Is it just me?

[Absaroka]

I'm glad you're feeling better Anne. I take it no one really has any idea what happened or what the cause was?

Zari

[Anne Bonny]

No, labs seem fine, not on any stimulants, or medications which would cause this. I do run, and with the 27pounds of weight loss my pulse and blood pressure should be lower. Some Olympic level runners can have rates in the 50's but I am nowhere near that level of athletics. I suppose we will see, thanks Zari.

[Anthony Simon]

The only thing I can think about is my first analyst. Like one day I came in and he had dirty great rings under his eyes. Evidently something was going on. Apparently he had a major family bereavement or something, but no-one seemed that bothered. The next thing I know his wife's ringing me up to tell me he's in hospital after a quadruple bypass.

Now I don't really know the specifics (at all) about it. But it does seem like that came pretty much out of the blue....I know you're under what looks like horrendous pressure with your wife Anne, so...People do have physical breakdowns when a lot of the underlying stuff is mental...

Coping with you wife's problem is obviously difficult and there seems to have been an exacerbation recently. You say this has stopped you dressing, but might it not also have a role in your physical problems?

[Anne Bonny]

Hi Anthony, feel guilty about stealing Paula's thread about how sometimes we just feel silly or rediculous about crossdressing. Which I suppose we all do from time to time.

I did bring this up with the Dr, told him maybe I'm nuts? It could all be anxiety, my wife has dememtia. But they had actual EKG changes, Vital signs, and some symptoms - at least in church. I have been taking care of myself too - down 27 pounds look much better in a dress! Jogging. Talking as here, housework, stocks, news, looking for a new sailboat. So I am caring for myself - were I to go down it would be like the central tent pole being knocked out! I do have a CT, have the holter monitor on now, and then a follow up - no symptoms since so I am fine, thank's for your concerns. It is great to be involved in such a caring group - wonder what it would be like if we all met up some day.? Of course people really don't know the full spectrum of our personality - I imagine we would have a lot of very real differences economically, spiritually or beliefs, cultures, manners, morals, politics, ages, interests. Nah! this is the best place to meet.

[Carolynn]

Stress can be a killer. And add your stress in dealing with your wife to your obvious gender dysphoria (if you are a crossdresser you have gender dysphoria) and you have layers of stress.

Before I finally began therapy and transition, I had a rather high blood pressure, and occasionally experienced heart palpitations, unexplained weight gain (since I had been eating basically a diabetic diet with my father and mother, getting a lot of excercise, though sometimes it was episodic). I was on a fairly high dose, of two blood pressure meds, and still had blood pressures in the 140/90 range.

I started therapy, and my blood pressure started dropping. Then I started losing weight. Then I went on hrt, and blood pressure went down to almost too low, so my meds were dropped, and now I am without meds, though now I have type II diabietes, a family problem with those meds. (Sigh) My wt. is cyclically a problem, and it is related to stress, such as the long illness of my sister and her eventual death. My BP went up a bit, to 88/63 subsequently, but with resuming more regular excercise it has gone back down. But yes, stress and grief can and does affect one in serious manners, and seeing your wife's decline can engender grief as well and adds to the stress. It is especially so if you have a non-type A personality as you and I both seem to do. We kinda need non-confrontation and we need better stress coping methods than others, but often don't recognize that need.

Sounds like you are doing what you can to take care of yourself. Keep it up, OK?
Carolynn

[Absaroka]

Carolyn I'm going to disagree with your statement that if you are a crossdresser you have gender dysphoria. When I looked it up, gender dysphoria was described as a discontent with one's gender. I'm perfectly content to be a man who likes to wear a dress. So the dysphoria part of the term would be inaccurate. In fact since I'm pretty happy with the way things are in this regard, I don't think I need any diagnosis at all. Which is fine, I have a whole slew of other diagnosis which I am perfectly happy to accept.

I'd think something similar is probably true of you. Prior to transition you probably had gender dysmorphia. After transition you were now happy with your gender, so the gender dysmorphia could be considered cured. But feel free to disagree, it's certainly not up to me to have an opinion about what you are anyway.

The whole gender diagnosis issue is something that I think could sometimes benefit from the "radical therapy" ideas of the 1970's, i.e. that sometimes it is not so much the person who is sick as that the person is healthy and reacting to a sick society. I don't completely agree with most of what those folks said, but there was much that could not be discarded out of hand. For example I think society having trouble with me in a dress is a sign of society having some sort of gender dysmorphia. After all I am part of society, and society is uncomfortable with how I express parts of my gender, therefore it is unable to accept this aspect of itself.

Anyway, whatever the causes, Anne I hope you will continue to take care of yourself. I've had a bunch of things happen to me over the years that left the doctors totally mystefied. I was always appreciative of them saying simply "we don't know what's going on"

Zari

[Anne Bonny]

Thanks Carolynn, and Zari. Listening to Mozart, good for the brain and soothing for both of us, Enya's another good one, ...