Today’s the last day that I’ll have this face. Which is an interesting situation.
It’s hopefully the last day that the damage that testosterone did – most noticeably in those four years between 16 and 20, when I finally started HRT, when I finally got my shit together at least somewhat, and that I see in the pictures of me, will be there. I know that it’s going to take a long time for that damage to disappear because it takes a long time for the swelling to go down and your tissues to adjust. And I know that I’ll look in the mirror at least for a good long while and wonder whether it was worth the pain, and whether I look different at all. This I know, because I’ve been chatting with people who’ve had FFS.
And I also know – because in the last 2 years I’ve put in a ton of effort to lose a ton of weight (stabilized at ~66-67 kg for a good long while) that my face has been changing, constantly. The change over these two years has felt pretty dramatic as I’ve shed the extra weight, but it’s also brought more clearly into focus the things that I dislike. Despite that, I know, and can see that over the years the woman looking back at me has aged and changed, I’ve had my hair long, and short, and whatever the fuck it is now (it’s PURPLE! And I have a number 1 on some of it and the rest of it is longer than its been in years. But all the same, how do people not notice that it’s PURPLE?! I’ve had 3 people notice at work – and only one of them is someone I work with regularly. I mean it’s handy because i can just point at my hair if anyone asks if I look different. But still).
I’ve worn make up and not.
I’ve worn glasses and not.
But also – also – underlying the nervousness, the anxiety about surgery, about healing, about sleeping sat up which is something that I have never, historically, been able to do (incidentally, ebay sellers: check the address before you send stuff? My sitty-up-pillow-thing did not arrive and y’know why? Because the dozy pillock appears to have sent it to a random not-my-address) – underlying all that is this bubbling excitement.
The idea that I might be able to look at myself in the mirror and not just see the damage.
That I might be able to look in the mirror and not shy away, or find myself focusing on the things I hate.
Because I don’t see him, I don’t see the person I pretended to be to survive.
I haven’t for a long, long time.
But I also don’t see me. And the idea that I might get more than a passing glimpse of me is terribly, terribly exciting.
