Out to the parents in law

 

Family Updates

Well I finally got around to telling my parents-in-law.  I did it by email, I really didn't want to do it on the phone, as I figured it would not go well.

I got to the point fairly quickly, and then onto how it impacted my wife and the kids, and that they were largely OK with it.

My wife ended up on the phone to them shortly afterwards, and they have actually seemed to take it a lot better than I had thought.

I did say it would perhaps be a bit too much to go on the week long family holiday planned for later in the year - there would be 3 families and the grandparents (my in laws) under one roof, with a number of kids.

If we had separate accommodation where I could retreat I might have considered it.

I had a short but nice message back from my mother in law, not had any contact with my father in law, but my wife said he seemed very unphased or bothered by it !

My brother popped over to see me this Wednesday, and show me his newly painted car. It was the 1st time he or his girlfriend had seen me in person dressed.  It went well, as if nothing had changed, which was really nice. 

Also got to go for a bit of a drive in his car, which is quite a bit faster than mine !

Work

Everything seems OK, my teams has eventually updated for everyone. I've had plenty of calls with people, and they have all treated me normally.

I went into the office twice last week, there were only a few of us in, but it went fine.  I was in a Joe Browns dress the 1st day, then a long utility dress on the Tuesday. 

I got some questions about what operations I might have from a long time colleague, which i had sort of been expecting. Had it been someone I barely knew it would have been less appropriate, but it's must be 6 years we've worked together at least.

Had a nice call from my boss while I was in the office too, he wanted to be sure I had no plans to leave, as I was a key employee - which is always nice to hear.

I am back in the office tommorow, might do jeans and a top this time perhaps. I am not 100% sure that floral dresses meet with the dress code - but I guess I am highly unlikely to be told off for fear of upsetting me :)

Social Events

I did Stockport beer festival on the 21st.  I popped into the bank when I arrived in the morning so I
could get my name changed on my account.   Did a bit of shopping , and a had a beer in a nice tap house before checking into the hotel.

I was joining a couple of friends, and had to wait while one of them glammed up, but did eventually get to the beer festival in the late afternoon. 

It is a nice little festival, we stayed until after 10pm, there was food on, I had a chilli, and got some cheese and crackers too.  I was dressed fairly sensibly compared to one my friends, she gets a lot of attention with her LED dress and handbag.

I was at Chameleons this Thursday, I had driven down in the Morris because I was heading to the owners club national meeting the day after.  I had failed to read the forum again, so was surprised that the car park was shut.

It was not big deal though, I just parked at my hotel and got an Uber in - I didn't want to leave my fully packed car on the street.

Considering the issues with the parking there was a really good turnout, I initially thought it might be fairly quiet - nice to see so many make the effort.  Ann gave me a white chocolate Biscoff KitKat to try - it was quite nice :)

Ann gave me a lift back to the hotel, and she got changed there - it seems there was a prom on at the hotel, so it was difficult to get into the car park. There were lots of young ladies in very nice ball gowns, I was most jealous !

I will blog about the Morris Minor national separately.

 

Informing the universe

 

Name Change at work

My name change at work was largely completed on Friday the 14th of June.

My email, Teams , HR login and a few other systems were all updated during the course of the day. Aside from having to restart Onedrive all went to plan !   I did have to manually change my profile picture on a few of them, but that was no great hassle.

I had emailed around 40 colleagues on the Thursday afternoon - partly as a lot of them would have been off on the Friday, so wanted to make sure they saw the email in good time.  I had a number of lovely messages back from perhaps 10 of them so far.  A few teams messages too.  

There are a few women who I would have hoped to have got a message back from, but haven't - but I have also had a few of the guys send me nice messages, so it's not worked out badly.

The email was a slightly modified version of one Ann sent to me, that had been used by one of her colleagues :

Hello,

I hope you are well - I have some important news to share with you.

It may surprise you to learn that I am transgender. I have been living as a woman outside of work for a while now, and I feel ready to make this change in my professional life as well.

Starting from Friday the 14th of June, I will be going by the name Isobel (or Izzy for short) and using she/her pronouns. All of my IT accounts will be updated throughout the day, although it may be Monday before everything is in synch.

I kindly ask you to respect my identity and refer to me accordingly. This is not a whim or a phase, but a core part of who I am.

I understand that this may be new or confusing for you, and that you may have questions or concerns. I am happy to answer any reasonable questions you may have, as long as they are respectful and appropriate. You can email me privately or talk to me in person if you prefer.

I also want to reassure you that I am still the same person you know and work with. I am not expecting you to change your behaviour or attitude towards me drastically. You don't have to walk on eggshells around me or avoid certain topics. Just treat me as you would any other colleague. 

I know that mistakes can happen, especially in the beginning. If you accidentally misgender me or use my old name, don't make a big deal out of it. Just correct yourself and move on. What matters to me is your intent, not your perfection.

I appreciate your support and understanding in this transition. I am looking forward to continuing working with you as my true self.

Best Regards,

I was dressed for the first time on Friday (working from home)  , but I only had two calls that day, one from someone who had been notified, and had sent me a nice message, and one from one of my closer colleagues who had known about me for some time, and was checking up on me. So I haven't really interacted with many people as yet.

I will likely get more calls on Monday, I shall report back :)

Telling my Parents

My dad has been waiting on a letter from the DVLA confirming he is still OK to drive. I had visited my parents yesterday, and this got brought up in conversation. I mentioned I had my new drivers license back (it arrived  late last week).  My mum's curiosity got the better of her, and she asked why I needed a new one, so I mentioned I had changed my name.

I could see she wasn't very happy, but I had taken my youngest with me, and I don't think she wanted to cause a fuss in front of him.  She did ask me what I preferred to be called, then continued to use my dead name for the rest of the time we were there - three or four times.

I also got a funny look, as I had gone with eyebrows done, and some foundation on my beard shadow area. 

My dad seemed oblivious, didn't really say anything, and deadnamed me when I left - with what is going on with his health I don't really mind with him, it could well be the last year I have with him, so I am not going to get upset with him  over this.  

My mum did send me a Whatsapp after I had returned home, wishing me a happy fathers day for tommorow - normally she would use my name in the message, but this time there was no name at all. So perhaps she will be attempting to not use one at all - which is better than my deadname at least.

I did wonder on reflection if the fathers day thing was another dig, potentially reminding me of my birth gender again, she seems to do this every so often. But I might just be paranoid.

3rd Parties

I got my drivers license back, and separately the deed poll I had sent. I had folded it, as I figure it's better to have a few copies that I can mail out, which I can reuse for other things, rather than spending a lot more on postage to send in big envelopes.

I've notified the electoral register, but not heard back - no idea if I will be able to vote now.

I did tell the HMRC too, using their online system, expecting to hear back from them asking me to post in the deed poll, but also not heard back.

Hoping to go into the bank on Friday to get things started with them, now I have some photo ID.

There are a few suppliers at work I need to email on Monday too.  I've been able to change my gas/electric details online with no proof, so I will be able to print out utility statements soon which will serve as other forms of ID too.  

I've also done things like Amazon and Vinted, as I can now prove who I am to go pick things up if there are delivery issues.

LinkedIn - posted some pics on Insta / Facebook to see what people suggested in terms of hair tied up or down. Most people said down, so I went with that.

Still need to do the Doctors, and will now need to notify Nottingham GIC that the NHS number on my application will need updating when I get a new one. 

Might do my mobile phone contract in a bit.

Medical Updates

I had a box of goodies from GenderGP, not wanting to play side effect roulette, I decided to try one new medication at any time, so I can be sure which one is causing me issues if I get any.

I have done a trial of the Finasteride this week (1mg), not 100% sure but think my tinnitus was a bit worse. There was also a bit of skin itching. I only did a few days, I will likely start on them again this week, but perhaps only taking half a pill a day.

I have not tried the progesterone yet, or the blocker - I am thinking I probably don't even need the blocker and that it was a bit of a waste of time getting it. The Finasteride will suppress my T level, and also increasing my E dosage to 3 pumps a day should also suppress it a bit more too.

My doctor has asked me to schedule another blood test, I am not sure if he just knows that I would want one sooner rather later anyway, he was concerned my E levels were too high - which they for someone with a male NHS number, but he did put in the notes he was aware I was on gel, as I had told him this.

Cosmetic News

I tried a new hair dye by John Freida, it was a foam type - meant to be a amber/brown.  It has worked OK on my grey, but on my darker hair it's not done much.  I didn't like how it went on, I have ordered some Schwarzkopf from Amazon to try - 'Cranberry Bliss' , I am hoping this will work better !

Social events

LFF was fab, there were four girls from Chameleons there, for three of them it was their 1st time. They all seemed to enjoy themselves. I was good, and remained relatively sober, despite several flaming cocktails in the Shed (Flaming Zombies).

I walked one of the girls back to the hotel from the Smokestack, and got her in the lift as she seemed a bit wobbly. Then went back for a bit, and ended up taking another one back via Big Bites as well.  

Ann managed to get the last one back after I had retired to bed, one had gone to bed early after the food, but it was not her 1st time.

I should have been at Chameleons on the Thursday night before my name change at work, but the car park was closed, and I really wanted a good nights sleep before that day, as besides the stress of the change, I also had some really important work to do !

Hopefully will be at the next one.

Last night I was at an 80's night in Hull, which was great - although I am waiting for a bus lane fine, as I am sure I was in one during a time when I shouldn't.

Josephine

I did some cool external videos' with my mounting system on the car, and my YouTube channel numbers seem to be growing a lot faster since the breakdown video - but have attracted more peddle pumpers. Well at least people are watching the videos
:)

The deed is done

 Deed Poll

Last pic of me before I signed

The deed poll was indeed kindly done by Lynn and Ann at Chams on the 23rd of May. Monday was a bank holiday, so it was Tuesday before I notified work.

I sent an email to my boss first, indicating that I would be talking to HR. He rang my back pretty quickly after getting the email, but unfortunately due to issues with Teams not playing call notification through the speaker, I missed it. I sent him a message, but it was then a good few hours before he tried again. 

That stressed me out a little.  But when I did finally get to speak with him it went well.

I explained I would likely agree a date with HR to do a switchover, as all the IT systems would need updating at the same time - perhaps on a day off.  

He asked if it was OK to keep using my old name and pronouns until this had happened - partly in case anything we sent each other needed to be forwarded to anyone else who was not in the know yet.  It seemed sensible to do this, so had no issue. 

I emailed HR after this, slightly amending the wording of the email I had sent my boss. She replied saying that she didn't see any issue in principle, but asked my permission to talk with IT first, then we could have a call about it.

She sent me an invite for the next day, so I didn't have long to wait.  IT had advised it was better for it all to happen on a working day, so that if I had issues logging into anything, someone would be on hand to fix it.  Fridays are better as 1/2 the company is off depending on what cycle they are on.  

So it ended up being set for the 14th of June :)

The HR lady was lovely, and admitted that I would be the 1st to do this, but she didn't want me to feel like a guinea pig.  I did offer to send her some material that could perhaps prove useful if anyone needed any assistance with getting their heads around this.  She mentioned that the standard policy's included the protections that I already knew I had, which was good, and seemed to be really on my side, which was fab :) . I felt quite emotional afterwards, in a good way !

Adventures 

I did Blackpool with four friends last weekend. It was really good, got some nice photos and 3D footage.

We were staying at the Garnet hotel, a first for me - it was really good, the breakfast was excellent. Although my veggie friend didn't like the meat free sausages, and after trying one I could see why.

I picked up Bennie from Wakefield before heading over the Pennines, we arrived around lunch time. 

As I was trying to get the new chargers working two other friends pulled into the same car park. There was also a weird guy who started talking to us - then I recognised his voice , it was another of us in drab. I had never seen her in guy more before :)

We ate at the station café for lunch, it's not actually in the station , it's just near it. We just did some shopping in the afternoon. Had a meal at Peek-a-booze late afternoon. 

In the evening we largely did the normal venues, Ma-Kellys, Galleon , Garlands and finishing at the Flying handbag

We went up the tower on the Saturday morning. Randomly I got a photo with a Dalek in a washing
machine shop on the way there ! 

I saw my friend Bella on the Saturday evening in the DragonFly for a short while, I had some bits that she bought in Whitby a while ago, and had somehow got left in my car.  But she didn't seem to want to stay out with us.

Saturday we did LuLu's , a cocktail place, Galleon, Garlands again perhaps, and then the Flying Handbag. 

There was a free photo session in Lulu's with a while couch, and proper lighting, not had the photo's
back yet. 

I avoided getting too tipsy, cheesy chips were consumed at the Flying handbag at the end of both nights.

This Weekend

Saturday I was meant to go to York pride, but the friend who I was going with had issues, so I didn't bother in the end.  I did go to the camping shop and get a mattress , a folding chair and table , and some other bits. I also put up the tent Ann had gifted me - this is in preparation for the morris minor meeting later this month.

Today I have been for a run in the morning, and then spent a good few hours tinkering on the car. She is largely ready, I got the electric windscreen pump working. It doesn't look very in keeping, but it works so much better than the original manual pump - and the useless modern lookalike replacement I bought. 

Only 4 days at work this week, then LFF !!!!!  I am very much looking forward to it :)