Some of my
experiences I have written in my account of my SRS process, and my travel to
and from Thailand, might seem trivial.
But the several weeks from the morning I left home to the day I returned
to the USA were filled with many new experiences in life, and I had quite a few
major new experiences for several days both before and after my actual surgery.
I have been
fortunate to be in such good health that in the first 38 years of my life, I
have never been under general anesthesia, never spent one night in any
hospital, and never needed IVs, oxygen, catheters, or any other tubes in my
body. In addition, I had barely ever
ventured outside my home country, the USA.
But in order to correct my body so I could feel comfortable with it, I
suddenly needed to travel to the other side of the world, and then endure
preparations for surgery, the surgery itself, and weeks of recovery
afterwards. I had to endure many things
I have never endured before, and these things did scare me. Long flights of six to twelve hours each, or
the insertion of an IV, might seem trivial to many people. But I had never had to do any of these things
until now, and the multitude of new experiences in such a short period of time,
plus my fears associated with these experiences sent me on a roller coaster of
emotions as I went through the process.
The fact that I had never needed to do these things before magnified the
emotional effects on me now that I did have to endure these things.
One post on a
mailing list would not suffice to express all of my feelings as I went through
this experience. I doubt that even my
long multi-page account could adequately describe my experience and how I felt
about it.
After years of
saving funds, getting letters from my doctor and therapist, arranging the time
off from work and my neighborhood, I felt eager to finish my physical
transition and have my surgery. But even
after I completed my last pre-op workday six days before SRS, I knew there were
still more challenges to overcome on my way to Thailand and Dr. Kamol’s
operating room.
My greatest
fear was that in order to have my surgery, I had to travel across the Pacific
Ocean and arrive safely in Thailand. I
still feared the extremely slim probability that Dr. Kamol might find a problem
while performing his lab tests before surgery, and tell me that I would not be
able to have surgery. I also worried
about the certain probabilities of some unpleasant processes such as having an
IV and an enema administered.
I was booked on
Northwest Airlines for my entire trip to and from Thailand. During the past six weeks, the airline had
suffered from a mechanic’s strike, filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy,
and dealt with fuel shortages caused by multiple hurricane landfalls on the
Gulf coast. I worried about whether or
not my airline would get me to Thailand on time, or if I would arrive late and
have to reschedule my surgery after I arrived.
Out of curiosity, I calculated the
exact number of days I had to work in this place ever since my first workday
more than two years ago. I found that
since I quit working at the chicken plant and started working here, today was
the 555th day that I had reported to work here. That’s how many workdays it has taken me to
save funds for my SRS. Shortly before I
drove to work today, I cried tears of joy knowing that my long efforts to save
and prepare for my surgery were almost finished.
Only two people at work knew that I am
about to take six weeks off from work.
The HR clerk who learned from the Social Security Administration about
my transition has arranged for my medical leave, and one superintendent in my
department knows that I will take six weeks of medical leave, but he doesn’t know
why. My other coworkers know that I will
take three days of vacation starting tomorrow, and that I will be off for the
rest of this week. I had decided not to
even let them know about my long medical leave, because I did not want people
asking me so many questions just before I left.
So my coworkers will be surprised next week when they realize that their
youngish looking and healthy coworker will be absent for six weeks.
This workday actually ended at 1AM
tomorrow morning. I had two more days to
do the things I needed to do in order to pack for my long trip and prepare for
my long absence from my neighborhood: shopping, post office to hold my mail,
landlord, and the bank for travelers cheques. I made time
for one last walk of six miles on the park trails to stay in condition for my
recovery from my imminent surgery.
Because I normally go to bed long after
Midnight and sleep until late morning around my work schedule on the second
shift, I tried going to bed earlier and setting my alarm earlier to prepare for
my necessity of waking up early Friday morning for my 25 hours of flights. But I was not able to sleep very much those
nights, and little did I know that I would not have another good night of sleep
for about two weeks.
A post-op friend arrived at my
apartment at about 6:20 to drive me to the airport. She had her surgery with Dr. Preecha four years ago, so she had told me some of her
experiences of traveling to Thailand and going through the SRS procedure. She reassured me a little as she drove me for
the first few miles of the longest trip of my life.
I really needed this reassurance,
because I had to travel much farther than I had ever traveled in my life so
far. Up until now, I had been outside
the United States only twice, and both of those occasions were mere road trips
to border towns in Mexico. Even then, I
had traveled with others. I had to make
it to the other side of the world, and I had to get there alone. I could not remember even my stepfather
traveling so far for any business trip.
For now I could only hope that I would
find help and friends at the other end of my journey of more than 9000 miles,
and that all of this would work out.
I first felt anxious at my local
airport when I was told at the security checkpoint that I had been selected for
extra screening. I tried to tell myself
that I had been selected because I was traveling internationally and alone, or
maybe because I had a temporary one-year passport instead of the usual ten-year
one. But part of my anxiety was over the
fact that I was still pre-op. They did
have a female administer the extra screening, which included waving a wand over
me and patting some parts of me, but fortunately not the genital area.
The first of my three flights took me
to the Northwest hub at Minneapolis.
After I had passed security in my home city, this first flight was
uneventful. As usual, I had chosen
window seats for all three of my flights, because I love to look at any scenery
as I travel. As we approached the
Minneapolis airport, I saw some autumn foliage.
The leaves back home had not yet started to change color, and I felt
sorry that I was going to miss most of the autumn foliage this year.
A friend on the internet worked at the
Minneapolis airport at this time, and I hoped that she would be able to find
me, but we did not get to meet today.
Hopefully we could work out a meeting on my return trip in several
weeks. But for now I was relieved that
my first flight had arrived on schedule, and it appeared that my flight from
here to Tokyo would also leave on time.
As I walked through the airport, I did see some strikers from the
mechanic’s AMA union outside, but they seemed to be having little if any effect
on the airline’s operations. Now I knew
that I was definitely going to Asia today.
My anxiety over Northwest airlines
faded. But when I submitted my passport
at a checkpoint before waiting at the international gates, and then waited
among many Asian travelers, the reality of traveling so far from home began to
set in. Still, I would feel mostly OK
until I arrived in Tokyo.
The 747 had a movie screen in front of
each section of cabin. The flight from
the USA to Tokyo was long enough for the airline to schedule three movies. But at first the screen merely displayed our
flight path, and statistics such as distance traveled and even the outside
temperature. I was shocked to see that
our flight was not going to cross the Pacific in a straight line to Tokyo, but
we were going deep into Canada, and then across southern Alaska. Because of the planet’s curvature, the
quickest way to fly from here to Tokyo is not necessarily a straight line. But I could look forward to beautiful
scenery, and I hoped it would not be cloudy for very much of our flight.
At first this scenery helped to relieve
the anxiety I had over getting farther and farther from home and friends, and I
only felt excited that after so long, I was finally on my way to Thailand and
SRS. For a few hours I watched endless
Canadian Plains, as we flew to just north of Edmonton and then toward northern
British Columbia. Although it was still
the last day of September, the few deciduous trees up here were already bare. Cloud cover started to increase as we
approached the Pacific, but in-between the clouds I could see the northern
Rockies, and so many mountains capped with glaciers. I’ve seen wilderness while flying over the
western US before, but this was absolutely raw wilderness. Enya sang on my CD
player as I watched snow capped mountains, treeless medium size mountains with
the first winter snowfall on them, and valleys inside these mountains, some
with coniferous trees wherever the climate was mild enough. There were no roads, and I did not see even
one home or cabin in sight.
I have forfeited many vacations to save
for transition in the last six years, and I looked forward to being able to
travel again. Although I did not get to
see Banff and Jasper Parks on this trip, I am considering taking a week of
vacation there in the summer of 2006. I
might also travel somewhere when my workplace shuts down for about ten days
this Christmas.
Because we were on a red-eye flight, a
stewardess asked those of us in window seats to close the covers. By now it was mostly cloudy anyway, and I
could not see much anymore. Autumn is
the wet season in this part of the world, and it would remain mostly cloudy
from here all the way to Japan.
Now my long hair was good for something
besides making me look pretty, and occasionally I would hold my hair around me
to block the light whenever I occasionally sneaked a peak through my
window. Usually I saw nothing but
clouds. Several times I saw tall white mountains towering above the clouds. I don’t know if any of those mountains were
Mt. McKinley or Mt. Logan. Much later in
the flight, the skies had cleared for a short while. Again, I saw pure wilderness without any
trace of man, and this time there were no trees either. I was looking down at a river winding through
the tundra of western Alaska.
When the cloud cover broke again, I saw
many chunks of ice in the ocean. I
thought I was supposed to be on my way to the deep tropics, so why was I flying
over lands of coniferous forests, snow capped mountains, tundra, and
icebergs? Where was I really going? I seemed to spend hours flying over chilly
climates on my way to my muggy destination.
As we traveled westward at high latitudes, we kept up with the movement
of sunlight across the earth’s surface.
I carried a watch with me, which I kept on my local time back at
home. When my watch read 12:00 AM, my
midnight sun still shined afternoon sunlight on the clouds above the icy
ocean. The sun would not set until after
we had arrived in Tokyo.
The woman sitting next to me
occasionally asked me what I saw outside.
She and her husband were on their way to visit family and friends in
Beijing, China. I didn’t tell her the
exact reason for my own long journey, but only told her that I was going to
Bangkok for tourism and that I hoped to meet another friend from the internet
while I was there.
After more than 12 hours in the air, we
arrived at Tokyo around 5:30 PM Japanese time.
Our plane needed to descend through a layer of overcast. Once we were under the clouds, I could see
waves lapping on the Tokyo shores. The
land had turned green again. When our
plane had reached a lower altitude, I could see the city and its traffic. For the first time in my life, I saw vehicles
driving on the left side of the road.
Outside the city, I could see a dormant volcano in the distance (I am
not sure if this was Mount Fuji).
Once we were on the ground, I had to
find my way to my next flight in Narita airport. Now I started to feel more anxiety from being
so far from home and in a strange place where I didn’t know anybody. If I made one error, or one wrong turn here,
I could miss my connection and be lost in a strange city far from either home
or Bangkok. Others had tried to assure
me that I would find plenty of signs and instructions in English, and that I
would not have to go through customs here because I was merely on my way
elsewhere. Inside the airport, I was
told to follow the overhead green signs (the yellow signs were to direct those
whose final destination was Tokyo or another Japanese city). But I was afraid to hurry for fear that I
might make a wrong turn and get lost. I
was not fast enough for everyone. Some
of the Asian passengers crowded me and bumped me as they passed by me, and I
remembered hearing about the crowding in the subways.
I did find a list of continuing
flights, and located my flight to Bangkok.
The departure time had been moved forward by 20 minutes. Then we had to pass through a security checkpoint. I feared having another incident of extra
screening as a pre-op in a foreign country.
But they did not select either me or anyone else for increased
screening, and I only took several minutes to wait in line and then go through
the checkpoint. The process was similar
to that in the USA before 911. My flight
was already beginning to board passengers when I arrived at the gate.
Now I was on a flight from one foreign
city to another foreign city. My anxiety
of being far from home continued to build.
What would happen when I got to Bangkok?
Would I find Jaruwan and then find my way to the hotel and my
surgery? Or would I miss Jaruwan, get
lost, and miss my surgery?
My last flight was only half as long as
the one I just finished across the Pacific, but it was still six hours
long. We were on an Airbus A330, which
had individual TV screens for each passenger, and a choice of 25 or so
movies. But by now I felt too anxious to
either sleep or watch movies.
I was tired and afraid. This time a gentleman sat next to me, and I
again had the discussion where he told me where he was going and I told him I
was going to Bangkok for Tourism. He was
on his way to another business trip to Pattaya. Because he had been to Thailand before, I
asked him about the process through customs at the airport. But he told me that because he traveled
light, he would pass through quickly, and he predicted that he would make the
road trip to Pattaya and still arrive at his hotel
before I made it to mine in Bangkok. I
did not feel reassured.
I was able to sleep for a few minutes
after the meal, and when I woke up, I saw my disembarkation form hanging on the
seat in front of me. Somehow this
doubled the anxiety I was already feeling.
This aircraft also displayed our flight path on its movie screens, and I
looked to see how much farther we had to go.
We were veering to the west of our planned flight path, maybe because
typhoon Longwang was about to hit Taiwan. Or maybe the air currents here were simply
more favorable for our flight. Ohmigod, we were entering mainland China close to
Shanghai. I never knew that China would
permit a western aircraft such as ours to fly in their airspace.
We were flying over a Communist county,
and I thought of Tiananmen Square.
Something about China seemed to really scare me, even though I could not
see it. Now my anxiety of being so far
from home overwhelmed me, and I started having crying spells, which would
continue all the way to Thailand. The
gentleman sitting next to me did not notice.
It seemed dark over southeastern China.
I had expected the world’s most populated country to appear much
brighter than this. Maybe it was mostly
cloudy, because there was lightning from a distant thunderstorm. But whenever I could see between the clouds,
I saw only a few isolated lights.
I finally saw many lights as we left
China near the outskirts of Hong Kong, but getting out of that scary place did
not relieve my anxiety. I was more
afraid of losing my SRS than I was of going through my first major surgery of
my life. Would I find anything or anyone
after I arrived in Bangkok? Was there really an SRS clinic and a hotel reservation
waiting for me at the end of this long flight over a large dark continent? There would be no relief for my anxiety until
I found Jaruwan at the airport.
Somehow, I managed to fill out my
disembarkation form, and hoped for the best.
We entered Indochina near the middle of Vietnam’s coast. A string of lights outlined the coastline so
clearly that a child could have drawn the coastline by connecting the
dots. There were more dots of light
offshore, which I believe were fishing boats.
But immediately behind this coastline and its string of lights was total
darkness. Wasn’t I supposed to be going
to a large city in a populated country?
I saw almost no more lights until we were actually in the Bangkok area
and approaching the airport.
Our flight had actually arrived a
little early despite the slightly meandering flight path. It was almost midnight Siamese time, and
almost noon back home. Except for a few
brief periods of sleep lasting only a few minutes, I had been awake for 30
hours, and I was still several hours away from my hotel room. I needed reassurance and relief from anxiety,
and this meant I needed to get through this strange airport and find Jaruwan.
I hoped I could find my way through
this airport as easily as I had in Tokyo.
At first all of the passengers seemed to practically stay together as we
walked through the corridors of the airport.
Then we entered a large room, and everyone suddenly split up and walked
in many different directions. What
direction was I supposed to walk in? In
this room I saw many lines through many stations, but I had no idea which one I
was supposed to wait in.
One of my worst fears seemed to come
true now: I was thousands of miles from home, and lost. I felt like just sitting there and having a
good cry. I looked for someone to ask for
help, but I could not find anyone who could speak English. Finally, I walked over to a Thai attendant,
and told him ‘lost’ and ‘visa’. He went
to talk with another attendant, and then directed me to a station where almost
nobody else was waiting. The shorter
waiting time was not worth the anxiety that I might be in the wrong line. Could this really be the right line if nobody
else was waiting here?
But the Thai attendant had directed me
to the right place after all. I received
my visa stamp that allowed me to visit Thailand until October 30th. The person who gave me my visa also gave me
directions to my baggage claim area. Now
the airport seemed more helpful, and they also let passengers use baggage carts
for free here (most if not all US airports charge money for this). Then I tried to find where I needed to go
through customs, but someone informed me that as a tourist, I would not need to
declare anything, and had already cleared immigration, so I merely need to
follow the exit signs.
I soon found the area where I was
supposed to meet Jaruwan. I saw a number
of people holding up signs with names on them, but none of the signs had Sherry
on them. Even though I had lost some
time for being lost, I had still arrived a little early, so I thought I would
wait for a little while. One bilingual
woman noticed that I seemed lost again, and tried to help me find my
contact. She directed me to a desk where
I could give my name and ask if Jaruwan had already arrived.
While I was waiting at this desk, a
slightly familiar Thai woman outside looked through the window and tried to
communicate with me. I say slightly
familiar, because the person who would share the hotel room with me and have
her surgery the day after mine had relayed some pictures from another Kamol
patient, including one picture of Jaruwan.
I waited a couple of minutes for her to come inside and then walk
through the crowd toward me. She asked
me if I were Sherry Joanne? Hours and hours of anxiety suddenly melted
away, for I had found Jaruwan! I now had
a newfound confidence that all of this was going to work out.
Jaruwan has reassured me many times in
E-Mail over the past eight months when answering many of my concerns which I
had about my surgery. Now I found that
she was very reassuring in person too. I
would look forward to seeing her almost every day while I was in Thailand,
whether I was in the hospital, or dilating at the clinic.
We did have to wait another hour at the
airport, because Jaruwan had brought another member of Kamol’s staff to meet a
patient from China, and her flight arrived later than mine. I had many questions about my surgery and my
process, and lots of time to ask Jaruwan about my concerns. She told me that most Thai women were shy
around foreigners, and soon she commented that I too was a shy as a Thai
woman. Jaruwan took me to a currency
exchange window so I could obtain some Bhat for food
and other necessities before the banks opened Monday morning.
Then Jaruwan went to drive her van to
the curb, and the other three of us waited just outside the airport. The Chinese woman was one of the shyest
people I had ever met, and neither of us said anything to the other
tonight. My first view of Bangkok was of
lines of taxis (after 1AM!) waiting for passengers,
strong diesel odors in muggy air, an overhead expressway just outside the
airport, and lightning from a distant thunderstorm. I was in a very unfamiliar city. But I felt like I would be OK here, because
now I was among friends again.
I had an appointment for my
consultation with Dr. Kamol at 10AM this morning. But because I arrived at the hotel around
2AM, and I had just completed a long flight, Jaruwan told me she would try to
reset my consultation in the afternoon so I could rest and still have time to
eat breakfast at the hotel.
Although I felt so tired, I only slept
for six hours. The breakfast buffet was
available only until 10AM, so I needed to wake up for that. Jaruwan did succeed in moving my consultation
to Noon.
Dr. Kamol’s clinic is located very
close to the hotel. A healthy person who
has not had recent surgery could walk there in two or three minutes. I had to let Jaruwan pick me up and drive me
over there because I was still so unfamiliar with this neighborhood. Dr. Kamol performs the minor procedures (such
as eyelid surgeries) at the clinic itself, and only does the serious surgeries
such as SRS and FFS at Piyavate Hospital. The staff keeps the entire clinic in pristine
condition. Even the first floor offices
and computer area is spotless. The
second floor is even more pristine. We
remove our shoes on the second floor and leave them just outside the elevator
and wear sandals provided by the clinic, even in the waiting room.
After a while, Dr. Kamol called me into
his reception room. He looked over the
therapist letter and the lab tests which I had E-Mailed him months ago. Everything seemed OK.
But when Dr. Kamol led me to an
examination room to determine what he could do with my unwanted male parts, the
news was not so good. He almost
immediately commented on the scrotal skin shrinkage since my orchiectomy six years ago.
Nothing else was very large either.
After he took measurements of my remaining male parts, we returned to
his little office.
I told Dr. Kamol that I was more
concerned about appearance than I was of depth and function. Dr. Kamol told me that he could provide me
with a desirable appearance, including a hooded clitoris, but only three inches
of depth. The only possible way I could
have satisfactory depth and function was if I allowed him to take a skin graft
from below my tummy.
Jaruwan advised me, ‘It’s up to
you.’ The additional $1000 that this
would cost hardly bothered me at all. I
had been required to work increased hours during the hot summer, and now I had
more than enough money in the bank to cover this surprise expense. For me the real price was not the money I
would pay, but the Cesarean like scar line I would always have on my tummy. Dr. Kamol also told me that this would
lengthen my surgery to 6.5 hours.
I had promised myself that I would not
have this extra skin graft if my surgeon could provide a mere four inches of
depth. But he could not provide even
four inches, and now I had to decide if I was going to sustain a visible scar
in exchange for invisible depth.
Uncertain that I could be content with three inches, and fearing that I
might someday need a much more invasive sigmoid colon transplant, I told Dr.
Kamol to go ahead and use the skin graft.
NOTE:
Even though my orchiectomy probably resulted in
scrotal skin shrinkage and the necessity of a skin graft from my tummy, I still
do not regret my orchiectomy. The benefits I have experienced over the last
six years have been too great to reconsider.
If I had to go back in time seven years and relive my transition, I
would again seek my orchiectomy first thing. Besides, there were other factors
contributing to my lack of building material.
Without those other factors, I might have not needed the graft despite
my orchiectomy, or perhaps I would have needed the
graft even without the orchiectomy. Keep in mind that many transitioners
experience shrinkage of male parts from merely HRT and androgen blockers, so I
probably would have lost building material anyway during my long transition.
After my consultation, I used the
computer to let my friends closer to home know that I was clear for surgery,
and that I had arrived safely in Bangkok despite my anxieties.
Twas the night before surgery, when all through my mind,
only one doubt was stirring, which had me in a bind.
I was having doubts about my decision
to add the skin graft from my tummy.
Why did I just decide to permit a scar
on the outside of my body where anyone could see to create extra depth inside
of me where nobody could see?
I had no doubts concerning my imminent
SRS as far as the penile inversion and scrotal graft.
Before and after transition, on and off
HRT, I hated the male parts I had, and there was no question that I would much
prefer to have female parts. I felt the
same way about this as I had felt about my orchiectomy
in 1999: if I went through with this, I
would feel relieved, and I should soon recover.
But I would not feel comfortable until I went through SRS.
I did worry over the months about
whether my trachea shave procedure would adversely affect my voice. Dr. Kamol seemed reassuring when he told me
he would limit his work to my slightly protruding cartilage, and that this would
not change my voice at all. My Adam’s
apple was really so tiny, many TSs had told me it was not easily noticeable,
and it certainly was not affecting my being stealth back home. But I was very self-conscious about it, and
wanted that tiny bump gone. Then a TS told me that her voice was affected during her FFS by
Dr. O, and she did not have a trachea shave, but the anesthesia and the tube in
her throat had caused this. I thought
that if I was risking my voice even without the trachea shave, then I might as
well have it done.
But I could not be certain about my
decision to have the skin graft from my tummy, and pay the price of a permanent
scar for extra depth. Perhaps worst of
all, there was no way to escape this dilemma.
If I had decided to not have this extra skin graft, I would now have
serious doubts about my decision to settle for a shallow vagina and not accept
the graft. I could tell Dr. Kamol
tomorrow that I changed my mind about the extra skin graft, but that would
merely replace my doubts with different doubts.
If I went ahead with this graft, I might regret my choice to forever
have a horizontal scar on my tummy. If I
changed my mind and did not have the graft, I might regret having a shallow
vagina. Either decision would be
permanent. Damned if I
do, damned if I don’t.
My instincts seemed to be telling me to
go along with this extra graft, and I would just have to trust them.
Town In Town
Hotel has several options for eating.
The same restaurant which serves breakfast also serves lunch and dinner,
a counter serves sandwiches and cake in daytime hours, and Pizza Town offers
Italian dishes. Tonight I chose to eat a
simple pizza from Pizza Town. Here the tomatoes
are sliced and placed on top of the pizza, similar to pepperoni slices.
I spent my last night before surgery
preparing for my coming ordeal and six days of bed confinement. I took a long shower, epilated my legs, and
repacked my suitcases and purse so I could access those things, which I would
need during my bed confinement. While I
prepared for my surgery, the lights flickered again and again, and then the
power failed for a short while. I felt
thankful toward a post-op friend in Texas who had sent me a packing list
including several items that I would be relieved I had, but I would not have
brought if she had not advised me to.
One of those things was a flashlight.
After our power came back on, a thunderstorm passed over us.
I would soon meet Sherry Marlene, who
had chosen the same first name as I, had chosen the same surgeon, and then set
her surgery for the day after mine. I
worried that she might arrive late, because I had watched for typhoons that
might affect my flights yesterday. Typhoon
Longwang had stayed far away from my connection in
Tokyo, but this storm was on top of Taiwan where Sherry Marlene had to connect
flights. I hoped they could immediately
divert both her route and connection to Manila, Hong Kong, or anywhere else
where the weather was calm so she could join me, and we could support each
other as we each made our final journey of transition.
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2005
Predawn Hours
My hotel room phone rang and woke me up
just after 2AM. Jaruwan was calling me
from the lobby to inform me that Sherry Marlene had arrived, and both of them
were in the lobby. It only took another
minute for both of them to arrive. I realized that it was now October 3rd,
and the day of my SRS had arrived!
Sherry Marlene was very tired. I was pleasantly surprised that she had arrived
in Bangkok on time despite Typhoon Longwang being on
top of her connection in Taiwan. Then I
was shocked because Sherry Marlene told me that her flight was neither diverted
nor canceled. China Air had decided to
land in the storm. The landing had been
very rough, and when the wheels had first touched the runway, the plane tilted
to the side, and some passengers had screamed.
Sherry Marlene had seen more thunderstorms as her plane approached the
Bangkok airport. We were both relieved
that she had arrived here safely, and both of us were having our surgeries on
schedule.
Sherry Marlene needed to rest, so we
did not talk much when she first arrived.
I went back to bed, but I got almost no sleep for the rest of the
night. I still had some ordeals ahead of
me, such as the IV, enema, and six days of bed confinement, but my excitement
was building.
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2005
Morning and Afternoon
Sherry Marlene and I went down for
breakfast just after 7AM, because my surgery was scheduled for 4PM, and I would
not be permitted to eat or drink anything after 8AM. When I finished breakfast, I commented ‘last
meal’, and Sherry Marlene admonished me to not say that. OK, so this was my last pre-op meal.
Jaruwan picked me up at 9:20 so I could
begin taking care of the financial aspects of my surgery. First we went to the Bank of Asia so I could
deposit my traveler’s checks in Dr. Kamol’s account. I did not have extra cash or cheques for the skin graft, so I went to the clinic and
allowed Dr. Kamol to take the additional $1000 from my debit card. Good thing I had brought my debit card with
me. Meanwhile, Sherry Marlene had her
consultation, and felt very relieved because she would not need the skin
graft. I had a little time to use the
computer, and sent one E-Mail before it was time for me to prepare for hospital
admission.
We returned to the hotel so I could
pick up my luggage. We have to check out
of the hotel for the duration of our hospital confinement, so I would have to
keep almost everything in my hospital room.
Then we were on our way to the
hospital, and Sherry Marlene was coming with me to see me in. In Bangkok distances are measured in how many
minutes or hours it takes to travel from one place to the next. Piyavate Hospital
was only a few miles from our hotel, but we had to wait in lunch hour traffic
for a little while. Finally, I saw the
26 story white building where my body was going to be corrected, and I would be
cured of being TS. I arrived at Piyavate Hospital at Noon, only four hours until my SRS.
I needed to fill out a few forms at the
admission desk. Sherry Marlene asked
Jaruwan a question, which I could not hear.
When I asked her what she had asked Jaruwan, she told me that she would
let me know after our surgeries. There
are some things I am better off not knowing.
On the other side of the first floor, I
changed into my hospital gown. The
nurses weighed me, took my temperature and blood pressure, took a chest X-Ray,
and performed an EKG test. These were
relatively uneventful processes, compared to the next several processes I would
have to endure before I made it to the operating room.
Now I felt afraid again, because I had
to endure my first little trial of my procedure. The nurses had to place an IV on my left
hand. I have never had an IV anytime in
my memory, and I feared this. Their
first attempt failed. They told me that
my veins were small, and whenever the nurses tried to reach a vein, it would
move to the side. The needle was
extracted, and I was told that they would have to try again. By now I was feeling a little faint, and if I
had been standing up, I would have felt like blacking out. Jaruwan dipped a large Q-tip in ammonia and
waved it like a wand in front of my face to make me feel better. Somehow the nurses were able to connect my IV
to a vein on their second attempt.
My ordeal with the IV finished, they
wheeled me up to the tenth floor and room 1006.
I was allowed to set up my CD player, and place my CDs, hairbrush,
books, papers, and everything else I would want within reach of my bed. It was now past 1PM, and my surgery less than
three hours away.
Jaruwan asked about my hair, and told
me that the hospital would remove any wigs or anything else that was not our
own growing hair. Oh no! But Sherry Marlene explained that my hair
system was glued on, and that it could not be removed. They would permit me to keep my hair on after
all, and I was relieved once more. After
all, wasn’t it unpleasant enough that we could not take our hormones near the
time of our surgery?
I chatted with Sherry Marlene and
Jaruwan until 2PM. Two women from the
finance department arrived to place my cash, cheques,
and passport in the hospital safe. Then
Jaruwan needed to return to the clinic, and Sherry had to take her ride back to
the hotel.
I was alone, with two more hours to go,
and I had two more ordeals to go before surgery. But after making it through the insertion of
my IV, I somehow didn’t feel quite as nervous about my next two ordeals.
One nurse came to draw blood for my
pre-operative lab tests. I hope no
discrepancies turn up on that blood test.
Oh, I should try to relax, because surgeries are so rarely canceled over
lab results, and I was a healthy girl. A
short while later, two nurses came to administer the first of those two
ordeals: a very thorough shaving of the genital area. My second ordeal, the enema, was even
worse. Then they instructed me to go to
the bathroom and then take a shower. I
feared my nurses would administer another enema, but I was fortunate that I
only received one.
It was past 3PM, and less than an hour
until surgery. I went to the bathroom
one last time. OK, this will be the last
time I am allowed to walk to the bathroom for six days. Somehow this thought did not provoke any
anxieties. In less than one hour from
now, I would go under general anesthesia for the very first time in my life,
and then I would be cut open. That
thought didn’t make me feel afraid either.
What was happening to my feelings?
My emotions were taking a sudden and unexpected turn. I thought I was supposed to feel nervous
about my surgery itself. But even with
my surgery so close now, all of my fears seemed to fade.
I did not have to wait in my room much
longer. At 3:45 PM, several nurses
arrived with a gurney for me to ride down to the operating room. The nurses shared my excitement. The waiting area outside the elevators was
not air conditioned, and we had to wait for a few minutes there, so a nurse
started waving a fan at me. I was going
to be very well cared for. Soon, we rode
down to the third floor, and the nurses wheeled me into the operating room
where they placed me on the operating table.
Very soon I would go through my first
major surgery of my lifetime. I used to
think that being in this room would scare me.
But now that I was here, where my body would soon be cut open, I felt
surprisingly calm. Even my doubts about
the extra skin graft were fading. What
had happened to all of my fears?
Maybe I had been so anxious about so
many things, and had been through so much in the last several days, that I was
tired of having anxiety and could not have any more. I must have left my fears in China. Or maybe it was the realization that I had
cleared all hurdles, and there would be no more ordeals to go through before my
surgery. I had been afraid that
something would prevent me from arriving here for surgery, but now nothing
could prevent me from having surgery anymore.
I knew I had much recovery to go through after this surgery, but somehow
this did not give me any anxiety either.
Maybe I had no fear now because I knew
this was what I needed to do for my own comfort, and I knew I was going through
this in spite of any risks. I could not
have caused myself to feel afraid even if I had wanted to. I went through so much anxiety before my
surgery, and I knew that those six days of bed confinement and even more
ordeals awaited me during my recovery, but for this moment I felt calm. Instead of the nine-year-old girl who is
terrified because they are about to take her tonsils out, I was the grown woman
who could not wait for them to put me under and remove that terrible defect
between my legs.
This was the easy part, just go to
sleep and let my consciousness time warp to the hour when my surgery was
finished, and feel nothing in the meantime.
I had arrived in the calm eye of the storm. I went through so much recently, and had so
much more to go through, but for now I felt like I had nothing to worry about.
Several nurses prepared the room for my
surgery. Someone gently wrapped a cap
around my hair. An anesthesiologist
introduced himself to me. Just after
4PM, he told me he was putting anesthetic in my IV, and that I would soon feel
sleepy. His word ‘soon’ turned out to be
an understatement. In only a few
seconds, I started to feel very drowsy……
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