First Local Gender Clinic Visit

On the day after my birthday, I went out to my appointment at the gender clinic here in Hamilton and, I dunno, I just thought I looked kind of nice?

The doctor I saw was fabulous. As I thought, the clinic here doesn't offer family doctor services. She wasn't sure if the one in Milton does: if not, I'll just keep going to the Hamilton one and wait for a family doctor to open up. If the Milton clinic *does* offer family doctor services, I'm going to get set up there.
So I have an appointment in Milton on the 22nd to do a meet and greet and find out what's up. I also have a follow up appointment in Hamilton in 2 weeks to talk about bottom surgery and try to figure out how changing provinces affects that, and to and see how my bloodwork looks.

She also refilled my prescriptions, switched me to micronized progesterone (she was really surprised that SK makes you start on the other stuff!), and got me an STI screening so I didn't have to make another appointment for that. And I got the blood draw done before leaving. It was a really nice visit!
The waiting room staff who called me for my blood draw used my deadname, and I actually corrected her, so go me 🙂

I parked in a public parking lot. When I tried to pay on the way out, it would not accept a debit card or cash, and I don't have a credit card. I had to use the help call button, and the person there let me out for free. The sign just had the Mastercard and Visa logos. I had an issue in Toronto where I couldn't park with a debit card too, but at least I didn't get stuck in the lot. I may have to try and get a credit card *just so I can park my car* which is really annoying.

( Picture behind the cut )

Emotional Dysregulation

My emotions have been yoyoing a lot lately, sometimes by the hour. On the downswings, lying down in a dark place and removing stimulation helps, so I've been trying to do that instead of doomscrolling on my computer, or freezing in place because I don't have capacity to make decisions about what I should do next. It's not very fun. Talking with Miriam about it last night gave me some insights, as talking with her often does.

I have more positive things in my life than I've had in a long time. In-person events, in-person friends, and confidence to reach out and look for community and connections are really all pretty new. That's a lot of disruption, and disruption is stressful, even when it's good. And there's some big bad stuff too that doesn't help. The US. My living situation and the clutter.

I regularly have moments when I feel really great in ways I haven't regularly felt in years, and that gives me a lot of hope. I very much believe that things are better now, and will keep getting better. But I need to incorporate all this change and find a new baseline.

Anyway, I sent in another job application: public services librarian in London. Which would be a crappy commute, but for a job that pays decently and gives me library experience for my resume, we'll move further from Hamilton and Toronto, even though I really really don't want to.