TRANS TURBULENT AIRLINES

 Hello Friends,

I’m back to continue my deep expose on the current state of the LGB  TQ community. The recent Dave Chappelle comedy special set the table for a huge discourse on issues surrounding trans women in particular — what kinds of jokes are transphobic? [answer: mostly the ones told by non trans people]

who is more marginalized, black folks or trans folks? [answer: black trans folks]

what was the true nature of Dave’s friendship with trans comedian Daphne Dorman? [answer: token trans friend]

What did it really mean when he said he was “Team TERF”? [answer: I am still transphobic but I’m trying to understand things]

Friends, I’ll have to admit that for the past couple of years I was cruising along not even thinking much about “trans issues” at all. During the year that I hid my face under a mask, something magical happened. I finally grew some facial hair — enough to earn “passing privilege” and to forget a time when the horrific slur “ma’am” was hurled at me everywhere I went, even if it was not meant to be hurtful. Some weight gain and some hair loss also contributed to my overall masculine presentation. I was thrilled, and because things were going so well for me transition-wise, I ass-umed all was fine in the community at large.

WELL, I WAS WRONG!!! There is a lot of shit hitting the fan, and some of it is of valid medical concern. Some of it is of valid social concern. And some of it is just pure transphobia rising to the surface because these valid medical and social concerns have started popping up.

I will give an overview of some of the turbulence affecting the trans community, and then I will give direct attention to some of the very special TERFs I have encountered.

First of all, it turns out that a lot of the people who were coming out as trans in 2015 are not really trans. Even back then I thought, is it possible that there are this many transes?? I mean, when I was a kid I knew, like, 2 people who were gender non-conforming, including me. And even we would never admit that we felt the need to live as the opposite gender full time. But in 2015, it seemed like a sizable portion of the human race had been secretly harboring feelings of gender confusion/dysphoria. And it was mostly young people. Kids, teenagers. Not as many people my age were transitioning, but they were out there too. And I felt pretty excited about this — a kind of I-am-not-alone euphoria to counteract the decades of I-am-so-alone dysphoria that had plagued me.

And most of the kids and adults who came out c. 2015 were choosing to medically transition (hormones, surgeries) as well as socially transition (wardrobe, name and pronoun changes). Not only that, but they were being celebrated for their bravery, their self-knowledge! Their journeys seemed like “success only” stories (I felt like I was the only person who wasn’t having a successful transition).

I first heard the term “Detransition” early this year. I saw it on some random youtube channel that had a transphobic tone to it so I didn’t pay much attention. I’ve known people who had to stop their hormone treatments for health reasons, but they still identified as trans. After the Chappelle special, as I was searching for info on Daphne and other trans comedians, I found a slew of “Detransitioners.” These are mostly young folks who were born female, transitioned to male for a period of time, then stopped testosterone treatments and returned to identifying as female. They sometimes call themselves FtMtFs. There aren’t as many MtFtMs going public, but there are a few of those out there too, and they tend to be older. I was surprised to see how many of these detransitioned kids were making youtube content. I know it’s possible they are “plants” from the neo-con universe, but it doesn’t seem like that is the case. They seem very sincere in their confusion and regret. [Keeping in mind that transgender people make up only about 13 % of the world population, these detransitioners make up only 5% of that 13%, but detransitioning was not something that was being talked about in 2015, 2016…].

So…more on detransitioners later. Now let’s talk about Autogynephiles.

A dubious psychologist named Ray Blanchard came up with a typology for transsexualism in males. One type is the homosexual male who is so effeminate he might as well just get castrated and live as a woman. The other type is the heterosexual fetishist who gets turned on by himself as a woman.

I can honestly say I don’t know any trans women who would describe themselves as either.

But apparently the latter type exists, and they are hijacking the whole trans rights movement with their male privilege!! They are taking over women’s spaces, and erasing the whole idea of what it means to be a woman! They are insisting that (biological) women define themselves with new language like “uterus havers” because transwomen are women even though they don’t have uteruses!  They are the force of evil known as Autogynephiles!!

They are the ones who would dress as women to get into the women’s restroom, or the changing room at the gym. And yes, there are documented cases of this happening, unfortunately. There was an autogynephilic transwoman in the UK who got sent to a women’s prison and raped someone. There have been several reports in the US of autogynephiles undressing and exposing their pre-op anatomy at women’s gyms or other women-only spaces. There are accounts of autogynephiles who troll lesbians for not wanting to have sex with them — dick & all. That’s transphobic, they say! Their main goal, it seems, is to play the victim and to make cis women feel uncomfortable.

Again I feel like I should state that I’ve never met any trans woman who fits this description, I’ve only seen/heard about them on the internet, so I am going out on a limb to suppose that they constitute a small percentage of the already small percentage of people who are trans. But they do exist, and that is cause for concern in some areas.

But more about the Autogynephiles later…let’s talk a moment about surgeries.

As a trans man I am familiar with the “trans rites” that constituted a successful FtM transition c. 2015. They included starting HRT (which I did on 12-7-15) a legal name change (which I did on 4-13-16) and “top surgery” aka double mastectomy with nipple grafts (which I did on 10-4-16). Notice I fulfilled my trans rites checklist very quickly — all within a year, and all because I was able to afford all this transformative magic (never forget the privilege!) I say that somewhat cheekily, but I am very grateful to have been able to do all these things rather expediently. It doesn’t happen that way for many trans identified people (and I have my theories about that being the origin story for the whole non binary movement, but we’ll get to that later).

The point is, once I made the decision to transition, I was helped down this path by a team of affirmative medical professionals who questioned me very little. I was under the care of a therapist who hooked me up with an endocrinologist and a “top surgeon.” I was with the therapist and a support group for a year before I made the decision to medically transition. I was 46 years old when I started the “journey.”  Most of the people I met on my way were much younger than me, and they were moving through their trans rites even faster than I was (ie, they didn’t spend a year in therapy first).

Notice I haven’t said anything about “bottom surgery” — which is the surgery everyone means when they ask “Have you had THE SURGERY??”  For FtMs in 2015 bottom surgery was not really part of the package (pun intended). Being on testosterone brings about some magical changes in the lower regions, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned in blogs from that era, and also there are some pretty life-like prosthetics you can buy to use at the urinal. Personally I felt no great need for “bottom surgery.” 

But it seems nowadays, more and more young trans men are opting for Phalloplasty. There is a better, less invasive surgery called Metoidoplasty, which makes use of the natural growth of the clitoris, severs a ligament to let it dangle free and look relatively like a micropenis. This used to be a satisfactory option for most trans men who wanted a little more enhancement down there, and I never heard of any long lasting complications or trouble healing from a Metoidoplasty.

Phalloplasty is a different story. It is a very complicated procedure that does not guarantee great results.

But let’s back up and talk about my own “top surgery” for a minute. I never once heard it called a double mastectomy with nipple grafts. It was always “top surgery” and it sounded so flippantly flamboyant! Everyone was thrilled to schedule their top surgery, including me. In Oct of 2016 I had been on T for 10 months but still did not look or sound very masculine. I was afraid the surgeon would take one look at me and decide that I was not a good candidate for top surgery. But that didn’t happen. I was a paying customer. No one questioned anything.

So I had the surgery and it all went well. I was surprised however by how , uhhh, surgical it felt. It was just top surgery, right? Elective? Cosmetic? I was not prepared for the level of pain and discomfort I felt. Basically I was sliced from the back of each armpit all the way across the chest, with each breast being fully removed, and the nipples traced by a scalpel and grafted back on somewhere higher than they had been.

There was much more healing to do than I was prepared for. They sent me home only hours after the surgery and I was barely able to straighten my spine into full standing position. I felt like I was splitting open. And then I had to get in a car and be driven home. That was scary! I thought, if we so much as bump into anything I am a goner. 

After about 8 weeks of healing I finally felt somewhat normal. I still felt like there was a piece of barb-wire yoked around my chest, right where my nipples had been. In fact, to this day I feel like my chest is tied up tightly with string. One day in 2020 after I finished running, I fell back on my bed and threw my arms up over my head and felt the most acute sensation of flesh ripping. In the days following I saw little pinpricks of blood all around the scar tissue. It has now been 5 years since my surgery and my scars still itch like crazy sometimes. My grafted on nipples itch a lot and I can’t scratch them directly because it’s too sensitive & tingly & weird. So I scratch all around them for relief.

I know this sounds like I’m complaining, or regret having the surgery. But that isn’t the point I’m trying to make. I do NOT regret having a double mastectomy with nipple grafts. I am thrilled about it actually. I could fill many more pages with how much I hated having breasts and how weird it felt to have bags of flesh dangling around & brushing up against my clothes every minute of the day. That I really hated!! I can live with itching and string. 

But I cannot, can NOT, CAN NOT, imagine living with those sensations in my genital area. I cannot imagine having to heal from scalpel wounds and stitches down there. I can’t imagine how much, and for how long, the itching of the scar tissue would affect that region.

I’ve unfortunately heard of so many young people going under the knife —for phalloplasties and vaginoplasties — and having terrible complications. In fact I haven’t heard any account of a phallo- or vaginoplasty that was without complication. These surgeries are not really ready for mass consumption. They are still extremely experimental. The things these kids go through after surgery is beyond anything I’d be willing to suffer. There is an especially cavalier attitude toward vaginoplasties —you cut the dick off and bam! instant woman. That’s how it is portrayed in movies, that’s how it is joked about by idiots. But ask any trans girl who’s undergone a vag-plasty and she will set you straight and hopefully smack the shit out of you for being so stupid.

But enough about THE SURGERIES for now. We will definitely talk more about those later. I can see this blog is getting super long and I haven’t even introduced you to the Triad of TERFs I want you to meet so badly. My god you will hate them…or love them maybe, if you’re hate-reading this blog. But they do deserve a mention in all this mayhem.

So I will mention them. Next time. In the Octopus Diary.

Farewell for now…

An Act Of God or Inactive God: Top Surgery part 3

Friends,

I'm feeling so much better than I did last week, and the better I feel the faster my memory of this adventure fades, so I'll try to wrap it all up in this post.

********

On surgery morning [10/4] I woke up feeling relaxed and foggy and detached. Exactly how I'd like to feel all the time, because who cares what happens when you feel that way? I could do so much more in this world if I didn't have emotions. I need a sympathectomy not a mastectomy. This is what my head was thinking instead of panicking

and I liked it.

But one thing did manage to creep into my psyche--would my snack from the night before interfere w/ the anaesthesia and would I be one of those people who was awake but couldn't move during the whole thing? Yay, thank you mind.

When I was checking in at the surgery center, I noticed they spelled my name with a 'Z' --  Zin? really?--and I had to do my paperwork all over again. Yay for that too. [This tiny, simple name that I've chosen has turned out to be very PRAWBLEMATIC. But more on that another time.]

I got called back to the prep area pretty quickly. I said adieux to Moonchild & put my bodily integrity in the hands of cold calculating medical professionals. I took off my clothes,  peed in a cup,  got a needle shoved into my hand, then Dr G came and drew purple lines on my chest. 

The anaesthesiologist came around this time & I asked them about how often people are awake under anaesthesia. And they looked at each other like, Not this question again. They both said That only happens on TV.

I felt better. Dr G had to run off to do someone else's surgery before mine, so Moonchild came back to my little hospital tent to hang out. I was feeling pretty relaxed. I was actually almost…excited about it!

Cartoon boobies

It seemed like I was lying in that tent for awhile--for the length of someone else's surgery--but finally the nurse came & gave me my "happy juice" as she called. it. And the next thing I remember…

…I was waking up and another nurse was standing over me saying "SHE HAD A SEIZURE!!!"

I tried to say "Who had a seizure?" But my voice did not work at all. The nurse noticed I was awake.

"VIN!!!! YOU'RE AWAKE, VIN!!! HOW ARE YOU? YOU WERE SLEEPING SO GOOD!!!" 

I tried to ask again about the seizure, but I still had no voice. The nurse patted my hand and said "WHY DON'T YOU SLEEP SOME MORE. DO YOU WANT ME TO GIVE YOU YOUR PAIN MEDICINE?" I nodded. She slipped some more happy juice into my IV & I slept for several more hours. 

When I woke up again I could tell it was late afternoon and I could see hurricane clouds swirling in the windows. My ALL-CAPS nurse showed up shortly to begin motivating me for departure. She was a real comedian, sort of reminded me of Aisha Tyler (comedy-wise not looks-wise). But she was really pushing for me to laugh and respond to her, and I just couldn't. I still didn't even have a voice. But the more I didn't respond the louder & more slapstick she got.

She made fun of my pink flannel shirt that I wore for its extreme softness factor: VIN,THIS IS LIKE AN OLD UGLY RUG AT MY GRANDMOTHERS HOUSE!!! As I was getting dressed I got dizzy & hyperventilated a little. She said "VIN!!! YOU'RE GONNA BLOW THE HOUSE DOWN!!!" And she fluttered the curtains at me. I felt like I was in a play again. I tried to laugh just so she would stop, but nothing would come out.

I could see the other nurse taking care of the patient across the way. She was a real Florence Nightingale, all tender and serene. But my nurse was … different from that. I'll just say she made the start of my recovery very memorable : )) And I never did find out who had a seizure, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't me because I felt okay and also…they were using my correct pronouns, so I was not 'She' to them.

Your tits are illegal. Cover'em up.

Moonchild & I made it back to our hotel room and I hovered in my Vicodin paradise as the Bahamas got battered and the death toll rose in Haiti. That evening the path of the storm shifted and it was headed right for us. Even in my haze I knew we would have to make some timely decisions about getting home.

And even in my haze I could tell I was pretty butchered up.  I was wrapped in a very tight bandage that seemed to be "holding everything together." And out of this bandage came dangling two bloody octopus tentacles. Aka "drains". 

Friends, I used to have an iron stomach. I could eat anything. I could inhale any odor or behold any gore without so much as a nostril twitch. I was an embalmer for the love of god. And even grosser, a taxidermist. I could ride any rollercoaster or carnival ride without puking. If my years of childhood bulimia trained my vomiting reflex to be voluntary, then my years of extreme alcoholism did just the opposite. 

I stand before you now, a wretched wretch who will retch at the slightest bee fart. I can barely watch food being prepared. I can't ride carnival rides, especially ones that spin around. I can't watch sloppy television programs like Shameless or The Walking Dead. 

So you can imagine how I felt about having to open up these octopus drains and squirt the blood out of them every few hours. I actually left that up to Moonchild, but every time I almost puked. I just had to tell myself, You cannot puke or you will bust open and be a slab of ribs & a beaty little heart w/ no protection. That worked.

[And I have to say that Moonchild missed his calling as a nurse! Anything I couldn't handle, he was right there handling it, blood, gore, psychotropic meltdown, et al.]

The pain was also a lot different than I was expecting. It felt more like I had been lasso'd by a piece of barb-wire right around where the girl-nips used to be(and under the arms) rather than sliced open. And even though the pain medication worked really well, the tightness and restriction of the barb-wire never went away. And I really had to keep my imagination in check or I would get all claustrophobic & panicky. Luckily the pain meds helped w/ that too.

[I know I sound like a huge druggie, but the best part of a medical vacation (aside from surviving the surgery) is the drugs. DON'T JUDGE ME.]

After watching the storm all night & calculating all the variables, Moonchild & I decided we would leave the East Coast early early Thursday a.m. Matthew was supposed to make U.S. landfall Thurs night or Fri morning and evacuations were starting in some of the counties just north of us. We didn't know what traffic would look like. I didn't know how my whole situation would hold up. But we wanted to be at home, not in a hotel during a hurricane.

So we packed up & got on the road at 5 am Thurs [10/6]. I tried to sit in the front seat but it was too much like a rollercoaster & I almost projectile vomited on the windshield. So I lay in the backseat watching the skeletal clouds dance. Traffic wasn't too bad & we made it home to find only 2 puddles of cat vomit waiting for us.

In the grand scheme of surgeries, I know this was a relatively mild one. But it was much more than I was bargaining for. I seriously thought I would be bedridden for about a week, then I would suddenly feel fine by the second week, back to writing and submitting and getting a goddamn haircut.

Scars & stitches & tape goo & legal nipples

But here it is three weeks later and the lasso has loosened, but I still feel like I'm leaning into a barb-wire fence. The healing process has been grueling. Getting my bandages & drains removed one week after surgery ( & driving to the E Coast again) was difficult. I didn't really want to see my chest while it still hurt so much. But voila! There it was, and my nipples looked really scary. Like they were barely attached and might peel off at any moment. Barf.

I rationed my pain meds so I was able to do my radio show 2 weeks after surgery. But shortly after that the Vicodin was gone and I was on my own. Week 3 without pain med = the hardest part of the adventure. (If I really wanted to throw my life away, I would start a slow dance w/ opiates right now. That is some pleasant shit. Luckily I still have delusions of making something of my life.)

Now starting week 4 post op and I'm doing fine on Tylenol and have resumed most normal activities. Nipples still attached and looking less pukeworthy. I'm starting to feel like this was all worth it after all. I was plagued by doubts for about 8 weeks but now I'm starting to be plagued by amazement.

And I'll be sending hurricane relief to the Bahamas and Haiti. I've been in the Bahamas during a hurricane & it ain't pretty. Now it just seems like the right thing to do.

So, I hope you have enjoyed the Top Surgery Adventure. One thing I can guarantee El Trumpo-style--there will never be a Bottom Surgery Odyssey here in the Octopus Diary. Believe me.

PHOTO DISCLAIMER: I'm aware my photos have been stolen & manipulated in the past. Yeah, I know about this. And though it's really creepy and invasive, I'm not going to let it stop me from sharing with people who may have interest in my story. If you need to steal my photos for your art, I'll let that be a reflection on you. Good Day.

Pre Op Psychoactive Euthanasia Yoga Party

FRIENDS,

On top of having phantom nipple pain I also have a monster headache today, so I will try to relay this portion of the story as justly & eloquently as I can…

**********

After watching the storm all weekend and seeing that it had stalled in the Caribbean, we took off for the East Coast early, early Monday [10/3]. We arrived at Dr Garramone's office at 9:43 for my 10:00 pre-op appointment.

One thing I didn't realize is that I would be sharing my 10 am appointment w/ about 5 other guys. We all had to fill out big packets of legalese paperwork that had some scary warnings & disclaimers. All stuff about how risky surgery is, how results may vary, how death is a possible side effect, etc…stuff I already know but prefer to remain cognitively dissociated from. It took me the longest to get through the paperwork, so I was the last one to see the doctor.

I could've been kinda upset about having to wait for 4 other people to see the doctor, but I was too excited to be upset. I realized that this was a once in a lifetime venture & I pulled on my big boy thong with lacy trim & waited. I was a little nervous about meeting the doctor as he is pretty legendary in the trans community. I expected him to be larger- and louder-than-life. But he was quite mellow and medium-sized. And way younger than I thought. 

I don't really remember what we talked about during the appointment. More scary stuff about where incisions would be made, and how I would have to take an active part in the healing process. Stuff I had meant to prepare myself for in the 6 weeks before surgery, but you all know that didn't happen. After the appointment, Moonface & I did all our preparatory errands--getting prescriptions filled, stocking up on post surgical necessities like Activia & compression socks, getting checked in to our hotel room.

It was late afternoon before we were settled into our room and my surgery-nerves were taking over. All the doubts & uncertainties I had held at bay for 6 weeks were now realities that loomed only hours away. I'd had surgery in my 20s and one thing I remembered (& was very worried about) was the nausea from the anaesthesia. I remember writhing in vertiginous torment for hours before finally throwing up gallons of bright purple liquid later that evening. I was really hoping to NOT relive that experience.

Luckily, someone was kind enough to supply me with a terrific anti-nauseant for this operation. I'll just call it a "medical edible" and assume you know what I mean. 

I was told this antidote was best eaten BEFORE the nauseating chemicals were administered. My plan was to have it as an evening snack and then just drift off into a peaceful, dreamless slumber. But…my nerves were already at the forefront & I wanted to shut them down. So I nibbled my medicine a little earlier--about 5 pm. We turned on the news to watch the storm a little. I started to feel a little relaxed. I thought, "This is great. Just what I needed."

Then we decided to go eat dinner. And, friends, I don't know what chemistry was at play here, but as soon as I ate dinner, the psychotropic properties of the "edible" kicked into high gear. And I was off on the most juvenile, overblown, exaggerated, unexpected fever dream/waking nightmare I've had since….

……I don't know…? ….7th grade?

Just what I did NOT want in the hours remaining before scalpel-time!!!

The first thing I felt was just disorientation and pure panic--I'M HAVING SURGERY TOMORROW!! HOW DID THAT HAPPEN???

And of course I was certain I was going to die. But I was going to be brave & die anyway, because what better way to die than during top surgery, right?

Then came the GUILT. Those of you who know me know I'm a master of guilt. I've been told I would make an excellent Catholic. Somewhere in my youth I must've gotten the message that feeling guilty about everything you do is super virtuous.

So I was a horrible person because I was spending all our savings on my selfish operation, I was guilty for hoping that the hurricane would hit anywhere else but SE Florida, I was guilty for putting Moonface through all my shit, I was guilty for being born female and not just accepting that. I was just a big hunk of guilty meat rotting on my bones & I can't even describe how HUGE the guilt was in my altered state. It was ridiculous. 

I felt guilty because I know people my age who have already survived breast cancer, and what would they think of me just volunteering to lose my two blobs of bitchflesh? Yep, I deserved to die.

I tried to remind myself that I DID need this operation, that I AM trans, there are words for it now, there is help out there for people who hurt in the way I do--not so much the physical way but that obscure unspeakable psychic pain that debilitates in separate but equal degrees.

But I couldn't convince myself of anything but horror and doom. 

After the guilt came a kind of sadness. I was pacing around our hotel room spouting guilt-gibberish & doing yoga because I knew I would be incapacitated for a few weeks (if I survived at all). I'm a pretty active person & I don't like how I feel when I can't exercise. So I was trying to get my joints & muscles all limbered up for their down time. It helped dispel some of the guilt & sadness.

Then things just got bizarre. I felt like I was acting in a play, mostly because the hotel room looked like a stage set. I kept asking Moon "Are we still doing a play?" 

A little after that, I started to see myself as a dog that was about to be put to sleep. I think I was even panting & jumping on the bed on all fours & treating Moonface like a dog would.

(When Moonface first moved to Florida he had a young Tibetan mastiff who died during surgery. And I kept feeling that the human version of that story was about to play out.)

ANYWAY…  this psychotronic diversion lasted for HOURS and was much more intense than I can describe adequately. It was really quite frightening for awhile!

I imagine most guys on their pre-op eves are happy, excited, sure they are doing the right thing & that they deserve it.

I did not have that experience. I was wracked with nightmarish questions & visions & doubts. And I'm sure that's how I would've felt with or without the medical edible--that just served to crank the volume of my neurosis up to 11.

BUT!!!! I did eventually drift off into peaceful slumber & had ZERO nausea after anaesthesia!! So you can bet I will be voting yes on Amendment 2.

***************

So, spoiler alert, I did survive the surgery. And perhaps I'll write a little bit about Surgery Day. Next time. In the Octopus Diary. 

Pre Op Detox: Top Surgery pt 1

Octies & Gentlepusses,

HTF are you??? I am fine in a post-surgical, not-quite-back-to-normal, all-my-Vicodin-is-gone-and-I-must-admit-I'm-no-longer-on-medical-vacation way.

That's right, last we "spoke" I had just made my appointment for Top Surgery & I was taking a hiatus from Octopusworld to get ready for it!!

And what an adventure this all became, from the moment I made my appointment, to this very moment 2 weeks after surgery, it has all been more than I bargained for. That's not such a bad thing; I know now that jumping right into the surgical portion of my transition was the right thing to do. I had planned on waiting til sometime in 2017 to do it, and now I am so glad I did not wait!

You all know I am a Hobbit. A hedonist. A kiddult who does not invite stress or noise or pain or people into my life lightly. I live my life in constant defense against those unpleasantries, so to schedule an event that creates lots of stress, pain & peopled-interaction is really against my religion.

But the money we had saved to turn our garage into a creative workspace was just burning a hole in our electronic spreadsheet after we learned that houses w/ garages are worth more than houses w/ a creative workspace & no garage. I proposed the idea of top surgery to Moonchild and he agreed that would be a good alternative way to spend our savings.

I asked him a few more times "Are you sure it's okay? Are you sure it's okay? Is it still okay if I make an appointment for top surgery?" And he kept saying yeah, it's okay.

 So I made the appointment. And I was immediately beset by panic & the reality of all the strength & nudity that would be required to get through this invasive medical upheaval.

I thought a good way to keep my panic in check would be to get really healthy. Detox, exercise, eat like a strict hipster-mommy bunny rabbit. Make myself feel like I was in control of my own flabby mortality.

But life had other plans for my pre-surgical waiting period. Just about everything that could go wrong in 6 weeks did:

A friend died.

My computer died. Stuff went wrong w/ the house. Stuff went wrong w/ the car. Stuff that usually doesn't happen to us kept happening.

Not to mention all the humiliating medical hoops I had to jump through. I was told I would need to get a mammogram before surgery and that flipped me out. I scheduled the mammogram for mid-September & spent all of August in abject fear of having to pull my tits out & put them in a vise.

But…the mammogram was no big deal. I dreaded it & dreaded it & it was over in the blink of a non-judgmental digital eyeball.

However…I was also required to get "medical clearance" from my physician. This I did not dread as much as the boob-fondling. And yet, it was so much more traumatizing.

Our usual doctor died last year and we have a new, young doctor whom I have not really gotten to know yet. During my medical clearance I discovered how little she's been paying attention to my holistic situation. She wasn't prepared to do my medical clearance, she thought I was there for a ….gross, I can barely say it….Pap smear. "Aren't we doing your Pap today?"

No. Look at my chart. When have I ever done a Pap? That's right--NEVER. 

I handed her the paperwork for my surgery--which clearly stated Chest Reconstruction for FTM Transgender Patient--and as she looked at the results of the previous week's mammogram she asked, "Why are you having a double mastectomy when your screens are benign?"

And I had to point out the part about being "transgender." And she seemed surprised, perplexed, dismayed and embarrassed. Which made me feel the same way, but worse.

I've been lucky on my "journey" so far to have a good network of local medical professionals who are invested in helping the transgender community. This was my first experience with a doctor whose mind it hadn't even crossed--oh this patient is on testosterone & is seeking chest surgery…but WHY???

Anyway--my intentions to achieve ultimate health and happiness before going under the knife were thwarted from all angles by life's tainted uncertainty. Instead I arrived at my pre-op appointment on Florida's East coast a stick of homo sapien jerky, gristly and fat and cranky and ready to bust into tears like the sissy boy I am.

Oh yeah…did I mention that the weekend before my surgery a hurricane formed in the Atlantic & was scheduled to hit FL that very day? 

The surgeon's office had called me on Thurs Sept 29th to tell me that they had received all my requisite paperwork & I was set to go!! And I had 24 hours of pure relief & happiness--This is really happening!! -- all dashed by Fri Sep 30th when I saw the weather report & the storm heading right for my operating room.

I was right back to wondering--Is this even going to happen?

Well, you all know it did happen, but there is more to the adventure. This was just the prologue. Unfortunately, I still do feel like a pizza with an autopsy (and two little Frankenstein-stitched nipples for pepperoni). So you will read the rest of this story as I'm able to type it.

I got to meet the holy god of top surgeons (Dr Garramone), I got to experience some lovely drugs, some interesting nurses, some body trauma I wasn't expecting…but the real pinnacle of insanity happened the night before the surgery. I will regale you w/ that adventure next time….

….in the Octopoussoir Diary!

**********************

Sorry I have no new writing or art for you. But remember, there's plenty of epic poetry sprinkled throughout the summer blogs to keep you RIVETED. And I can't wait to feel well enough to get back to it.

Espionage of Consciousness

FRIENDS,

How are you? I'm busy as fuck & hope you are too.

I have scheduled top surgery. I won't tell you the date because I don't want you casting spells on me on the operating table. But I can't wait!

(But I will wait.)

So….here is the next part of the Howl-length epic. You've been waiting anxiously. If you notice that I go between "you" & "I" as subjects, always know that "You" & "I" both mean "me." And also they mean "all of you, all of us."

Enj. Oy.

*******************************************

JUL -- SEP

Summer is the most monstrous segment of time's caterpillar

The noise of taming nature bleeds green into the perpetually sweaty ear cavity. Palm the hazy yellow pill, gulp it

The only thing that stops the white of noise is forbidden yellow tablet dissolved upon humid tongue & halting

A hellish cycle that began somewhere by the schoolyard where obsessive compulsive lawnmower man

Loomed again, again & against the pulpit of dawn

I run on slippery octopus feet    I slip on my own tears and disappear in a cloud of ink

This transparent inkcloud you peer through now. 

[My vow to stay sober is being revised] NEW VOW & TESTAMENT:

If I make it 10 years without I may check in

W/ the occult elixir once again. It's not required. But it will be allowed on days like July XX 2015 when XXXXX

The people who are visual thinkers would never notice how goddamn loud the daytime summer, tears into my paper 

Machete speaker cabinet skull

I am an auditory pupil, thinking immobilized, just flashes of insight all day long between tears, between mower clips & bullet spray & loud loud basketballs bouncing down the street; cracked asphalt playground lacking minor puppetmasters, they bounce alone reclaiming their net worth by making noise.

A night in the city of my garage making the only noise I can tolerate--music. Tube trance my own sub-genre of organic bleeps responding to electronica as she searched for the right word to finish her artificial thought

By Independence Day I made my choice

Between the tailor & the surgeon

It's hard to wait on these long slippery feet

How do humans sit, patient, flipping through slick zines with their parched inkless fingertips

How do they live in such hard hard heads?

The door held open by aliens, all domesticated & legal

How are you? Please step on the scale.

Me & Pixel as kiddens? Nope that's my very fist black kitty, Hannah

I slipped on cat vomit & cried for an hour. No worry  there was no milkfed this cat -- a true mammary cannibal oddity

The fangs of a vegan lost

Teeth in my house I never found

The soft yellow of the pill dissolves the sun's glaring dictatorship

The sun atop the stems of brains casting coronas all around error & artifice

Around all thoughts even those perceived to be automatic involuntary motion detected sympathy cards of stock response

TransPanTastic

When you care to copy every footstep laid down for you-- 

Sing songs to your cat in homemade videos, play guitar with your old alcoholic hands shaking & sweating just because it's in the rule book

Buy sex toys you do not need.

Consider doing a podcast. It's part of the process, the process can't be stopped & you haven't even got past the initial consult

You spend this summer studying the nuance of your new identity

You decide not to send a thank you document to those who paved the way, happy little footsteps pitter-pattering past the very need for surgery, for needles in your life--

the twilight agony zone of binary boxes, or rather shell game switcheroo at embryonic hormone car wash, squirted but unresponsive, or not hosed down at all. Which is it that caused you to emerge as default gender specimen?

An hourglass w/ cubist tendencies. This is how your time travels, the sands get lost in transit. From shard to shape to shadow. From suitcase to station to supernova. It explodes into a yearglass.

Responded to the rattlesnake; still haven't held a beerglass

Or a chainsaw to your tits

Ears in distress

When chainsaws call like wolves at night your insomnia feels even more like a karmic repercussion, unusual & unconstitutional

They lowered that damn redneck flag, forgive me for saying I'm proud not to be afraid of god (even as "he" pinned me to my own ribcage last year) I'm proud to be gun- and child-free, I'm proud to say I love social justice but hate the poetry!

They lowered their damn trousers & whipped out their dicks

Because every story needs a scene like that.

Yes?

I study The Others--all here for the same reason. But further along in their laboratory body journeys. I feel extra prima donna ballerina. I still cry ballet tears, the broken toes, and my NY fat Abby Lee Miller boss stinking of her own feet, dry cracked voice yelling at my posture, my weary quadracep letdown. Yelling that I'll never make it to the stage…

I walk away and pull a page from my notebook & dance on it, but she doesn't see. I remember those tears like yesterday, all tears on the windshield have dates & reasons pinned microscopically into the shatterproof focal pointe

Ballet is melting flesh. Buttery transcendence from ape to raven to helium to ether and back to butter or human again but so visual it leaves the auditory among us out in the cold vomitorium

Babysitter teaches me & my brother how to feed babies properly--a skill neither of us ever needed

Tuesday finally. Peace. A gift. Sang. Brothers. New webisodes of chaotic watercolor cartoon I love so much, through my own tears it looks like a computer generated image. Lacking humanity. Lacking vision.

Word salad on this planet--you aren't anxious. You are a unit of anxiety--an anxiet.

On this plate you are always the potato never the meat. On this template you are always the sidebar. Contemplate tempest. Men's room euphoria/dysphoria all@once.com I couldn't find myself in the mirror. In the backpack i find someone else's junk & use it to do my business. Women have no business in the genderless bathroom. Women are the most gendered of them all.

Who's spotted a rhino wearing lipstick? A pit bull with breast implants? A tarantula Brazilian-waxed? 

Sometimes men have zero mirrors on the wall. To be free of any reflection is how free I want to be.

Yum. Stress. Mmmm.

Now with more methylethylcellulorhomboid marshmallows.

Very unclever. An age of privilege is coming to a theatre near you & it ends. Loud vocalization of orgasmic opposites shaken like water off your golden retriever, creating that yin thing, that yangxiety

Feels like heart pinata busted & leaking sugar for favors. Please please, pretty please, who taught that to their daughter?

Feels like rodents, spiders, sticky whiskers

Anything but butter flies along your nerves

Anything but horses powering your will to live in this device-shaped society &

Estrodial still controlling your libido

The laboratory journey begins with a letter to the ologist and a Shakespearean wait.

A play at the goddamn hickory-dickory-trickery-dockery tea house, so prior to Boston Harbor we can hardly call it a Party.

Blacked out on Earl Grey, you'll never believe who I forgot seeing there--Elliot. 

(I'll never see him again)

What? I saw him a week later on that couch in that building. Talk to yourselves about how inappropriate catastrophic language is for this scenario.

Who remembers the Vivian Girls and their loving but wrathful creator? Not god, but not Satan. Not like Abby Lee Miller either. I am the Vivian Boy with balanced chakras despite (his my your poem voiced many flaws) Speaking of being a defective dickless version of Humanitor--

I made an invention that I got off the internet

It makes me smarter every time I drink water

Sometimes gotta spend some quality time w/ numbers

Numbers jotted & numbers scribbled out w/ numbers wriitten over them like birds about to poop on their importance

Sometimes time is my only friend & I don't even have to pay it; it is its own currency

After all the attention paid to space

Mass gets its own reception

All 5 senses -- and the 6th I imagine -- round out the 9 dimensions we occupy

Stonewall Birthday

Numeric empirical paranoid conclusion

Phone walls not stone but awfully withholding  when all I get is an ancient archaic analog answering machine

Take our quiz: Can You Draw A Vagina?

Can you draw a weapon from your vagina?

Can you draw medical marijuana into your vagina? 

Is your eye drawn to pointillism? Is your vagina?

In the future, new bodies will be ready & upgraded for our pleasure & utility & there will be no vaginas left, yes?

Can you recall all your residences--the places you've lived since birth?

I can't but I had to anyway.

These government papers are not hyperbole. They are not suggestions. So dig deep, citizen. Where were you the night you were born?

ART!!!

The troll from under the internet's Golden Gate attention span came crawling into your humid ante-chamber

While you waited for Julieticide

Romeo knocked on my nervous system & offered a cocktail I could refuse (but didn't)

The troll thinks you are linked to me (romanxiety, genitoxic masculinities) and you are but only platonically, hemlockishly socratically, aristotally innocently, hella adverbally.

You can't control the remote eyeball army, you can't offer trigger but not bullet warnings, you can't troll me away from my safe place. I tried. You should've been kidnapped. I was. At gunpoint. I didn't even live there at one point. But he tried to get me to stay put. At gunpont. Even on the potty.

Singing is the new crying.

Crying is the new sculpture.

Sculpture is business & business is booming, exploding

Into theatre,

where I fail to resonate with super heroes, 

Where animae won't do it for me anymore--where is the human touch, the alcoholic ink-washes that make your characters pop out of their limitless hallucinogenic skin? Replaced by soft hazy digital 3-D overly lifelike adorbs and yet so lacking luster husks.

Business is blossoming into a rare Tarot orchid a 4th of July lily dropping pollen for bees

Who would rather step in shit

Than enter through August's automatic doors whooshing with wet warmth and crying out for freon

Headache barometer leo-panthera uproar

Rain. Flood. Sing. Guitar. 

Hollow evening misogynous latitude--you're allowed a certain degree even in this heat,

Especially in this cheap August heat

You have acute anxiety issues -- guns help. Safety first! Too many Tuesdays in 2015--most gunshots happen on Tuesdays, 

ask anyone. Social media got my tongue, my ego my exquisite scapulas. I hunch like a gargoyle over its busy sidewalk, observing their puff-chested text for my own cues to evolve

Evolution was going the speed limit but now it accelerates. I'm catching up after lagging a decade behind. Driving like a blue hair in the turn lane for 12 years, blinker on so they know I'm alive. Social media is the new paperwork. We've come a long way. We've gone right back though….

Slipped on the literal & proverbial banana peel, the controversial cliche is problematic for fruit whose skin does not make a mockery of man

Thursday--feeling light & fun! Enjoy the fuck out of it because it's just a surge from the guy next to you. Happiness never your own private property, must plug into the system. Be seen in photographs with rows of friends, paperdolling at your big event, not strong enough to be plastic, mannequins posing alone, self equals selfish, a virtue to some

Write. Guitar. Read. Respond. Silly cartoon, blood is for canvas. Silly art, work is for living.

Left alone in the parking lot w/ cliquish trans guys. Even in the marginal pervzone I am alone. Walled to an even further, exclusive narrow curb club nervous skateboard breakdown balance beam bard burden… I get lost trying to figure out where conversations should begin….

Says the boy who cries good bye on the sidelines. Downtown all torn up by bulldozers & people who never lived here before.

Humans swarm like moths around the Sarasotellite

Today I was interviewed by a saint. Today I swear. My victim died. My valiant parole officer removed me from the prison of my body. Now I'm a murdered woman too. A militant stylist needs to know the gender of my cut.

The house was open to the public, even us. Before we moved in, a leopard lived here. A father figure lectures me in my new dream bedroom. I stand up to him in my sleep. Baptizing turquoise walls w/ my stale tears, trapped in women's prison 40 year incarceration, oh my tiger,  Sleeping tiger.

Sadly, tears do not age like wine. I tried to get drunk on them. Too dry, brutal.

The stoic auction. 95. 98. 109. Sold to the gay couple whose marriage will destroy the neighborhood & all its unseen Dachshund nazi dog owner lesbians & spraypainted hearts on garbage cans also lesbi-owned. Knock it to ruins & build a better fortress for your love graffiti.

The electronic contract. The Beckett on top of the Shakespearean weight, all this waiting in centipede bitcoin. I can wait like a playwright who knows the exact date his engine will die. You are straining for meaning & there is none.

Everyone panics like eternity's out to get them, but I celebrate at the mini-mart taking it personally that I haven't been chosen yet. The stainless crescent v. the scythewhack mascot who's unrecognizable in his threadbare lingerie.

Like I said, the mini-bar has been depleted since double oh seven & I'm still surrounded, shaken by drunks who stir in their dead brain cell habitats. They give me headaches & tell me not to look so horrified.

But the truth is I'm horrified. By this year & its added dimension. If I knocked that wine glass from your fist you'd be the first to adopt my horrified face. How can you tell the dental hygienist Don't touch me! Get the fuck outta my face! It's her job to be there in your head, for your teeth to bleed on her & stink up her gloves. I erase this week w/ some arterial graffiti.

Why does poetry give? I don't know but I'm drowning

In an aspect of the muse that melted on my dashboard, a crayonscape touched by sun in a standstill parking sandlot

And unlike your forgotten child, it came to life

As it liquefied

The dogs remind me I was young not long ago

But now it's time to be old. That's just how it goes.

Summer is your horoscope's dirtiest joke, the punchline divine but directed at your ego's fonatanel. It urges you to switch seats at the sound of a bell, or a chainsaw. Ringing on a liquid shadow limb, why cut on a day that pants for shade, a day whose shirt is a dripping tongue with no deodorant on. Sublingual sweatglands on uberdrive, Axillary stress drool under my thumb the only pulse belonging to its true owner.

Hormones are god & god says it's good to wait in your room.

Howling or scowling or bowling or reading JK Rowling or knitting that cowlneck sweater for someone else's winter, not yours.

The host *must* have a dick to refer to.

The poet laureate must have a penis!

All those critics & pundits must stand to pee or they'll be told to sit down on the sidelines like they do in the restroom. I will walk from the margins to the outskirts & make it to an alternate universe by dinner next year.

You won't believe how loud I will sing in this electric rain storm, you don't understand how inspiring lightning is!! Only I & my lonely ego understand snow. You corrupt rainbows, ignore the sunset unless you have a camera. Enjoying nature is a sacred accomplishment. Congratulations on your eyesight.

A live sacrifice on Jeopardy! Trebek evolves before our eyes, an onyx goddess, superheromoon above his full pouty lip no longer moustachey but utterly clean and sober. Scholarly cockroach flounder amoeba contestant. who will ring in first, who will be the patientest?

Jesusfish subject to evolution too, now a cat with claws scratching holiness into your low-brow paint job. Clouds are patient. Moon is doctored. Clouds separated at birth, moon behind a mask of their silver microsurgery vapors. Stars sacrificed like blurry white lambs. Fuzzy little.

Sun will identify all errors on the chart w/ a big orange smile. Congratulations you survived August.

If you over-identify w/ this team or that politician you may be a: chauvinist

                                                                                                                racist

                                                                                                            exhibitionist

                                                                                                               patriot

                                                                                                             cartoon

You're fired from your art. You must start caring what the world does. We'll tell you when to stop. You're all grown up now.

Fall Fashions.

I used to catalog colours. Organize them like code for a galaxy of sentients whose language is yellow butter urine sunshine blue blood from another planet's vein tap red into scarlet into brickyard, amber amulet, purplish puritanical prunes pureed

Color is the tenth dimension

But I've gotten ahead of my/our self. I was told to go & I went too far, back to the original pattern where god's galaxy-voice asks me to start again & move my mind faster when I talk because my mouth has all the answers. Long short demagogue dialogue high low road brow. Black white binary. Brown yellow second life marginalization. Yellow optimization for poetry publication.

Limitation. Tranquilization. Autism. Oblivion-stim. Don't interrupt--Grrrrrrrrrrr!!!!

1975. Hippie-WASP road trip about to happen. Is my Charlie Chan coloring book racist?

Let's go into broadcasting. Let's go into our minds, garages, hives & tell the world how to enslave colors & sacrifice numbers as the Bible said we should.

Wait, when did we open the Bible? When did we unscrew that childproof cap? Was it the night Alex T became a Somalian warrior w/ mutilated genitalia, female would be my guess…guessed. Guest. Contestant. Flounder. Amoeba.

I hate dinner & a movie.

But not tonight.

Tonight is a rare, well done exception to that medium.

The story told in 90 minute visual format w/ minimal dialogue & overdosing sp/fx obesified on gratuitous eye candy

I stopped the soft yellow pill from melting on my tongue

Fuzzy little lamb stars burnt up & I did not cry!!

I did not make a movie of myself crying & 

My spirit didn't break into the pill dance

Somewhere nearby there's been a breakdown

Of the legal system, break-ins at a neighborly arm's length pace, who can piss farther? You can, burglar winner.

It's the day before my hormonal adventure and I still haven't packed my suitcase. I must've known I wasn't going down that road. Yet. 60% disappointed 40% relieved.

I write. Other writers like what I write. I am a fascist apologist masculist/feminist misogynist. Radical progressive who needs approval from magnetic verbs, slow sung vowels roasted not vocal-fried,

This poem is 75% noun & the Revolution demands more verbs. I've been disapproved, intransitive. Insensitive. Invalid. I'm a writer w/ likes but no loved ones. I'm a subject w/ no verbs to add to the conversation. I'm a gawker in the talker age. Realm. Era.

This is me on a support beam, bent by jet fuel, clung to by past glass relationships.  I will jump soon. I summon courage that doesn't come in the form of a pill & freefall, a lungful of heartache twists my intestines' matching tapestry & just when I'm about to break,

Out come the nubs

The feathery aerodynamism of winged suspense. My fuselage is not too big to fail. I'm flying on my own 20K feet. Be careful of the drones the flocks of geese honking in the slick atmospheric galley.

All the wrong faces

Misogynist

Pugilist

Methodist journalists in the flock of jerks

Weirdo herd noise crowd funded sex and drugs

Entitled laziness, stillness, you've got no rights left

Human being ghostplane crashing on this sad date

You've also no right to avoid your fate, multi-tasking brain

Takes on one more dimension

The Boys' School w/ androgynous uniform questions 

Principal shape color scent texture mass size taste on your tongue buds intersecting with time

Now I know I can stand up for my selves.

Now I know I can fly like a highway paved with the soft crude leftovers of girls & boys who never grew up to be dinosaurs

Riddled w/ rat paw blossoms, black-eyed susans

Lantern-jawed Pedros

Start packing, rats! It's time to make our exit w/ our selfish selves intact. Get more boxes from the liquor store. Liquor never goes out of business. Like mental illness and sarcasm. Repeat like historical phonecalls between powers that be on answering machines before magic rectangular palm-held social devices invented on a rainy waiting room night, singing, telling dick jokes, even laughing into my camera, missing the point of the total eclipse

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