- S
“Be strong enough to stand alone, smart enough to know when you need help, and brave enough to ask for it”
-Unknown
Hello family, friends, and all supporters alike! I need your help to make a long time dream of mine possible! The time has come for me to take the next big step in my transition, TOP SURGERY! I’ve been absolutely blessed with the opportunity to have my surgery with one of the pioneers in transgender care, The Crane Center, which is located right here in my hometown. I’ve also been fortunate enough to have health care insurance that does not exclude trans care. While these factors have greatly decreased the overall financial cost of my surgery by removing any need for travel, I need your help to make this a reality. As many of you know, I work as a full time plumber 5 days a week as my current career choice which is very labor intensive. Due to this I will be required to take 4 weeks off of work post surgery in order to fully recover with no complications. All the funds I raise here will contribute to my expenses during this time to ensure I can recover without the stress of bills and my day to day expenses. This will also ensure that my partner can devote time to helping care for me along this journey.
This surgery will truly change my life. For the duration of my transition I’ve had to bind in multiple layers just to appear flat chested. Binding over a long period of time leads to bruised ribs, back pain, and breathing complications. Binding also puts a limit on the types of activities that I can enjoy like swimming, staying active, and wearing clothes that make me feel comfortable. To anyone who can help know that your donation is greatly appreciated and will be used to enhance the life of another. To anyone who’s reading this and can’t make a financial contribution, I appreciate you still. If you can’t donate, please share it with someone who might! Thank you for taking the time to read this, and share my story! I will be sending out a special thank you to all donors! Please fill out the form through the hyperlink below to receive your special thank you!
For those of you who want to know more about me and my story, I’ll be getting into more detail below!
To say I always knew I identified as transgender, wouldn’t be true. At the ripe age of 23, I can think back over my life and remember that there was always something different about me. I was never the typical girl, nor did I have any desire to be. Growing up, I had no idea what being trans meant or how it could one day apply to me. For most of my teenage years, I identified as a lesbian female, but found comfort in presenting as masculine. As I got older, and started to think about what my future held for me and the kind of life I wanted to live, I discovered a massive incongruence; ME. I discovered that the body I have, doesn’t align with who I am on the inside. I felt so confused and empty. To feel disconnected from the only body I’ve ever known was a new low for me. Though I had no idea that there was a term for people like me or even a medical diagnosis for what I was going through. I spent the better part of the summer before my senior year of high school extremely depressed, asking God, “Why me?!”, begging Him to be normal. One evening I found myself going down a YouTube rabbit hole, and stumbled upon a video explaining what it means to be transgender. As I watched I can remember a sense of panic overtook me. While I was partially relieved that I wasn’t an isolated basket case, I was also in complete denial. I cried and prayed, and cried and prayed… until one day I finally stopped fighting myself, and decided to embrace who I am. Once I stopped rejecting myself, I was so excited to learn about all the new possibilities that life had for me. A life where I’m addressed with the proper pronouns, called by a name that doesn’t make me cringe, and have the ability to take the medical steps needed to align my mind, body and soul. At the time I had no idea what the journey ahead of me would entail. Like many of us, when starting a new journey, I was very impatient. I wanted my transition to be almost instant. The truth is I’m 5 years into my transition and I’m still not where I want to be, but I’m so thankful for all the steps that I have taken to get to this point because without them I would not be here. I live by the motto: it’s a marathon, not a sprint. I may not run the race as fast as others, but I’m taking this journey at my own pace.
Thank you again for taking the time to either donate, read my story, share it with another, or all of the above. I truly appreciate each and every one of my supporters from the bottom of my heart.