REPOST OF NATIONAL COMING OUT DAY FACEBOOK POST

National Coming Out Day, Supplemental:

What you are about to read is, for me, the most important (and long) post I’ll ever make in my life so far. For others, it’s maybe just a whiny waste of time; too goddamn long, drawn out, & dramatic. I just want to warn you this post is probably going to take like 30 minutes of time to read, and I apologize in advance for the level of effort required for this one. It’s a doozy. But here’s your chance to get a more complete picture of who I am — Only Carolyn and Beth (I love yous!!) have that complete picture, currently.

This is a confessional.

Most people who have known me know what my primary interests are: Computers, music (punk/metal/industrial/cartoon, and concerts), video (cartoons, movies), games (board games, video games), socializing (hanging out, parties, camping, festivals,), people (especially the ladies), and of course sex (like most humans)!

But most people also know that I am a bit…off. I can be a little…difficult. I’ll be nice to myself and leave it at that. I’m socially awkward, and it’s taken me a long time to be as cool as I am now, which is not that very. I test halfway into Asperger’s Syndrome, test higher on the autism spectrum than over 98% of adults, test as a borderline HSP (highly sensitive person), and test an almost-as-maximum-as-possible HSS (high sensation seeker). I have low-grade depression & low-grade alcoholism; a general need for substance use; incredibly low empathy; problems with attention; and traces of sociopathy, narcissism, & borderline personality disorder.

 

>>>>>>>But while being a very open and vocal person — always talking about all the many things that I loved & hated…. I was also hiding a lot about myself, living a lie, avoiding talking about many deep truths that were directly affecting me, and coping with a deep issue dating back almost as early as I can remember. I have been coping with having a so-called “gender identity disorder”.

When I previously came out, on Oct 11 2016, I stated that I was bisexual, pansexual, polyamorous, kinky, a crossdresser, genderqueer and/or gender-fluid … Which was a lot of labels to suddenly add to one’s public identity at the same time … yet … I still wasn’t being fully honest with everyone else… or even myself!

It’s far more accurate to state, today, explicitly and without ambiguity, that I am transgender.

I am trans;
I am transgender;
I am transfeminine;
I am a trans female;
I am a transgender female;
I am a transwoman [preferred trans term];
I am a woman [preferred general term].

And I am currently transitioning to be a full-time female. And really have been for some time. Since the beginning of 2015 when I stopped cutting my hair & started losing weight.
But even more specifically, since I started hormones at the end of July (basically August 1st).

So anyway, as horribly awkward and controversial as this may be…. For me, it’s do or die. So it’s happening. And it’s not up for debate. But I need to let people know — because “the questions” have already begun — so this is me letting you know.

I really think some people had this MOSTLY figured out. (Who had? I’m curious. Lemme know.) I’ve been hiding it less and less over the past year. But the jig is up, it’s time to come clean, come out of the final closet, and stop living a lie.

 

POLY SIDE-COMMENT: Being polyamorous just makes everything that much more confusing for everybody to comprehend, too :) Sorry :) Our lives are different than 99.9% of peoples’, and probably incomprehensible to 90% of people. You, the reader, may never be able to understand our lives.

PARENT/FAMILY COMMENT: I thought it was comically funny–

and cosmically unfair–that Carolyn & Beth have both had to deal with having awkward conversations with their parents about my “gender stuffs”, but that *I* haven’t had to deal with conversations with my own family about my “gender stuffs”. Mom, Dad, Britt & Chris, everyone else family-wise: I’m sorry for the weaseliness. This is how I have to do things. I’d rather go through this awkward process as few times as possible, and definitely not in person. This is like ripping one huge band-aid off, instead of 1,000 tiny band-aids. And Mom and Dad, did you really suspect nothing? I really doubt it. See you at Thanksgiving? No need to change my name on any Christmas presents already labeled? Lol? I won’t complain if I get a women’s jacket? Lol.

——————————————————————————

WHAT NEXT?

I’m not done. I need to talk about some shit — BUT MAKE SURE TO READ THE “ADVICE FOR PEOPLE” SECTION AT THE BOTTOM…... More writings on other stuff will come out later this week.

——————————————————————————

——— ***** ON HOW THIS HAS FUCKED ME UP AND MADE ME FEEL: ***** ———

Holy shit I’m not at all happy about this, in terms of life convenience. This is harder, not easier. Why can’t I reroll my character’s stat, and get a generic character that isn’t special? I was born in the wrong time for this! It’s inconvenient! It’s a pain in the ass! It’s expensive! We’re maybe $13K down in the past year alone, and future expenses will most likely make that seem like just the beginning.

>>>>>>>It has, for the majority of my life, fucked me up in all kinds of ways — usually without me realizing it.

>>>>>>>As a child — and as an adult — I’ve always felt kind of lonely and unconnected from people — and I think this has been exacerbated by the fact that it’s hard to have a true connection to a person when you aren’t even your true self. (Devi Lyrics: “When I say that I’ve had surgery, I mean I’ve had a ski mask stapled on permanently.”)

(My neurodivergent state of being hasn’t helped, either.)

This has caused me to seek connections to people in ways that are sometimes excessive.

I feel like “extreme extroversion” is occasionally a coping mechanism for some kind of self-problem — and maybe my extreme extroversion was really just me looking for the validation from other people that I could not give to myself. I feel like Andrea had this “extreme extroversion syndrome” in common with me, and seeing it in her taught me something about myself. She used her love of speaking & spoken languages to connect to more people than someone who did not know those things, and I used my love of programming & computer languages to connect to more people than those who did not know these things. We both were making out-of-country friends growing up, and connecting to people like crazy…trying to increase the pool of eligible friends to be large enough. Large enough for what? Why, to include a true friend!

When you have low self esteem, you believe you need to meet more people to find those that can tolerate you, because the percentage that WILL tolerate you is close to 0. We both had tools and career interests that were both really self-serving ways to be able to connect with more people. Seeing her cope with her problems helped me realize that some of my behavior was not behavioral preference, but me failing to cope with my own problems. Instead of connecting with others, I needed to be connecting with myself–because, for the most part, I just feel a coldness from most people. Or hollow words. Everyone hurts; I’m chopped liver, and all sore spots. I really do need real connections, but I’m going to cope with this by being my true self, instead of by attempting to be friends with every warm body I meet. It. Doesn’t. Work…. I’m. Too. Different… I don’t even think the ‘maximizing the friend pool’ strategy is a bad strategy. I plan to continue to do that. But I was doing it for the wrong reasons.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>So as I was saying, this has, for the majority of my life, fucked me up in all kinds of ways — usually without me realizing it:

My well-being, my self-confidence, my ability to attach to people correctly, my ability to maintain relationships correctly, my ability to be a good husband, my ability to date, to be comfortable having sex with people, my mental health, my physical health, my finances ($13K down already! It’s my entire fucking car again!), my ability to enjoy myself at vanilla social parties, my ability to enjoy myself at kinky sexy parties, my ability to know what to do with my life. (Violent femmes lyrics: “Everything everything everything everything.”)

Try having way too much dysphoria to be comfortable naked. It’s a bringdown. When everyone hops in the hottub, I leave the party. I’ve been shamed in front of the whole party, for not being willing to drop trou. It was mortifying, it made me feel like less of a person, I did not appreciate the pressure or the shaming, I couldn’t tell people (or even myself) all the reasons why I was not cool with it, and I’m glad the person who did this to me drank himself to death, because he hurt me. In so many different ways.

 

 

———– ***** THE ROLE OF ALCOHOL: ***** ——–

Speaking of alcoholic assholes…. I don’t really remember, say, 2003-2011, very well at all. Yay alcohol?

(Devi lyrics: “All the time that I’ve wasted–I just want to burn through the rest of my life. Everytime that I say anything, I’m so FUCKING humiliated by my self! I’m afraid. I just want you to know. Please don’t come near me. I just want to dig deeper down in this well.”)

I know I worked a job for 4.5 yrs, still my lifetime record. I know built an addition to my house. I know I then took 4 yrs off work. I know I did some parties and social things with some people — pretty much none of whom I see nowadays. I don’t really remember what else happened.

I’m not really sure when the daily drinking tapered off. I know Carolyn stopped the daily drinking a few months before I did, and that I HAVE NO RECOLLECTION OF ANY OF THIS. I don’t even remember that this event occurred. It’s a story Carolyn tells me. It rings no bell. I have a hole in my head where some of my life used to be. (Nine Inch Nails lyrics: “Head like a hole, black as your soul, I’d rather die, than give you control” – It’s like I would rather die from drinking myself to death than give control to my feminine self..)

I did all this to myself. And for what? To look forward to death? To “have fun”, but not even remember it, get fat, kill brain cells (alcohol does, marijuana does not), sleep poorly, work poorly, be dehydrated, reduce liver function, not having time to process issues, not having time or will for self-care? What’s the fucking point? We should have pulled each other out much sooner. We lost years. But we did. Carolyn yanked us out of the abyss, and then I pulled us the rest of the way up. It took both of us, and a medical scare, to get to the level of consumption we are at now.

—

——— ***** SO MANY DOUBTS: ***** ———

So YES, I’ve been avoiding this thing. “Maybe I’m not trans?”,

“Maybe I’m more cisgendered than transgendered?”, “Maybe I’m not far enough into the transgendered spectrum that I can ignore my trans side and continue to bask in my privilege and not ever come out of the closet?”, “Maybe I can just explore this sometimes, and not deal with it all the time?”, “Maybe I can be bigender — both genders?”, “Maybe I’m agender and can just be androgynous, or nothing?”, “Maybe I’m gender-fluid, and shouldn’t transition, so that I can maintain my male-female fluidity that I’ve enjoyed for so long?”…….

“Maybe this is just how my bisexuality makes me feel sometimes?”, “Maybe I just like looking at transwomen?”, “Maybe I just like boobs enough that I want a set on my chest to feel up all the time?”, “Maybe this is just a foil for increasingly hating men, their violence, and their aggression?”, “Maybe this is just a foil for increasingly hating myself, my violence, and my aggression?”, “What if I’m doing this because I’m a failure as a man?”, “Maybe I just want an excuse to diet?”,

“Maybe I just want a fresh start and a creative solution for re-inventing myself, and this is a way to give that an illusion of legitimacy?”, “Maybe this is just a mid-life crisis?”, “Maybe this is just a creative solution for depression?”,”Maybe I’m so bored with life that the novelty is the thing that is actually appealing to me, and I don’t realize it’s not authentic?”, “Maybe I’m just seeking attention for myself?”, “Maybe I’m so compulsive and non-self-aware that this is simply the next hole I dig myself into before realizing I’ve wasted even more of what little time I have left?”,

“Maybe I just want increased sexual attention, and could do that without making major changes to my body?”, “Maybe I just like women so much that I fetishize them so much that I want to be one, but for fetish reasons, and not for actual gender identity reasons?”, “What if I get there, don’t like it, and can’t reverse some very important things?” [male-sexual-dysfunction for 75% is not something people realize hormones actually do…and many transwomen often say the new orgasms are better and full-body, BUT WHAT IF THEY AREN’T? Cause I don’t like the butt stuff as much as most of my people, so my options may be limited], “What if I should just get a boob job and surgical feminization but not take hormones specifically to protect male sexual function?”,

“What if I die poor, homeless, and alone, just because I valued my identity and well-being more than the practicality of living?”, “What if I just crossdress, then I can still go to McDonald’s as a privileged male who has far less possibility of being attacked”, “What if Carolyn wouldn’t be attracted to me?”, “What if women won’t be attracted to me?”, “What if men are TOO attracted to me?”, “What if nobody would be attracted to me?” [ironically, I want to fuck myself for the first time in my entire life,haha], “What if I can never pass?” [usually true for MtF-trans in their 40s, but not 30s… I waited 10yrs too long],

“What if my family and/or friends disown me?”, “What if I can only find trans friends, and it’s back to the lonely existence of a huge geographical distance being between me and my friends?”, “What if I can’t travel because a lot of the country is no longer safe for me?”, “What if I can never get a fair shake in a police encounter?”, “What if my feminine voice just sounds like I’m doing a goofy cartoon character?”,

“What if my neighbors burn my house down or vandalize my car?”, “What if I actually have to use my concealed carry permit to defend myself from a transphobic attacker?” [1st time I’m attacked, I won’t go unarmed again; 2nd time I’m attacked, I will end that person to save their next victim], “What if the reason he attacked me was that I goaded him, but in doing so, I save someone in the future who would not have been armed, and who would have been killed, but then go to jail for saving that future person, because police and judges will be biased against me?”, “What if I need facial reconstruction surgery after an attack, because I was scared to carry my gun, because I was scared of going to jail after righteously using it, because I was scared a jury in a country full of Trump-voters would not give a transwoman defending herself via the 2nd amendment a fair shake in court, and will never look the same again, because an empowered transphobic trumpster attacked me after I goaded them for being a piece of human shit?”,

“What if I can never get a programming job again? What the fuck can I do? I don’t know anything else & am kind of bad at adulting, having coasted on privilege the whole time”, “What if I am just doing this because I’m guilty of the privilege I’ve had, and want to punish myself”, “What if I’m doing this for all the right reasons, but still can’t succeed?”, “What if I’m doing this for all the right reasons, succeed, but still want to change my mind?”

Could you even get through that list? The doubts go on, near-infinitely. And can be dwelled on, near-infinitely. Or at least for 20-40 years, for me.

“Am I really trans?” being the big one. (Devi lyrics: “Your place will consume and then deny ya, Make you feel like sugar in saliva, It’ll jinx and hex and echo and ride ya, but it’ll still want you when you go.”)

——— ***** THERE WERE SIGNS: ***** ———

But I have to continually remind myself that I’ve gone through things cisgendered people don’t go through. Like 30 appointments of laser hair removal and electrolysis, or having spent 1,000+ hrs reading up on how to transition, or just thinking about it as much as I have. That’s not intellectual curiosity.

And some of the signs of my transness were always there (super-sexist list warning, sorry):

– I was mistaken and asked if I was a girl a LOT while growing up.
– My favorite color was pink.
– I was self-conscious about my bits.
– I loved pantyhose and skirts and would run under them, not to check out the ladyparts, but because I liked the feel.
– I mostly emotionally attached to women when I was young. NOT men.
– I preferred to play imagination games more than building things and sports (though I love games, & still played baseball, bicycle games, and sometimes basketball)

– I was never handy with stuff (couldn’t change a tire until my 30s).
– I was never strong (still don’t know what a pull-up feels like, could never make ‘standard’ on anything).
– I despised sports & gym…. Greatly preferring home ec or art or music class.
– I’m not into cars and still can’t identify most of them.
– I have a poor sense of direction. (this is one of my sexist items, sorry)
– I was ALWAYS picked last in all-male gym situations — for co-ed gym situations, I would be picked only after all of the guys (and some of the girls).

– I’ve always chosen female characters when playing video games.
– I’d choose female usernames for anonymous online accounts.
– I spent time practicing crossing my legs like the girls in middle school. I told myself at the time it was just admiration.
– I often sat (and stand) in ways that most males do not
– I curl my body up in a ball instead of stretch out

– I’m not a romantic initiator — Guys are supposed to ask girls out, but all 4 of the significant women in my life (Jackie,Carolyn,Andrea,Beth) initially approached me, not the other way around.

– I lost my virginity to someone who had shorter hair than me, and was more sexually aggressive than me, and who was physically larger than me… Not a super-gendered thing, but, i must admit, these words probably describe a typical female experience more than a typical male experience, so I figured I’d throw that in there.

– I don’t mind playing around with girls without fucking them, sometimes not even taking up an open offer to do that. PIV (penis-in-vagina) sex just isn’t as high up on my agenda as it is with cisgendered males. It’s a good time, but it’s not the main goal of a play session for me, or the center of my sexuality.

– I’ve always loved My Little Pony (1st gen even) [4th gen My Little Pony accelerated my transition by years–not joking.]

– I have small shoulders.
– I have small feet.
– I don’t have large hands.
– I don’t have hairy hands or arms or butt cheeks.
– No back hair whatsoever.

– I’m a “social butterfly”, which, I had to have a dude tell me “you’re the only DUDE i know who is like this”. Never thought of it as feminine.
– I’m a diva.
– I can’t stand the hot. Or the cold. Just keep me inside out of the sun.
– I Can’t stand physical activity.
– I’m very emotional and moody (sorry some of this is sexist, it’s hard to have a list like this and NOT have it be sexist)

– Hell, At my last job, they “punished” me by moving me into a room that had only females in it. I didn’t realize it was supposed to be a punishment. I felt better there. The ladies fed me, were pretty, and I got to look at boobs & butts & legs & eyes & hair all day, every day. Punish me harder! Maybe you have a room with EVEN MORE WOMEN in it?! If I miss a deadline, will you send me to the playboy mansion?

 

 

>>>>>> So yeah. There were some signs. Nothing definitive enough in and of itself. I don’t feel strongly gendered in general, so it was hard to suss out and fully believe that I was trans. I thought I was just awesome. And I was right about that. Except for my dishonesty with myself.

>>>>>So there’s been a ton of feminine-gendered things about me my entire life. But everyone is a mashup of femme and masc traits, and your preferences don’t ACTUALLY determine your gender, and all genders are free to do ALL THE THINGS, so I always just wrote off these aspects as me being larger than life and having enough of a personality to cover both genders. That was part of my trans denial (I have a whole side-writing on denial to share later).

Doubts, doubts, and more doubts.

————-

——— ***** BACK TO THE SELF-IDENTITY DRAWING-BOARD: ***** ———

So….Yeah… Fuck these doubts. I can’t ignore this thing. It’s been going on way longer than I’ve realized. I’ve tried to steer clear of it, but it’s NOT fucking happening. I’ve been destined to be trapped under it. In avoiding this trap, I’ve unwittingly trapped myself anyway! (Devi lyrics: “For the last 21 years.”) Shit. Didn’t see that coming.

Although I’m mostly done figuring things out, but the process never actually ends. Everything, including the totality of this post, is subject to change. But it probably won’t. It probably fucking won’t. This is basically the conclusion of a 43-year experiment, and you’re reading the thesis.

So here I am. I’ve always been this way, but I just haven’t been able to fucking own it like I should. I didn’t even know about the option until I was a teenager. I wish I had. It could have saved my life. And now I’m embarrassed about having been embarrassed. There’s no elegant way out of this. I can never save my life; I can only salvage what’s left. There’s no repairing the wasted past. That cannot be saved. And that’s going to be most of my existence that was wasted — I’m 43. I am NOT living another 43 years, to age 86. Not with MY genes and lifestyle. All I can do is salvage the tiny piece that’s left. I’ve got like 10 years of beauty to milk.

—

So anyway.
I am transgender.
I am trans.
I am transfeminine.
I am a transwoman.

This also means I prefer female pronouns. Though they feel weird, like shoes that haven’t been broken in yet. (NoMeansNo lyrics: “But I’ll get used to it. I have to.”)

But “he” is starting to feel weird. And I’m starting to feel like I’m crossdressing when I’m wearing male clothes, instead of the other way around. And I never really expected that. But I got there so easily. And it’s wonderful. I just had to let go of myself.

It’s quite empowering to become my true self, but Clio will never make Clint’s salary… Not even for the same job. Clio will face an increased likelihood of having violence directed against her. Why become the marginalized Clio who can be fired & legally discriminated against just for who she is, when I can disguise myself as the cisgendered heterosexual white male apex predator Clint? I “shouldn’t” become the marginalized Clio. But I have to. One can’t just will this away. Believe me…. I’ve tried, and failed, for my entire adult life.

You can’t will away who you are — even if you’ve never actually gotten a chance to really be that person yet.

(Devi Lyrics: “This is a part of me. // It can not be separated. // Although it looks like a wound–it is not a wound.”)

“It’s only going to get worse.” They keep telling me that!

—

——— ***** SO MANY REGRETS: ***** ———

This is my path, my destiny. The road less traveled. My boulder [127 Hours reference]. The obscure macguffin in the movie of my life up to this point. The last stop on my traincar of personal hell. The {insert long list of additional histrionic dramatic phrases here}. I wish I’d figured this out earlier. Not today in Trump’s America. I’d give it all up to have another chance to do it right. But I fucked up my one chance to get this right.

I coulda been hella hotter with hormones at a younger age, but I lacked the self-confidence to believe this.
I probably wouldn’t have beat up my internal organs with alcohol so much.
I probably would have had a longer lifespan.
Maybe my autoimmune disease wouldn’t have developed.

I wish I hadn’t thought therapy was somehow representative of a lack of being able to solve one’s own problems. Such stubbornness truly made me my own worst enemy. But not going into therapy only fucked me up more. I had to wait for the “Youtube Therapy” era just to bridge the gap to real therapy. Ironically, by the time I finally went to therapy, I pretty much didn’t need it. It turns out that in like 20 years, you can slowly work out like an equivalent of 1 year of therapy on your own, hahahah. Think of the co-pays you could save by slowly wasting your life and solving your problems on your own! (argh!)

 

>>>My own pride at being independent has held me back so much that, in truth, it caused me to *lose* my ability to be independent. Oops! There’s NO FUCKING WAY I could live without Carolyn right now. This isn’t a remark about sweetness, it is a remark about co-dependence and not knowing how to be a fully functional person on my own.

Our house is messier than ever. I’m no longer doing a lot of productive things. I deliberately haven’t worked a job in 2 yrs, with no aspirations or plans whatsoever at the moment. I’ve slowed down in most endeavors to give myself more time to process things to a point of understandingness. To take time for self-care. To take time to work this fuckin’ shit out. I’ve gone back to the egg to regenerate.

It’s a fucking lame feelfest over here, guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nobody — not even me — wants a part of this bullshit, lol!!!!!!!!!

I feel like all of this can be a fast process with trans people who have strong gender dysphoria. The poster-child strong-dysphoric transperson feels trapped in the wrong body, hates looking at themselves in the mirror, suffers strong depression about it as a child, knows what the fuck they want at a young age, and does something about it. I am not trying to forget or erase their struggle, but merely point out the path to take is more clearly laid out for them. Most transwomen actually have it wayyyyy harder than me. They don’t have supportive partners, they have intolerant family, friends, bosses, they aren’t financially well off, they have jobs they can lose, they have more strongly-gendered faces or bodies than me, they live in less tolerant areas of the world or country. Their struggle is way more than mine, and I respect and want to help that. But at least they know what direction to point themselves–I did not. My weak dysphoria simply prolonged the process, and added extra depression over waiting too long, never knowing what the fuck to do with myself, and wasting my life. That’s so, so bad.

I’ve had to learn about “gender euphoria”, and how some transpeople don’t hate their assigned gender, but simply flourish much better in their true gender. I’ve had to learn about “secondary dysphoria” — problematic behaviors one might not realize have been caused by gender identity disorder. I had to really do some soul searching to get in touch with myself.

But there ARE good things about my weak dysphoria. It let me at least have a pretend male life long enough to take advantage of male privilege, and establish some kind of life for myself, to create enough stability for me to finally transition now, without taking as much of a risk as most transpeople have to take.

The coward finally has her stage, in front of her pre-purchased audience. She can do her little jig without any risk whatsoever.

———–

—

——— ***** RECOGNIZING YOUR OWN SELF-DECAY: ***** ———

 

>>>>>>>>I wish I had told people earlier. I wish I had come clean a long time ago. To myself. To Carolyn (well, she’s been privy to all my feelings in these matters for like 17 yrs of our 25 yrs together, but I can’t tell her I’m explicitly transgendered if I don’t explicitly realize it myself until 2016/2017). I wish I had not gone off and lived a closeted sheltered life. It’s only made it harder to connect with people. It’s only increased the distance between us. It’s only made this situation a harder pill for everyone else to swallow–including myself. It’s only eroded my person, and chipped away at the core of my very being, to where I don’t even recognize myself anymore.

 

>>>>>>>>I remember who I was once. And who that is…. That is not who Clint ended up being. Clint ended up being someone who, one day recently, I realized — I do not even RECOGNIZE as myself anymore. Not my original, TRUE self. Who was he? / Who was she? I’d lost him. / I’d lost her. It’s weird, when you start to become a stranger to yourself. It’s very weird. It’s an incredibly complex set of feelings that is hard to put words to. “How the fuck did I get here?” “Who am I, really?” It didn’t occur to me until 2016 or 2017 that I couldn’t remember myself.

(The Church lyrics: “They say that he’s famous, from the waist down, but the top half of his body is a corpse. His gold won’t buy him sleep, his poverty runs so deep–in winter he cracks, in summer he warps.”)

I was just the outside exterior skin of myself, slapped onto a rotting interior. I looked the same on the outside, but I was rotting out on the inside. I’d only known someone well enough to have seen what that looked like in detail exactly once before, and only recently: In Andrea. Andrea gifted me with the most unfortunate, but useful, perspective. The ability to understand how someone’s personal problems can cause them to diverge from their native personality. She was most definitely and assuredly was NOT the same girl everyone talked about at her memorial services. They were all full of shit, is how it felt to me. But without a doubt, their stories were true. She had just diverged from the awesome person she had meant to be, and had become filled with a decay that infected her entire person. It was about the worst thing I’ve seen in my entire life. And I, too, had diverged from the person I had meant to be.

Someone (Mocos Locos) wrote, “I’m not the man I used to be” on facebook, and I suddenly replied that I knew exactly how that felt, even though I had no idea how HE felt. The words resonated with me perfectly. I’m NOT the man I used to be. (It’s also a Ween lyric.) Even the “man” part resonated with me.

 

>>>>>>> When you look into your own mind, and remember what “you” felt like, and know that the original “you” doesn’t feel like the current “you” — at all. And that the current “you” is suffering in comparison, and is not as good as a person as the former, true “you”….. and is beaten up, hurt, angry, impatient, unable to connect, unable to BE…………..

…………..When you look into your own mind, and you realize that who you are is actually a stranger, because you are no longer the original you…………….

…………..that you’re kind of a husk………….
…………..that you miss yourself………….

You cry for your past self.

Every time you think about this, you cry for your past self.

Every time.

Every time you read these words, you cry for your past self.

Every time.

>> “Let me out! Let me out! This is not a dance!” (Rick & Morty reference that is actually extremely appropriate.) (Levity needed. That was absolutely the hardest part for me to write.)

For other reasons, I’ve cried the hardest of my adult life in these past 2 years. I’ve broken my life-adult cry-record, broken it again, broken it again, broken it again and again. I’ve lashed out. I’ve done things that should have gotten me divorced, or arrested (fortunately not both at the same time). These behaviors are in the process of being exterminated (Exterminate! Exterminate!). My tears nowadays are tears of regret, tempered with joy — gradually turning into tears of joy, tempered with regret. That’s about as good as it’s ever going to get, and that is an incredible improvement.

The complex web of interdependent issues has been nigh fucking impossible to sort out. I’m still not sure it ever will be fully sorted out! I’m still not sure of anything. I never will be. That’s my fucking problem. That’s why this took so long. There’s no “easy button” for this!

The only way out is through. Break on through to the other side. {I’m seriously slipping a lot of song titles and lyrics into this post, they inspire me.}

–*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-
–*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-
–*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-*—-

——— ***** WHAT’S NEXT?: ***** ————–

Fuck if I know. My scumbag brain, and my scumbag body, they do what they choose to do. My consciousness is just along for the ride, often feeling like a helpless rider on a roller-coaster with no seat belt, hanging on for dear life, just trying to survive.

My consciousness has had a fucking beating and a half. A lot of it from myself, and a lot of it from others. I’m damaged. I’m broken. I’m hurt. That’s not ever going to change. I’ll carry a heavy heart with me forever. You can smooth out the paper and get it flat again, but those creases are never going to go away. I’ll never be that same, original, uncreased piece of paper.

But hopefully my brain starts treating my consciousness better. I know that treating my body better–diet and reduced alcohol consumption–has already helped a lot of things. I’m not in constant pain when I sit! Not at first, anyway. Lol

I was disintegrating as a person for years. Now I’m finally re-integrating again. As a new person who is both the same person I’ve always been, and yet a different enough instance to still be different.

The parts of me that feel good haven’t felt this good since the 1900s.
The parts of me that feel bad are losing their sway and being forgotten.

There were times — and more recent than I’d care to admit (because it was the Prius) — when I half-seriously considered hopping in my car and just driving away — alone, even without Carolyn — to Mexico — leaving everything and everyone behind, not even telling people where I was going, because I couldn’t take the various pains of existence anymore. It’s a common trans theme, wanting to move away, changing your name, telling no one.

(Ween lyrics: “I couldn’t believe… She wanted to leave” … “So go fetch a bottle of rum dear friends, and fill up my glass to the rim. For I’m not the man I used to be. Now I’m one of them.”)

Well, it turns out… Things aren’t so bad after all. Not for me. And I don’t need that glass filled to the rim, either. Now I’m one of them — in this case, women. Still too strange for words.

————–

>>>>>>It has been said that you get 2 lives to start with.

The 1st, you’re born with — Your parents, your upbringing, what’s imprinted upon you before you gain your own, true, free will.

The 2nd, you make for yourself, when you individuate, grow up, and function as your own, free adult.

The 3rd? You usually don’t get one. But I’m atheistically-blessed with a 3rd life, based off not living a lie anymore. I’m so lucky that this is possible. I’m so lucky that I’ve found the will to be increasingly doing the things that are needed to address my situation. I’m so atheistically-blessed (gonna keep using that phrase, I think). This brings tears to my eyes every time I think about it.

—————–

—– ***** WHAT’S HAPPENING RIGHT NOW? ***** —–

>>>>>>I started hormone replacement therapy on 8/1/2017.

A leap of faith, as my sureness level never really “got there” until AFTER I started taking the hormones. I do things backwards, like buy a house before I get married, or have someone move into our bed before we get to know her. This is just another example. Trial-by-fire is one of my preferred methods of determining if something is a mistake or not. And it wasn’t.

50mg spirolactinone 2X a day as an anti-androgen to stop testosterone production and most likely (75%) end male sexual function in the long run. Yikes. It’s not like in the pornos, y’know. When you realize you’re willing to do that, yea, you might be trans. (Though there may be hormone tweaks around that, it’s probably not gonna be part of my newsfeed haha.)

2mg estradiol 1X day. That’s estrogen. Which I take sublingually, against dr’s advice, because I think I know better than her. She’s all concerned about clotting because of my pro-clotting mutation discovered by my 23AndMe genetic sequencing. But the liver creates most of its clotting agents during first-pass liver metabolizing, and taking things sublingually bypasses first-pass liver metabolism for a good 50% or more of the pill, while also granting higher average blood serum levels….. So I don’t know why my endocrinologist would tell me to “not believe the rumors about taking it sublingually”. I honestly don’t know why anyone would want to deal with the estrogen spikes of injectibles, because when your estrogen is super-high, your body can convert the overage to testosterone. But some say they give better breast feminization. But what about progesterone? (Yes, I know a lot about this shit, and I’ve been researching it since before you ever knew it existed. And probably before you knew how to research things online, too.)

Breast growth in just 5 weeks. That’s a good sign. Sooner means bigger, bigger is better. Thanks, Mom! I don’t want a boobjob, but I’ll take the free ones Carolyn’s work offers, if the administrative hoop jumping isn’t too circus-like.

The hormone regimen has created a habit that is making me finally take all those other vitamins and supplements that I’ve meant to take my whole life, but never do. Some of these bottles were bought 10 yrs ago, a lot bought this year. My vitamin D levels are within healthy range for the first time since I ever started caring. And of course the Truvada that makes it 99% harder to transmit HIV (and costs us $0) is never missed. But I’m even doing fish oil and baby aspirin. It turns out that increasing self-care in one area makes you increase self-care in other areas. I now take like 25 pills a day — and only 3 are for my gender.

>>>>>>I’m finishing up / slowing down on the talk-therapy.

The 3 I saw have helped me…some…but not as much as I can help myself by just sitting in front of my computer, reading and writing about things myself (like this document). The 3rd one was finally interactive enough that I didn’t feel like I was just talking to myself. 2 of them were trans. The 3rd one was trans and poly and kinky and a burner, well, some of you know her, it turns out. But none of them are going to say “Don’t do this, Clio. Don’t.” It’s almost annoying that they won’t, because I WANTED somebody to save me from the inconvenience of this, haha. I was bouncing from therapist to therapist hoping to find a devil’s advocate who would tell me that I’m doing this for the wrong reasons, and that I should not do this. None will say that. The main blocker has been… ME! I’m the only one who can save me from myself. My enemies (and others) always told me I was my own worst enemy. And they were right. But only by dumb luck; not wisdom. I was my own worst enemy, because I allowed myself to holding myself back. The magic was within me all along.

>>>>>> I’ve almost finished my replacement wardrobe — in some ways the hardest work of all. Changing clothes in a hot dressing room while having a headache and sweats from starving from dieting is about as physical of an activity as I can stand! If you can get even 3-4 clothes in one shopping session, you done good But I’ve gotten about 115 in person, plus the whole year of buying stuff on aliexpress. But for casual / non-party / work / “real-life” girl clothes, you kinda need to go to a thrift store. And hit the sales. I had to make up for a lifetime.

I keep typing “Cliont” because I don’t know if I’m typing Clio or Clint.

I’m starting to work on my voice. I’m absolutely terrified of the concept of voice coaching. I might Dr. Girlfriend it for quite awhile (Dr. Girlfriend is a sexy female character from The Venture Bros., who has a deep male voice). But then, my voice isn’t *that* deep.

>>>>>> “I’m trying to accept and let go of who I thought I was and who others think I was and am, and who I wish I was, and who I might have been.” -Twig, really nailing it with the timing

——— ***** ADVICE FOR PEOPLE: ***** ————–

Most of this advice is, unfortunately, not positive.

I’m sorry.

I’m scared.

Some of this has already happened to me.
Some of this will happen to me in the future.
Some of this happens to other trans people, so it will happen to me.

So I have some advice…

ADVICE:

1) My first advice to you is that I am not soliciting advice from you! I don’t need to hear about why I should not do this, about why I should think it through more, or the laughable “consider Carolyn’s feelings” response. (<sarcasm>Oh wow we didn’t know we could talk to each other about feelings! That changes everything! Thanks! We just changed our mind about everything!</sarcasm>) In general, now is NOT the time to make this about YOUR advice, what YOU think, or casting YOUR doubts. This is my time. Unless you are supportive, step back and let me have space to breathe.

-*-

2) Use female pronouns. If you mess up, just correct yourself. Don’t stop and apologize and interrupt the flow. It’s okay to use male pronouns & names when recalling past memories of me, for now. But I’ve already starting to feel my first pangs of annoyance at misgendering when I’m en femme. If you do that to me, it’s going to damage our relationship.

-*-

3) Say hello to Clio. Please make a real personal connection with me — with Clio — before I erroneously start to feel that you are part of Clint’s past life, and not Clio’s future life. I am way too sensitive, way too emotional, way too over-analytical, way too aggressive, and have waaaay too much social anxiety to deal with the taxing energy of decrypting people’s silence. Silence is alienation. Silence is othering. Silence is friendly ghosting. I probably already feel hurt by you. I’m one big sore spot. This will now amplify. I don’t feel safe. I need friends and always have. Friendship is a participatory two-way street. I don’t want to feel like I’m just here for your entertainment. If the traffic doesn’t flow both ways, I assume I am unwanted. I remove myself from situations where I assume I am unwanted. All I hear is uncomfortable laughter behind my back. I give up. I recuse myself. Via defriending. Then I feel guilty that they might feel bad that I defriended them. Then I feel persecuted that they might think me bad for defriending them. But really, I just wanted to stop being reminded of the hurting.

-*-

4) After my Facebook/Legal name changes, “Clint” will eventually become a dead name. But it will awkwardly continue to exist in my URLs for my websites, in my photo captions (even in new uploads, as the past pictures are still going to be pictures of Clint) so… I’m sure someone will think it is hypocritical for me to use the name “Clint” in uploads, but ask other people not to use it.

Let me just say — we have situations in our society where only certain people are allowed to say certain words, or else it’s socially unacceptable. (Please don’t make me point it out.) This is a similar situation to that. Just because you might catch me calling myself “Clint” doesn’t mean it will be okay for you to do so. Sorry. There’s already a ton of people who ONLY know me as Clio anyway. Dropping the old name will actually make things LESS confusing.

-*-

5) Please DO NOT grief & guilt me for not sharing this earlier. Now is NOT the time; That’s not supportive. Put your grievances in a backpack so they can all be in one place.

I’ve already had multiple people privately get on my case and give me flak for me not sharing private aspects of myself. It’s such a height of privilege for people who don’t live in a closet to tell the people who do live in a closet that their feelings were hurt by that closet. Oh I’m sorry? Did my hiding hurt you? Was I oppressed in a way that hurt your feelings? Do you deserve to know everything about me? I thought I already shared more of my personal self than just about everyone else anyway! What more do you need, my blood?

First, I had someone else tell me that I had to block her profile on Fetlife — because I saw her profile, and didn’t friend her. I wasn’t comfortable sharing aspects about my transness and gender identity with someone whose profile said very little besides that they liked sex. It was a vanilla profile compared to mine, in my perception. But because I saw her, and didn’t send a friend request, therefore, I am a bad person. Or something. It didn’t matter what my preferences or consent about sharing information about myself was. Carolyn & I later both got put into her facebook jail without ever doing anything. We finally did the defriending ourselves, because who the fuck wants to be friends with a restricted profile? This person had written about trying to be inclusive to transpeople while unwitting doing the opposite. Even people in the community make asinine assumptions.

Another time in the past, I was also mocked for not knowing my blood type with “i can’t imagine any reason why you can’t give blood”, and yea, I originally couldn’t give blood because of a heart valve defect, but it’s true that it had healed. But I still couldn’t just go out and donate blood. Why? Becuase I’d had sex with a man once in the past 6 months! I didn’t want to say I’d had sex with a man on my facebook. So I had no current-day defense for not being able to give blood. I got put on the spot and mocked and it escalated to Carolyn chewing that person out and us not being friends. It was another case where, well, not my transness, but my queerness, hurt a relationship due to someone else not being able to understand holes that I was not willing to explain. I didn’t expect that.

SO AT THIS POINT, I’M KINDA SENSITIVE TO BEING GUILTED FOR NOT SHARING SHIT. MULTIPLE FRIENDS GAVE ME PRIVATE FLAK IN PRIVATE MESSAGE after coming out as crossdressing. Not because they didn’t support it, but because it was about THEIR feelings being hurt because I hadn’t told them before. Jesus christ. I’ve carried some anger over how self-centered I can be. It’s okay. Had a falling out with one of them anyway, over unrelated stuff.

Applaud people for coming out, don’t fucking grief them by private message.

-*-

6) If you use this situation to suddenly try to fuck Carolyn, like now she needs your penis or something? Wow, just wow. You’re really not understanding your role in the slightest. She’s NOT my property, but she IS my fucking wife. Figure out what the fuck that means.

-*-

7) FIGURE THINGS OUT YOURSELF.

I’m not here to educate you beyond my personal perspective. I’m going to use words, terms, and concepts that you do not understand. If there is something YOU don’t get, take it upon YOURSELF to Google some articles. I will not answering the same dumb questions over and over. Nobody wants to do that. Basically, don’t ask me things you can google.

Know that AMAB stands for assigned male at birth
Know that AFAB stands for assigned female at birth.

Normals seem to think they are owed explanations by everyone who is not normal. What a hypocritical load of crap.

If you can comment, you can google things.

-*-

8) Here are some links for allies dealing with people coming out:

* So Your Trans Friend Is Transitioning And You Want To Be Supportive – Here Are 6 Ways How – https://everydayfeminism.com/…/how-to-be-ally-to-trans-fri…/

* Your First Trans Friend – A Beginner’s Guide – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…/your-first-trans-friend-a-b…

* Family Members especially are encouraged to read this: http://web.archive.org/…/20060103152219/http://w…/index.php… – it has a clickthrough at the bottom to “Do’s” and “Don’t’s”, which I will also link here: http://web.archive.org/…/20060102231752/http://w…/index.php…

* Also, this one is a great explanation of the genderqueer concept, which is how I used to identify. It’s not how I identify now, but it’s kind of how I present at this stage in my transition. Mostly, it’s funny, and has some insight – I Am Genderqueer (And What the #@%! That Means) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hmULQc5jIw&app=desktop

-*-

9) I hope you all can accept me for who I really am, to the same level that Carolyn and Beth have. I could not have done this with without their support. Thank you both. I love you.

Beth, your additional support in embracing who I am as a person, your love, wisdom, patience, tolerance, understanding, experience, graciousness, companionship, leadership, and generosity have helped make 2017 one of the best years of my life, and I couldn’t have done it without you. You are an amazing person. Thank you. I love you.

Carolyn, seeing your eyes light up at finally understanding just what we can be together fills me with amazing joy. I want to be your wife, and I’m sorry I kinda blew off the vow-renewal thing you talked about in the past. I wasn’t ready to renew my vows then, but I am now. Your insane level of literal financial support, your tolerance of MY insane level of bullshit, anger, rage, abuse, depression, impatience, obsessiveness, aggressiveness, criticalness, laziness, and so many other bad traits…. There’s no reason I even deserve the life I have now, and I couldn’t have done it without you and your undying love. Thank you. I love you.

I’d also like to thank Devi McCallion. You don’t even know me, but your music changed my life more than all other music combined. Your brutal emotional honesty, your willingness to express yourself, your willingness to go so far out on a limb that you actually become embarrassed and remove your music. And then your bravery to put it back up. To know that you really feel the things you are expressing to such an extent that the emotions are more important than the music. To taste your very real pain, and realize that it also came from within myself. To empathize with a complete stranger more than any person I’ve ever known; when I have so little empathy that I have some anxiety over whether I am a sociopath a not. To show me how to feel. To let me feel. To let me know what it’s like to be who I am, by seeing it in you. Even your non-transy pony songs got me through my first days at work after a 4 year break, by filling me with happiness. Then I discovered your non-pony music, and that was that. I was home. Please don’t ever stop. You are the stranger most responsible for helping me take the direction in my life that I need to. (For some people, that’s jesus, lol. Not me.)

—

Anyway, I hope you all can accept me for who I really am, even as I am just getting to know that person.

If you don’t accept me for who I am, this FUN diva ain’t got time for your shit.

Love me or leave me — Clint is finishing up, and Clio is here to stay.

Sincerely,
Claire James “Clio” L.

P.S. Handy Conversion Chart:

*** “Clint” => “Clio”
*** “Clent” => “Cleo”

*** “J. Clinton” => “Claire J.”
*** “ClintJCL” => “ClioCJL” {primary name will come first instead of being a middle name like with James Clinton}

*** “he” => “she”
*** “him” => “her”
*** “his” => “hers”

*** “Clint & Carolyn” => “Carolyn & Clio” {now it’s her turn to be first, plus, Carolyn’s name is the familiar one}

*** “Clarolynt” => “Cliolyn” / “Clairolyn”
*** “Clarolyntopiastan” => “Cliolyntopiastan” / “Clairolyntopiastan”

*** “straight married couple” => “gay married couple”
*** “couple” => “lesbian couple”
*** “those guys” => “those girls”
*** “husband” => “wife” / “spouse” / “partner”

*** “wears annoying amount of black all the time” =>
“wears annoying amount of color all the time”
*** “talks in a stupid low voice” =>
“talks in a stupider less low voice”

 

With my amazing girlfriend Beth, 10th Annual DC Fetish Ball, October 8th, 2017

Where is Carolyn? She had too much exposed nipple to post here :-D

 

 

 

“CALL 911!”

I got to be part of an emergency scene…sort of. After the oral surgeon x-rayed me (biopsy consult)… All of a sudden someone RUNS down the hall. “Call 9-1-1!” “Is she breathing?!” Big scene, people obviously freaked out. I’m freaked out, running around. “Does she have an inhaler?” ….”DOES SHE HAVE AN INHALER?”

.
The medworker is on the phone calling 911… Holding an inhaler in her outstretched hand that someone handed to me (later they tried to return it to me, haha). Everyone is running around, nobody is taking it.

.
Finally I ease up, reach up, body-language-ask “Should I take this?”, she body-language-responds “Yes”, I take it, run top speed down the hall, yell “Who needs the inhaler?”.. someone grabs it from me real quick.

.
also overheard: “DOES SHE HAVE SEIZURES?” “No”

.
“Thank you Mr. $MyLastName.”
Yea, my adrenaline level wasn’t down even an hour later.

.
Later the girl said I was the coolest patient ever, but that was also because I was like “no you don’t have to move me out of this room just because the ceiling leaks! i don’t care!”
Then the ambulance couldn’t find the fucking place (gee, *I* could, and I’ve never been there, or even to Upper Marlboro, Maryland in my life I think. people are trashy there, you’d think it was Culpeper or something)… Me & another lady are out in the streets looking for them to no avail. I forgot my jacket and tablet; glad no one took advantage of that moment because that would have made me even more cynical.

.
The girls mother, tho, was not heated or worried at all. She was playing with a baby (that was her granddaughter). I didn’t learn until later that it was a fully grown woman who had asthma. But yea, they didn’t tell the Dr about a bunch of things they were asked and supposed to tell her about.. Herpa derpa.

.
I’d like to think, if she was otherwise going to die, that maybe I 0.01% saved her life. That might be a generous percentage, given what the trained professionals do.

.
The other time I came close to that was when a drunk hit our telephone pole (maybe the 3rd of the 4 or so times?)… Electric wire fell, burned so brightly that the reflection off the trees in our back yard, through the cracks in our black-velvet-covered bedroom windows, lit up the inside of the bedroom bright enough to read by. And dat sound. Scariest sound I’ve ever heard, and I’ve heard it a few times. Like a ground loop buzz going through a concert-level subwoofer.

.
Went outside, people were literally screaming. I saw a passenger *bail* from the car he was in [it was stopped, duh] and just run the opposite direction. People were turning around. Power lines were across the sidewalk. Someone was walking up to rubberneck. “STOP! STAY BACK! STOP! LIVE POWER LINE!” .. They stopped. I’d like to think I get more than 0.01% for that one.

.
Oh, me? They didn’t actually perform the biopsy. Apparently those bumps on the back of the base of my tongue are something everybody has; They just make me gag when eating now because I am so dry (possibly Sjogen’s syndrome). This oral surgeon is going to coordinate with my shitty dismissive rheumatologist, who didn’t even fucking call me back today. I’m supposed to buy lemon drops

 

YEAR IN REVIEW: 2011: THE YEAR IN TEXT + music & yard sale summaries

I created a command, “after month”, that would edit a text file; I then created calendar reminders to remind me to edit that every month. The result is that I now can look back in my life and have a textual sense of what each month was like. Pictures are great, but there are lapses in pictures, and I shall be keeping text summaries as well from now on.

In addition, so that the post is not “dry” and pictureless, I will include graphs of my music listening habits for the year as well.

ALSO: Summary of our yard sale stats for the year.

 

JOURNAL: 2010: The Year In Text & Music

I created a command, “after month”, that would edit a text file; I then created calendar reminders to remind me to edit that every month. The result is that I now can look back in my life and have a textual sense of what each month was like. Pictures are great, but there are lapses in pictures, and I shall be keeping text summaries as well from now on. Also included will be my graphs of music I listened to, because all text is kind of boring.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Fuck teeth – just extracted #1 and #32

So after 18 yrs of dentists repeatedly telling me I need to extrat tooth #32 (very bottom right), an impacted molar growing sideways towards my other teeth, I finally listened. Perhaps I should have done this a few years ago, but I always seemed to meet my $1,250 yearly maximum. (It was finally raised this year to $1,500 or so.) It’s definitely made tooth #31 (the one to it’s left) crooked, given that tooth #30 was extracted 18 years ago when my other 3 molars were taken out. (I was fine 24 hours later.)

Man those needles fucking hurt. The people at this place don’t bother with the topical Novocaine that makes the needles hurt less. I DON’T KNOW WHY. They also do their billing up front and actually know how to get answers from the insurance people. I paid $380 on the spot. It’s kinda lame that pulling a tooth costs more out of pocket than getting a 4-surface filling. Call me old-fashioned or a fucking ignorant retard, but to me, removing something should cost less than fixing it. As a rule of thumb.

Oh, the bottom left of my mouth where I had a cyst removed, twice? Still infected, years later, apparently. She wants to open it back up, clean it out, and “maybe” remove the tooth. Blaaaaah, that’s like the rest of my insurance money. I think I’ll do the “Clint way”, which is to ignore all medical advice until I’m in too much pain not too. Or until December when I know I have unused insurance money left over. The one time I listened to the dentists and spent all my money, they went over my yearly insurance limit (by double), never told me, I lost $2,000 out of pocket, and worked on the tooth that, I believe, caused all this in the first place. Fucking barbaric Asian dentist S.K. in Reston who uses hot tongs to kill your nerves when doing a root canal. Like, orange metal in your mouth. Yuck. Had to have it redone. Then a cyst removed twice. Seemed to come from an infection near that area. I have good instincts and actually knew the root wasn’t killed on that tooth within a day of it being done. But my instincts are not good enough to know about a cyst until it’s in throbbing agony.

The procedure was REALLY quick. Goddamn those needles hurt. I don’t get sedated for this stuff. That drill is the loudest drill ever, it was actually so loud in my mouth it hurt my ears. When they twisted that tooth out, I felt the stress all the way up my jaw to my ear. It was like having your skull attacked. So much blood being vacuumed out, I’m still bleeding now.

I went to Wendy’s and got 6 Frosties, I’ve blogged about the medicinal value of Frosties before.

I also got a temporary filling on tooth #31 (see above), which has already had 3 fillings in it, and looks all decayed. Turns out the decay is just the silver from one of the fillings. I was wondering why a black tooth didn’t hurt for years. Yay? But I still have to come back, and maybe get a crown on it.

Yea, everyone wants my money. Or Carolyn’s money, however you want to look at it. Blah. It costs more to be me than it costs for Carolyn to be Carolyn. So lame! Time to start looking for a job soon. I apparently need thousands of extra dollars sitting around, not so I can sit on my ass for 4 years, but so I can fix my teeth, car, and house. Lamelamelame. Right about now I could really use the $80,000 we spent on the addition…. Of course we bounced back from being broke to building an addition in about 4 years, so I feel like rising from the ashes is an easy thing. Of course, it’s never possible to predict the future…

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Hand injury update

all healed up. major tape fail but other people set me up at x-day, my friend 808 who’s like the most industrious person ever. He welded his own stakes using rebar and washers for his huge tarp that’s actually a pool cover, dubbed the spaceship of X-Day and the coolest place in the south field. So it’s no surprise he had this awesome green tape that doesn’t stick to skin [like medical tape] but sticks to iself. it split open again when i showered as the water made the scab go away, so i could still see under it. but each day it got bette.r the skin underneath it grew back. the skin overneath [ha] it survived. people commented they were surprised that flap survived. i could finally crack my left index finger again on day 5 or so. now i’m trying to stretch the scar out a few times a day so i have full flexion…..

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Cut my hand the worst I ever have with scissors in my life

So I decided to upgrade our 7.1 Home Theatre rear surround speakers…. From crappy black noname ones I got at a yardsale, to these better silver JVC ones with a bass port and everything, which I got off of Freecycle.

First, in order to hang them, I have to use a ruler and mark off where I want to add my hooks. Then I nail a thumbtack into the holes [my way of drilling pilot holes] and remove them. Then I screw in picture hanging hooks. I use 4 per speaker, for redundancy, after a speaker fell back when I use 2. A total of 8. Except I started with a different set, and ended up using 12. (Did a blind listening test with Carolyn — literally wearing a blindfold — which confirmed the results of my own listening test, that the silver speakers were better and I should have been using them. I didn’t realize they were wood-cased, I thought they were plastic and thus would not accept hooks.)

Anyway, screwing those 12 hooks in last night gave me a huge blister on my right hand! From screwing those tiny screws in! 1.0cm long, 0.5cm wide, and 0.4cm raised from my skin. I broke my tradition of popping all blisters and let it fester there in pussy healiness, since the body obviously does that for a reason.

The next step is to use picture hanging wire to create a wire hook to hang it to a ceiling hook that I have on my ceiling. Wire it through the hooks in a redundant fashion, then make a loop to hang.

Problem is, we ran out of picture hanging wire for the first time in 10 yrs after I did one speaker. I asked Carolyn to scrounge for more, and she brought up some REAL wire, i.e. stuff thick enough that you could use it in a soldernig iron. NOT woven picture hanging wire, but a single wire well over 1mm thick. A bit harder to bend.

Today, I went to cut that wire with scissors. No go. Way too thick. So I opted to use the “two handed dangerous scissor cut method”, which I have used many times in my life before, with larger and more dangerous scissors than the plastic-handled ones of Carolyn I was using.

I put my hand on both sides of the scissor and squeezed as hard as I could on both ends. BAM! I got that wire chopped!

And a great deal of my hand too. I screamed in pain. I looked at my hand, and saw an injury that was not so minor as to automatically exlude the possibility of going to the emergency room. It was actually a bit of horror movie psychology that I got to experience myself: Looking at a wound in horror, making noises that come from the animal kingdom (not humanity), feeling the adrenaline rush, and not knowing what to do for 2 or 3 seconds. (I don’t really panic, so losing presence of mind for 2 or 3 seconds is a significant psychological event for me.)

Of course I went for the camera right away [after 2 or 3 paper towels]:

Here’s the blood that landed on the floor between me sitting down and taking a picture 10 seconds later:

Much more on the floor before I managed to wipe it up. And it was stainy, leaving some red on the floor. I ended up spitting on it, as spit breaks down tough stains with its digestive properties, and carries its own disinfectant as well (why we lick wounds), but, most importantly, can be dispensed without leaving a trail of blood between you and actual cleaning products. Because waiting another 30 seconds would let the stain set more, plus I don’t want to get blood on any carpet. Later I used some water, I think I’ll have Carolyn use some Murphy’s Oil Soap on the floor later to give it a proper cleaning.

I went to the bathroom and realized a bandaid was not going to cut it. Hell, just while rinsing it with water, the blood would NOT stop. I needed some pressure.

Having no clue where we keep the gauze, since I hadn’t used it in quite awhile, I knew I needed something gauze-like to use. Not a towel or washcloth, they are too expensive to get blood all over. Not a shirt; same deal. What’s cheap? What’s cheap, cotton, and guaranteed to be clean? UNDERWEAR which just came out of the laundry. I’ll look for a pair with holes in it that I would probably be throwing away anyway.

So here I am with underwear wrapped around my hand. I call Carolyn up, and she talks me through finding the gauze. Speaker phone kicked ass, but I couldn’t hear her from the bathroom, so I tried our cordless phone we hadn’t used in years. It didn’t work. Argh. So I had to keep walking back and forth between the bathroom and the phone. But if I’d had a cellphone, I’d probably have gotten blood all over it, so this is okay. I find out the gauze is in the back of shelf 3 from the floor, so I get it out. I know where the tape is, because I had just reorganized 3 boxes of band-aids plus 2 rolls of medical tape plus scissors all into one tiny metal coffee tin; it was a 10 minute space-saving project we did last week in order to find a use for the coffee tin [rather than throwing it away]. It saved a ton of space.

So I wrap that baby up. By then, the toilet was pretty messy from the blood. (The sink was too.)

So I then scrub the toilet — I had to stick my hand in the toilet water and everything. Blood does NOT leave easy, I had to wet the whole rim of the toilet just to get my own blood off. Talk about adding insult to injury.

Now my day is filled with left-hand typos. What is the recommended interval of bandage changing, anyway?

The moral of the story: If wire clippers are 5 feet away, and you need to clip wires, for “Bob’s”sake get up and walk over there rather than using a pair of scissors that can’t cut it [pun intended].

Anyway, the other neat thing was – MY BLISTER ON MY RIGHT HAND INSTANTLY DISAPPEARED! I guess all the pus went over to my left hand. No, not really. But my body lost enough blood that it realized its fluids would be put to better use than being used for pussing up something that happened 16 hours ago. So now I have this weird “ex blister” on my right hand, bandages on my left hand, a cleaner toilet than this morning, and bloody underwear in the trash.

ALWAYS FUN UPGRADING SPEAKERS

 

CLINT’S TIPS: MEDICAL: Get rid of a canker sore instantly.

Canker sores suck! And most everyone gets them from time to time!

There’s one thing that’s ever worked for me, and it’s worked in 1 treatment 50% of the time, 2 or 3 treatments the other 50% of the time. Apparently some people don’t know about this, so I thought I’d post it here.

Stomatitis by matsuyuki.

1) Get some salt. Not a shaker, the bit Morton’s container. You’re gonna need to *pour* salt.

2) Fill a BIG BIG glass full of HOT HOT HOT water, as hot as you can stand it being in your mouth. Just don’t burn yourself. It sucks to burn your tongue, and it’s not my fault if you do. I’m trying to help you.

3) Put salt in water. Keep stirring until the water is *completely* saturated, accepting no more salt. You can tell this because there will be a layer of non-absorbing salt in the bottom. Also, it should be a pretty vile concoction.

4) Hopefully it’s still really hot at this point. Take a mouthfull, and gargle/swish the salt water everywhere, especially on the sore. This will hurt. Do this as long as possible. Do this until there’s no heat left in the water.

5) Step #4 was just for one mouthfull. Repeat #4 until you’ve gargled every mouthful in the BIG BIG glass. This will take quite some time — at least 10 minutes.

Pretty much.. at least half the time, after doing this, I am INSTANTLY cured of my canker sore. It’s still there, but it doesn’t hurt. And it recedes within 24 hours. No need for painkillers, Oragel, or crushed aspirin. For me, this kills it. Dead. In 1-3 treatments.

I hear this is also good for preventing gum disease.

Saltwater is your new god! Image by amandabhslater.

Leave a comment if this worked or didn’t work for you. I’m curious as to how this solution affects different people. DON’T BURN YOURSELF! If you do, it’s your own damn fault.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: I hurt myself! Stupid cat.

So Oranjello keeps climbing onto this shelf he’s not supposed to climb on… Becuase Carolyn used to keep the catnip there. Fucking drug addict. So I tried to grab him to punish him as he ran away… I lunged for his tail…

Next thing you know, I’m screaming in pain, face down in the couch. I managed to lunch right into the edge of the couch. What I thought were couch cushions was really the hard wooden frame of the couch. I basically slammed a piece of wood horizontally across my heart.

I really thought my heart had stopped or something. It fucking HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURT.

12 hours later, there’s still no bruise. But it hurts like HELL. Every time I rolled over from sleeping on my left side, to my right side, I yelped aloud in pain. Leaning forward really hurts. Making certain sounds with my voice hurts.

Did I bruise my fucking heart? What the hell. There’s no visible bruise. It’s about as intense as waking up with a bad back that lasts for 2 days. This shit suuuuuuuuuuucks.

 

CLINT’S TIPS: The medicinal value of Wendys Frosties

An important tip to share with anyone who is just had oral surgery, or possibly some teeth removed:

Wendys Frosties have high medicinal value!
Wendys Frosties have high medicinal value!
Wendys Frosties have high medicinal value!
Wendys Frosties have high medicinal value!

 

date_created_gmt = 20090304T01:22:00

Read on for today’s interesting stories.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: “My existence is illusive. The kind that is supported by mechanical resources.” (I have pnuemonia and sinusitis.)

So it turns out that I have pnuemonia AND sinusitis. Nice double-whammy there. The pnuemonia very well may have been cooking since last Halloween, the first of 4 times I got sick.

THURSDAY: I feel sick.
THURSDAY NIGHT: Worst night of sleep since my tetanus shot in in 2001.
FRIDAY: No appetite. Didn’t really eat. When Carolyn came home, I explained to her that the *ONLY* thing I could *POSSIBLY* eat would be cheeseburgers. She went to McDonald’s and got like 3 burgers for me, and some fries. It was literally the only thing I could stand eating. (You know it’s bad when McDonald’s is the only edible food.)
FRIDAY NIGHT: Hellish night of “sleep”. Laid in bed 10 hours, got 2 hours sleep max.
SATURDAY: Still sick, but I felt like I we recovering.
SATURDAY NIGHT: Nope, definitely not recovering. Hellish night of sleep.

So — after that incredibly hellish Saturday night where I tossed, turned, moaned, moved locations multiple times (couch->foof->bed->foof), and in 12 hours of “sleeping” only actually got 2 hours of real sleep…. We decided to take me to an urgent care facility. Left at 1PM, got back past 6PM (we ate while we were out).

It was actually the hospital/health center that my grandfather died in, and where my wallet full of $500 was most likely stolen when I stopped to duct tape my bumper back on after a car accident, so I tend to have bad associations with this place. However, they are actually quite capable there.

And don’t get me started on how hard it is to find a doctor on a Sunday. I couldn’t have done it myself; Carolyn made the phone calls, drove, even helped me get dressed. Such a fucking pain in the ass. And what do we have to thank for this? 2,000 year old dogma. A fucking sky fairy says you shouldn’t work on Sundays, and 2,000 years later people are still suffering because they can’t find a doctor as easily. FUCK YOU, GOD. If today was a weekday I possibly could have scraped by this with my standard $25(!) co-pay, but I’m sure it’s going to end up costing a lot more. My doctor was a female Muslim (I assume by her hair being covered) with beautiful green eyes. I actually assumed on the car ride up that I would be attended to by a Muslim, since it’s not “Christian” to work on the frickin’ sabbath. It’s funny when one can make such generalizations to oneself and end up being right.

I was in bad shape. I basically slept in the waiting room by taking up a couch sideways. I actually used the “hospital rails” on the walls to assist in walking, because I had no energy.

Once they got somebody to see me, they measured my oxygenation level in my blood, and weren’t too happy that it was only 95%. (80% is dangerous.) So they had me use a nebulizer, which is pretty much a medical grade bong for inhaling liquid medicine directly into the lungs. Will I have to pay some absurd amount for this medicine? I dunno. It took about 20 minutes to “nebulize” :

After the nebulizer, it was more like 97%. If I took a couple deep breaths, I could get it up to 100%.

They also took my temperature. It was 100.2 by Carolyn’s thermometer this morning. But at the clinic, it actually measured 101.5. They gave me acetaminophen (Tylenol). Stupid me, I’d been taking Ibuprofen (Advil) the whole time. I hadn’t realized I had a fever. When you have a fever, you do acetaminophen. My temp got back down to 99.1 before I left the clinic. (I was there for 4 hours.)

They also took a flu test — shoving q-tips farther up my nose than anything had ever been shoved up. (And they did this while I was using the nebulizer… Tears streaming out of my face, medicinal “smoke” coming out of the nebulizer, and a huge q-tip up my nose.) They also gave me a mononucleosis test. I’ve had mono *FOUR* times — don’t let anyone tell you you can only get it once. And nope: I don’t have the flu OR mono.

They also took a couple chest x-rays, and gave me a huge bag of intravenous fluids (with elctrolytes — seroiusly, I felt like I was in Idiocracy for a second).

The damn IV took like 30 minutes to empty. Poor Carolyn got to have a very boring day.

They also told me if my symptoms get worse that I should simply go to an E.R. And started to write me a note saying I had to miss work for *FOUR* days, but I stopped her: I don’t have a job. Less paperwork.

And what’s the financial damage? Urgent care didn’t want a co-pay. They said they’d send me a bill. That doesn’t sound very promising!

And the prescrpitions? $20 for Nasonex, and $80 for 14 once-a-day Levaquin pills. $100?!?!?!?! For something that might give me tendon damage (tendons may rupture UP TO A YEAR after you stop taking it — and my tendons do NOT heal the way they are supposed to) and perhipheral neuropathy? Ugh. Fluoroquinolone Toxicity Syndrome sounds pretty shitty. 806 people have died from Levofloxacin (Levaquin), and this was only found out by Freedom Of Information Acts (fucking corporations). The injuries you get from this drug are not treatable and may last a lifetime. “These patients remain a medical mystery; denied the medical care they so desperately need, while being shuffled from one specialist to the next.” It’s just lovely that this can happen anywhere from 2 hours after you take the first pill, to ONE YEAR AFTER YOU STOP (!!!). I love how the FDA has stated the odds of this happening are very low, while in the Netherlands there may be a 10% chance of this happening. Great. Last thing I need is to walk with a cane the rest of my life because I had to use an expensive cutting-edge drug. Previous generations of this drug have been taken off the market! Jesus, maybe I should call her back tomorrow and ask her to send me a new prescription.

The guy at CVS said we still “saved” $150 at least, but I’m wondering if I should have gotten on the phone and had urgent care fax over a generic prescription instead.

Then again, pneumonia is serious shit, so I should perhaps get the best that money has to offer. After all, I shouldn’t be alive, so I should take what I can get.

We went to Giant to fill our prescription — but the pharmacy closes at 3PM on Sunday! (Thank you Old Testament.) So then we had to go to CVS. What a pain.

Anyway…. I’m feeling much better from the IV and the nebulizer, but those are both short term treatments. We’ll see how I fare tonite when I try to sleep again. Hopefully no tendons spontaneously rupture. My back problems and plantar fasciitis are enough to deal with already.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Being sick sucks.

Fuck this shit! Fuck having to use TWO handkerchiefs (because the 1st is saturated). Oh, I could use paper towels, but I’d have gone through at least a roll today alone.

Fuck pouring 2-4 glasses of water at once because I can’t get enough water.

Fuck my stomach hurting from drinking more water than it can hold, yet being parched.

YARRR.. I’m going to actually go to the doctor this time.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: wah wah

*** Boring post warning! ***

So, our friend Chris H visited again last nite — after seeing us Thursday — because he had forgotton something and had to drive back this way before going back to California.

I swear I felt the virus jump straight from his cigarettes into my body.
I often know, within a 15 minute range of time, EXACTLY when I got sick.

For instance, in 3rd grade, I can remember what chair I was sitting in (I was in trouble in the principal’s office) when a girl walked by to go home from having Chicken Pox. I knew I was infected, and was right — I didn’t make it to school for WEEKS after that, missing an award ceremony where I would have had go to up in front of my whole school THREE times. You see, as a 3rd grader, I beat all the 5th graders in non-fiction writing. MUAHAHA.

So anwyay, I knew I was infected with something before Chris was even gone. And I was right.

I opted to go to bed early (11pm instead of 1am) with Carolyn, who went to bed early due to a morning vet appointment to mutilate Lemonjello’s balls. I could NOT sleep. I was tossing and turning. It reminded me of the feeling of a tetanus shot.

Finally by 5AM I left and went to the foofsac. I sleep better on non-level sleeping surfaces, as they allow me to put weight somewhere else other than my constantly-sore rib (now less sore after going off the Bactrum — could it be that it was enlarging my liver?). I had slept in the bed with Carolyn 4 nites in a row, which, I think, is a record out of the past 1.5 yrs. No back problems. Maybe because I’m too busy suffernig with this sickness.

Stayed in bed until 12:30PM or so. That’s about 13+ hours. I usually sleep 4-6.

This is the 3rd time I’ve gotten sick since fall.

Was my immune system weakened due to 3 years of daily antibiotics?

And considering I have something like 400+ antibiotic pills remaining …. Should I take these to try to kill the sickness?

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Podiatrists, the American medical system, and why I’m buying shoes online from now on

You gotta love the American medical system. I went to a podiatrist. I paid $25. The insurance company paid her office for a visit. X-rays were taken, and the X-Ray companies got to make their buck. My doctor got to make money off the insurance companies paying her to do the x-rays. My insurance company also received $75/mo for the last few months I never went to the doctor.

Everyone made money but me. And my advice? “Yes, you have plantar fasciitis.” Something that, based on the symptoms, Dave O diagnosed over email. And guess what? It’s not something that you can diagnose with 100% confidence anyway. Even with the X-Ray, the podiatrist is still just guessing.

So why did I go? Why did I pay? She made a little heel-support out of a piece of medical gauze/tape and a heel pad. The total cost of this was probably 10 cents. Then she sent me to a shoe store. One which had printed advertisements all over her office.

So podiatry is just a front for selling shoes? More or less, she told me to buy some shoes.

At the stores she sent me to – Metro Run & Walk – they had heel supports specifically made for plantar fasciitus. They cost $20 — $5 cheaper than my co-pay. But I didn’t know they came in different sizes, so I got the wrong size.

Why doesn’t the doctor have these? Why does my $25 copay get me nothing but a 10-cent support she fashioned herself in 30 seconds? Is that becuase all the money had to go to the insurance company, x-ray, doctor, secretary, etc? I think this is a classic example of how Americans pay more, and get less. Why does the doctor not even recommend these $20 supports MADE FOR MY CONDITION, AT THE SHOE STORE SHE IS ADVERTISING?

And if this shoe store is taking referrals from a doctor who diagnoses such conditions — WHY NOT HAVE THE SUPPORT IN MY SIZE?

Oh, and the shoe I wanted? They didn’t have in black. I’m supposed to walk around in white shoes like Steamboat Willie? So I had to special order the shoes.

Here it is 4 days after going to the doctor. We’ve now had to drive to the store TWO times, and will end up driving there FOUR times. Once to try on shoes and bring home the wrong-sized support. A second time to return the wrong-sized support and find out they don’t have it in my size. A third time to return when they finally special-order the correct-sized support. And a fourth time to pick up the shoes when they come.

So now I’ve trekked down to Springfield TWICE at a cost of over an hour (multiplied by 2, since Carolyn was with me). I’ve spent $25 on a doctor. I’ve spent $20 on a support and then gotten my $20 back returning it. I have NOTHING TO SHOW FOR ALL MY EFFORTS WHATSOEVER, but plenty of people (including my gas station) have made money off of my pain.

I gotta wonder if a more sensible thing would be for a podiatrist to have supports made for pantar fasciitis — one of the most common foot ailments — available in her fucking office. And I gotta wonder what Metro Run & Walk had to do to get her to carry their advertisements, considering they DON’T EVEN HAVE WHAT I WANT.

Anyway, I made it a point to get a professional shoe-size measuring — something I’ve never done. If I have to buy $130 Saucony shoes after buying $20 PayLess shows the rest of my life, I’m at least going to get a professional measuring. And I now know my foot width, too.

I’m buying my shoes online from now on. Brick-and-mortar shoe stores nationwide just lost another customer, permanently. Shoes cost $5 to ship. I already spent more than $5 on gas and have nothing to show for it.

And I bet that fucking shoe is available locally right now! But nooooo, I felt guilty that the salesmen had spent 30 minutes trying on shoes with me, so I special ordered it at Metro Run And Walk. It’s not like people are custom fabricating the shoe for me. I’m sure it’s available locally SOMEwhere, just not there.

The salesman even told me they didn’t come in black, probably because he wanted my commission. Only when I was going to walk out did black suddenly become available.

Oh, and let’s not mention the sad sack who has to buy my used foot pads, which I wore for a day under my socks, and even slept in. Of course I shoved them back in the packaging and acted like they were new. Capitalism screws me, I screw capitalism back. If my doctor had provided the supports, I’m sure they’d have given me the right size. I didn’t even know they CAME in sizes because I had to discover what felt like the most effective treatment MYSELF. Even my doctor couldn’t bother to tell me about these — she just said to buy new shoes; an advertisement basically.

I’m thinking my hurty foot could have easily had both the supports AND the show by now, had certain elements in our society tried to cooperate instead of compete. Had my doctor not sent me to a specific store that may have some sort of arrangement with her (why does she have Metro Run And Walk flyers in her office?). Had she known these supports existed and recommended them. Had the stores managed their inventory better (perhaps using data from the medical system? Or sharing data with her?). But good luck getting anyone to cooperate. I’m just stating the problem, not the solution.

It’s quite ironic that the thing that helped me the most was NOT recommended to me by my doctor, who eagerly wanted to set up another $25 follow-up appointment only 1 month later (this plantar fasciitis has been a problem for 4 months, and can take 18 months of treatment to heal). It’s all about how they make their next buck, not about giving me the best advice. Not from the doctor. Not from the shoe store salesman.

But at least I got to go to Metro Run & Walk and find the supports. CVS doesn’t carry them. I can thank capitalism for THAT much, anyway. Of course my attitude is if such supports help, they should be carried by the medical industry. I should have been given one (hopefully at a wholesale price instead of a specialty-store price) at the doctor’s office, not some stupid support made with a 10 cent piece of tape.

So much time wasted. And since the store is by Carolyn’s work, she is going to pick up the support for me. 10 minutes for her vs 45 minutes for me. But it sucks. We have to drive our car to the store FOUR TIMES. Plus the CVS trip. Fuck that. I’m buying shoes online from now on. Even if I go to a shoe store to try things on, I’m walking out. Nobody’s ever going to get a commission from me. I’m too jaded to fall for all this ever again.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Plantar Fasciitis, annoying doctor visits. I’m gonna die. (Not emminently.)

So I went to the podiatrist today. She said I most likely had plantar fasciitis, based on my symptoms. So Dave O, you were spot on with your diagnosis this August. And it’s kind of sad that paying $25 and having 2.5 hours taken out of your day gets you 10 minutes with a doctor who can provide a diagnosis no better than a friend over email provides you based on saying “my heel wont stop hurting”. But not all medical conditions have a way to diagnose them.

Apparently my boots do not have good support, because it is possible to bend the shoe with your bare hands, as well as twist it with your bare hands. You should not be able to squish the heel. She said the shoes she suggets run closer to $90. They are Asics Saucony(?) GT2140 or New Balance Brooks 749. She gave me the location of Metro Run & Walk, but I find it suspicious that this store has advertisements sitting in a doctor’s office. Then again, they had (two very small) shoe displays there, so maybe podiatry is tied to local business more due to shoe sales…

Nevertheless, No more buy-1-get-1-free $15-$20 shoes for me. Sigh… I never expected the cost of walking would increase faster than the rate of inflation, but I guess everything gets more expensive as you try not to die of old age.

She gave me a tip, that new shoes should have 1.0-1.5cm of space between the tip of your toes and the front of the shoe. And that this is best measured with the insole out (which surprised me).

She made me a temporary foot brace (some padding with some tape, removeable apparently), and I should line the line she drew on it up with the line between my first 2 toes.

She commented that the diagnosis Kaiser-Permanente‘s shitty physical therapy staff gave me of having one leg longer than one another was a “gross diagnosis”, with gross being a medical term that basically means “really vague, low-level”. The proper way to do this is to CT Scan the legs so the bones are actually meausured against this. She said it’s very questionable to just visually look at someone and then stick a heel lift under their heel — which has been where it has been their entire life. This may explain the 2 months or so of extra-exquisite (more than usual) agony I had due to Kaiser-Permanente not really treating my problem properly. They also forgot to write down which leg to put it on and I very well may have put it on the wrong one. Nice system.

And a special thanks for Google Maps totally FUCKING me and turning a 15 minute trip into a 45 minute trip by making me go a retarded way that coincidentally had major construction that I had to sit through as people broke the law and dangerously drove around me while violating my right of way and failing to yield when the sign tells them to. And thanks for the fictitious street name/turn AGAIN. Google Maps has such an awesome interface that it really makes me forgive it when I shouldn’t. It’s like a good looking lover who intoxicates you with their beauty while slapping you. “It’s like slapping yourself in the face…”

Honorable mention to the medical center for creeping up on you on a 50MPH road. If you pass it, it’s a full 3 minute drive to the next light. Where you u-turn. When you get back, you are greeted with a no left turn sign. So then you have to go another minute past to u-turn a 2nd time. Miss the center? Expect at least a 10 minute delay just to get back to the same place! Wow.

Fortunately, me being 30 minutes late didn’t matter. I still had to wait an offensively long time for the doctor to service me. They even joked that it was a good thing I didn’t come on time. This didn’t really make me feel better. If I’m on time, I’m screwed and wait 45 minutes. If I’m not on time, I’m stressed out that I’ll have to wait longer. And either way: Apparently my actions have no affect.

They also put these fucking paper socks on me to walk to the x-ray, and I slipped on their smooth vinyl tile floors. Wrenched my back. Have been in the most back pain I’ve been in in 2-3 weeks for a few hours now. Gee, thanks.

And as always, I’m told to simply take a bunch of ibuprofen constantly. Just like my back. It treats inflammation but not the root cause. I need better shoes for that. pfft.

So I have to call back for an appointment in a month. But I don’t think it’s possible to get better in a month. The page says it can take 18 months untreated. My wounds, treated, usually heal slower than untreated stats. I think it’s an attempt to milk me into going an extra time. These copays are $25! So I think I might wait 6-8 weeks instead. It’s not like the doctor can magically wiggle her fingers and cure me — or she would have already done it.

It’s bad enough having guitar playing mostly robbed from me due to Arlo breaking my finger during a padded swordfighting match by swinging the sword in a way I explicitly asked him not to, but now I wonder if I’ll be able to play Dance Dance Revolution again as well. And if I can’t do THAT, I can just kiss cardiovascular health goodbye, because that’s the only cardio I’ve EVER thought was fun EVER.

So like.. I’m gonna die and stuff.

Eric Mens made a good point to me this weekend — Since we’re going to get screwed out of social security, and since even our 401(k)s and investments are quite subject to be destroyed by the american economy … That surviving retirement may only be possible in countries that offer universal health care. This, he plans to emmigrate not for specific politics, but literally to save his own ass. Hmm.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Being sick sucks.

But worse than being sick is having a miserable day getting very little done between 7AM and Midnight, falling alseep for only 1.5 hours, and waking up at 1:30AM unable to sleep despite being sick. Oh, and not being able to go to the doctor because my car wont start. And of course, being sick, I really don’t feel like dealing with the car issue at the moment. If we can’t jump start it, I’ll have it towed up to Tacoma, MD, where Carolyn’s uncle can work on it again. It better not be the fucking alternator (alternator number five, still under warranty.).

So I played Culdcept all night (well, 2:30-7AM), winning the last 2 maps, and completing story mode, gaining 2 more medals for a total of 15. (Out of 50. I’m done with the game but still have a long way to go for 100% completion, as we rarely play 1-player. I’ve now played Culdcept for over 400 hours total, though I thought it was over 500 hours last time I checked.) And saw Carolyn off to work.

Now it’s 10AM, and I’ve been up 25.5 of the last 27 hours. And I probably wont go to bed til midnite tonite when Carolyn goes to bed. Maybe if I CoolEdit enough WAV files (I’m processing my incoming music backlog these days) and sedate myself slightly, I’ll finally be able to mentally fatigue myself enough to take a nap before Carolyn comes home. But it’s unlikely.

I better not fall asleep during Heroes, which we plan to watch tonite!

blah. I don’t usually go to the doctor, but since it’s a big party weekend, I was willing. Too bad about the car. Even if we were to jump start it tonite at 6PM, I seriously doubt going to the doctor on wednesday is going to cure me by friday. The only time I ever got an instant cure at the doctor’s was when I went to a specialist who gave me a direct injection of the steroidal drug Dexadrone (which they warned me makes your balls itch for 60 seconds; I only felt it for about 3 seconds and they were all very disappointed). I went from having 3 weeks of mononucleosis to being COMPLETELY better, INSTANTLY AND PERMANENTLY. Of course when I told this to the HMO doctors at Kaiser-Permanente, they were like, “Why would anyone do that?”

Indeed. Why would anyone cure a sick person? There’s far more money to be made in prescriptions and follow-up co-pays!

As such, compared to that experience, I find most Doctor care to be quite mediocre. If you can’t cure me in 10 minutes, why should I give you a $25 co-pay? My current primary care physician SUUUCKS. His office refused to take my medical records for the last 2 years from Kaiser-Permanente. After all, who needs records? It’s just my fucking medical care, that’s all.

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Biopsy results: not cancer. Radicular cyst (again).

Well, it’s not cancer. It was simply a regrown radicular cyst, possibly thanks to the suckitude of my last oral surgeon, possibly thanks to the suckitude of the 3 root canals in those 2 teeth, or possibly due to none of the above and simple bad luck and/or genetics.

Doctor’s recommendation is for me to get the area cleaned out again, losing tooth #19 & #20, and paying $1150 out of pocket because Carolyn’s Aetna insurance only covers 50%. They told me there that most people’s Aetna covers 80%, so a special thanks to Carolyn’s employer for giving out shitty dental benefits. But then again, dental benefits are getting shittier and shittier by the year, with most companies scaling back maximum yearly payout from $1500 to $1250 in the last 10 years. My dentist was just commenting on how this has gone down, despite dental costs going up. People: Pay attention to your dental benefits when seeking employment. If a few people turn down employment based on inferior benefits, companies will be forced to negotiate better scams. It is unfortunate that our capitalist system will gradually move towards exploitation unless each individual is individually vigilant. This is one of the reasons why socialized health care can be much better for the average person.

So, it’s either $1150 out of pocket to go back in in an equally invasive procedure — or I can wait for when and if it grows back, and have an equally invasive surgery for a mere $135 out of pocket. So I am being encouraged to not deal with the problem, or pay over eight times as much.

[sarcasm on] Gee, our capitalist health care system is the best on the planet. It’s so good that the republicans have prevented us from running things like the rest of the civilized world does. It’s great that money encourages people to seek out less healthy solutions. [/sarcasm off]

It would be cheaper (in terms of total money spent; NOT for me) to fix it for good with the apoco ($1150), yet I am encouraged to keep coming back and pay for cheaper surgeries ($130), thus giving the insurance companies more profit by having more business. Keeping me sick for their profit; fining me 8X as much if I want to get better. Welcome to America. (How do I get out?)

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Surgery was a success!

Well, THAT was fast. The surgery was a good 10X faster than my last oral surgery, which you can read about (complete with after surgery pictures) HERE. (It’s actually one of my more popular blogposts, having been viewed several thousand times. Apparently people don’t share pics of themselves much, and there is a high demand for such personal recounts.)

I also got to see a copy of my pathology report from the last surgery. “Squamous epithelial lined cyst with acute & chronic inflammation and histiocytic inflammation with focal cholesteral cleft dispostiion & woven bone formation.” “Consistent with radicular cyst” ( site devoted to radicular cysts … gorey pictures of someone else’s removal HERE). I didn’t get a chance to write down the diagnosis, though. A few types of thingees were ruled out. I kidn of want to get a copy of that.

cyst in my left mandible removed before. I’ve had 40+ fillings. But no pain compared to this, not even when the lidocaine wears off and I can feel them drilling my tooth. (I no longer need lidocaine, which is really weak, because my prolapse mitral valve got better). I cried out twice, and tears filled my eyes instantly. (NOTE: I have a high pain threshold and generally win pain games like “see who can touch the bottom of the sink the longest while it fills up with hot water”.) Granted, my eyes ALWAYS tear up the second the needle goes into me, but this was waaaaay above that level. They would have streamed down my face had I not wiped my eyes 3-4 times. Having 4 injections in the roof of your mouth (which I had in the past) SUUUUUUUUUUUCKS ASSSSSSSS, but I would have rather had those 4 than the 1. I think I was injected about 12 times or so, but I couldn’t even feel the last 6 or so at all. And she started digging in RIGHT AWAY. A tug of war with my head and everything. I saw something come out that I thought was my tooth, but nope… I got to keep my 2 teeth. For now.

She said it came out all in one chunk — UNLIKE my last one. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but it made for a quicker and cleaner surgery. It definitely still hurt a good deal when she REALLY DUG IN THERE and sraped next to the nerve. But fuck general anesthetic. People die on that shit. People go to sleep and never wake up. You have to have someone drive you home. And you have to fast (ironically, I haven’t eaten in 20 hours, mostly due to losing my appetite due to the pain).

The cost was $135, and they knew that right away. UNLIKE Dr. Pell+Kaiser Permanente, this Aetna-based clinic knew. I didn’t have to fight them for 6 months to get a $1600 bill reduced to $1200 reduced to $600 reduced to $135, like I did with Kaiser. The office was OPULENT in comparison. Let me say it again: If you’re given a job offer, and the job has Kasier-Permanente for insurance: TAKE ANOTHER JOB. Take a 20% pay cut to get off Kaiser-Permanente if you can. It’s not worth the risk of dealing with incompetent assholes.

So anyway, I am scheduled to return back the following monday after X-Day to get biposys results. Depending on what they are, they may go back in and scrape out more, and then I will lose the 2 teeth (that i’ve paid close to $4000 out of pocket since 1997 to try to keep… That’s $400 a year, or $200 a year-tooth. With 32 teeth, if they were all that bad, I’d be paying $6400 a year just to keep them. FUCK THAT. In the UK they performed experiments where they injected stem cells into the gums of adults who had losts their adult teeth — and they grew new teeth. At a cost of about $1000; cheaper than a root canal+crown. The lower-end dentists should want this, because the new teeth will continue to need fillings, and business would shift from high-end braces/false teeth/implants/dentures to low-end mom-and-pop just-do-fillings dentists. Of course it was pioneered in the UK where people have really shitty teeth.)

Perhaps the aneshetic hasn’t worn off.. but… I am actually in less pain than before the surgery. During the drive there, THROBBING started… I much prefer a constant pain to any throbbing pain. And the referred pain made my upper-left teeth hurt, and as of today was going all the way back to my left ear. I asked her about it, saying, “I know from my previous surgery here that it can hurt a lot after surgery. But it hurt a lot before, and that would have relieved the pressure, right?” And she confirmed my suspicions, “Yes, you’re trading one kind of pain for another.” GOOD. I could deal with constant pain if it simply moved to a different spot on my body every 24 hours! What I can’t deal with is constant pain that never changes. For lack of a better reason, it’s just boring (and mentally distressing) to hurt in the same way.

Will I have the crazy ‘nerve attacks’ that I had last time? Maybe not. My nerve was not scraped as much as my cyst removal with Dr. Pell. When he did it, it felt like someone held a 4th Of July sparkler next to my face, and sparks were hitting it. I didn’t quite get those same sensations, so I don’t think the nerve was affected. Which is good. The nerve attacks are twice as maddening as post-surgical pain. I remember saying, “I want my pain back!” Teeth falling asleep is a weird sucky feeling that made me rub paper towels into my teeth franticly for an hour at a time, just to make them FEEL something other than the prickly needles of a leg waking up.

I’m supposed to do cold compress, 20 min on, 10 min off, but I have never been able to keep up even 1 cycle of that in my life. Fortunately we have some cold packs from Peapod’s grocery delivery service. They don’t make a big mess like ice cubes, and don’t occasionally leak like a bag of frozen peas. Though I have to say, a bag of frozen peas works amazingly for a sore knee, as you can contour it to the shape of your affected area.

No new drugs. I have Darvocet for pain, which I’ve still only taken 1/3rd of a pill of. I crushed it into a powder and put directly on affected area as somewhere I read this might work. And if it doesn’t, since it’s metabolized in the liver, it will still get into my system when I swallow it. But the first time, I spit out the Darvospit, and still felt num in the area. But only for 5 minutes. Meh. I read the stuff is weaker than Vicodin. Whatever. I don’t like painkillers, but I might have to resort to eating one at some point. I’m on clindamycin 150mg 4xDaily until those run out. I can’t drink alcohol / smoke / eat hot food / whatever.

I don’t remember what they told me to avoid exactly; I simply remember the medical value of Wendy’s Frosties. When unable to use a straw, you can’t really drink a milkshake for nourishment. Frosties are thick enough to spoon into your mouth. Since I’m not good at applying cold to the affected area for 20 minutes (how can I type? I’d prefer to bleed longer! And I like the taste of blood anyway), so I will “eat” my Frosty by putting a spoonfull of it on the affected area. The cold is very soothing, and as it melts, it’s delicious!! And you get to eat too. Medical + Food + substitute for laziness with the cold compress, all solved by one magical “food”: Wendy’s Frosties. So I immediately went to Wendy’s and ordered 10 chocolate Frosties for $20.90 or so. They tried to talk me into having 6 chocolate and 4 vanilla, but FUCK VANILLA FROSTIES! I went inside and waited the extra 5 minutes. I had to rearrange the freezer to get them all in.

I’m still planning to watch Parasite Dolls tonite, even if I can’t drink or smoke. I might see Judy Tenuta tomorrow, depending on how various logistics play out.

Well… I haven’t eaten in 19 hours — I’m guessing that the jaw pain made my hunger pains imperceptable. I wasn’t sure if I was supposd to fast, but based on Angel’s comment, I guess I didn’t need to. Post-surgery, I’m actually hurting less (UNlike last time), and now I’m hungry. I bet those Frosties are more frozen now (they were a bit runny when I got home). I can hear them calling my name…

 

JOURNAL: MEDICAL: Oral surgery, Dethklok, and car woes.

Well… My mouth hurts like FUCK, and triple ibuprofens barely help. I still have a high disdain for painkillers, so I got her to give me Darvocet instead of Vicodin. But I’ve still refused to take a full pill… I’ve crushed it and taken smaller portions. I really don’t like the wooziness of painkillers. And I need to be able to drive to the surgery. I took 3 ibuprofen immediately before the Dethklok show last night (which was AWESOME!!!!!!!), and the heat, noise, and crowd gave my mind other things to worry about. I didn’t feel the pain during the show. I didn’t feel it until we (Carolyn, Greg Z, and me) were hanging out outside with Beth B, Wayne H, and Shehab. Anyway, I know from surgery last time that it SUCKS. I was in major pain for a week, and then had nerve attacks for a week after that. Basically, when you scrape a cyst off of a nerve, weird things happen. The nerve attacks were worse than the pain. It was like the prickly feeling you get that DRIVES YOU CRAZY when your leg wakes up from being asleep. Except instead of in your leg, it’s in your teeth. And instead of being over in 30 seconds or so, it goes on for hours. I was literally rubbing paper towels in my teeth non-stop to override the nerve transmissions with actual stimulus. It sucked. I’m hoping that I don’t have to deal with that kind of crap while at X-Day next week, becuase that would really suck. To top it off, Carolyn’s car overheated from having near-zero coolant, and we barely made it to Dethklok at all. We were lucky. My car’s air conditioning is too sub-standard (I’ve been parking in the shade) for a long road trip, and now her car is deemed unreliable. We’re trying to talk a parent into trading cars with us for the week. I could take mine in for repairs, but with the surgery going, I will probably be in no mood for it. We may have to go to Carolyn’s uncle’s this weekend to get HER car looked at. She might just have a slow leak which could be driven as long as we carry extra coolant with us. We should check the levels this week. Judy Tenuta is playing at the Arlington Drafthouse this weekend… I might do that if nothing else is going on, and I can deal with the pain. I definitely need medicine for this pain, but narcotics just don’t really help me with pain. They don’t take my mind off of it. Anyway… This is going to suck. I hope it’s benign (it’s recurring, and they usually are). I might lose the back 2 teeth (the molar’s already gone) which would basically mean a visible gap in my smile with my 0 molars on my bottom left (I think in their numbering system, #18 is gone, and #19 and #20 might die). These 2 teeth already cost me $3500, and it’s all for nothing. The infection may have been due to my first root canal in 1997. I should just pull the fucking things. I like applesauce and hate flossing. Maybe toothlessness is the evolutionary future for mankind. My parents basically have shitloads of bridges, dental implants, jaw surgery, and the like. It runs in the family.

But this pain? It SUCKS. Fortunately I have a high pain threshold. For example, I’m insisting on being awake during the procecure. Well, I’m running late and need to drive there now. They never advised me not to eat, but I haven’t for 12 hours anyway because that is usually the protocol for such procedures. Ugh. Wish me luck. Esp. on the biopsy results.

Mood: in pain
Music: Alec Empire – Kiss Of Death