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After the psychiatric nurse recommended I seek out the community
mental health clinic for on going care, after a couple weeks of
consideration, I did. The psychiatric nurse was the first
person, beyond my mother nearly a decade earlier, that I had ever
started to bring-up my 'situation' to. And yet while she didn't have
any interest in it, I found that once I had opened that door, I
wanted to continue talking about it... With someone.
And so I sought out the community mental health clinic and found
their main branch location at the far end of town. When I got there
and talked with them and found out their phone number for future
visits, they noted that they had a branch location nearer to where I
lived and set-up my first appointment there. It was based on a
sliding scale and since my personal income was only a few hundred
dollars of temporary state aid each month, I was able to get in and
have appointments for a two dollar co-pay. So far, so good, I
reflected.
'Stella Hernandez' was assigned as my counselor and we first had to
get the elephant out of the room; within the first two weeks we
discussed and she agreed that I didn't have any psychological eating
disorder. Once that topic was out of the way, I thought we could now
get to the subject of my strange puberty and I could gain some
understanding and insight.
She explained to me how she had benefited a great deal from counseling
herself and how she had wished she could continue with it even though
her counselor finally decided one day that she no longer needed to
come. But then it occurred to her to seek a job as a counselor
herself, and then in this way she would be able to continue in
counseling, albeit with the shoe on the other foot. Stella
told me of the time she and her friends got to go on a trip to Spain,
in their teenaged years, and visit the coast there. She told me of
the job she had with a retired military boss who would only call her
by her last name and how that hurt her feelings until she realized
through counseling that he was just calling her by the last name as
he called everyone else and it didn't mean anything personal.
I was initially very impressed with Stella and her technique of being
the first to open up with me so, I assumed, I'd grow
comfortable in the relationship and more easily open up to her. She
told me many highlights of her childhood and the awkward moments
during her teenaged years and of troubles finding her first job as an
adult. By the end of the first five weeks, I found myself wanting to
force my way, edgewise, into the continuous monologue about herself:
So I could talk about 'me'.
It was then I began to realize what she had meant by her desire to
continue with counseling, the only problem was I was now
the one making the co-payment on her
behalf.
By the sixth week I made sure to have the first word of the
appointment before she could start talking at length about another
aspect of her life. I said I wanted to talk about my gender issue
and what it meant. She flat out told me how lucky I was to be
legally male and not to worry about it because it made me 'so
privileged in society'. In fact, she told me, I had never
known discrimination in my life as a result of being deemed male and
why would I want to open up that can of worms? I sat there
incredulous for a time, apparently my gaping expression was enough to
leave her speechless for a moment.
''So you're saying that me, as a stutterer with
a mixed raced background, had never known discrimination in my life?
That seems plausible to you?'' I responded.
She was flustered for a moment then clarified that being a woman was
a whole new level of discrimination in society that would make
anything else I had experienced pale in comparison. Be that as it
may, I didn't know why that meant we shouldn't talk about my
'situation' and what might have caused it, what it meant, and what I
could or should do about it. But the flood gates were open and she
gave me examples of people thinking less of her because she was a
woman, ultimately the examples didn't seem all that different from my
own experiences, but our time was soon up.
When I arrived for my next appointment, she handed me a flyer for
what I'll call the 'Gender Support Group' of Colorado. Glancing
through the flyer it was apparently a support group for transsexuals
and transvestites. By handing me the flyer, Stella had successfully
kept me quiet enough that she could begin talking about her first
husband. When I tried to ask her about the flyer and what it meant,
she didn't want to lose track of the topic we were already
discussing: Her husband.
By the eighth appointment, I arrived to find out it was check-point
day and Stella quickly told me that I was to have an interview
with her boss. I was ushered into a dark backroom office where a guy
introduced himself, explained that his job was to get his own feeling
about my case and then next week I'd be back seeing Stella again. He
started off by noting how Stella had told him that I was so
comfortable having her as my counselor as she reminded me of my
mother. I burst out laughing and I said if she had reminded me of my
mother I wouldn't have been caught dead seeing her. Her boss was
taken aback, did I have issues
with my mother? A
bit, I returned. He was surprised Stella didn't know
about that, but we have been talking about my gender issues,
right? Not really,
I answered, she's
told me quite a bit about her own life. But
that's just to get things going in the first week and you've been
discussing your gender issues ever since...?
No it's been nearly every
week and I've found myself frustrated trying to get in a word about
my issues during the appointments.
Really?
He commented as he made some notes. Yeah,
I affirmed. So she told
me that you wanted some medication.
She did?
I replied. You had
talked with her about starting medication...
he lead. No,
I answered, what would it
be for? You
mean you haven't talked about it?
The subject's never come
up.
''Hum,'' he said as he made more notes and had a growing concern
spreading across his face. That was the end of the appointment.
There were a few minutes left and Stella intercepted me in the
waiting area as I was heading for the door, ''So that went well,
then?''
I asked her what the whole medication thing was about and she looked
nervous, ''You mean we hadn't talked about that?''
No, I answered and then I noted with a confused smile, ''And
he said you thought you reminded me of my mother?''
''Don't I?'' she returned. Given that she physically bore no
resemblance to my mother, nor in personality either, I said she
didn't. ''You don't get along with your mother?'' she
suddenly asked. I told her I didn't and she became wide-eyed
as she thanked me and I was on my way.
When I arrived for the ninth appointment, I was first called into the
financial aid office where they told me they had recently changed
their standards, they would now need a full financial disclosure from
my mother in order to figure what my adjusted co-payment would be
since ''she was financially supporting me.'' I told them that,
actually, I was more of a squatter in her home and she didn't give me
a penny to help pay for anything, not even food. The financial aid
people couldn't believe that and said the standard was now everyone
living under 'one roof' must have their finances reviewed in order to
determine what the appropriate co-payment would be.
When I affirmed that I wouldn't be able to get that sort of
information from her, they just couldn't believe it. I then asked
about the 'one roof' policy, did that mean that people living in
an apartment building with one roof would have to provide all of
their neighbors' financial statements in order to determine the
co-payment of one tenant? ''Yes,'' was the answer I was given
and I couldn't believe that.
Since I couldn't provide the level
of financial paperwork they now required, my time with them had
apparently come to an end. Just
like that.
I was actually thankful for it.
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