Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Now batting for Prem Arin, Estra Diol

I was at therapy on Monday...the first time since before SRS. I had two reasons for seeing her...the first being my current hormone regimen. Before SRS, I was on 5mg per day of Premarin, along with 150mg of Spironolactone. I cut the Spiro after SRS, and was officially dropped to 1.25mg of Premarin after SRS. I still had a number of 2.5mg pills, so I continued taking 2.5mg per day until I ran out last week. At that time, I dropped to the 1.25mg pills. I’d rather stay at the 2.5mg dosage, since I’ve only been on hormones for just under 3 years. I also wanted to try Progesterone since my breast development is minimal, and figured trying it wouldn’t hurt. My HMO also issued a statement a few months ago telling us it was switching everyone from Premarin to Estradiol.

So, I asked her about the Estradiol and if she could switch me over to it now instead of waiting for me to run out of my current Premarin. She did. I also asked her about the dosage. She said she’d normally put someone post-op on a dosage of 1mg per day, but she would put me at 2mg per day. I think this is still kinda low, but I’ll work with it for now.

I also asked her if I could start progesterone since I had minimal breast and nipple growth. (Officially, progesterone has not been shown to increase breast growth, but some people swear by it that I figured I would at least try it.) She said she would, and asked me which progesterone I would prefer...prometrium or medroxyprogesterone. I had done a little homework before our appointment, and found that the medroxyprogesterone is a synthetic progestin while prometrium is naturally micronized progesterone from yams. I’d heard that the synthetic stuff can mess with ones head quite a bit, so I asked for the prometrium. She prescribed 100mg per day for me.

Also during therapy, I talked to her about an issue I’ve noticed among some of my friends and family. People who have been with me during my transition know that I’m very comfortable talking about my transition and I’m very honest with them. They know they can ask me questions. They also know that I have other transsexual friends.

Unfortunately, my non-T friends then think that since I am fairly open about my transition, that others must be the same way. That’s not always the case. Not only that, but many of my non-T friends then almost default all of my friends to being T. Sometimes they ask me if the person is T or not which really puts me in a hard predicament.

This situation is really unfair. From now on, I’m going to be very forthright and tell them that it’s none of their business. Hopefully people will realize that if they are OK with me and other transsexuals, then it shouldn’t matter if they know or not.

Later Monday evening, I was out to dinner with some friends, a few of which were T...with one having surgery the following day. Somehow three of us got on the subject of revisions, and I mentioned that I was awake for my hairline advancement and sorta felt him cut out the section of skin along the hairline.

“Did he show it to you?” she asked.

The evil side in me (oh, admit it, we all have it) saw an opportunity. I stuck my arm out straight, touching my forefinger and thumb together. With a serious look on my face, I said, “He wiggled it in front of my face,” as I shook my hand back and forth.

They both cringed.

I took it one step further after they regained their composure.

“And then he ate it,” as I moved my hands to my mouth and made a slurping sound.

At that point, they both knew I was kidding, but they both still cringed at the thought of seeing Dr. O sucking down a raw piece of my forehead.

Both of them joined in.

“Did he have a fondue pot there, too?” in reference to the end of the Hannibal movie.

Cindy made the Hannibal Lector sounds, “ffhhuuhh ffhhuuhh ffhhuuhh ffhhuuhh,” as she rolled up her lip and sucked in air.

It’s nice that we can at least laugh about it.

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