As always, my paranoia stems from using the women’s room in the states we travel through which frown on it.

Through it all, I keep telling myself this is the fourth or fifth tour we have been on, and I have never had any restroom problems, so why start now.

Other than that, we don’t have much going on except I have a mammogram in February.  It is hard to believe the winter will have moved on so quickly from me. Especially at my age, it is sad to see life moving by so fast. 

Back to the present, to reward Liz for getting her flu and pneumonia shots, we went through our favorite coffee shop, drive through for warm coffee drinks and a light breakfast sandwich and the girl at the drive through window said, “you girls have a nice day.”  With that comment, she made sure I did.

No matter how long I live my dream of being a transfeminine person, reinforcement from a stranger is always great acceptance and more.