I'm home from my second day of First Event, the big trans-conference north of Boston, and I'm still flying. For two days in a row I got to be myself, and toward the end of the second day, yesterday, I really began to let go into that. Just a few times so far as I feel my way forward into femininity - and yesterday afternoon was one of them - I have suddenly noticed that I'm talking high and light and fast and expressively, that my voice is more full of breath than it ever is in man-mode, that my hands and in fact my whole body are uninhibitedly involved in my expressing myself, and that a big girl-smile is stretching my mouth wide, because I feel like smiling, I just can't help it. In those moments I feel the quick warm feminine joy at the center of my being just beaming out of me, and I feel free. That is such a lovely feeling. :-)
There were way more people at the conference yesterday, Saturday, than there had been on Friday, including a goodly number of people in their teens and twenties, and many more trans men than before. The look of the crowd at mixed trans events still makes me smile: tall big-boned women with fabulous hair, and short soft-featured crew-cutted boys in jeans and t-shirts. We look so different, but in conversation and friendship I find that the sharing of the journey usually seems to eclipse the relatively minor matter of which direction you're going.
By conference end I had had three private consultations with three different plastic surgeons about FFS - Facial Feminization Surgery:
Dr. O is the patriarch of this select fraternity. He favors thorough reconstruction of the bones of the face, and his results are startling, sometimes to the point of making you look like a completely different person...but, always, an entirely feminine person, and sometimes strikingly attractive. I can't deny the seductive pull of his work, but I'm concerned about a few things...he dictates rather than collaborates, and he also told me my ideal weight at 6' is 30 pounds less than my current 180. Who says I have to be skeletally thin to be an attractive woman? Hm...I don't think I'm the first person to ask that question... :-p
Dr. B. is young, relatively unknown, and hungry. He offered to cover my airfare and lodging for trips to California to be operated on by him. He favors a less invasive approach - more soft-tissue, less bone - and he seems less completely bound to an underlying unquestioned assumption about what constitutes beauty.
Dr. M., who also does genital surgery, radiates competence. He was pleasant to talk with, and seemed to strike a good balance between offering professional guidance and listening to my concerns.
I didn't talk to Dr. Z, because going to him seems to constitute joining a cult. I don't want to be a Z-girl. And I missed the chance to talk to Dr. S, but I will definitely talk to him, too, because he's based in Boston, in easy driving distance. All the rest of them are in Arizona and California...lots of air fare...
And price? Ah, yes...I'm still waiting from quotes from the other two, but Dr. O's estimate: $45K, plus another $13K if I need a face lift after, which I probably would. Whee.
Best moment of the day: a compliment from a stranger..."You take up space in a womanly way." Typed out like that I guess it looks rather odd, but in context I took it to mean that to the speaker my over-all presentation was coming across as strongly femme...a validation of my ongoing effort to become a woman from the inside out. Of course I gushed my thanks... :-)
Worst moment (not bad, just mildly yucky): being one of only four members of the audience for a presentation about dealing with the media by a hard-faced trans man who edits a GLBT newspaper somewhere out west, and observing that he was making good public-speaking eye-contact with the other three people in the room...by appearance, a boy and two girls all in their twenties...and carefully passing over me each time. It reminded me of the way I have sometimes felt pointedly ignored by activist Lesbians when I am in man-mode. Whatever. I left.
I dressed in man comfy-clothes when I got up this morning, just because I'm used to them. Ordinary life beckons once again...and that's almost a relief. When you have learned patience, all times are soon.
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