One of the saddest thing I've noticed about Susan's is that once posters have achieved their goals (whether it be srs, ffs, etc.) they fall off the face of the earth.
I'm guilty of this, and I want to provide a small update of my life for some of you, especially the young transitioners - susan's for me changed my life, introduced me and educated me to topics i wasn't aware of or lacked knowledge. Learn from others, we've walked a mile and carved a path for you. Use it.
I'm 26, I started my transition at 22 browsing this very site. I knew what wasn't sitting well with me but couldnt vocalize it until i found a community of people just like me - spirit of a woman, body of a man.
In those four years I've accomplished quite a lot. Nothing was easy but the good things in life never are.
I wanted to share some lessons with some of you:
Lesson 1: I had FFS with Dr. Ousterhout at 24 - i got 'the works'. It changed my life immensely, it made me passable to a degree i couldn't imagine. It didn't come without consequences, in the months after FFS i developed a serious infection called osteomyelitis. I nearly had to have my jaw cut off to stop the infection from spreading. Thankfully I had a team of doctors in Toronto who treated me with an 8 week course of IV antibiotics and emergency surgery that only allowed for a tiny chunk of jaw cut off - nothing disfiguring.
The lesson i would tell you new transitioners in regards to this is simple... listen to your bodies, allow yourselves to heal. Don't push your limits. I felt amazing 6 weeks post-op with my 'new' face, the next thing i wanted to do was drop 10 pounds so I could go clubbing and flirt with the boys. I so desperately wanted to lose weight that i started cutting back what i was eating significantly. I probably put my body to a state of malnourishment that i contracted some kinda bacteria which led to my infection. Don't make my same mistake, give your bodies time to heal.
Lesson 2: Patience is the key to success. I held off transitioning for a few years to save as much money as possible to have FFS. There wasn't a single day that i thought "i cant do this anymore, i need to be me now." If you can hold off, do it. So many TS rush to transition that they don't take into account what could happen if they lost their jobs, if they had surgery related complications requiring significant financial investments.
I spent 3 years waiting since my FFS to have SRS (i still haven't had it, but i'm booked for October 2013 with Brassard). I chose to wait to ensure my ontario health insurance covered my surgery. I refused to pay it out of pocket. Hardest decision I ever had to make, but I feel unto this day it was the right one.
I apologize for not being as active as I can be on susan's, but I promise to provide updates from time to time. I look forward to sharing my SRS experience with all of you.
