My 1.0548 year transition anniversary, et al.!

Posted by: annahell on: Wednesday, May 26, 2010

In: my t zone | random
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Mood:	Wubba wubba Wednesday
Music:	Current 93-Red Hawthorne Tree

Sort of...in a way

Holy cats, you guys! I’m actually writing a Blog, Sweet Blog post for its own sake and not just reposting mah tumblrs. Don’t get me wrong, tumblr is my new spiritual home and the place I spend most of my time, but we’ve been through a lot, this blog and I, and I can’t stop loving it just because its not tumblr. Besides, this post is relevant to Blog, Sweet Blog‘s interests, which is why I’m posting it here first.

It’s my anniversaries!

I started this blog (well, posted first anyway) on April 23, 2008, or 2.0767 years ago, give or take. I can’t begin to tell you how important this blog has been to me. It wasn’t ever about attracting readers or experimenting with practical narcissism (those came later). I’ve always considered this blog to be a safe place for dumping the crazy, discussing whatever, and letting the air out of my head. I’ll be getting to this in a minute, but it’s easy for me to forget how turbulent the first six months of HRT were for me. I had just ended a three year long relationship with, until that point, the person I loved most in the world and I was in the middle of chemically altering my body and mind. I felt unhinged most of the time and happysadangryhyperdepressedenergeticlazy the rest — but not in a bad way, if that makes sense; it felt right and weird. Anyway, I don’t think I would have done as well if I hadn’t blogged and exercised.

My little blog, bless her, has changed with me. I’ve struggled with moving from more of a personal/transition journal to an everything blog featuring my thoughts and creative work. I’m still not sure of where I want to take it, but I kind of like that it’s all over the place.

I started HRT on June 6th, 2008. I had started some other transition processes before then (started seeing a therapist, my doctor), but I think it’s fair to call that date the start of my transition. So, let’s see, that makes me 1.097 years old, in a way. I won’t ever be celebrating my “new birthday” (the old one is just fine) but I do keep the date on my calendar. Like I said above, a lot has happened since then (here are the big ones). I think the process of transition is never ending, but I feel much closer to the end almost two years later. There are still more physical changes to endure (bottom surgery, the neverfuckingending weekly electrolysis), but I feel like I might have finally graduated to late puberty, at least emotionally.

The last anniversary occurred 1.0548 years ago when I changed my name and started back to work as the real me, the girl named Anna. Life has gotten kind of weird since then, but work has always felt like a safe place. I’ve had better and worse days, but no one has ever made me feel uncomfortable or anything but loved and valued. I know that my experience, sadly, is not the norm and I can’t fairly attribute the ease of my work transition to any more than luck…ok, maybe a little bit of preparation and moxy helped .

Still, I’ve struggled with my career choice. I really don’t think I would have become an engineer if I would have transitioned earlier. I’m not 100% sure I’ll stay an engineer until retirement, but I feel a lot better about it than I did a couple of months ago. If I won the lottery or totally stopped caring about my current life, I’d move to New York or Paris and trade engineering to become a professional artist/bon vivant/salonnière/cultural maven/woman-about-town. There aren’t any plans to move in the near future, but I’m working on my writing and art in the meantime, just in case.

So that’s it, you guys, happy anniversary/birthday to me and Blog, Sweet Blog!!! I hope the following years are way easier/better than the last two.