My wife and I have decided for a variety of reasons not to have children.

She doesn’t want them and I can’t have them.

In the early days of our relationship we thought it would be a short-term thing and I was only 23, so it just wasn’t an immediate issue. Then it got to crunch time. If I wanted to have a family I was going to have to find another girl. And lets face it men just don’t do that do they? Split up with women because they want children?

Eventually I realised that I loved her more than I wanted to have children – this discussion ended up with us getting married. I still occasionally have a twinge of pain when I see children and realise they’re not going to be part of my life. But by and large it goes away. Sometimes I think of getting more involved with activities for children or being a godlessparent. Sometimes I think of just doing all the things in life that are so much easier without children.

Sometimes I wonder if this feeling is a part of the female me that needs to be thrown in the incineratore like the rest of the bits. I don’t know if men who want children feel this ache just here.

Of course I know what the standard transsexual response is:

The desire for children is neither a male or female one, it’s a human one

There isn’t any doubt that men and women have a different experience of child rearing. There aren’t many women that find that they have a child that they knew nothing about years after a night of passion. Ultimately men impregnate women, who then carry the child for 9 months then give birth. That’s a key  part of the experience of being a biological man or woman. Part of the reason that women in their 30s are very keen to have children is that women have a limited time to do it in, and men have longer.

Of course you can have biological children yourself – before you change sex. Or you can store eggs/sperm in some way. Or you can hope you remain fertile. And we can see the pregnant man fiasco. I admire them for taking the steps that they did.

When I was 19 I decided for certain that I would never have my own biological children. I thought it would be easy enough to raise children – but just not mine. I hated the female parts of my body, and if I grew a children in those female parts I couldn’t be sure I wouldn’t hate the child as well. So I didn’t even have a second thought when I had a hysterectomy. I briefly flirted with the idea of donating eggs to an infertile couple. But I would want to meet the offspring one day and it didn’t seem fair that they would have to find out that their mother was now a man.

I assumed that I would go out with a woman who would either already have children or want them. If they already  had children I would be a step parent, if they wanted them then we would have fertility treatment. If it was down to me I would rather foster or adopt then at least they would be related to neither of us so we would have an ‘equal’ relationship with said children. I suspect that the step parent, or at least the male one anyway, never gets much of a say over the big decisions in child rearing.

At times we have discussed if I could consider being a single parent – not sure how I’d get the child, but I don’t want to be a housewife. I also don’t want to compromise my career.

Then there would be the question of finding a woman to have children with. It’s difficult enough finding a girlfriend when you’re FtM, let alone one who wants children but is ok not going out with a biological man. There are plenty of biological men around, so you’d think if she wanted children she could find one to do the honours.

Can you see the problem here?

So mostly yes, I’m ok with not having children. I’m glad I’ll never have to deal with the whole ‘Daddy used to be a girl’ discussion, I’m glad I’ll never have to deal with ‘You’re not my real parents anyway’.  The whole ‘having small babies and turning them into adults’ seems like an interesting project though. That’s why I have a godlessson, and hopefully some neplings if my brother and his fiancée could just oblige us.

But there’s no point kidding myself that what I’m feeling is what a biological man would feel. It is a totally different experience. It’s bound to be.

A biological male is only going to find out about infertility when his wife or girlfriend wants to have children, and they find that they can’t.

The other difference is that we have to either ‘try’ or ‘not try’ there is no middle ground no, ‘well lets see what happens, a nd let nature take its course’. If we want children we have to find them somehow. If we don’t want children we aren’t going to accidently get them.

I suspect what I feel is  a mixture of what a woman would feel about infertility and what a man would feel who would like children, but whose wife would not. It’s another unique transsexual experience.

But I have no regrets – I am married to the best woman in the world, so the fact that we can’t have children is just a tiny compromise. If I’d wanted them that much I could have done something about it when I had the equipment myself.

Tonight I discovered Lamebook - think Regretsy for facebook. Oh? you haven’t discovered regretsy? Oh dear. It would have been such a productive evening if only you’d not checked my blog post.

Lamebook is a website of a screen captures of face book, think Chealsee (14) annoucing she has genital warts, Kasha showing you pictures of her home waterbirth with little Kelsy watching. It’s great. And it’s finally taught me that teenagers are a different species.

I can’t spell very well, but compared to some kids today I am a master of the art. Also I seem to have got the hang of using capital letters. One at the begining of the sentances, and also for abreviations and the word ‘I’. I have a vauge grasp of ‘you’re’ and ‘your’. Though I sometimes get those two mixed up.  I have never felt the need to TyPe CaPiTaLs and LoWeR CaSe LeTtErS alternately. Neither have I felt the need to use L33t speak, I can’t get Leet speak.

I have, for my sins, found the slim notepad I kept a diary in when I was 18 years old. The time when I lost my virginity, got into medical school. Shamefully it was written in long hand, using a pen – yes a pen. The handwritting was neater than my current handwritting, I’d even underlined the important bits using a ruler. I’m amazed at how much of my life was defined during the time I kept that diary. During that time I had sex for the first time (with a woman, I never did the man thing), and got a place at medical school. If I hadn’t got into medical school I’m not sure where I’d be now. I wouldn’t be me anyway. Yes, it is pathetic to be defined by your job, thank you for telling me.

Anyway yes, Teenagers. I have no idea why I have suddenly taken an interest in teenagers. I see teenagers in 2 circumstances.

1. Overdose. Of paracetamol usually. Stupid thing to overdose on.

2. Diabetic keto acidosis. Occassionally they aren’t known to be diabetic. Often they are and have simply not taken any insulin. Or got drunk, or got a STI. Or all three.

Sometimes I also see teenage relatives of older people. These teenagers are usually quitely crying in the corner.

Being a teenager is shite. Your emotions take you over. Your problems are the most important thing in the world. You get dumped you can’t imagine living and want to kill yourself. You have a row with your friend, you can’t go on and wnat to kill yourself. Obviously if the only teenagers you meet are the ones that are admitted when you are on call you imagine that teenagers spend their time flitting from paracetamol overdose to paracetamol overdose. With only a few days in between.

Until recently I had thought of myself as virtually a teenager.  But the last teenager diabetic I saw was a completely alien creature to me. I just couldn’t comprehend why she wouldn’t let me get a line in to treat her entirely self inflicted DKA. That entirely self inflicted DKA that would kill her if I didn’t get a line in and actually treat it.

The other day one of my school friends contacted me on Facebook and asked why I choose to change sex. I think I muttered the usual cliche about being ‘trapped in the wrong body’ or something. But as far as I can see the real question is ‘Why on earth are you still a woman?’

Because life as a woman was seriously weird. 

Things that were rubbish about being a woman.

1. Make up.  I tend to cultivate stubble when I’m not at work, but it gets hopelessly itchy after a week. Anyway if you think shaving is bad, try having to slather some weird powdery stuff over your face every day. And get this  – it’s for no apparent purpose.
2. Periods. Urgh. Why ?
3. Dying in childbirth. Sorry but any species where 1 in 5 females die in childbirth unless they have medical (or veterinary) help is really seriously badly designed. More evidence that either there is no god or he is a misogynist.
4. High heels. Again, why? What on earth is the fucking point?
5. Breasts. Honestly you can’t really wank over your own breasts. Blokes think you can, and often some even think it would be good to have some. But seriously the sheer freakishness of them growing out of your chest  is just weird.
6. The lack of women willing to have sex with you. 9 out of 10 women are just not willing to have sex with other women, which is really really depressing. When you meet an attractive woman you just don’t bother asking them out because the chances are they aren’t a lesbian.
7. The feeling that if you have causal sex with strangers you are some sort of bad person. If you are a man that has casual sex with strangers (which lets face it is a perfectly good hobby when you aren’t in a monogamous relationship) you are thought of as ‘lucky’ or ‘a stud’. But if you are a woman you are a ’slut’. This means if you are a woman you have to get into a relationship just to have a shag.
8. Black tie events. Ok for men these are easy, just can wear the same outfit you wear for every event. But the bizarre rule for women is that you can’t wear the same outfit twice! How screwed up is that. Oh and when your friends get married you must go out and buy a new outfit. And people look shocked if you tell them it was from Primark. (You probably don’t need to tell them – Mrs Z) but why would you actually spend lots of money on clothes you’re only going to wear once? (One word: Accessories.  You never noticed?  See.  It works – Mrs Z)
9. Hormones. Men have testosterone, this makes you want to have sex. Simple. Women have a variety of hormones that make you totally irrational at random times. I remember one day seriously wanting to end my life because it all seemed so hopeless. And the next day I had a period (which is repulsive) but then I realised that I hadn’t wanted to kill myself at all – it was all just hormones. There is something seriously weird about having hormones that out of control.
10. Netball. Who on earth invented a sport where you can’t move with the ball or touch another player? It’s frankly the most boring sport ever. No one watches professional netball games. There’s a reason for that.
11. Being rubbish at sport – because no one will let you play a proper sport once you turn 10 so you get worse than everyone else and instead expect you to like netball.
12. The entirely weird relationship with your weight. If you are a fat man then it’s a bit annoying because you are likely to die of heart disease. If you are a fat woman you feel that you are worthless as a human being.
13. The way that society makes you feel like you are going to be killed if you go out after dark on your own. It’s so nice to be able to go for a run though a deserted dockyard when I finish work at 10pm without people making me feel like I’m committing suicide.
14. The entirely fucked up nature of societies attitude to child-rearing. Lets face it once you have had a baby you have suffered nine months of hell carrying it to term and then suffered the nightmare that is childbirth. You’d think that the logical approach to this creature that had done this to your body would be to give it to the father and tell him to get on with it.  But no, unless you give up your entire life to raising this creature that has already ruined your body and nearly killed you, you are a BAD PERSON.
15. You get paid less than a man for doing the same work. Oh and women do more unpaid work in the home.
16. Men keep trying to have sex with you. Less often if you are obviously a stroppy teenage dyke. Then they tend to go away.

So the real question is – why does anyone put up with being a woman? In this day and age if you are cursed with two X chromosomes you don’t actually have to go through the horror that is being a woman. I mean I’m glad you do – because I much prefer sex with women. But seriously: Why do you girls put up with this crap?

And I’m still not dead. But it’s going ok. I’m enjoying it and feeling that I’ve made the right career decision. But I’m just that much less anonymous than I was as an SHO. There are hundreds of SHOs in the country so I can easily blog in the background. I could be anyone of them. Hell there could even be another transsexual Medical SHO.

So if for instance I say ‘Yesterday my Consultant was angry’ my consultant is much more likely to put two and two together that maybe his Registrar is a transsexual.

At the moment I love being a Medical Registrar, I’ve got a bit addicted to the adrenaline rush of looking after the very sick, and I can effectively manage a good shift. I’m a bit more unsure about the specalist stuff, I’m ok at the TIA clinic, but the Falls clinic can overwhelm me a bit. My consultant says that I should get out  of my comfort zone, and at the moment my comfort zone involves admitting people to ITU, getting a central line in and starting some inotropes.

Sometimes I wonder if I should continue blogging, I’m hardly a Dr Crippen, syndicated in the Guardian now isn’t he? But this is something valuable. This is a record of my life since I was a House Officer, and now I’m a Registrar. Yesterday my House Officer said that he wondered how he could ever know enough to be a Med Reg. But it’s only been a few years, and it’s possible. And it’s nice looking back at how far I’ve come.

So far so good. I have sited 5 cannulas, of which 4 were cannulas ‘no one else can do Doctor’.

And now I’m providing ward cover to 10 medical wards, but all is peaceful at present. There are sick people but not ’sickies’. The people who are unstable have plans and treatment in place. Those who are dying have their families informed and seem to be pain free.

In the meantime I am working my way through BMJ Learning. I should work on my case report more, but I’m not  in the mood. I should also sleep  perhaps another redbull is in order. But this isn’t a ’sleeping shift’ though you can do what you like if you are on your break.

As you will have gathered from my last post, I have just got married. I am now offically loved up and rather tired. It’s all good.

My best man was my friend A  – he was my flat mate at Uni. When we first met I’d just transistioned, literally for a few days. I don’t remember if he ever met me as a woman. Anyway, we were both definately Queer. We went to gay clubs, we went to LGB Society at Uni. (I added a T on the end eventually). I found it difficult to make new friends when I was obviously transisioning – in fact I think he was the only person who could see through the  transsexual bit to the person bit.

Then legally, neither of us could get married to people of our prefered gender. I couldn’t change my birth certificate so couldn’t marry a woman, he couldn’t marry a man. Ironicaly we realised that he would have got a larger student loan if he married me, which we could have legally done- that way the means test would have been my income and not his parents. My parents were pretty poor so I already got the maximum loan. But we both felt totally repulsed by the idea.

Anyway yes, I was sharing a flat with A when I first met my lovely girlfriend-now-wife and he was very tolerant of our – ‘we’re both awake: must shag’ phase. I’m sure he overheard more than he would have cared to. Mind you he wasn’t a vestal virgin either, and sometimes we just turned the  music up and pretended that the walls were thicker.

So time passed and the law changed. I was able to change my birth certificate, which I did in 2005. See my posts about that time here and here. The law on ‘Civil Partnerships’ was passed, and he was able to get a Civil Partnership. But it’s not a wedding. It’s got all the same rights, but it’s not called a wedding. It’s called a civil partnership.

That’s because if he could marry his partner. It would demean the institution of marriage. Of course it would..

But really if you think that A marrying his partner would demean the institution of marriage. Then don’t you think that me being a girl, having a masectomy, taking some hormones, changing my birth certificate and getting married also demeans it?

Anyway it just seems silly that I can get married and he can’t.

‘Gosh,’  I think to myself. ‘ I wonder why I can’t close my fingers, oh yes, it’s because I’m wearing  a ring. But I don’t wear jewelary’

‘Oh!’ I remind myself  ‘Gosh’

‘It’s a wedding ring’

I’m married.

I had a sufficiently unusual wedding to not be comfortable posting about it here. Or at least not in a lot of detail. But it was perfect and we are very happy.

I have to admit being vaguely smug about the fact that my wife’s family don’t know about my past. It’s one of those feats of passing that one shouldn’t be pleased about. But it is a feat of passing.

Another good thing was that the fact I was transsexual wasn’t even mentioned. The Best Man (who happened to be the person who picked me up from hospital after my mastectomy) was under strict instructions Not To Mention it in The Speech.

Even in the legal paperwork bit they didn’t mention it. They asked for my birth certificate, I produced a birth certificate saying I was male.

Simple.

I know churches have the legal right to refuse to marry transsexuals, but I’m wondering how they know?  Do they ask everyone if they are a transsexual? Or do they just ask the people who look like they are transsexuals.

We couldn’t get married in a church anyway.

She’s divorced. Oh and I don’t believe in god. I think they ask about that.

I want to do a PhD. I’m not so fussed about the qualification, but I do want to do a PhD. I want to spend 3 years devoting my life to answering one question. I want to persue my intellectual interests, and torture, er, teach  medical students. I really enjoy the science behind medicine. And lets face it having a PhD never did anyone’s career any harm. The grand master plan is to get a few more things published and apply for a Welcome Trust/MRC fellowship. They are the most prestigious sources of funding.

So when I got an e mail from a friend about a funding PhD that was available down in the South of England I was excited. I didn’t think I’d have enough experience but there was no harm at all in ringing up was there? So I rang up, and had a chat, he thought I did have enough experience. So I sent a CV, so far so good. I went down to The South of England and had an ‘informal chat’ which I have to say was more like an interview.

The Proff said there was no reason I shouldn’t be shortlisted.

Now the astute of you will have noticed a problem – I have a job next year on the Regional Training Programme in Care of the Elderly. I spoke to the Consultant who was fairly high up in it all. He thought it was all a splendid idea and didn’t think ‘Out of Programme’ experience would be a problem.

Things all seemed to be coming together.

There was only one problem – the interview was 3 days before my wedding, when we would be in Scotland on our romantic getaway. This was a bit annoying. However I have a firm belief: I don’t think one can compromise ones career just because of their life. Life is fleeting, careers are forever.

This was all going splendidly. I was getting rather excited. I was starting to have doubts, life is much more expensive in the South and it would be difficult to have the same standard of living on the much reduced salary. Or indeed any standard of living, finding somewhere for me and my cats would be a problem. And what would I do with my wife?

Anyway, like I said, you can’t compromise your career just for your life can you? You never achieve anything doing that.

But a couple of people whose opinions I respected told me it might be a bit too soon for a PhD, perhaps I should do some research first and get my teeth into geriatrics, so to speak. So I e mail the High up person in Geriatrics for advice. He asked me to meet up with him, I didn’t have long to arrange this because the deadline is next week.

He was very nice about it, but he had spoken to the associate dean at home last night, said associate dean said that I couldn’t have time out from the programme right away, I needed to prove that I was a competent trainee first. Of course Nice Top Dr knew I was a competent trainee but, the associate dean said I needed to be a Registrar for a while first.

Still Nice Top Doctor said he would put me in touch with people who were doing research locally and help me build up my portfolio of research that way.

This Lighter Life Thingy has been surprisingly effective. I am now 3 stone less than when I started. I am generally pleased about this. Of course I’m missing food, I really could kill a lettuce right now, but it’s worth it for the fact that I’m actually getting results.

For the first time in my life I don’t look like a fat person. I instead look like a thin person who’s put on a bit of weight. I can fit in ‘medium’ clothes instead of Large or XL.

This is good. I’m less self conscious playing sports and swimming now. I was always conscious  of being the ‘fat bloke’ before. I also look more masculine, I didn’t think I would. In fact I was a bit worried that loosing my padding would reveal my bone structure.

There’s still a stone to go though, and by god it’s sticking. There was one week where I stayed exactly the same weight. On 500kcal a day! How is that possible? I have obviously developed nuclear fission.

I think it’s become apparent that I loose weight less quickly than the men at the group who have an XY chromosomal alignment. This is again frustrating, it’s yet another reminder that I am not biologically male,  whatever my driving license says.

I didn’t tell the group leader that I was trans, there was a medical questionnaire, which I refused to give to her because she couldn’t give me a written guarantee of confidentiality. So instead I sent it to the head office. I thought she might get funny about having a trans person in her single sex weight loss group.

Although I’m not biologically male a lot of my issues around food are the same as most of the men in the group. However I did realise that I put on weight as a teenager because calorie counting was what ‘girls did’ so overeating was rebelling against the pressure to be an attractive woman. Also I hated sport because it was gender segregated.

I just hope I can get to my target weight before I move to the Distant Hills, where there isn’t a Lighter Life Group.

I’m overdue my testosterone injection. I tend to do it myself, there’s no reason why not and it’s difficult to take the time off work. Some GPs have been okay with it, some haven’t been, but considering I can put in a central line I think I can manage a intramuscular injection.

I don’t get symptomatic any more at the end of a testosterone cycle, I used to get symptoms of low testosterone, poor concentration, indecisiveness, over sensitivity to criticism, etc. But I don’t any more. My sex drive doesn’t go down either. I think it’s just that I’m at a steady state now. The only reason I do it is so I don’t get osteoporosis, and if I don’t for a while I’ll get symptomatic.

But I don’t really want to. Everytime I do it I’m reminded that I’m not really male, and despite what the law says I’m never going to be male.

I also hate the fact we don’t have to worry about contraception. I want to make a woman feel sick to the stomach and worried if her period is late.

Imagine how amazing it would be to have a child as a result of sex? Not needing any of that messing around with clinics or adoption.

I don’t really worry about this that much, until it’s the time of the month when it’s time for an injection.