Support system - another key piece!
By Chrissy
· 2,878 views
After almost a week of playing phone tag I finally got in touch with my doctor last night. I was trying to talk to him about getting a finasteride (sp?) prescription (which he took care of) and a referral for an endocrinologist. When I originally left the message for him I hadn't said why I was asking for these, so on the phone with him was when I told him that I had come out (I don't like using that term for some reason) as transgender.
I've been going to him for a number of years now (10 or so? Maybe many more, maybe a few less - time is hard to keep track of), and I like him alot. Beyond being a really good doctor, he's very friendly, he's ALWAYS on time (my prior doctor was almost always 45 minutes to an hour late for appointments), and he's holistic in his approach. Consistent with all of that, as soon as I told him I'm trans* he congratulated me, and then asked about my support system. He then gave me the name of an endocrinologist, and said that once I'm on the hormones he would be able to do the follow-up, but that an endocrinologist was better for setting the initial levels. He also said that he works with a number of trans* patients, which made me feel even more comfortable.
I haven't officially decided on HRT yet, but I feel like it's going to happen, and possibly quite soon. I raised the question with my therapist last week, to see what her general "guidelines" are in terms of providing a letter. She said she doesn't really have any, she's worked with a number of trans* clients and has done letters for them at all different times. For now she thinks we still need to work a little more through my lingering doubts (which I suspect were really fears, not doubts, but I completely agree with her on this point).
So I now have a pretty decent support system in place - my doctor, my new gender therapist (who I like a lot!), a bunch of close friends who are incredibly supportive, a job that is also very supportive, this website!, an electrologist who I like (and who is also a transwoman), and next Wednesday I'm going to a trans* support group in the city.
As a "side note" this week was the first week when I started to introduce myself as Christie, and be referred to as Christie by a number of people, and it's starting to feel normal 
This actually gives me the confidence to send the email to my sister that I wrote over the weekend. I had to spend some time on it to make it non-confrontational.
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