Down to the Wire!

My friends are sick of hearing me say anything and maybe you are too-but it's true I'm down to five days until I send my "Stiletto's on Thin Ice" E-pub book off to be published.

With my friends, it's difficult to explain what the book is all about because they don't really know or care anything about my past.  To them, I came into their life as a transgender woman approximately five years ago and that's it. I'm sure they are thinking, "Just do it and shut up!"

For those of you who are Cyrsti's Condo regulars, you already know what it is all about-a synopsis of how I got here in my life.  Along the way of course, are a ton of wrong moves, dead ends and huge discoveries over the course of 50 years.

I suppose the book could be called a tragedy because I took so long to face up to whom I really was or a celebration of actually finding out.  As I have said before, the book will be very inexpensive and I am certainly not seeking wealth or riches from it.  If you do choose to buy it, I'm sure you will recognize certain experiences and thoughts from here.  Hopefully in a lot more depth.

I'm also sure as soon as I press the "pub" button, I will be asked many more technical questions before the book goes "live."  Hopefully by Friday though, I will be one of the millions who have been told "you ought to write a book"-who did.  I guess it's one step up from being told you should be on the "Jerry Springer Show." 

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Girl" of the Day

Our feature cover today in the Condo is Brazil's transgender beauty Melissa Brolliato:

Cyrsti's Condo "Thought of the Day"

"The longer I am on HRT, my feminine responses to the world are less externally driven and more internally grounded."  In other words my desire to be accepted as a woman by the world is no longer as important as understanding everything it takes to interact in that world.

Cyrsti Hart 

Cyrsti's Condo "Sunday Edition"

"Ker Plunk!" it's time for another issue of the Sunday Edition in the Condo.

Page 1.- Courage.  Just to be different this morning, I'm going to go a bit out of order with how I structure the edition and go with a comment I received from Jen Smith.  It concerned the experience last week I had last week with a guy who called me "Sir".  To catch you up, I simply lost it and asked the guy "WTF" did you call me?   Jen wrote:

This is an amazing story to me. You must be one special person, so brave, to handle a situation like this. You were in the military with him? I would have probably gone into shock at how to react in a situation like this. It seems like you have tons of confidence! Take care! jen

Thanks so much Jen!  As far as "brave" goes, I think I had my split second angry reaction covered in my brain before he did it.  It wasn't like I was in a situation where I would face physical harm with some redneck guy and his friends-this guy knowingly or not - gender trashed me for years.  I just had had it.  For some reason I turned on him before I knew it.  No, we weren't in the military together.  He was in the Marines and I was in the Army and the only common ground we have is we were both in Vietnam.  He served an entire tour there while I was just passing through (thank goodness!)

Looking back, perhaps I should have an added a "don't try this at home" tag to this post.  I also should point out, I essentially transitioned in front of the regular head bartender in this sports bar. It's down the way from where my wife worked before she passed and both of us stopped in when I was a guy way back then.  She got a kick out of when I verbally "swatted" John because he so deserved it.  I suppose my shock set in Jen, when I got to meet his wife and daughter who were so nice.

Page 2.- Trans Ohio Finally finished all the registration work and overnight lodging reservations for the Trans Ohio Symposium in a couple of weeks.  The problem was (if you are a golfer) the Memorial PGA Golf Tournament is going to held in roughly the same area of Columbus that same weekend.  The Symposium this year is going to be held at The Ohio State University (also roughly in the same area) so I didn't know how that would effect getting a room.  Last year, the event was held in one spot but his year we are encouraged to stay at a nearby hotel with a shuttle.  I lucked it out and took the last room though and booked a 4 star room for less money right off campus-come on Expedia!  The whole weekend should be more interesting if the primarily cross dresser group still has their mixer that Saturday night at a place called Club Diversity .  In the past the CD group (which has it's share of cross dressed sharks) has manged to act up and get kicked out of there. Regardless of the little spice they add,  I have always loved the place and it is diverse in it's clientele.  Plus I believe it's co-owned by a trans person.

Page 3.- "Book 'em Danno!"  Of course my deadline to hit the button with Vook and publish my "Stiletto's on Thin Ice" is this Friday.  So this week I will be kicking my virtual butt because I didn't get more done before now.  In my past there were those who thought I worked better under pressure, so I will find out again as I dig out literally from years of procrastination! (Book 'em Danno! is a vintage saying from the Hawaii Five-O television show.)

Back Page.- Last week brought all kinds of enticing news to the transgender community.  Reports surfaced the Pentagon and Defense Secretary Hagel were going to reopen the un American ban on transgender military service-finally!  On a lesser scale Tyra Banks felt the need to produce an upcoming show of some sorts on a group of transgender women in Chicago.  Called me jaded, but the whole project sounds a little too "fierce", glossy and profit driven to mean much to me here in small town Ohio. There is hope though if Carmen Carrera (left)  is heading up the project.

Well kids, that's it for this week's edition. Hope all is well for you in your part of the universe and we can get together again next week to do it again!

Cyrsti's Condo "Thought of the Day"

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Girl" of the Day

Our cover feature today is the beautiful transsexual woman Sophia Abella from the Philippines:

It's a Small World

Yesterday was the day to have my fluids checked at my local VA Clinic.  As a point of reference, my clinic could be compared to an urgent care center on steroids and my much larger regional hospital center is 20 miles in Dayton (Ohio).

After being probed, tested and questioned, I'm happy to say my primary physician Doc told me all was well and go on with my life.  Of course none of that is as easy said than done when you are my age and on HRT. My primary risks are potential blood clots and mood swings because of my history of being bi-polar and my Mom's cause of death from heart disease.  Definitely, I do pay attention to both.

Of particular interest on this visit to my Doc (my second), he said he felt a certain closeness to my treatment because he has a Mtf transgender niece!  Even I was at a lost for words for a second.  It turns out the niece is in her 20 somethings and lives in the Chicago area.  Very quickly our conversation turned to my dealings with my endocrinologist, dosages of meds and future plans.  Even gender markers!

He asked of my dealing with the VA as a whole and I said the only problem I have ever had was getting someone in the system to prescribe my HRT meds.  My original primary would make sure I got them filled but he didn't feel comfortable in prescribing them.  My problem became getting the VA in Dayton to pay for me to go outside the system to find a endo-doc who would prescribe and monitor.  The process took me nearly eight months. If I would have had to pay for the outside doc myself the cost for the initial visit and others would have been over one thousand dollars. I should point out, all of that was about two years ago and much has changed in the system. As far as my meds go, my estrogen is about the same cost with my VA copay, but my Spiro is much less. (Spiro is what is prescribed to lower testosterone fairly commonly.)

Of course I understood after the appointment why my Doc seemed to have a little more empathy for me and of course was pleased with the prognosis I would live on for a couple more days or so. (Have a lot to do!)  I am also set up with a stable number of refills on my prescriptions.  On this visit, I did ask him about if I should ask for a mammogram because my maternal grandmother died of breast cancer and I was developing more and more breast tissue.  I am supposed to hear back soon.

Now, the next hurdle for me will be how all of this will work with my upcoming date with Medicare coverage when I'm 65. (If I make it through the party!)

Cyrsti's Condo "What If?"

Well dear, you always were harassing me about joining you and the girls some night and getting bored...I'm ready!

You ARE Gay Dammit!

Just when you thought it was OK to come out of the closet and be the NFL's first openly gay player (if he makes the team) Michael Sam was shown smooching his boyfriend after he was drafted. (Left) Of course many are in shock now over the public display of affection but if you ask anyone who has watched the draft closely over recent years-it certainly has looked on occasion that NFL Commissioner Goodell was leaning in for a smootch from NFL players on more than one occasion! So Sam's smootch was not the NFL's first man on man kiss!  Goodell had him beat years ago!

Speaking of the "G" word, if you recall me writing about the wife and daughter of the guy who mis-pronoun-ed me last night, the daughter made sure she didn't make a mistake with me.  When her and her Mom were having the conversation with me about being a transgender woman, Mom said something about me being gay.  Of course I said, I'm transgender not gay.  I had to love the daughter when she said: you (me) are here with two women, your partner is a woman and you identify as a woman-you are GAY! 

I said you are right!