Tori

So I mean I think like most trans men and women I think it does start very early on, I think you have an inkling, you have a feeling, you feel a little bit different, (sorry that’s my dog) and I think you just, you just feel a little bit different, but I think the difference for me when I was about six years old my Dad actually came downstairs one morning to find me with a pair of scissors trying to cut off the member that I was unfortunately born with, so that was a huge, I think realisation for my whole family. But this is, you know, not too sure of my age but back in the nineties, so it really wasn’t heard of as much as it is now. So, I think you know we had meetings, I had to go to speak to psychologists, just to try and identify. They didn’t, they didn’t want me to be going through something deeper and, and worry for my, you know for my health. So I went and spoke with them and stuff, but it was very, I mean I kind of remember the meetings as well. It was kind of like there was a dolls house and they’d tell you like what member of these dolls do you think you are, and I’m like, ‘What, but I know what I am,’ but it’s hard to say at six years old what you should be, if that makes sense. So I think my family and I were really, really you know clued up on it quite straightaway, but they didn’t diagnose me with trans, gender dysphoria or anything like that at the time. I guess because it was a lot less heard of, and because they didn’t think that it, it was that, because I could identify what gender I was, and so they just put it down to maybe being you know a flamboyant gay boy that I would grow up to be, and it was left at that really.

But my whole life I’ve always, always not felt right, you know? Going to weddings and having to wear a male fitted suit, I mean I’m not built like a man anyway, you know I’m 5’6’ and got no broad in me at all, you know, so these suit’s looked ridiculous and I felt ridiculous in them, so I think it kind of progressed more and more and more as I got older but I guess it wasn’t until I went through a serious incident that kind of made me have to start from scratch, so to kind of think actually let’s have a look at life, and even though I loved it, I loved being a gay man, I would not burn my pictures from before, I would not hide it from my past, I loved, I loved that era of my life. It just wasn’t the era that I, you know it just wasn’t the way I should have been. But I just wasn’t very sure, I didn’t even understand it. And because I didn’t look into it I just thought I was a very flamboyant feminine boy, even though not feeling right, even being an effeminate boy and being a part of the LGBT community, and them accepting me as a you know a feminine boy it still didn’t quite feel a hundred per cent. But I lived life to the full and still loved everything about it. But yeah the incident happened, I was set on fire like well nine years ago now I think, eight years ago.

And it, I think I laid in my bed and I just thought I’ve got to piece my life completely back together again, and I think when you see how strong your body is, and see that actually even the, the craziest of things can’t bring you down, that’s when you start to look within yourself completely. And I think it was time for me to you know express myself the, the proper way and acknowledge that I, you know the things that I’d felt always, were fine. And then it, it was just down to finding information. I had no idea you could have gender reassignment, like that was you know I remember being on my bed, and my granddad bought me this bubble bath, and at the bottom of the bottle there was a ring and this was like a bubble bath you know that had a fairy on top, you know I was never neglected to feel the way that I should feel, and he came in and he gave me this, and he said, ‘Once you’ve used all the bubble bath you can get this ring, and when you’re in the bath, you wish for anything that you want.’ And I remember say, ‘Anything, like anything in the world?’ And he says, ‘Anything.’ I said, ‘What even to be a girl.’ And he was like, ‘Anything you want you can wish for.’ So, I think from that day on I, you know every night I’d fall asleep wishing I’d wake up in the female figure that I should have been. So it was only a matter of time I guess, and lack of information probably stopped me from pursuing it a lot earlier on.

I mean like I said I was never really a boy anyway. So I don’t, you know even my Dad when I first started to transition in the early, early stages, when I’d got a little bit more information from friends, and, and even the internet, and knew that actually this was something that I could, you know, I could go through. So I just started, I mean I first got a job as a drag queen, where I was obviously a door whore, and I was you know it was almost, I mean don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t the way I wanted to look. I didn’t want to wear you know awful wigs and well, I still wear the tiny dresses sometimes, but you know it wasn’t kind of the full feminine feel that I wanted to be, but it was an edge into what I could have a taste of, and just kind of, see how I felt with it more than anything, I guess. So as it got more and more and more, I progressed to become more feminine, I started to grow my hair and my Dad kind of just started to notice from a very early age, I mean he knew anyway, you know but he was waiting for me to find my own, my own path. And he noticed that I was working as a drag queen and knew that what drag queens are, you know he knew that they don’t, they don’t necessarily become women full time, and they’re not transgender always, you know, so it wasn’t until he started to notice me outside of work, I was becoming a lot more effeminate and in touch with more my feminine side, and he turned round to me, and just said, “Look, you know I get the feeling that you probably want to spend the rest of your life as a woman, I just want you to know that I’d be you know just as proud to call you my little boy as I would my little girl. You know you are, you,” he loves me either way, so, I was very blessed to have the, the good family that you know and the support that they gave me. My Mum, the first time my mum found out she rang me and asked me what name I’m gonna pick. She was like, “You’d better pick a good one.”

My first step was actually changing my name, I mean it took a lot longer than what I had hoped. So because of being in the incident I was still waiting for a lot of things to go through, court cases were still going through, compensation was still going through, so a lot of things stopped me from being able to start it. I couldn’t change my name legally because then I wasn’t the person that were needing to go through this other situation that I was going through. So, it was a difficult time to kind of know what I wanted but have a hold on it. But it was a good time, it was a good time for me to start you know dipping my toes in the water if you will. I started to grow my hair at this point, cos you don’t need to change your name and dress in women’s clothes to grow your hair, you know. Or to, you, I think any step that you take first is an incredible step. I know a lot of people that never change their name, and you don’t need to, you know. I’d always hated my original name so I couldn’t wait to change it, but I spoke to [city] [city] clinic for transgender dysphoria, and they were kind of my first step and they basically told me that until you change your name legally we wouldn’t really even consider a meeting with you yet. And I needed to go through my GP. So, this one had to kind of wait in the wings until you know my court cases and everything had kind of gone through. So that, I mean that took a year. It took me a year of transitioning in myself and finding my own self, before I could start my journey. And then that was it. As soon as everything had gone through, as soon as everything was laid to rest, I was off. I changed my, I changed my name, online, I found out that, cos a lot of people pay for a changed name. And that’s not legally right. So, you can change, there you go, there you go. You can change your name on a piece of paper as long as you’ve got two witnesses, and you just, all you’re declaring is that is no longer your name and you will never use it again. So that was the first thing I did and my friend was the person that signed for me, and I had another friend, both were transgender, and they both signed for me, that was a great, it was a transgender male and he, I worked with him so he was, he was really lovely. And he kind of told me about changing my name to be honest, he was so, “You actually don’t need to pay… and you can do it this way,” and he’d already started to go through it, so I did all that and that was it. I went straight to my GP, luckily I have a client that works in the GP’s so as soon as I started to go through it she recognised my name and I got put through quite quick. So even the time that I’d lost I’d gained it quite quickly. But its, you know as I started to go through it and started to you know get my meetings and it’s a huge waiting list and I think it gets more and more every year. I think they’re saying two years now. Whereas a year for me. So, and I got quicker than that because I was able to see doctors sooner. So yeah it was, it was a long process before I could even start the journey really.

So the first ever start of it, I kind of, well I started to look on, online but without having any information you know you just put in you know “Want to be a woman,” or whatever, and its, it’s such a wide variety of stories and information that it was hard to kind of try and pinpoint how I was feeling. So what I started to do was kind of reach out to trans women, I only ever reached out to two, and one of them actually became one of my really good friends who I met through working on, on the scene, so she came in and I, I knew of her anyway but didn’t know her at all but I knew she was transitioning, so as soon as she came into the bar, which was freaky really because I’d only been back at work for a couple of months, so I’d only just started to realise that this was what I wanted to do. And she doesn’t go out that often at all, so the fact that we kind of met and it was, it was kind of perfect timing.

And she is a very incredible open, you know, flamboyant person, she was very confident in, in what she was doing so I outright asked her, I was sitting on the door taking her money to get into the club and I just said, “I would love to just sit down and just ask you a few questions really.” “Just really get an insight on what you were feeling so I can identify whether I’m feeling the same.” Or even if it’s just a few things you know, everybody’s different. So, you can’t go on completely with somebody else’s, but it’s a great way for, you know, for some information and insights. So that night we ended up going to a bar after I’d worked. We got stupidly drunk and then we went back to my apartment in town and she, we sat up till six, seven o’clock in the morning just talking about everything, literally everything that she ever felt and you know her story kind of was very different to mine, her family wasn’t, I mean they support it, and she goes around and sees them often, but nothing like what my family were like, you know my family gave me the wings and just let me fly, whereas for a long time they still called her, her male name which I felt didn’t support her as much as what she should have been. But a lot of the things that we spoke about were very similar, and I noticed that our stories even though they were so different, our feelings were very similar. So that was my first, my first kind of information. And then I found a girl on, like on Facebook, we became like, you know alright friends as well. I don’t see her that often, but she was a friend of a friend. So yeah, she gave me some insight too. She was younger than me, whereas you know my other friend was older than me, and it was just again, it was just, it was almost like you know get through and see you know if, if it is continual and it was, so after that I really just knew that I was gonna, you know grab, grab the wheel and, and take it off straightaway.

I went by myself. I did it all by myself really. I mean I’ve got, like I said I’ve got an amazing family and they would have all been there in a shot, but it was a long way to go, and you know I’ve had other surgeries before, it’s easier to do it by yourself, you’re not thinking about somebody else, you’re not thinking, you know it’s best to just get there and get done. The night before I stayed in a hotel, by myself, and that was daunting I guess, I didn’t have the best sleep and then the next day you wait around a lot before you get to, well I did, I had to wait around a lot before you got taken down to surgery so that was very daunting, and I was like ringing my Mum crying, like “Mum, oh what if something happens?” Like what if I’m like a zombie apocalypse and I wake up on the chopping board and that’s it. Everybody’s gone. Do you know what I mean? It could be anything but its, I think it’s going to be daunting whether you’ve got fifty people there or one person there, or nobody there. So, for me it was more comfortable just to get in and get done.

I mean there’s a lot of things that are difficult, you’re not unbandaged for five days, so you’ve got catheters and stuff that you, you have to use, and it’s fine until you know, you’re having to start to try and get back to normality, you know. I didn’t take any painkillers at all; I was only on paracetamol. So, I know, yeah. And the issue with me being in surgery before, I know that it clogs you up, and this sounds gross but the hardest thing to do, after surgery, is go to the toilet. So I didn’t want to have lots of morphine that even though it would kind of stop the pain, it would then later on become more of an issue. So I didn’t, I did it all on paracetamol. And it was still you know you’re packed up; you’re packed. So, they put like this huge pack up you, to stop it from closing. Your body will always treat it as a wound, that’s why you have to dilate and that’s why they have to pack it for five days after surgery. So once they started to unwrap me and everything like that, they wanted to encourage me to go to the toilet, number two, because I still had the catheter in, and everything like that, I still had the pack in, but I had, I was eating like normal, so I was eating all these high fibre foods, and prune juice and coffees and it, the hardest part I’ve got to say is trying to go to the toilet. Because I couldn’t push otherwise you’d prolapse, and I thought I’ve got this far and I can’t destroy it already, you know. It were really difficult. Really difficult. I was dancing around, I was walking around the hospital, I was trying to shift something, but it was really, really hard.

You have other things. I had I had bleeding still for a while, but then that stopped but so then you have discharge and I had this thing called granulation tissue, so until I kind of researched it and spoke to my consultant, and who’s been incredible. My consultant has gave me her email address and she’s message, like I message her with any pictures or any complications that I feel like I’m having, and she’s incredible. You know she looks at it, identifies it and knows exactly what to do. So I, what I found out was that I was getting granulation tissue which is when your body starts to heal in that certain area you just get extra tissue, but that does bleed and that does weep, so I was having to treat that for a while, and you know it’s a bit of a messy job for the first few months.

Pads are really essential. They’re going to really identify if there’s something, you know, something up down there, you know up, down, because it is going to see things that if you’re not wearing a pad you wouldn’t necessarily see you know. So I saw these spots of blood, which I was, you know horrified with. And I started to just feel around, like I said I was very comfortable with having a look around personally anyway, and I had like lumps down the scars, and I thought, “Oh my God, no way could I get an infection, like I’ve been so clean, I’ve been washing it, I’ve, you know every morning I do this, that and the other, like you know, it’s not even been that long, and I was squeezing it and this, you know, this liquid was coming out, so that was really scary, that was really daunting, and I thought, “Oh God, like what if my stitching’s gone wrong, or what if something’s, you know something’s wrong with it. And again [name] was incredible, my consultant she messaged me straightaway and she just said, “Look, again this is just very normal, they’re like because of dissolvable stitches as you’re heal, as you heal over it it’s just a collection of fluid and stuff. So they can bleed and they can weep, just to massage them, you know five, ten minutes a day, and just keep an eye on them, make sure they don’t worsen and stuff like that, so it is scary. It’s scary to, you know they don’t give you any information like that really. They probably did, they’ve probably given me leaflets of it, but I just went in guns blazing, you know. So yeah research stuff like that or listen to what I’m saying because that shit does happen.

You know obviously you can contact them, like, I’ve literally contacted her probably every week, every couple of weeks, just to make sure, taking pictures, you know. “Is this normal?” “Is this normal?” I sent one last week, and I was like, “It’s very red down there, like is that normal?” And she’s like, “It’s going to go through many, many colours, so don’t worry about it.” So they are very supportive and I am a fretter anyway, I think as soon as one thing feels abnormal, I kind of know my body very well, so I think, “Oh this doesn’t feel right, I need to check that out.” So, they are very good with it, but you are left to your own device quite quickly, so.

So you have to dilate four times a day at the beginning. Three really, but if you struggle doing it three times a day because you’re losing depth, or losing, or it’s too tight, then you have to do it four times a day. Now I just did it four times a day anyway because I was worried to lose depth or tightness. That is a nightmare. You try and sit for twenty minutes, four times a day, and spread that evenly through the day. I was getting up at six o’clock in the morning, and then going, doing it, you know at 12 o’clock at night, just to make sure I was doing it every sort of six hours, and that really took a toll on me, I was so tired, I was exhausted.

Believe me for dilation you’re going to need a lot of lube, okay, because it’s bigger than what you think. The dilation is huge, it’s huge and you’ve got to use the whole length of it, so yeah you need, you’re gonna need lube, it makes it a lot easier.

She, obviously through video call I have to speak to her because of the pandemic, but she was really good with me, she was asking me how my dilation’s going on, because you have to do that way regularly than what you think, you know, it is, there’s a lot more that comes with this surgery, you should not consider it light heartedness. But it, if it makes you feel empowered do it you know. So, I was doing everything right. I had everything that I felt like was going right, but you worry constantly, like you’re constantly worried about your new parts because it’s foreign to you. And she messaged me, and this is about six weeks after surgery, seven weeks after surgery, and she goes, and “Have you managed to orgasm yet?” And I’m like, “What should I be playing with it already? You’ve only, you’ve only just done it, like what you want me to start fiddling around with it, what if I break it?” And she was like, “No you definitely need to, you need to you know experience your body. You know don’t be afraid to touch it.” As soon as they unbandaged me, they said, “Look, jump in the shower and don’t be afraid to touch it, find your body because the less you’re scared of, the better it is.”

I’m always very, as you can tell up front, I’m very open. I don’t want anybody to feel like they’ve been tricked into it, there’s a lot of trans women, even after surgery and before surgery and they’re like, “Oh I’m not going to tell them yet, I’m not going to tell them yet.” Just don’t do it. Just be open and honest with your life, because that’s who you are. And if you really like them, you’re going to need to be, you know. Nightclubs I’m always still very open and honest, and they’re surprised and you know, I don’t think they originally thought that, but I’ve never had any bad reception from it. I’ve had guys go like, “Oh sorry that’s you know just not for me.” And that’s absolutely fine too, even though it’s only sexual at that point, you know what I mean, they were only thinking about well how are we going to have sex? Because that’s going to be for me. And if I’m looking for something more serious then that’s not for me either, you know. So, it’s all about identifying it.

But, you get it anyway like, you know Facebook, you know, Instagram, you get loads of weird Instagram messages. Tinder, I think a lot, the last three guys that I’ve dated that were serious were Tinder. And it’s because for me like, I work so much, and I’m with friends, and if I’m out on a night out I’m normally that drunk or can’t see some guy giving me the eye anyway, so and I have a lot of gay friends which almost sometimes damages me trying to find somebody on you know a straight scene because a lot of them want to go gay, which is fine. I love a gay scene; you know I will still go there. But I’m not, I’m probably only going to pull a girl, you know. So very difficult. I think the biggest thing I guess is when guys that I speak to will go, “Oh but, you know I really fancy you, and you know I’m not bothered or anything, but I’m not gay.” And I go, “Well obviously.” And then, “Well what do you mean?” And I’m like, “Well if I resembled a man, then I would think that you were gay. But because you fancy me and I don’t resemble a male, then that still makes you a heterosexual man.” So that’s a very big miscommunication with a lot of guys. They think that if they fancy a trans woman they’re gay, and it’s further from the truth.

Unfortunately, this is a very common, a very common thing with the trans community. I think not so much as female to male. I mean I can’t speak for them because I haven’t lived their life, but I don’t feel like there is much of, and like a fetish for that. I think the chick with a dick scenario, is very highly you know highly… wanted, you know. I’ve been offered to do all kinds of things, web camming and everything when I had my original parts, and it was because you know they could pay me more, and I would be more, you know a higher fetish than biological women. So I’ve experienced that too, but kind of, I’ve always stayed away from that, every guy that I’ve ever dated has dated me because he’s liked women and he’s just always been you know very humble and open-minded to the fact that oh what I had at the time. Those guys that I spoke to then still message me now, and they know that I’ve had surgery, and they still want to take me on a date. So, I know that it’s, you know it’s, it’s got to be about you. You know they’ve got to fancy you. So, but it is difficult. And I think a lot of women you know, a lot of trans women, they struggle getting jobs, and they do end up working you know, as other professions because it’s easier, and they do get messed around a lot as well. And I think it is, that is difficult. But, that’s like a woman, you know that’s very pervy, you know, what if he’s only, you know, playing around with her because he’s not going to marry her, because how could he? But that’s one of his fetishes. It’s difficult, isn’t it? It’s hard to identify what’s real and what’s not. It’s up to you, whatever you want, you know. I’ve had, I mean I’ve slept with some guys that are, were only ever really, I think a lot of them never knew to be honest, I think when I first spoke about, they didn’t, they didn’t know that I was trans, so they fancied me before and then when they found out they were a bit like, “Oh okay,” like, “Let’s have a go. You ready?” So, it’s difficult really, I guess.