Chasing my Hormonal Tail

About two weeks or so ago as I was rummaging through my not so organized Cyrsti's Condo medicine cabinet and noticed a real disparity in my on hand inventory of the magic blue pills called Estradiol (a generic estrogen) as well as a couple other of my VA co-pay provided meds. I called the 800 line to find out when the refills were due to be shipped and found I would have a real estro shortage.   Being the clueless person I am, I was taking what I thought I was prescribed rather than what really was.  In my defense I was working from two different scripts too.

I didn't want to, but I went on lesser dosages for the last month as I waiting for back ups to arrive.  In fact I hate it.  I'm not so pleasantly surprised how quickly my "T" wants to reclaim as much of my phsyical being as quickly as it can. Body hair and muscle definition began to return, my breasts lost quite a bit of their sensitivity and even my thought processes seemed to change. So I was not the happy camper as I waited for my med refills.  Well, they came yesterday and came in a big way.

For security reasons at my mailbox, I have them sent to my daughters and on the way home I had so many bottles of pills, I figured if I got pulled over by a cop I would have been arrested!

By now I know you are thinking Cyrsti what is the problem here?  Actually there is.  The supply I received is large because it is written to last a while and when I follow the correct dosage, everything is fine. Of course what my Endo Doc said he was going to prescribe isn't what he actually did and of course the Veterans Administration pharmacy works from him. So no, the dosage is too small and we are not fine!

Not to worry, I do have the whole process to revisit soon anyhow. I need to schedule blood work from the VA and hand carry to the endo doc's office to insure it gets there and then calmly ask why the hell is he saying one thing and writing another? Assuming he does write what we agreed on this time (I now know what to look for on the script)  then I  take it back to my new primary provider at the VA for approval who will then have me sign off again on a release form from the Endo Doc to fill the scripts. Then I have to set up an appointment in Sept with my new VA provider (who I have never met) to check my overall well being. (Sinking fast!)

It's fine, I really don't have anything else to do anyhow, right? Plus I know this HRT path I walk would not be feasible without the VA's help-no matter how convoluted the system is. Just maybe if a few steps were cut out of the process, life would be easier but then again a lot more boring?

We Got Mail!

High Dollar/High Tech!

Our Cyrsti's Condo high tech mail box received a couple of well thought out and presented replies recently from Alexis Michelle. The first is a comment concerning the personal and financial cost of a transgender existence:

"Expensive is so true. My whole journey has cost me a great deal of time, torment and troubles, not to mention the financial aspects. And I totally feel that the non-calculable mental costs far outweigh any financial burdens associated with my life of transition. I went through my own personal 'hell' for many, many years as I tried to keep my thoughts and feeling buried within and still project the image of a "normal" person.

What I went through I would not wish on my worst enemy. Finally I came to a point where I felt I had two choices--first of all, start opening up to others about my turmoil. Secondly, I was so close to just ending it all more than once. Luckily I began to open up and found out those I entrusted with who I really was didn't hate me for it. And with the help of those friends, and a few other, I crossed over to the other side of the street. The monetary costs took all of my savings and the obvious and hidden costs do go on forever. Yet I don't regret my own Ownership at what Cost?"

Alexis makes a couple of very key and relevant points. Either you open up to others or risk the chance of losing your most valuable resource- yourself. In my own case when I began to come out to the friends I had left, two of them did hit the door. That was fine. I did not feel for a second they were obligated to accept me but I certainly needed to accept me!  Similar to Alexis, my new transgender reality  opened up a whole new world of friends.
Her second comment was on my Presently Unavailable post:

" Like you, my mind has always flipped from place to place, time to time and subject to subject. I think many people, whatever their orientations have a tendency to do this. Is it escapism? Perhaps. But I have survived because of my ability to get away from true reality at times. Those like you, who struggle with something so major in life as "who and what am I" are entitled to do this. Imagination and fantasy can be a marvelous thing....as long as yo can come back to the necessary task at hand when the need arises. Keep moving forward, lady!!! on Presently Unavailable."

Indeed! From the days of day dreaming of being a cheerleader when I was on the football team to the countless times I just wondered what life would be like to live for five minutes in the shoes of a woman I was watching, I was in that marvelous place until reality came back with a thud!

Thanks and please remember I'm always humbled and flattered that you all care enough to comment such as Aleis Michelle and Pat and so many others! Don't forget you can email too! Follow the links here in the blog.

The Scenic View

The "before's,  after's and in between of the video we just watched here in Cyrsti's Condo:

Victoria's Asian Secret

Delightful advertising video on the Cyrsti's Condo big screen:

Heels n Hose n You

When I saw this picture, I thought it was-me about 20 years ago in the mall!

Not to say this untitled person wasn't me or isn't a genetic woman but it is  the picture used in a Fabulous after 40 post called : "Dressing Tips To Slim Heavy Calves and Ankles". Check the opening paragraph and you will know why you should visit here for more.

"Can you barely fit into a pair of boots because your calves are so wide? Have you given up wearing dresses because you don’t want anyone to see your huge ankles? You may not be able to change the muscular legs mother nature gave you, but you can make them a lot less noticeable."

Relax girls, this article will give you six tips to wear your beloved heels, hose, skirts and boots to the mall...the right way!

New Construction in an Existing House

If you have ever embarked on any restorations in a house or car or whatever, you know you always discover more to do the deeper you go.

Certainly you can compare a gender transition project as a similar situation. The deeper you go, the more there is to do.

Shelle, who I share links with here in Cyrsti's Condo as well as many similar life experiences just wrote an excellent blog post detailing the road map she is following.

Those of you who are farther along in your transgender journey will certainly see the similarities. Those of you who are considering making the jump will find this read to be very informative!

Check it out here.

NOT Your Father's Camp

More than likely not your camp either. This story I am about to present evokes so many "what if" thoughts in my life, I can't begin to document them all. I'm sure most of you will feel the same after this post from theFrisky:


"For the past three years, photographer Lindsay Morris has been following a group of special kids who attend an annual four-day camp for “gender-nonconforming boys and their parents.” In order to protect the boys and their families, Morris simply refers to the camp as Camp You Are You, and explains it as a place where these boys “don’t have to look over their shoulders, and they can let down their guard. Those are four days when none of that matters, and they are surrounded by family members who support them.”


At camp, boys dress up, play, perform and interact in whatever stage of gender identity they most feel comfortable in. For some, that means wearing wigs and dresses. For others, it includes putting on makeup or heels. Whatever it is, says Morris, it’s a positive step for these kids. “They get enough questioning in their daily lives, so it’s a great place for them to express themselves as they feel. … I feel we hear so many of the sad stories and how LGBT kids are disproportionately affected by bullying, depression, and suicide, and it hangs a heavy cloud over them and kind of dooms them from the beginning. I’m saying this is a new story. This is not a tragedy.”

Author Julie Gerstein said it up best when she wrote" Excuse me, I have a case of the happy cries" I have the deafening echos of "what if".

Getting Frisky!

One of the so called "civilian sites" I visit on a regular basis is theFrisky.  As you may recall, I pull the Cyrsti's Condo  "Horror Scope" from them as well as occasional fashion and other "girl stuffs". theFrisky also is not shy in running transgender and transsexual related material also.
Their latest post that caught my attention was called :
"Mommie Dearest: Let’s Talk About The Difference Between ‘Sex’ & ‘Gender’"

Check out this radical thinking:


"Someone’s sex doesn’t necessarily dictate their gender. A person can be assigned the female gender at birth based on their sexual organs, but be of the male gender. That’s why when somebody gleefully posts their baby-to-be’s “gender,” I bristle a little at the assumption. Now, I’m certainly not advocating for raising up our babies as gender-less, but I don’t see what’s wrong about thinking a bit more critically about all of this. It’s worth thinking about deeply: why are we so obsessed as a culture when it comes to the sex of our babies? Will we treat them any differently based on what’s between their legs?

Unfortunately, various studies have shown that we actually do. There’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting to know a baby’s sex. I get it. We’re a society that feels comfortable and safe when things are easily defined and labeled. However, when this need to know starts the basis of a lifetime’s worth of gender indoctrination, then we have a problem. If you think strict gender codification with babies isn’t a real thing, think again. I have no issue with allowing little girls to be girls or little boys to be boys, but when we put so much pressure on defining them based on their sex right from the start, we make it that much harder for those who stray outside those narrow boxes. Let’s give our kids the space to figure out for themselves what they want to be and love them unconditionally no matter what."

Of course I jest, those of us who do our best to live as a transgender person in a binary gender world just love her thinking. Better yet though, you have civilians such as theFrisky preaching our gospel!  Good for them! We need all the positive preaching we can get!

Follow the link above and you too can "get Frisky"!

Presently Unavailable

For as long as I can remember, I have had a very difficult time living in the present.My mind is always jumping around to other times, places and scenerios. I always was under the impression I simply marched to some distant drummer and that was it.

Now as I think about my life more, I wonder if my mental "escapism" was due in part to my transgenderism. Part of my noggin was available to navigate the present while part of it wasn't.  I'm not saying the other dimensional "half" was operating 100% of the time in a female world but yes it was there a lot.

Perhaps, I just slowly but surely trained myself in a coping mechanism which included my thoughts wondering elsewhere?

Interesting to me as well is the fact I'm into all of this "introspection" at this point in my life.  As I continue to connect my gender dots and merge my gender experiences, perhaps I'm experiencing the opportunity to live more entirely in the moment. Plus (while we are on the subject) , I consider the use of the word merge an incorrect one. I consider I have flipped my dominant gender to the one which was always destined to be me. As my male gender fades more and more into the background of my existence- he is still back there when I need his years of knowledge or expertise in certain situations.  When he dominated though, I could never reach deep inside to my girl soul but somehow I always knew she was there. The world was always just a tad to completely out of focus.

Of course this is all a theory and I will have to leave it to the ones closest to me to determine if focus becomes one of my new traits.

In the meantime I have tired of all this transgender introspection. Lets see, there has to be something else here in Cyrsti's Condo to get my attention!