#lincenberg

So the whole thing started on Wednesday when I went into Dr. Lincenberg’s office for a 3rd time, but just was just for him to draw his procedural process on my chest and make a final decision on how it should go. Despite a lot of waffling on my part, I told him I wanted the lateral double incisions that is most common with trans men. I’d looked at post op results on his website and decided the Comma Incision wasn’t ideal. So he agreed and I handed over paperwork to be filled so I could get some sort of medical leave pay from work. 

Then I went to work, ever conscious of the eyeball-esque markings on my chest (my nipples looked like the eyes it was weird) and generally shaking like a leaf. A lot of my favorite regular customers wished me well and a speedy recovering and I even ended up coming out to a couple of them?? Definitely didn’t plan on that but it was fine! Everyone already knew someone who’d gone through this (transition, top surgery, etc). It was such a relief.

But honestly? Thank god they’d given me anxiety medication because I was Freaking Out. So good that my work friends were so sweet to me.

I went home and packed up my clothes, sleeping stuff, and Christmas presents because my plan is to camp out at my parents’ house while I recover, which should have me going home around Christmas. I hope so anyway. We’ll see~

That night, I had to shower with a surgical grade antibacterial soap called Hibiclens. It’s pink and very liquidy and made my skin feel so drryyyyyyy but I wasn’t allowed to use any lotion after showering. Boo.

Despite everything, I managed to get to sleep for a while before getting up at 5am. Jax was with us at my parents’ house at this point which was good because I love that boy and really count on him to get me through scary shit like this.

As soon as we got to the surgical center, everything seemed to go pretty quickly. We were in the waiting room for about 5 minutes before being called back (mom and Jax came with me, as 2 people were allowed to visit at any one time) and from there I gave another urine sample and stripped down to my hospital gown. Even my panties were forbidden. Rip.

We hung out for about an hour or so, then it was Surgery Time.

First they stuck my right hand with a numbing agent and placed my IV. I was warned it would make my mouth feel dry and by damn it did. Weird. Then Jax and my mom were shooed away and the nurse took me (bed bound) to the main hospital and my own operating room. Good GOD it was cold in there?? but they wrapped me up in blankets from some kind of heated storage so that rocked. I talked a bit with the other nurses there and we went over my basic info for about the nth time that day before i was told to transfer onto the operating table. It had these crucifix-esque arm fixtures for my arms to lie on, which gave me minor Saw V flashbacks. Then they put the anesthesia mask on me and I was out.

I came back to consciousness near a nurses’ station in the surgical wing, hazy and sleepy, and overheard some discrepancy about which recovery room I was supposed to be in. Apparently 20 was supposed to be mine but was in use so they put me in 22 instead? I don’t know. It seemed like a big deal out of nothing. But by the time I got into the room I wasn’t in my anesthesia haze anymore so sadly, no wacky hijinks ensued.

Well, one hijink ensued. The nurses told my family I was ready to receive visitors and since only 2 people can visit at a time, my mom and sister came back first. For some reason I burst into tears and told them I loved them but I really wanted Jax back there with me. My sister completely understood (thank God because I still feel bad about this) and got him in, which launched me into another crying fit. I wanted to hug him so badly but I couldn’t, of course. But I felt better with him there.

Now that I’m home, my life has been short cycles of consciousness and not. I get tired pretty easily and fall asleep for about 20 minutes or more, over and over. I’m also dealing with this rising and ebbing nausea which would’ve been controlled by the anti-nausea patch I was supposed to get with my prescriptions but I don’t recall ever seeing it?? Do really wish I had it though. I tried drinking a smoothie and that didn’t go great.