My top surgery adventure as a nonbinary person with the NHS continues

Based on, and intended as an update to, this post. It was updated in January 2015 here.

Bit of a history:

So I was on my surgeon’s (Victoria Rose’s) waiting list for 4 months.

At the moment I am in a constant state of overwhelm. I am excited, and I am scared, and I am feeling everything that I’ve felt since I worked out I was trans all at once. I am realising that in the grand scheme of things even though this is a huge catalyst my mission is just to get through it as minimally-scathed as possible, because this is incredibly stressful and getting from A to B is all I actually need to do.

I’ve made accommodations for my cat (she’ll be fed by my neighbour while me and Adam are in London, and then she can have my house all to herself while I sleep at Adam’s to prevent her climbing on my chest in the mornings). I’m looking at hotels for me and Adam for arriving the night before we check into the hotel. My mum will come to London to be with me too. I’ll stay in the hotel until I feel well enough to travel back to Aberdyfi, either driven by my mum or on the train in a first class seat.

I’m assembling advice and an Amazon wishlist.

Exercised and strong muscles heal faster. I’m going to try to walk and use weights on different muscle groups every day pre-surgery.

I’ll need shirts with buttons down the front because I won’t be able to lift my arms for a while.

I’ll need drinking draws because I won’t be able to lift a mug to my mouth easily.

I’ll have to make sure everything I might need is below chest height.

So if you’ve got any post-top-surgery recovery advice, or any advice about the surgery itself, let me know. :)

10 days to go…