On the phone

I’ve been told that my phone voice is now unmistakably male and that it has been for a whole. Indeed, when credit card companies call (because they always have to call) looking for Nancy, I have to pretend to hand the phone over to Nancy for them to believe me.  And when I’m “being Nancy”, I revert to a voice that is as feminine as possible . . .I probaly sound like Nancy with a cold. But I “pass”. And it hurts my vocal chords.

Soon, I won’t have to pretend to be female anymore . .. if this bloody name change paperwork can finally come through!

Blog Reader Appreciation Day

Thanks to Genderkid‘s post, I just became aware of Blog Reader Appreciation Day. I think that it’s a great idea. Having readers is what motivates me to write.

So thanks to all of you who drop by, even you lurkers that come back often and don’t write anything . . .I know you’re there. A special thanks goes out to those of you who share their perspectives and stories.

Most of all, I want to thank everyone here for contrubuting to civil conversations. There has been no flaming or insulting here . . .that makes this guy VERY happy!

Stubble! And sideburns!

The last time I shaved all my facial hair off was in August 2008. Since it took about 3 weeks for it to grow back to a respectable (by my definition) length, I avoided shaving again. I got a trimmer nad have kept it trimmed, and only shaved the hair that grew higher up on my cheeks. I mean, not even a year on T and I have facial hair 2/3 of the way up to my eyes!! Haha. But that part that I would shave had been taking a while to grow back too.

So last Sunday morning, I shaved off those two small sections again and trimmed the rest, except for the sideburns. Two really cool things happened as a result:

1. I now have visible sideburns and have noticed that the hair there is getting more rigid and less fuzzy, like real man hair.
2. A day later, the hair that I had shaved off was already starting to grow back! Three days later, I feel the stubble and I can see the darkness underneath the skin where the hairs are starting to poke through.

sigh (Happy sigh, that is.)

Jacky hearts facial hair.

Life before transition

This post by Gender Outlaw and the comment by Genderkid made me reflect on the common portrayal of trans people as miserable, near-suicidal individuals who would not survive if they did not have access to physical transition through hormones or surgery. I understand that this might be t he case for some people. I’m sure that in some cases, transition is a life saver.

Crossing the border

I’m pleased to report that I crossed the Canada-US border with my female ID with no problems whatsoever. I was quite worried because, based on my fairly extensive experience crossing into the US, I know that many US customs officers are on power trips and seem to enjoy humiliating people in whatever way they can. I’ve been disgusted by the racial profiling that I’ve witnessed more than once, for example, and bitterly remember when I was a target of prejudice: once because of my tattoos, twice because of my youth and once, last summer, because of my ambiguous gender presentation. (DISCLAIMER: I’m not talking about the American population here, just customs officers. I grew up in the states, consider myself at least part American, and know damn well that the authorities do NOT represent the people. So if you’re looking to call me on some kind of anti-U.S. bigotry, it won’t fly so don’t try.)