Although written to be mildly humorous,
this entry describes a medical procedure that is the centerpiece of
recovery for anyone who has undergone gender confirmation surgery
(GCS). Those not wishing to read about such personal medical
procedures are advised to look elsewhere and catch up with this
journal at another time. Meanwhile, OD and I are rather busy, as you will discover below.
* * * * * * * * * *
I first heard the Russian expression
водка без пива,
это деньги на ветер (vodka
without beer is
throwing money to the
wind)
from my Petersburg friends Zh and V in 2005. I'm sure the expression
has been around forever, but like anyone who attempts to master a
foreign language as an adult, I am continually picking up new
expressions that were not in textbooks and dictionaries when I was a
university student in the pre-Internet days of the 1970s.
One
might debate the wisdom of the aforementioned Russian expression, but
OD and I have our own variation that applies as one of the
certainties of life for anyone walking our path: GCS without dilation is throwing money to the
wind.
For
those who have walked this path already, I apologize for a
digression into known territory where OD and I are still beginners. For those who have no clue as to where I
am leading, I will attempt to enlighten.
You
see, what Dr. Sanguan has done for us is to create neo-vaginas. Two
weeks post-surgery, I look in the mirror and marvel at how normal I
appear even this soon. To our bodies, however, our neo-vaginas are
wounds that should be closed up and healed over. To prevent this, to
adapt our bodies to the new normal, we must dilate. For the first three months, we most do so three times per day,
morning, noon, and night. Dilation is, in fact, the centerpiece
around which we must arrange our days.
Dr.
Sanguan visits his patients the day after the second surgery in his
2-step GCS procedure. He comes bearing gifts in the form of six plexiglass stents that bear a somewhat clinical resemblance to a particular part
of the male anatomy. Whereas a woman might
see a man for the first time and wonder about the size of this anatomical feature hidden inside slacks or shorts, OD and I were left in no doubt about our new friends. Lengths are
clearly marked, ruler-fashion, in inches, and diameters are
recorded to the nearest 1/16 of an inch. Our reaction to Dr.
Sanguan's gift would be familiar to any teenage girl, a combination
of fear, anticipation, and an urge to exclaim, "You must be kidding;
you want me to put that . . . in here?!"
 |
| Our Insatiable Gentlemen |
The
stents are marked clearly as Nos. 1 through 6, but OD and I
decided to personify them with human names. This being a bilingual
pilgrimage to Thailand, we have, of course, chosen appropriately from
both English and Russian.
No. 1 is Lyolik – nice, gentle Lyolik. He is small and shy and slow
to take advantage of the
situation. He must be coaxed inside and coaxed further still to
go the distance.
No.
2 is Johny Angel, who is
nice and gentle but without the shyness of Lyolik. Just think of
OD and me as Shelley Fabares wannabes.
Johny
is followed by Dimchik and then Good
Neighbor Sam, that
family man from 1960s suburbia who steps in to assist his neighbor in
a time of need. Vasya then marks a transition to a qualitatively and
quantitatively different dimension.
Finally
we come to No. 6. Here OD and I come to a certain parting of the
ways. For OD, No. 6 comes from deep in Russian history with a
name that inspires a certain degree of dread. I, on the other hand,
felt I needed to end on an American note. I have chosen from U.S. political history a figure whose title
implies the respect with which I approach No. 6. With this mixture of
dread and respect, OD and I hold our last gentleman inside
for somewhere between five and ten minutes.
So
that, dear readers, is how we spend much of our day while in recovery
at the Aspasia Resort in Kata Beach, Phuket, Thailand. Between
preparation and cleanup, each daily session with our gentlemen
friends takes on the order of 45 minutes. We can already see that
our days for the next three months will center around these thrice
daily trysts. Neither of us is looking forward to our first session
after our return to Romania and Moldova. For nearly 24 hours of
travel time, we do not expect to be able to arrange even a furtive
meeting.
Speaking
of our return to Europe, we fly home from Phuket in two days. If
there has been a casualty in our journey to Thailand, it has been my
writing. Forgive me for my conceit of believing I would be able to
write frequently, giving near daily updates on our status. In this I
was sadly mistaken. Recovery from GCS, in my case combined with
facial feminization surgery (FFS) and breast augmentation (BA), takes
time, strength, and patience. I will fill in the blanks
retrospectively from my home in Bucharest.
Meanwhile,
our six insatiable and implacable gentlemen
are calling. Our day is
planned. We are working hard to prevent our money from blowing away in the wind.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Follow these links for more of The Exclamation Point::
Previous entry -- We Interrupt this Program
Following entry -- My Million Baht Body
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