Transitioning (HRT Stuff): It Gets Better

So today I did my second shot of Testosterone.

Now, it’s only been 6 days, not 7, since my last shot, but I need to move the schedule. You see, T gives you energy. Or well, I’m not entirely sure that it does it for all people, but it’s definitely doing it for me. I have much more energy now than I did before I started, enough that getting up isn’t so hard anymore, and I’m able to lift weights and do steps at work without being exhausted at the end of the day. I’m eager and excited about exercise now, because it means that I can have an outlet for this energy that I wouldn’t have if I were regularly cooped up like I am.

T gives me energy, yes, but T is not a super-fast acting medicine, meaning that it won’t kick in immediately after I take my shot. No, it takes about a day for the energy to kick in, and I’d made the mistake of taking it on a Monday. My energy kicked in on Tuesday, which isn’t an issue, but it decreases during the days before the next dose, so Monday was going to be hell. An energy-devoid, 8-5 hell. Which I was not doing, so I moved my shot to Sunday to make the work week even for me. Hopefully I’ll be at a different job soon, but for now this will work.

The shot was easier today. Mostly in that I didn’t sit for half an hour before I did it this time. No, I nicely measured everything out, used all the right tools, did all the parts right. And the first attempt was slow, but it was the only attempt. My gods was it strange, though. I can’t describe it the way it needs to be, but it’s definitely sharp, yeah. Painful and strange, but what’s stranger is that I could feel every layer that the needle went through, from the initial pop of breaking skin down to the muscle I was trying for, it was scary!!! But I did it, and fast, so I’m proud of myself. This time there was less stress, just a quick process of getting everything ready, then it was done. I’m pleased with my progress. I feel like my voice is already getting deeper, though that could be just wishful thinking.

I’ve started to do a reading once a week, to track the changes in how I sound. I did one before I started T, and did one on Thursday of last week. I’ll go for Thursday again this week, probably, and I look forward to comparing the recordings. It’s all very exciting and new and scary, but I do feel like it’s working. I’m so eager to see everything change, but I need to remind myself to be patient. I’ll be tracking the days and weeks on a basis of T-shots now, I’ve already started. It’s something to look forward to, and boy do I look forward to it.

This is great and I am so happy I’m able to do this.

Transitioning (HRT Step 2: It Gets Real)

It’s been a while since I made a post here, and it’s because I hadn’t gotten my Testosterone sent to me.

It arrived today.

It’s a small vial in a prescription bottle, and the box it came in included syringes, two different sizes of needles, and alcohol swabs. Initially, I was supposed to have a nurse friend of mine help me out with the injection tomorrow at work, but I got super excited and didn’t want to wait, so my injection happened today. Just a few hours ago. I’ll walk through what happened.

So. First thing I had to do was wash my hands with anti-bacterial handsoap. Safety first.

Then I took a syringe and one of the smaller needles and attached the needle to the syringe. I take .35 ml of T for my dose, so I drew up that much air into the syringe, poked the vial of T, pushed out the air, and drew up the T. Now, I fucked up when I did this, cause there was some air at the top of the vial that I didn’t realize was there. Also I was supposed to use the big needle for that. In my pack, the pink package needles are the big ones and the grey package needles are the smaller ones. I used the grey one for drawing up the T, which was the wrong thing to do, but whatever.

I actually tried to put the pink one on after I drew up the T. I held the syringe upright and took off the grey needle, then put on the pink one. I then realized that I had fucked up. The grey needle is the smaller one, and is the one the T should be injected with, since smaller needles hurt less. A grey needle was put on the syringe again, I flicked it to get the air out, then pushed up the meds so that a little bit of T was at the tip of the needle, to make sure all the air was gone. Then I wiped down the needle and my leg with an alcohol swap, and prepared myself.

I was sitting down for this, cause I believe that’s easiest.

It was not easy. I spent 30 minutes freaking out, because it’s just hard to stab yourself in the leg if you’re not used to that. And I am not used to it. I kept telling myself to just fucking do it, because this is T and I want it, but it’s also STABBING MYSELF so it didn’t come for a while. You’re supposed to have the needle at a 90 degree angle and just quickly jab it like a dart, but quickly was not happening for me. I had to gently prick myself a few times, and even then I wasn’t able to jab myself. I was able to gently push the needle in, which probably made the sting last, but I didn’t care, I did it. I was probably shaking a little right then, because it was so scary, but I pushed all the T in, gently pulled the needle out, and patched myself up.

It was terrifying, but I’m so so proud of myself and ready giddy about this. It’s happening, it’s here, I stabbed myself in the thigh 4 and a half hours ago and there’s a red mark on my skin to prove it. Testosterone is in and entering my system. I’ve got enough T and supplies for months and this is the beginning of a beautiful process that I’m so ready for.

When? Now.

Back a little while ago, when I disassociated cause of an episode of Breaking Bad, I wasn’t sure when I was gonna finish that series, right? What’s funny is that I think it was less than a week later that Nico and I had a marathon and watched something like 11 episodes in one day. We were up until 7am.

On that topic, Breaking Bad is an amazing show on many many fronts. The writing is great, the characters are great, the directing is great, I loved it from start to finish. And most of all, it made me FEEL. On episode 14 of season 5, which I believe is called Ozymandias, Nico and I sat in silence the entire episode. We didn’t say a word to each other or the TV. I just cried the whole time cause I was sad and angry about everything, and Nico made angry faces the whole time. We’ve never sat silently through ANYTHING. That’s not what we do. So, yeah, this really got us.

But I’m thinking on it, and holy shit. We wasted an entire day, and a NIGHT OF SLEEPING NORMALLY to watch a TV show. Now, granted, I loved watching the show, but I could have been doing so many other things. Laundry, for one. I always need to do that. I have a load running right now, as a matter of fact.

I don’t know. I read an article on Cracked recently that was “6 Harsh Truths That Will Make You a Better Person“, and this is a time in my life that I really needed to hear those things, because I was losing my sense of purpose, and my willingness to do anything has been decreasing rapidly. That article has been helping me kick my own butt and do the things that I have to do. I need to be my own leader, and those points are going to help me do that. One important thing the article talks about is self-improvement. You, doing what you need to do to be the person you want to become. And that’s something I’ve never really thought about in that kind of clear way.

But now that I am, I’m making plans. I’m trying. My calendar has all kinds of stuff on it, my HabitRPG has new tasks and habits, I’ve got new to-dos, and I’ve got a TON of New Year’s Resolutions. I want to get a significant amount of them accomplished. The few that I want to focus on are: Learning French, Taking Pole-Dancing Classes, Taking at least two 15 minute walks a week, painting more as focus, and writing more as a focus. When I say “as a focus”, I’m pulling from my high school and treating it like our “Senior Project”, so I’m gonna spend at least 100 hours working on it, and that’s gonna be true for the painting, the writing, and the French. So far, to accomplish these goals, I’ve looked up when and where I can take pole-dancing classes, collected a few pieces of cardboard to do smaller paintings on, added reminders on all of my reminding things, set up a duolingo account, and toyed around with an idea for writing a story for this year. All in all, I am working on it.

And that brings me to why I’m kind of looking back on that marathon with a little bit of discomfort. Cause I really need to get in the habit of watching things as rewards for myself. Or, hell, I’ll pull a Full Metal Alchemist on it and do a law of equivalent exchange. For everything I take in, I need to create something else. I’m gonna be honest, I haven’t had that thought in such clear terms while I’ve been throwing around my self-improvement plan, so I’m patting myself on that back for that. That idea means that if I want to watch something, I’ve got to write a certain amount of words or, paint a certain amount, or craft something hella rad before I can watch it. I’m not gonna count my exercise and language learning goals because those don’t actually make anything, they just improve me. Well, “just”, I say.

I don’t know, I’m kind of excited for things, but I also know that I need to be careful about certain things, like work, and make sure I’m not slacking off in a way that’s gonna get me fired. All these ideas and goals, they won’t happen if I get fired. So I need to keep myself in line and kick my own ass, make sure that I’m the best person that I can be as much as I can be.

But, you know. If I need to take a Sunday break or something every now and then, that’s fair. So long as I don’t knock myself off a good track, I’ll be okay.

Time to kick some ass and take some names, y’all. Happy 2015.

Endless Cycle

Sunday morning, I woke up at about 5:30am, and was really unsure why. I was very warm, but the worst thing was that I was nauseous. I HATE nausea. Like, seriously, it’s the worst part of being sick for me, just because it makes me paranoid. Sunday morning I was nauseous for about an hour and a half, and I must have gotten up and crouched by the toilet four times before anything happened. I probably also slept a little during that time, but at around 7am I finally threw up. I thought it was over, then, because generally that’s how it works for me, one time and I’m done. So I brushed my teeth, and I think I took a shower at that point, and I went back to bed. After another couple hours of fitful sleep and nausea, I got up and was sick again. Two hours later, same deal. Though, at that point I was wondering how anything was even coming up, because I’d purged most everything I’d eaten in the last day. I brushed my teeth after each purge, and I spent the majority of my day in bed, sleeping and being very careful about how I was turning my stomach in case I puked again.

Luckily I didn’t puke again, I think I was right in that there was just nothing left to purge. It was at this point that I felt like I had a fever, and I alternated between feeling chills and being hot. At around 3pm, I think, one of my friends brought me some crackers, but they left them outside my door cause they didn’t want to catch what I might have. Going to get the crackers made me realize that I was achey, just all over weak feeling, and it was hard to make it the few feet to my door and back. They jokingly yelled for me not to come downstairs, and I weakly told them that I could barely make it through my door way.

I’d been hoping that they would get me some ginger ale, too, but it seems that the world didn’t feel like doing me that solid, and like all of the ginger ale in this town disappeared or something. But whatever. I have water, and I need to stay hydrated. After a while, I would wake up and feel strange, like my stomach would rumble but I wouldn’t necessarily feel nauseous. It realized after a little while that I was hungry, so whenever that would happen I would eat like 10 or so crackers and call it a day.

I’ve been doing the same thing for a long time, now. Sleep for a little bit, eat what I can, sleep a little more. I got up at like 4 this morning during that cycle and I took a shower and got some food. I actually went downstairs and made some food, which I was proud of. Problem is, I made ravioli, and honestly whenever I tasted it, the sauce tasted like puke. I also got a can of pears, and that is a little easier to eat, so I’ve been eating that for a little while. It’s still hard to eat much at once, and I’ve fallen asleep once since I showered, too, and now I’m just really really warm.

I think I’m sweating out my fever, which, if I am, hallelujah. There’s no way I’m gonna be able to make it to work today, which sucks because I need the money, but I need to focus on taking care of myself. I think I’m mostly through this, but better safe than sorry.

Ringing In

I’m not sure what’s happened, tonight.

Good News

I’ve made it home for the holidays. After a 3 hour drive from where I live away from my parents, I’m back at their place and in one piece and tired as all hell. Sunday night/Monday morning messed me up something fierce, but yesterday I still managed to do laundry, clean my room, take out the trash, do dishes, and wrap all my Christmas presents for my family. And I went to the store!!! I’m very proud of myself, and I deserve a good, undisturbed rest.

Plus, ever since I got home today, my Mom’s been good about things. Like, a few things!!! For instance, she agreed with me about the sexist actions of the high school I went to, as they recently put the ladies at the holiday social through the ringer, and gave them 25 rules about dress code to the boys’ 2. There was a lot of dress code checking, and punishments given to only the girls, and that’s utter crap. Mom agreed with me about that, and I was proud of her for it.

What I’m most proud of her for, though, is getting my name right. She’s messed up a bunch, but either seconds or just a moment after she says my birth name, she’s started to correct herself, and I’m DAMN proud. She’s doing well, and has started correcting herself to say ‘guy’ instead of ‘girl’ and things like that. I’m really happy with how far she’s improved at getting this right, and I’m hoping it’ll continue. It needs to rub off on Dad, too, since I’m getting the feeling he’s gonna avoid saying my name/using gender words near me just so he doesn’t have to use my words.

Mom did the same thing previously, she was just vocal about it. I’m hoping I’m wrong, and Dad’ll fall in with the rest of everyone and use what’s right because it’s right, but I’ll be prepared to sit him down if he doesn’t.

My sister isn’t home because she’s at a friend’s house, but I’m excited to see her. I got her a great set of gifts this year, and I know she’ll like them.

Wow I am so tired. I noticed it at work, but it’s really really starting to hit now that I CAN actually go to sleep. I think I’ll just do that, then.

Goodnight, blog.

There’s a Reason for This

So I have a wordpress now.

There’s a reason I’ve made a new account on a different blogging site than I’m used to at 2:15am on a Monday in December. It’s because a) I have Things I want to say, and b) those Things do not belong on my other blog, which is on tumblr, and shall not be named yet. I may mention it later, maybe not.

For now, I’m going to get into what I came here to talk about.

Namely, my triggers, my gender, and depression, and how they affect me.