Going beyond transition

Category Archives: transition

Yes, I’m here… somewhere… for now.

Posted on by Posted in fitness, Life, transition, Traveling/Work, vegan stuff .

I’ve been far more remiss at posting blog entries this year than last. I think it’s because my life has become rather mundane although it’s been starting to ramp up a bit. This year has started off great and seems to be continuing (and potentially gaining speed) to be great. I’ve been hearing rumblings of a new work visa that will keep me here, potentially on a very longer term. I recently got a promotion (yay!) and a little pay bump (double yay!). That, along with a strong desire to finally skewer the remaining bits of debt that I have, have resulted in less stress and a more positive outlook on life. Things will get quiet here soon as K heads to L.A. next week and Bobcat and I stay here — for now. I’ve been trying to avoid buying things and actually have been contemplating selling certain things on Craigslist starting next week.

I have some concerns for the move, particularly how long it will be before Bob and I can go out to L.A. The very last date will be the end of August but I’m hoping for before then (end of June or July). The other concern is Bobcat herself. She ain’t no spring chicken any more. At 16, she’s cranky, whiny and a bit senile. She wasn’t happy about the flight from Toronto to NYC and a flight to L.A. will not be fun either.  If she comes onto the flight with me, she’ll be non-stop meow and worse than a baby crying. But I feel guilty about putting her in cargo. Ya, I know. I baby her far too much but she is my little furrkid.

My transition, such as it is, continues happily. I’m becoming a bear, I think. **ROFL** Hair loss is not an issue for me. I am contemplating moving up surgery to sometime this fall once I’m in L.A. A few of my fellow transmen recommend a specific doctor there and say that he does wonders, even for larger guys. I think once I’m in L.A. and have settled on a new doctor/health care environment, I’ll make a consultation appointment with this doctor to see about how much and how long before I could have the surgery. I have to admit being tired of binders and the constricted feel of it all. And I’d really like to not have to bike long distance with a binder (I’ve done it before but I don’t think I want to continue to do it).

One of the things that I will have to do is return back to a vegan lifestyle, more than like a raw vegan (or at least 80% raw vegan). I want to see if I can completely eliminate all processed food items (save for almond milk and cereal grains) from my diet. Not only will it help me lose the necessary weight for surgery but will generally help extend my life. K and I have become huge fans of The Biggest Loser. (ok. I’ll admit it. Jillian is hot!) These people are incredibly awe-inspiring. I would love to have a trainer again and be able to work out at a gym again but I’m afraid to. Most gyms have strict policies about locker room usage. Being in L.A., especially if the gym is within walking distance, will open up more workout opportunities but I think I’d rather be able to do so with shirt off or with a muscle shirt.

So that’s life in a nutshell at this point.

Whee! I iz famous now!

Posted on by Posted in trans activism, transgender, transition .

I am famous now (my 15 min so to speak): http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/04/14/transgender.irpt/index.html?hpt=C1 (see picture #4). The comments below it, however, leave a lot to be desired. It never fails to amaze me how people voice their opinion without truly understanding what is involved and the why. It would be like trying to have someone who feels completely whole with their body at birth try to explain that to me. I cannot fathom it.

I just wish people would just see us as human beings as well and be ok with us being ourselves.

Who knew Monday’s could be good?

Posted on by Posted in Finances, Life, trans activism, transgender, transition .

So this weekend was good. I had originally planned on going for nice long walks on Saturday and Sunday but had nearly forgotten about my H&R Block appointment on Saturday. Geesh! Where does the time go?? It is that time of the year again, tax time. I figured I’d get some back and H&R Block are pretty good about reminding me about things I can cover as expenses and such. I owe a small amount to NYC for city taxes (only because the company didn’t realize I was in NYC area and thus, taxed under it). But it’s really small. Between what I get back from the Feds and what I owe for NYC and paid towards H&R, I’ll get back a fair amount. Additionally, after discussing it with my preparer I may have held back more money from my stocks than I needed to. If I’m right, between the return and the difference another credit card may yet bite the bullet. Even if I don’t use that amount, nearly a third will go *poof* thanks to the Federal return. Paying off this particular credit card will be important since the interest rate is 29%!! It’s absurd how much they can charge in interest. Heck, loan sharks seem to charge less in some regards. Once this one is done, then I’ll go after the remaining credit card and then, lastly, the line of credit (which has the lowest interest of anything I have). I’m contemplating canceling two Canadian credit cards (Amex and Visa) since I have ones down here but I may keep the Visa and just trash the Mastercard. They give me the most grief since I don’t have a Canadian address any more.

And as always, I checked my FICO score in both Canada and the US. I do this for two reasons: first, to see if there are an discrepancies between the reality of me and what they think I have, and second, to see how I fair out there. My Canadian FICO is actually good (mid-700s) while my US FICO is a little low (mid-600s) but I think the lower US score is due to only being here for two years. I’m sure as time passes that will get better and better. My plan to get a house is more realistic as each day passes. I’ve been better about my spending and this will alleviate some of it. If I continue as I have been, I should be credit card and line of credit debt free by this time in 2012. And that is definitely a good thing.

As I was writing this entry, I went ahead and canceled my Canadian AMEX. It was surprisingly easy. They even had it as part of their automated telephone system. It was weird, however, since I was hoping to speak to them and have to battle to get it canceled. But I suspect the major ones, especially if you don’t use it that often or if it’s paid off, are not really interested in fighting you for it. Ever since I took that leap and paid off most of my debt, I’ve felt free and more alive. It’s a great feeling. Getting rid of it completely will be awesome.

After doing that, I got a call. It was CNN. I finally did that interview with the intern. It was nice and very polite conversation. It’ll be interesting to see the final piece. He said it’ll be by the end of the week or sometime next week. (knowing news media it’s possible that it could be pre-empted by some disaster somewhere and that’s fine). I’ll give credit to CNN that they are, at least, attempting to put us more in the spotlight and not as some freak show. They seem genuinely interested in who we are and how we got to where we’re at. I still think they need to cover more of the rainbow of the types of trans individuals and not just the white side of things. What I face as challenges are far, far different than what POC trans individuals face. That I have no illusions about and I mentioned that as well.

Moar I iz famous.

Posted on by Posted in Life, trans activism, transgender, transition .

I really need to remember to bring my phone with me when I go out. K keeps reminding me to do this. I should have but forgot.

Class had finished early so I thought I’d go out for a walk given the nice weather. I haven’t left the apartment in about a week and it was nice to stretch my legs and get out for a few hours. I had to get more yarn (yes, I’m a man who crochets… don’t all gasp in horror at once). I was going to get my haircut but I’ll hold off on that until Sunday (I’ve become rather shaggy and this warm weather hasn’t helped). I’m also going to visit the optometrist as it’s been a couple of years since my last exam and I’m finding that watching TV has been hard (the fuzziness). So it’s a needed expense that I have to do.

After walking around for about three hours, I came back to relax and follow up on some work that I had to do. I decided to call K in Los Angeles and noticed that there was a voice mail waiting. I listened to it and it was an intern from CNN wanting to talk to me about my transition.

<insert jaw drop here>

Wow.

Who knew that 3 simple pictures would make such a difference?

I called back and left a message. As it happens, I’m doing the same course next week as I did this week which means long hours (9am until 7pm) but since it’s a co-teach I might be able to call during lunch or while my co-instructor is teaching. We’ll see what happens but needless to say, it’s all rather exciting to be contact by the media for something positive than my last experience. (My last direct interaction with the media was a reporter asking me how I felt about my mom being brutally murdered. It was one of those “You aren’t seriously asking me that, are you??!”).

If I get a follow-up, I’ll definitely update here.

Stay tuned!

Much closer to my financial goal…

Posted on by Posted in Finances, Life, transition .

Last week I took a huge step and cashed in a whack of stock. This morning, I woke up to the proceeds of that. I took a chunk of it and sent it off to an ING Direct account (for tax payment later on). The rest I used to pay off 4 credit cards, the majority of my line of credit and huge payments on remaining credit cards (2). It is nice to be free of about 60% in a few minutes. And more importantly, the interest that would have accumulated with it and the stress that comes with that. I quick but not wholly accurate estimate is that I saved about $10K in interest alone.

Yes.

That’s thousand.

That’s the cost of top surgery. What is nice about this is my line of credit (which has the lowest of all interest rates — prime + 1%) , once it’s paid off, could be used to fund my top surgery. So the goal will be to lose 60-80lbs between now and 2011 (this year has too many things going on) and schedule with — Browstein in San Francisco. I’m pretty sure we’ll be in California by then and I should be able to schedule this finally. It’s something I want before the bike trip from San Fran to L.A. K and I had talked about this as part of the immediate two year plan for us.

But the other thing that this brings is me closer to the ownership of a house. This is something that I’ve wanted for a long while. I want to own my own place. Not for investment purposes but more for settling down and creating a history for myself. I want roots somewhere. I’ve spent most of my life on the move and being able to be in one place and being content there is important to me. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind the mortgage (although I want to reduce that as soon as possible). I just don’t want to be constantly on the move and constantly at the whim of a landlord.

I iz famous!

Posted on by Posted in Finances, LGBTQ, transgender, transition, Traveling/Work .

So I’ve had a busy week. I got my 2nd 15 minutes of fame in my life (my first was when my mom died and some friends did a wine and cheese to raise awareness about violence against women in Canada). This week CNN has been doing a few pieces on what it’s like to be transgendered/transsexual and they wanted members of the community to transmit messages to the world at large. Yesterday I got a ping from one of the editors who wanted more info about me (including phone number). As it turned out my iReport was used as the main iReport for the overall concept (see here: http://www.ireport.com/ir-topic-stories.jspa?topicId=417959). It’s rather flattering. I checked out Anderson Cooper’s interview with Chaz and some of the responses/comments to it. Most people seemed to be saying “Why? I don’t understand..”.

Possibly the only way I know how to answer that is with a question: Explain to me what it’s like to feel completely at home in your gender, where looking in the mirror you think to yourself “Yup. That’s me”.  It’s odd that this is something that has always been part of my life, like a dull migraine in the back of my head but one that I never really examined until I saw that perhaps there was a way to get rid of it. And when I understood that there was a variety of paths I could take, including on that might actually result in me seeing the “inner me”, it was time for a jump. I have not regretted any part of my transition thus far and I still have more to go, along with the challenges associated with them. One of the biggest is surgery. I so desperately want top surgery and I’d like to get it before going on my bike trip next year.

So to that end, I cashed in some stock that I got as a bonus (the government took it’s overly fair share) and the rest will go to wiping out nearly 60-70% of my debt in one fell swoop. I still have more shares left over and those I might use towards surgery itself if I cannot get it covered under health insurance. I’m waiting until I get to L.A. and there I will be aggressively aiming at losing weight. I’ve fluctuated at losing about 10 lbs but I need to shed more. I have to bring myself down by nearly another 90lbs. I’ve let the exercise go by the wayside because of a few life challenges but will be trying to incorporate those again. I’ll also be looking at pursuing a more raw vegan lifestyle.

K and I discussed the move the other night and we decided to sell or donate all larger items (except for the printer, bikes and humidors) or stuff we don’t need. Books and non-critical stuff we’ll send via USPS while critical or sensitive stuff we’ll send via UPS. This makes only Bobcat the issue when moving (she won’t like it but hopefully this will be the last plane trip for her). Once we’re in L.A. we get furniture there. I’ll be selling my Dell desktop and I’ll get a new personal desktop when I’m in L.A. (likely go Apple but not sure yet as to whether to get a Tower or a Mac Book Pro). The thing that I like is that it removes my attachment to things and allows me to purge the things I really don’t use/need. This should, theoretically, make life simplier. As I look around I realize there is a lot of clutter in my life and things I really don’t need. I’ve gotten better at asking myself “Do you really need that? Wait a night or two before buying it, if at all possible”.  Books, in particular, fall under this category. I LOVE to read and I LOVE to learn. Books, for me, have always been the avenue for this. Most of the books I tend to keep are technical books since I tend to use them as reference (I have a heard time reading on my laptop or other computer screen although I’m ok on my iPod — go figure).

Of course, tied in with this stress over the move (exact date TBD) is the stress over the work visa. And it appears I may be getting a new one. This new one should lead me to a green card and then, well… who knows. If we get just get the visa part settled, it would alleviate a lot. Add to that the wait for the new birth certificate. Now that I’ve settled all the uproar over what commissioner they wanted (a commission of oaths), I’m now waiting for the actual certificate to come through. Then I can move forward on a SIN and then — yay! — new passport with a new picture! Gender will still be F for now. Until I have surgery, I cannot get that changed. Once I do have the surgery, I get to go through this all over again…

Whoop.

Dee.

Doo.

CNN iReport and A Message To..

Posted on by Posted in LGBTQ, trans activism, transgender, transition .

So I recently got an email that piqued my egotistical interest:

Hi there,

Since you previously contributed to our Transgendered Stories assignment on CNN iReport, I thought you’d like to know about a new assignment that just launched. To coincide with the CNN documentary “Her Name Was Steven,” we’re looking for transgendered, transsexual or questioning individuals to share a message with the world. What would you like others to know about you and your experience?

The assignment is simple: Just put a message that you would like others to know about you on a sign and take a self-portrait holding it up.

You can find the assignment here: http://www.ireport.com/ir-topic-stories.jspa?topicId=417959

We’re accepting submissions until April 9. Please feel free to pass the word along! We look forward to seeing your submissions.

Best,

Katie Hawkins-Gaar

p.s. “Her Name Was Steven” airs on CNN this Saturday and Sunday at 8 and 11 p.m. ET. You can find out more here: http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/presents/

Hrmm. Sending a message out to others to let them know what they should know about me, eh? Very intriguing. And how to do it in a few words, no more than a sentence or two? Well, I came up with 3 different messages. You can see the posting on CNN iReport section here and I’ve posted the larger ones below. In some ways, this feels akin to “Ask a Trans” kind of threads and videos I’ve seen elsewhere. And perhaps in a larger, more mainstreamy way it is. My last video on there was actually well received. I think, for the most part, people are nice and kind. But we rarely remember those.

Our minds would rather burn in the painful, angry, hateful ones and forget the ones that show love and affection. It’ll be interesting to see how it’s received. I have no illusions that appearing hetero-normative and being a white male is a benefit to me. Nay, it’s a privilege that I will never shake.

I've always wondered what people saw..

Are you sure you know what you see?

Yes, for real. I am.

More of Life or something like that..

Posted on by Posted in Daily life, Life, transition, Traveling/Work .

The Dance of the Fountain..

This week has been a challenging one. Granted last week was fun. I got to stay in Vegas and teach there, which meant that in the evenings I got to enjoy the town a bit. That was good. I won some, I lost some. I think my biggest win was $70, which I used to buy some premium cigars. I think in all I lost maybe $40, which is a reasonable amount. I will say that if you go to Vegas, want a decent hotel room (with a full kitchen), willing to pay around $100 and don’t mind being directly on the strip (but can get a free shuttle to the Mandalay throughout the day/evening to go to the strip) then the Homewood Suites near the Vegas Airport (right across from it, actually) is a place to stay. The staff were amazing (particularly those during the Monday-Thursday shifts). I’ve stayed at quite a few hotels in my time but these guys were the best.

Clean shaven boi

One day I’d like to return to Vegas for non-work reasons and just have fun truly exploring the whole city. I didn’t get to the older part of Vegas like I did last time and I would love to visit some of the more natural sites. Maybe I should plan a bike trip from Los Angeles to Vegas in a couple of years. I did stick to my workouts for the two weeks I was on the road (Toronto and Vegas) and my diet was so-so. It could have been better. I learned that Vegas Portions are a supersized version of American portions, which are, to my Canadian eyes, to big as it stands. Flying back wasn’t fun as Mother Nature had some nasty things in store. I lucked out in that I missed most of it, although I got snarled in the after-effects. I had ended up on a single stop over — Vegas to Los Angeles to NYC. The Vegas to LAX part was packed but LAX to JFK was really empty. Either way, I managed to get upgraded to business class and it made the flight kinda better. I certainly didn’t have as much inspect as I had when traveling from Toronto to NYC (they’ve added in at least two more search options). Interestingly enough through all my travel I never got challenged on my passport. My picture doesn’t match my face any more and, to be frank about it, I suspect it’s a white male privilege thing. The beard and simple moustache should have thrown up markers since my gender didn’t match but that means either no one was threatened, didn’t care or didn’t notice.

Upon arriving back, I decided to shave the beard (leaving the pencil thin moustache). It was kinda shocking to see my bare face again (I left a little on the chin). K did a double-take after I had shaved it and, I think, still trying to come to gripes with the new face. Heck, even I am. It was funny that when I had the beard, I could have sworn I saw my uncle P looking back at me. As hard as life has been in the past for me, I will say that it was my mom’s siblings and her mother that centered me enough to become the person I am, even if it wasn’t what they expected. I’m a rather self-centered child (a side-effect of being an only child growing up around adults, I suspect — not an excuse but more of an observation).

NYC Blizzard (Feb 2010)

NYC Blizzard (Feb 2010)

For the rest of the week, I had been battling a rather nasty head cold. All I can say is “Thank the gawds for the inventor of Nyquil!”. This stuff knocked me out for two days in a row, giving my body enough time to recover. And since this was an off-platform week for me (plus we got pummeled by more snow) it was great. As it turned out, K had a “Snow Day” on Wednesday. She squealed like a little kid when she saw all the snow falling. And more so when she began playing with it (making mini-snowballs). I treated her to some vegan hot chocolate and vegan marshmellows with a bit of not-so-vegan chocolate liquor mixed in. It was an awesome way to spend the afternoon as the sky fell down to the earth. It also allowed me to catch up on my Hulu queue and finally clear that out as well as get through the 3 NetFlix videos. The Beautiful Daughters one was particularly good. As a trans guy, I’m pretty privileged in many ways but the most important way is that I blend in a lot easier and am accepted far more than many of my trans-sisters are. This is probably part of why there was no issue with traveling between Canada and the US thus far. This video, which documents the first trans women version of the Vagina Monologues, is absolutely beautiful and shows some of the same difficulties that many trans women face that cis-gendered women face. And then some. If you can get the video and haven’t seen it, do so.

In other news, I’m hopeful that this year will be a good year for work. Some of my discussions with my managers seem to indicate so. The visa still looms large ahead of me and performance reviews are soon. I think I did well last year and I’m hopeful that it will be reflected pay wise. In the meantime, the company issued bonuses and let’s just say, the gov’t will be pleased with their cut of it (I hope I can get some of that back at tax time since that amounts to an overpayment). But my credit cards were also happy. I paid off my “cigar card” with part of it and paid off half of another (that one will be paid off completely in March). So life seems to be turning around a bit in regards to finances and such. Perhaps my dream of getting my top surgery done in 2011/2012 isn’t that far off now… eh.. we shall see.

For now, I have a cat to feed and a woman to romance a bit..

Yes, yes.. I’m still here.

Posted on by Posted in Daily life, Gratitude, Life, transition, Traveling/Work, vegan stuff .

I’ve been lazy and busy at the same time for the last little while. I sometimes go through a non-desire to write and the most recent time period was it. I’ll admit to being a little bit of a WoW addict of late. (Yes, that is the first step to healing). But it is a cheap escape for me and the puzzles do exercise the mind in many ways. I think I’ve gotten a little bored with work. The excitement is down and I think I’m getting a little worried about the visa situation. I’m still waiting to hear. I think if it does fail, I’ll head to BC (Vancouver) and ride out the year there. It’d suck but, one does what ya have to do.

I have gotten a little bit excited about a new site that I’m helping out on: ButchFemmePlanet. Coming in at the ground level, it’s re-energinzed my non-work related geek to poke at vBulletin more and to do a little work on VeganBodybuilding site (I’m the admin there too). I have to say that BFP definitely feels like a breath of fresh air and has a good community feel about it. The community feeling is important to me. It adds to that sense of belonging and purpose that we often want in life beyond our partners. Anyways, it’s refueled my desire to re-learn PHP, go more advanced and get beyond that. I’ll be investigating into some things I could do to improve the blog a bit but we’ll see.

The NaNoWriMo failed for me this year. It was that whole bored/lazy thing. I dunno why but the idea I had at first fizzled. I used to have such a creative mind but now, not so much. It’s made me wonder if some of that is the T. My emotions and how I display them have certainly changed. I find I cannot cry any more (things that would have me sniffling barely get a whimper). It’s a very hard thing to come to grips with. It doesn’t mean that I don’t feel for them, it’s just that I cannot show it like I used to.

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. This has never been a huge holiday for me largely because we never visited family and associated meaning with the holiday. When I learned the true history of Thanksgiving, that it wasn’t as “Rockwellian” as we’d believe, it lost it’s importance to me even more. It’s shocking how everyone here talks about how it’s for family and such — and then I see a lot of the grocery stores open (albeit with shortened hours). It is a commercialized holiday to the Nth degree and that really does suck. For us, we didn’t celebrate Thanksgiving but rather our 3rd year together. We first started dating on Thanksgiving in 2006 (although online) and it’s been an amazing 3 years. Certainly we’ve had bumps and bruises along the way but I have found that we’ve gotten closer and love each other more now than before. It’s an awesome feeling. I made a pure vegan dinner — tofurky, vegan dumplings, potatos, onions, carrots, gravy and a vegan wish bone — that we thoroughly enjoyed. And then we watched Bruno. That has to be the weirdest movie I’ve ever seen. I’m surprised that it made it to theaters and that lawsuits of one sort or another didn’t prevent it from airing. There were some parts that were just downright funny and others that surprised me that the audience didn’t kill him.

Anyways, online blog buddy DolphynGyrl wanted to know what 5 things we’re thankful for this holiday season so here are mine:

1. I am thankful that I finally found my path in life, even if it took a few years.

2. I am thankful that I have a job I love (yes, I do still love my job)

3. I am thankful for good health of friends and family

4. I am thankful that Bobcat is still around, cranky as ever.

5. I am thankful for K being in my life. Without her, life would be lonely and very plain.

Then and now (portrait comparison)

Posted on by Posted in photo blog, transition .

I figured it may be a good idea to show what I looked like back in 2007 to compare how I look now. How things have changed.I think I look better today than I did then but.. eh..

Back in 2007

Me back in 2007

Me today

Me today