Author: Stephanie

After what I can confidently say was my worst nights sleep since getting home today was always going to be a challenge, I’m not sure why I didn’t sleep but it felt like the longest night ever, up and down to the bathroom and I just tossed and turned all night. I had lots of little jobs to do plus coffee with Alison and some shopping for Denise, I was to have had a meeting with the bank to deal with my name change but it was canceled and re booked for Thursday.

The day started slowly with a fairly relaxed dilation, I don’t enjoy any of them but the first of the day is always the worst, however, it has to be done and it was, I then got ready to go into town to meet Alison and do the shopping. Catching up with Alison was good, we had a good chat and nice coffee, then I did Denise’s shopping then a visit to Coles. I don’t mind supermarket shopping, I enjoy picking up stuff which is on special and there was plenty today, I didn’t want a lot so only used a basket but it was full by the time I had finished. As all the self check outs were busy and there were a few people waiting I looked to see if there was an ordinary check out available, the one at the end was the best, one person just putting her last few things on the belt so I headed that way. On arriving I noticed it was my favourite check out lady but for some reason I have not bumped into her since I started going out as Stephanie back in April so when it was my turn I said hello ……… how are you, she replied but I could see she didn’t really recognise me so I said “long time no see” she looked at me again so I said “I haven’t seen you since I swapped sides” she looked at me and flung her arms around me, gave me the biggest hug and whispered in my ear, you look amazing, are you happy? To which I obviously replied “very” she gave me another complement about how I looked and asked how my family had been with my transitioning, I told her that Denise has been amazing as had all my friends. You could just tell she was so happy for me, she gave me another hug and it absolutely made my day! It didn’t matter how tired I was I felt ten feet tall, so happy, that’s all it takes, someone to be happy for you, I almost cried! I went back to the car and just sat and thought how lucky I am to have all these people giving me love and support and above all being happy for me. The rest of my jobs in town went very easy, I was in such a happy frame of mind, yet another example of how people have been with me, so blessed!

My paperwork manager (Denise) has been putting in some long hours sorting out all that is needed for the various organisations which need to be told of my change of name and change of gender, the important ones being passport as we need this to travel to the uk in August and driving licence as it is the main form of photo ID. Both of these are done through the post office and I have to say I am not the biggest fan of post offices! In the past I have had a few issues, not major and more so in the uk than here but today’s two visits were just perfect. Firstly, both ladies we dealt had no issues with the gender change thing, it’s easy to tell if someone has, we witnessed it at the name change place two weeks ago, that roll of the eyes says it all but today there was no sign of any bad feeling at all. I guess it helps if you have all the right paperwork and we certainly had that and as a bonus the post office was not busy so we were attended to almost straight away, driving licence first but only the initial part of it as we needed the old licence to do the passport, it all went very smoothly, the lady who did the passport felt she had made an inappropriate comment by saying obviously I haven’t done one of theses before and apologised straight away, I hadn’t even faulted it but she was very apologetic and decided that to be on the safe side she would call the passport office and check that she had done everything correctly before we left, she had indeed done it all correctly and as a lovely parting comment wished me well in my new life as Stephanie which I really appreciated. The second part of the driving licence involved having my photo taken, she actually took it three time before she was happy and was quick to say if I don’t like the photo I can have it changed at any point which I thought was a nice touch.

i have also had a visit to my GP today, she was lovely as always, we talked about both my physical wellness and my mental/emotional wellness as well, I have to admit that before the surgery I was pretty blasé about the whole recovery thing, I wanted it so so much that it never even crossed my mind about how I would feel after it, I had read numerous articles and blogs and some which talked about waking to a world of unbelievable pain but I just thought that i would deal with it as it came and when I came round from the surgery I felt nothing at all in terms of physical pain I thought the rest of the recovery would be a breeze. Sadly it has not quite been that way, the physical side of things is easy to deal with, I have a very good supply of painkillers and thanks to my GP an excellent plan for dealing with it, the mental/emotional side of things has been totally different and I had not even given a thought to how it would probably mess with my head. I am blessed to have Denise by my side to talk about the things which have come to light and the way the surgery has affected me but it’s totally unfair to load all this on her, she has more than her share of emotional issues of her own to deal with to do with my transitioning but in typical Denise form has always been there for me. I hope one day I will be there to help her in a similar way as I simply couldn’t have done this without her, Denise you are pure gold xxx

So much has happened over the last few days that I just haven’t had the time or the energy to keep my blog up to date so I sincerely apologise for that! Firstly there was Thursday when I received the certificate for my official name change, it was a strange moment when I opened the little door on the PO box, there were 2 letters inside and I was expecting a large one with the certificate in but in reality it was just a normal size envelope but when I looked at the name on it a really strange feeling came over me, I gripped Denise’s hand very hard, my first mail addressed to Stephanie Vaughan! We hurried back to the car and set off home as we had Jessie and Anna coming round for morning tea and didn’t want them arriving at our house and us not be there, I asked Denise to open the letter as I was driving home and it was indeed my certificate! A warm feeling came over me as I realised it was one of the major steps completed. The certificate itself is a bit brief to say the least, not sure what I expected but I suppose it says all it needs to say and at last I am officially Stephanie Rachael Vaughan. Morning tea was a particularly lovely occasion and included a gorgeous chocolate cake and some very pleasant bubbles to go with it along with some beautiful conversations with two beautiful young ladies whom I feel very privileged to have in my life.

Next came Friday, the start of preparations for my stepping out party but not before our visits to the gorgeous Linny for pedicures, eyelash tinting and eyebrow shaping and tinting, how I love having my feet pampered! It’s just the best and most relaxing thing, add to that the none stop conversation with Linny and you have the recipe for a gorgeous 2 hours. The whole eyes thing is of course all new to me but as I am not very proficient with the mascara it makes life much easier, the silly thing is if I had known about the whole eyelash tinting thing I would have started having them done years ago as my eyelashes have been clear for years and virtually impossible to see. Anyway it all adds up to being a beautiful experience!

On arriving home it was a quick change as the start of the transformation of our outdoor area for the party was due to start around 1pm with the arrival of Chris And Alisha with the marquee, followed by Alison who soon knocked us into shape and pointed us in the right direction for assembling the said marquee. This turned out to be a fairly easy job, it fitted perfectly in position and after a small fabrication job was secured in position, side walls fitted and the whole thing is taking shape in time for the big do tomorrow. The outdoor area was emptied in preparation for the furniture arriving Saturday morning and I’m getting excited.

Saturday morning arrives and this is the big day, I’m a little nervous to say the least, there will be people at the party I have not seen for some time, lots who have not seen me fully Stephanised as you might say and most of the guests have not seen me since I came back from Philadelphia so won’t know what to expect, also I planned to make a speech, a speech I wrote while we were still in the recovery suites in Ardmore after my surgery and I have to say, I have revisited it more times since than I care to remember as I have thought about saying different things adifferent orders but at the same time I am excited. The furniture arrived at the arranged time and was duly unloaded and the job of setting up began. Straight away I was concerned that there was too much seating and the place soon looked too fussy and crowded, I voiced my opinion and some rearranging was done, some bits removed and I was happier.

In the afternoon it was another visit to Linny’s beauty spot for makeup hair and nails, nails first then to Linny’s very talented daughter Megg for my hair, I am literally blown away watching as my hair is carefully styled like never before, Megg you are a miracle worker, I am so impressed, I go back in the where Linny was doing Denise’s makeup and they too are blown away, I just love it, so much volume and style like never before, just amazing! Makeup was next and another transformation takes place, I’m starting to think people won’t even recognise me anyway at the party. By the time I get home the caterers have arrived and things are really taking shape, the outdoor area is looking perfect, bar stocked, punch made and decorations in place, the only slight down side is that it is cold so the patio heater was lit and all would soon be good.

By the time people start arriving I have completed my look, even put in my earrings which after 5 weeks of being absent I thought there was no way the holes are still going to be open but in they went and I was very happy.

The whole night was perfect, my speech could have been better as I missed bits out and got things a little out of order but I don’t think anyone noticed so all went well. Once again I am struck by the amount of love and support given not just to me but Denise as well, after all this whole journey has almost been as difficult for her as me as it was Denise who had to do most of the organising, all the driving over in the States and be responsible for me while I was under the weather. Also she had the most difficult job of worrying about me while I was asleep being worked upon during the surgery, after all, I only had to turn up and go to sleep, Denise was the one answering all the questions, getting help when I needed it and the one there when I was having issues of any kind. All in all a beautiful occasion, I felt very special, I was truly honoured that my GP joined us, it gave me an opportunity to thank her for the amazing way she has looked after me and continues to do so, I know an arranment of flowers is a very small gesture for all she has done for me but I think it was appreciated even if I was temporarily in trouble for doing it! I had thought going on previous days that by 9pm I would probably be struggling to stay awake but I think I was running on adrenaline as I managed to stay awake all night and didn’t hit the sack until probably 12.30am and when I did go to sleep it was with a very warm glow inside me knowing we have so many beautiful friends.

Give or take the fact that memories of my childhood were somewhat darkened by my unhappiness in who I was and later by the fact that my parents were shall we say economical with the truth about my beginnings I was brought up knowing right from wrong, in a god “respecting” home with a sense of values and above all a work ethic which I think is probably lacking a little in this day and age. I have however had my moments and I know I have hurt people by misbehaving in the past which is my biggest regret. Apart from that I have always tried to be a good person and always look for good in people instead of complaining and criticising which in the long run gets you no where anyway. I am a big believer in giving credit where it’s due and have always believed that the way to get the best from people is through encouragement, praise and assistance rather than berating them for making a mistake. However, somewhere down the line I think I’ve got mixed up with some other person as today again I have been completely blown away by the service I have received, they say you reap what you sow well I definitely don’t remember sowing any of this!

After seeing my GP last Wednesday I sent emails to both my endocrinologist and my specialist in Perth just to let them know that they would be receiving the results. I plan to go up and see them both in due course but it will have to wait until I can sit in relative comfort for the duration of the journey which is probably some time off yet, Jenny, the endocrinologist emailed me straight back and said she would be away for the school holidays but would love to see me when she gets back, I didn’t hear from Stephen my specialist at the time but thought I would probably hear from him after he got the results. Anyway, my GP called today and gave me the results, I seem to be very menopausal! No testosterone which is to be expected as there is nothing to produce it now but after years of having oestrogen levels off the scale, I seem to have none of that either which explains the night sweats and the total inability to regulate my temperature. Anyway, it was decided that I would contact Stephen again just to get his thoughts and maybe a plan of action so I sent another email and was totally blown away by the response. Now a number of people have mentioned that they think it strange that I have this type of relationship with doctors and specialists, that I have email contact with them and there was indeed a day while in Philadelphia shortly after the surgery that I had emails from no less than 4 of the health professionals who look after me but today I the response from Stephen really shows how blessed I am, he is currently on holiday in Europe with his family but still sent a reply suggesting a plan of action! Like I said, blessed and humbled! xx

Today has had its up and downs, I’ve had some considerable pain at times and others have been virtually pain free. On the whole I am much happier with my regime of painkillers than I was but I think i must have turned over in bed or stretched a different way at some point in the night and have suffered for it today which brings me to the second part of today’s post, communication, over the last few weeks I have come to realise that one of the things that has kept me going, kept me focused, kept me believing in the fact that in a couple of months the pain will have reduced to a very manageable level, the swelling will have gone down and I will be enjoying my life as Stephanie a great deal is in fact communication. Whether it be by email, messenger, Skype, text or any of the other myriad of methods, waking up in a morning to find those little numbers next to the icons on my Samsung is one of my greatest pleasures and all down to the amazing support I have had from friends and family from numerous places around the world. Only toninght I received one such message through messenger from someone I have only recently reconnected with and only then because she heard my story which both made me smile and made me realise and appreciate the amount of support I have had and indeed have, I try very hard without appearing rude to reply as soon as I can to all messages, I think that’s only right and good manners when someone has taken the time to message me and is obviously thinking about me or us, I also make a great effort to answer questions which are in messages as I think there is nothing worse than sending an email with numerous questions in it and getting one back which has only answered the first question so is obvious that the rest of the email has either not been read or certainly not absorbed.

Another of my favourite pastimes is checking messenger and scrolling down to where it shows who of your contacts are online at the time and just sending a one line, how are you message, I know how much it means to me so hope it does to others as well. The only thing which I do need to take into account at the moment is that I appreciate the fact that I am in forced “take it easy mode” so spending the first hour of the day answering emails, many of which come from the uk as they have arrived during the night due to the time difference is probably not an option for most people, also many of you who know me well will know I am the author of some very “novel” like emails, sometimes when I pick up my iPad the fire just flows from my fingertips and onto the screen, in fact my mind works much faster than my fingers can type so I have to go back through them to sort out all the predictive text mistakes, most of which are my fault I would add but it gives me such a lot of pleasure writing them and it bodes well for when I do finally put pen to paper as it were and write my book. I really feel that people need to know what went on back in the 60s and 70s with intersex kids and if writing my story down makes even a few people aware of it then my time will have been worthwhile.

In finishing today’s post I just want to say how much we both really really appreciate all the messages, calls, emails and any other communication we have received, it just goes to reiterate how lucky we are in having such amazing support, thank you xx

Having had a really good day on Thursday following my best nights sleep I went to bed on Thursday night expecting more of the same, this wasn’t to be the case though! Firstly I was up more time to go to the bathroom in the first three hours than I he’d been the whole of Wednesday night and secondly, when I got up at around 2.30am I was in considerable pain so I don’t know if I had pulled something when turning over or what I had done but it was not good! A cup of tea was organised and a couple of plain biscuits before taking a painkiller to calm things down. Half an hour later the pain had subsided and I settled back down with just one more visit to the bathroom before morning.

I guess in some ways it isn’t a bad thing that there was a slight hiccup in my recovery as if I’d had two good nights rest I would probably have tried to do far too much today, as it was I had a fairly relaxing day for me, spent a good deal of it writing to people, communicating via messenger with various people and a small amount of  very light jobs around the place, nothing which involved lifting or excessive bending so hopefully I will be good tonight. It’s only 8 days till my stepping out party and I want to be in good shape by then, I know I will probably need a sleep during the day as by about 9 pm I am tired and hopefully by that stage to party will just be getting going! I’m also hopeful that by then I will have more energy as we discovered yesterday that I am lacking in iron, probably due to the fact that I have been bleeding for over a month, not a massive amount but just enough to cause a problem and make me anaemic. Anyway, tablets have been purchased and I will hopefully be on the mend in a few days. It certainly makes sense that there is something sapping my energy as I don’t have to do very much at all before I need to sleep again which is totally not me, I am usually on the go all the time and have trouble doing any sort of relaxing so it’s good to find a reason for it.

Making sure that everyone who I needed to tell before the event was told was always going to be tricky and the danger of telling one person but missing another was always going to be a possibility, one which came up last night. I probably should have spent more time telling members of my extended family in the uk than I did but knowing where to stop and knowing who would actually be interested anyway was always going to be a challenge. Hopefully my apologetic email and an explanation of my story will be enough to avert a problem and the offer of a face to face Skype or FaceTime will be taken up as it’s much better to talk face to face even if you are at different sides of the world, I guess time alone will tell.

 

I always though that once I was home things would improve but the last 24 hours have made a huge difference. When we arrived back at 5pm on Tuesday I was in so much pain I had had to get into the back of the car to lay down, then that started to hurt my back so I had to sit up in the back at whatever angle took some pressure off my new bits the best. Once home I felt better immediately, had something to eat and took some painkillers which although take a little while to kick in do a good job once in the system but don’t last very long so I am soon looking at the clock to work out when I can take the next lot. So although they do a good job they create lots of ups and downs which is less than ideal but at the end of the day anything which takes away the pain has to be a good thing.

After the usual broken night’s sleep due to the number of visits to the bathroom we got up this morning around 9, I felt ok and that it was good to be back in familiar surroundings but I was still very stiff from the traveling and in a fair bit of pain. We had some things to do, Denise needed to do some shopping, go to the post office and several other things in town and I had an appointment with my GP. As much as the team at Ardmore, Philadelphia had looked after me very well, nothing ever seemed too much trouble and they were all lovely people there’s nothing quite like seeing your own GP who knows what you’re like and in my case is just wonderful so in a weird sort of way I was looking forward to it and looking forward to seeing Karen and Mikhaela (I’ve probably spelled that wrong!) who so fit the place they work, always a smile like sunshine. As a general rule people are not at their best when visiting the doctors and to be greeted with a lovely smile and treated in such an empathic way goes a long way in making a visit to Sunshine medical centre so much less stressful than other such establishments in town.

Its a weird thing but it has crossed my mind on a number of occasions that on my first visit to the doctors after my surgery do I offer to show Dr Rumer’s handiwork or not, afterall they have seen hundreds right? Even if they have all been “original equipment ” as it were not manufactured as in my case, I didn’t need to worry as when it came to it it just seemed the natural thing to do and to my surprise, instead of the reaction being “I can’t believe how much swelling there is” it was totally different, I think she was surprised how “normal” it looked and agreed that after a couple of months it will indeed look “pretty” as the Surgeon almost promised. We talked a lot about painkillers and different approaches to pain management which was totally unexpected but so relevant and we came away feeling so much more positive, as positive as you can do when the next stop is to donate some blood at the hospital for a long list of tests for one person or another but it all went very smoothly and even that was in fact made pleasant by the fact that the two people involved, Rayleen and Leah were both gorgeous with me, very interested in how things had gone in Philadelphia and the best part, the needle was sharpe, I didn’t feel a thing, such a talent and one which not every person taking blood has I can assure you, over the years I have had some pretty blunt needles and even though my veins are very visible some pretty botched jobs but as with most things you find someone/somewhere that you are comfortable with which makes all the difference.

So that was our first day back in Busselton and I already feel much better, I have more energy (which could be a problem as I will want to use it!) and just generally feel better, if I continue to improve the same amount each day I will soon be fighting fit again. The only down side was dilating this morning, it was so hard to push inside me this morning, not desperately painful but difficult to get fully in which was a worry, my second attempt was much easier but actually more painful which is weird but I guess it will get easier over time (just as well as I have it to do for a long long time) but I think the first one was just because I only dilated once yesterday and it was over 24 hours earlier so it’s a lesson to me to keep it up, pardon the pun!

 

At last we are back I Australia after a mammoth journey, and a life changing experience! 5 weeks ago yesterday we left Australia for the biggest event of my life and I can’t really believe it’s all happened and we are back on home soil, in Perth if not back in our beloved Busselton.

For once I don’t really know where to start with my blog today, usually the fire just flows from my finger tips without much stopping to think about the content but I think today is such an occasion that I’m feeling a little disjointed and my fingers will take some time to warm up.

Firstly I’m going to talk about the flight home, Denise had some real concerns about flying with Qatar because of the current unrest in the area due to what to me looks like all its neighbours ganging up against it with claims that Qatar is supposed to be supporting terrorism and groups with links to terrorism. From my point of view I always thought that the airline would be going out of its way to look after its customers and keep its image of one of the best airlines in the world. We have always had good service in the past when we have used Qatar and our homeward journey was going to be nothing different except this time due to me not being able to sit for long periods we decided to upgrade to business class. That in itself wasn’t as expensive as I expected and the benefits of doing it have so outweighed the costs. The second thing Denise did was inform the airline that I have had a medical procedure while being in the US and would need to use of a wheelchair to assist getting me around the airports. This I found a bit daunting, I have never even sat in a wheelchair up to a month ago and was very unsure how I would feel about it, I don’t feel ill and thought deep down I was a bit of a fraud but it was just the best possible thing to do! From our arrival at Philadelphia international airport to being wheeled through into the arrivals area in Perth I was looked after so so well, everything went like clockwork (except for not being collected from the business class lounge in Qatar and having to remind them which was no big deal) I was looked after like a Queen! I can’t thank them enough, amazing service all round and as I have a passion for telling people all about the service I receive whether it be good or bad I will be making a point of passing my appreciation on to all concerned.

Perth is well known for being slow at processing passengers through immigration and customs, I’m not saying that it’s a bad thing to be very thorough with both those things but there have been times when there are several big aircraft landing within a few minutes of each other so the potential for up to 1000 people arriving in a very short time and there being just 3or 4 of the 14 immigration desks being open? I mean, why have all those desks if you’re never going to use them? Doesn’t make much sense to me but then I’m a very practical minded girl! Yesterday’s experience was completely different to anything I have ever had, my wheelchair was waiting for me just outside the aircraft and a lovely young lady then proceeded to navigate me first through immigration where you get to go through a special gate, get dealt with almost immediately with no waiting then to customs wher we were just waved through and straight into the arrival area, job done, she even had time to help someone else during the very short time we were waiting for our “priority bags” to come through on the carousel, just gorgeous.

Josh and Louise were waiting for us in arrivals and very soon we were on our way to Stuart and Andrew’s house in City Beach. It was so good to be back in Australia even if the temperature is not very inviting! The feeling of being home is already making me feel better. Tomorrow we will be collecting my certificate of gender recognition from Jerusha at the GRB office then lodging my official name change application at births marriages and deaths then heading home to Busselton finally.

In ending this blog I just want to touch on something which I will cover later but I am continually overwhelmed by people’s kindness and a sense of wondering why everyone I seem to come into contact with is just overflowing with the stuff, maybe I haven’t been looking before or maybe I just haven’t noticed it but it’s just all around me, everywhere I look there are examples of people’s kindness and I’m left wondering why, I am nothing special, yes I have always been the sort of person who gets more from giving than receiving but (and there are tears rolling down my face as I write this!) why is everyone being so kind to me, it’s just very humbling and I just don’t think I deserve it at all, as I said earlier I am nothing special, I’ve had some shit to deal with just like everyone else in the world but I am continually blown away by how lovely everyone is treating me. I so want to give something back to the world and can’t wait to be fully healed and get on with setting up the transgender support group which I am planning. One example was on the flight from Philadelphia to Doha, I am struggling with my hormones as you can imagine at the moment, my body must be having a very hard time coming to terms with what it now has to deal with and I guess what it has lost after all the years of being Robin so any extremes of temperature however small are difficult to deal with and I had an example of this early on the first flight. We were on a virtually brand new Airbus 350 in the business class area in the centre of the aircraft, the seating in this area is two in the Middle and one at either side on the window side. The problem started when I was feeling a bit warm and started looking for the air vent for my seat, there isn’t one! And I panicked which immediately made things worse and I could feel it coming, once I start to over heat I can feel this fear starting to overwhelm me and the eventual outcome is that I faint and that is not pretty as I usually manage to throw up shortly after that! I got Denise’s attention and told her what was happening, I headed for the bathroom as I knew there would be a vent in there for the short term. A few minutes later, Denise is knocking on the door saying all is sorted and I’m to move seats, I came out and the cabin crew had moved a gentleman out of his seat to one a couple of rows forwards and I was to have his seat, this in itself was big enough but then one of the crew came to me and asked why I had overheated, I explained about the lack of vents and the fact that my thermostat was not working very well due to me having had surgery in the US just under 4 weeks ago and she asked what the surgery was that I had, by this stage Denise was there and before I had any chance to answer she said it was internal and the crew member seemed ok with that. Shortly after, she came back and asked if I was now ok and asked again what the surgery was, I could see she wasn’t going to give up so I just leaned forward and beckoned her do the same and I whispered in her ear “I’m not actually he any more, I’m she!” She gave me a big smile and told me how brave and courageous I was to follow my dreams, held my hand and said to call her if I needed anything. About half an hour went past and the member of the cabin crew who I think was in charge of looking after this side of the business class seating, a lady called Ruxandra came up to me and squat down beside me and took my hand, she said the other lady had told her about me and she wanted me to know how much she admired me for following my dreams and again if there was anything she could do, anything I wanted I just needed to ask. There are two examples of how kind people have been to me, I have not had one single negative comment and with Philadelphia being the main centre for transgender in the US it would be fairly obvious to anyone who looked at me carefully but they don’t they just go about their daily routine and allow everyone else to do the same. I have also had no negative comments from people in Australia, I know we are a very accepting nation but to not have a single negative comment especially in the early months when I was less confident about myself is amazing. Ironically that just leaves our two relatives in the UK, my brother is I’m sure coming round with some help from his wife but from the total lack of contact from Denise’s brother I’m thinking there is no progress there at all. Sorry today’s post is a bit of a novel! But eventually it just flowed out!

 

After being stressed to death for the last few days because I have felt that I have not progressed as well as I should have done, today was my last appointment with the surgeon before heading home and to say I was scared that she was going to take one look at me and say I was not well enough to fly would be an understatement. I am still losing quite a lot of blood every day, I am still living on painkillers every day, the swelling in the pelvic bone area is not getting any less and dilating is not getting any easier so I think it’s fair to say I was worried.

We were up early as we had to be at Ardmore for 9.30 and I’m not as quick at getting ready at the moment as I usually am but we were away on time and despite a little detour on our way to Ardmore we arrived on time in fact a little early. We pressed the button and were let in straight away and greeted by Dawn whose first words were, “how are you? We’ve missed you”, it was such a little thing but set me at ease. She showed us straight through and asked me to prepare for Kathy, set the chair up and then left us. In a couple of minutes Kathy and Dawn came back in and after exchanging pleasantries she had a look and announced that she was very happy with progress, not what I had expected at all, we had written down a list of questions which she answered fully and explained each one as we went on, we talked about the swelling and she suggested opening up one of the drains to see if anything came out, to be honest I was horrified at the thought of it but I asked if it would help, she said it could do so I agreed, it didn’t hurt much at all but not much came out so nothing much gained but at least she tried, she then took an instrument and inserted it! I thought that would hurt also but it was fine, she had a look inside and announced that everything looked perfect inside and that the healing process was going well. She then went on to explain how most people don’t realise that this surgery is unlike virtually any other in that it is both on the inside and the outside and thus will take twice as long to heal and take twice as much out of me. We discussed the dilating, she was very happy with where i am at with it and then talked about a product that she will mail to Australia as they don’t keep it in stock but it will just assist in joining up the split which has opened up on the left side lobe. It’s not a problem and will heal on its own but she felt it would speed up recovery.

To say I was relieved would be such an understatement! Honestly they are the most gorgeous team of people, so much like the team at Sunshine medical centre back at home, each one of them gave us both a big hug before we left, it’s a small thing but to me it is massive, this Is an extremely experienced and famous surgeon who has pioneered new techniques and has been doing this surgery for ten years who made the effort to give us both big hugs and say if there is ever a problem they are at the end of a phone or on Skype and not to hesitate to call and she is happy for us to speak directly to her if we would like, quite amazing and very humbling indeed.

So there we have it, we fly at 10.40 am tomorrow and I can’t wait to get set off. I’m sure I will recover much faster when we get home, it’s going to be a long journey but worth it in the end. So my next post will be when we are back in Australia, I’m so looking forward to catching up with all our friends and getting back into some sort of normal life albeit it will never quite be the same for me!

Today we drove from Lambertville closer to Philadelphia city to our final accommodation before heading home. We are now in a resort style apartment in a place called Plymouth Meeting, a huge complex of 4 storey buildings and the usual resort things like swimming pools etc. It’s a pity I can’t use the pool as it looks really nice and the weather is hot, there also doesn’t seem to many people around which is a bonus. The funny thing is that obviously the owner of the apartment is not really allowed to have it on Airbnb and has given us strict instructions not to talk to anyone about who we are and under what circumstances we are staying here, to be quite honest I would be tempted to drop her in it as it’s not really in the spirit of Airbnb but the apartment is nice, well equipped and clean and I probably won’t be venturing far to come into contact with anyone anyway.

Talk about the sublime to the ridiculous, one of the very few complaints I would have had about the last place was the bed, yes it was comfortable but as it was only about 12 inches off the ground, had this very annoying plinth around it and a memory foam mattress which tend to be a bit dead when you get into them it was pretty difficult to get in and out of between one of us recovering from surgery and the other being a bit stiff from arthritis, this place however, I think Denise is going to need a step ladder to get in and out of it, it’s about waist high for me but again it’s comfortable and a big bed.

Its only about 67 hours now till we fly out and we are both very excited about it, while the flights will be long and even in business class I’m sure not super comfortable being on our way home will give us both a big boost I’m sure. We are hoping that when we get to Doha the Airline will be able to put us up in the Airport hotel so we don’t need to get visas and only need to be there 1 hour before the plane leaves the next day as it will leave more time to relax before our flight but I guess time will tell. The lovely Kami from Dr Rumer’s office has given me a letter confirming the need for a wheelchair and requesting I be taken on board first and off first at the other end which will be a novelty, I will feel a bit of a fraud as I can walk a certain amount but soon get sore and tired so there’s no point in pushing myself too hard at this stage.

One final thing, yesterday’s “f” word tally was very close, Stephanie 6 Denise 5 so a score of one I think is very impressive in the circumstances, we have also agreed that the odd indiscretion while dilating is acceptable as it’s both very painful and uncomfortable and the odd descriptive word makes me feel better. I’m sure you will agree that a result of just one is good one though!