OldEggNewTricks

Hello, everyone. Hopefully I'm not doxxing myself too badly if I reveal that I live in Japan, which is not a great place for trans healthcare.

The standards of care here are still from the stone age, and date from a prosecution under Japan's widely reviled eugenics laws (fortunately repealed in... 1996). Yes, that's right: the guidelines themselves state they're to protect medical practitioners.

The key requirement is to jump through enough hoops to convince your doctor that you really do know what you want, and then do it all again with another doctor, just in case the first one was biased towards the patient. The hoops include, potentially, genital exams, karotypes, interviews with family and coworkers, and RLE. There's no set timeframe, but six months to a year seems to be the standard. Only then can you access any gender-affirming care, including HRT.

Now fortunately there is a loophole. Any treatment started outside the scope of the guidelines can be taken over by the evaluating doctor concurrent with the inquisition. And, as it happens, I'm not personally bound to follow anything.

So, with the sound of a month's supply of my new favorite hormones in convenient gel form hitting the mailbox, I'm ready to start DIY! Hopefully my doctor (who I'm due to see for the first time in October) will be cooperative. From the sound of it a lot of people are using the same trick...

I tried to put some feelings down in words. It's a bit dark; I hope that's OK.

A ship sailed over waters deep
Beneath a graying sky;
A sightless pilot at the helm
Dreaming of distant shores.

The clouds rolled in, the waves grew tall,
Yet onward pushed the boat;
What else to do for a lonely crew
Who knows no other home.

Insidious breakers beat the prow,
The sailor's grip grew tighter.
Far away from an unknown port
The ship began to founder.

To stay with these worthless timbered bones,
A barnacled prison cell,
Would bring an end to a pointless voyage,
And beautiful dreams as well.

One step, so small, into the dark,
Leave the ship to the ocean grim.
It matters not what the morning brings
For I was born to swim.