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Karen's thoughts

A blog by KarenPayne in General

  • Entries

    261

  • Comments

    690

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    132,280

About this blog

This blog is dedicated to telling those who read the entries about my journey in hopes that something can be learned. 

Entries in this blog

Published

Published

About six months ago my job changed from writing enterprise web applications to now teaching seasoned developers to transition to another ecosystem. While doing this I was asked by a magazine (well a friend recommended me) to do a write up on something that is well worth knowing yet not many have written about. Can't point to the article as its for subscribers only.    

Providing my local community classes on self defense

My background includes certifications in what I call common defense that does not require years of training but does requires that my everyday students (I have professionals in military and police students). Two years ago I went under the knife to transition and after 12 plus years of teaching I put a pause on teaching. Over the past decade or so I've read about people in the LGBT community murders, bullied and so on. This gave rise to me seeking out in the past few months a place to teach that

Post-op ten months almost

Wow, just about ten months since my reassignment surgery.  In no special order somethings I have noticed. Yes I admit this, have gained 20LB since December when I was weighed last. My doctor said it's the hormones. So without hesitation I started running for 45 minutes each day and completely cut out anything one would consider food that encourages weight gain. The nice thing (if there is any) is that the weight is evenly distributed because if nothing else I still fit into my clothes and only r

Post surgery report thoughts

It is save to say that I am doing well now other than feeling crappy from not taking a shower since prior to surgery and plan on taking one this morning as I was given the okay to take a shower. From the post surgery visit yesterday they explained to me about the current status of my breast skin and what to expect in the next few weeks which is what I will report on next so others who will have breast augmentation will know about what to expect. In retrospect It is critical that you have a suppo

Post Surgery report 4

At my post surgery appointment I was told all looked fine. There will be at least four more visits/check-ups. They were very surprised when my female friend reported that I had taken only twenty-five percent of the pain killers since surgery and said most patients take all the medication.  They gave me Lipikar Baue AP creme which helps restore skin's hydrolipidic layer for my breast. My current pain level is under 1 using 1 to 10 scale  

Post Surgery report 3

Had problems sleeping last night but got around three hours then awake for one then slept for about four hours. The pain during those hours was fairly intense until my friend woke up and gave me my meds. After the medication was taken I almost feel like I am back to myself unlike yesterday after medication was taken I was still in pain. Right now the pain is almost non-existing. It's just before 5 AM which means five hours to go for my post-operation checkup. I can easily see myself back to work

Post surgery report 2

My friend had me pick up groceries prior to surgery, two items in particular I wondered about, strawberries and blueberries. Well last night I found out they were for me to assist with constipation as happens after surgery. So I am eating them right up. Urinating is no problem at all. Speaking of urinating, I am wearing a rather loose fitting and long top so each time I go the top is lifted up over my new breast and of course have to stare at them, oh so nice looking if I do say so myself. Dinne

Post surgery report 1

My best friend and I took a taxi to the hospital, signed a few papers the off to a room to prepare me for surgery. About thirty minutes later the surgeon arrived, drew on my body to mark up for my implants. About ten minutes later, off to the OR. I am so use to the OR it felt like a second home I woke up in a recovery room, a bit groggy as one might expect. Pain level I mark at between 3 and 4. I was given some pain medication which greater reduced the pain. Terry had them bring me a Starbucks

Post surgery planned visit with old friend

I was on Facebook tonight where I mentioned taking my new laptop to California with me. I have about 146 friends where about 8 know what's going on. Well my brother's old girlfriend from back from a few years after graduating from High School back in Pennsylvania saw my post and said "we should hook up". So I wrote her a private message explaining what was going on, she still wants to meet Those were interesting times back then, she was dating my brother and I was dating her best friend. We

Post surgery appointment - breast augmentation

Last week was my first post surgery operation appointment for breast augmentation where I was told there would be several more appointments over the next several months. Today I was examined and asked about pain or discomfort. I told them what little pain was still present was almost completely gone on Monday of this week. Both the surgeon and his assistant (a female) agreed that my recovery was better than the average person after breast augmentation and said even with heavy muscles I was doing

Post operation part 1

The following link is my blog entry for post surgery with Marci which includes dilation. http://karenpayneblog.com/2015/02/02/post-operation-appointment/ What I did not post there is peeing after the pee bag was removed. First thing, did a decent spray (not really something to be proud of) both times. I was told this may happen so I was well positioned for this event.

Pooping (a serious topic)

It is critical that one can poop before being discharged. With past surgeries I had a great deal of troubles unlike this time. What made the difference? Consuming massive quantities of water and a decent Amount of prune juice. Past and present I had same amount of stool softener. With that guess were I am heading :-)

Physically preparing for GRS

To prepare physically for GRS I decided to stop eating any fast food and only eat fresh veggies and meat purchased the same day I consume it. Running on a NordicTrack at home, lifting lightweights, slamming a punching bag for tone. To be honest out of the past three months devoid of fast food I do not feel any healthier but have notice I am constant in bowel movements. Lastly, I only drink coffee and water. I had elective surgery in 2010 and 2011 were I did the same thing and healed up quick

Physically have it all?

So in under six months I have gone through both gender reassignment surgery, tracheal shave and breast augmentation where three years ago I thought this would be impossible and now very happy that I am finished with surgeries as there is in my mind not much more that can be done that would make me happier. I read about some who will get various parts of their face done to have the bone structure, hairline and eye's of a female and they might possibly benefit me to look more female but at what ex

Phase II

Thought I would disclose my current plans for me in regards to making changes I thought about first then acted on. There were no rushed decisions, all well planned out beforehand. Phase one was gender reassignment surgery and breast augmentation. Phase II current to end of February The Fraxel Experience: laser treatments not only improve the look of your skin, but it will improve the health of your skin and the strength of your skin by encouraging collagen turn over and proliferation. Your skin

Personal protection part 1

My life lessons started early on from confrontations on the streets of Philadelphia with no formal training. I looked into various forms of martial arts through the years and found that not one was all-inclusive for real confrontations. Another thing about sticking just simply martial arts in general is that they are classroom based, what I call a close environment as appose to an open environment where you are in street clothes, placed in real life situations. Closed environment training is usu

Permanent cosmetics

Many years ago, I made a fatal mistake of plucking my eyebrows and did a horrible job in that when still moving between male to female then back to male looked bad in male mode but looked good in female mode. November of last year I researched permanent cosmetics for my eyebrows. The research began with a fair amount of time looking at pictures of woman who had their eyebrows done followed by researching who to check out and discuss my needs. At the end of last October, I had a list of five p

Passport

About just under two months I applied for my passport, three weeks later I was informed my birth certificate was not good, so I called, asked what needed to be done which was provide another one (which I had) and sent it to them. I never changed my original so it still says M for gender. Today I am now a proud owner of a US passport with F for gender. There was never anything mentioned about my gender change, only a birth certificate not being correct because it did not have my mother and father

Paralyzed with fear over others perception of us

Over time it is hard to not recognize that not just with gender issues but every aspect of life we encounter a fear and doubt our abilities to cope. This is normal behavior until we key in on gender dysphoria because if nothing else we are living in a world that is gender centric, male or female. Fear of being late with a car payment is vastly different than stepping out one’s front door dressed in the opposite gender. We can call the bank, chat with them and make special arrangements if your

Over planning for surgery is best

It has been four months since surgery and bills are still coming in which is not a problem for me as I make bring home a very good paycheck. With this in mind there are many who are not so fortunate in regards to funds that may be put aside of surgery but rather they need to scrimp and save for a long time to reach the amount needed for surgery. Let's look at an example, you are planning for gender reassignment surgery which will be (rounding numbers off) thirty thousand dollars with virtually n

Oh what fun

So I arrive in San Francisco, love the hotel room, went out food shopping then downed to twos of A1 coffee (I tend to only drink water and coffee) and then thought, how will I get to the pre-surgery appointment tomorrow morning? Open the phone book to Taxi cab companies, there are about 20 WHAT. I call one and they said, how can I help you ma'am? I told them what I needed in the morning but got a bad feeling so I thought why not ask the front desk to see which cab company they recommended.

Observations, the female voice in LGBT M to F

With no disrespect I’ve been noticing the more I’m with cross-dressers that two things (at least from my experience in the last several years) is, the majority of cross-dressers will not transition so they are part-timers only and that they never attempt to mask their voice to female mode and one reason I believe for the voice aspect is they only do to trans-friendly establishments. Keeping with voice, I’ve only met three post-op transgender and I’m astonished to find they don’t attempt to chan

Not happy with Comcast

Seems Comcast has taken down all personal web sites without notifying me and this is were I stored pictures. The majority of these pictures are only stored there. So all pictures I have posted here will not show. I called into Comcast and at this point they are clueless but I did a Google search and it appears that they discontinued the personal web sites yet the Comcast help desk person has no clue to this. PISSED BIG TIME Just got off the phone with Comcast and they said they would have a tech

No picnic

Check out my No picnic entry, perhaps one of my most important entries where I write about being overwhelmed when thinking back on yesterday. I will state I am fine, just wanted others to see what I went through which in many ways more then the day of surgery. http://karenpayneblog.com/2015/02/03/no-picnic/

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