1 month after top surgery / Summer of t-shirts #1
Posted: July 1, 2016 Filed under: t-shirts, top surgery | Tags: androgyny, fashion, gender identity, genderqueer, lgbtq, non-binary, queer, t-shirts, trans, transgender, vintage 14 CommentsYesterday, I went out in a t-shirt, without the ace wrap I’ve been wearing for 3 weeks, for the first time! It felt seriously amazing. (I still have sterile pads over my nipples because they are still sloughing off gross stuff, so it’s going to get even better, once that’s over!) I don’t know when I last wore just a t-shirt, out – 10 years ago? 12 years ago? Sometime in there, before I started feeling overly-self-conscious about my chest.
I had my 1 month appointment via Skype, with the physician’s assistant, and it went pretty much how I imagined it would. I focused mostly on what to do to continue healing, which is going slowly, and also to change my return-to-work date. Whenever I brought up a concern about an aspect of the appearance, I was told, “Right now it is ______; in _____ amount of months, it will be healed nicely. Your final results won’t be visible until a year from surgery.” It felt like I was being fed stock answers. I can live with that for now, but I doubt things are going to change enough for it to actually look good. I’m not happy with the results. Some of it seems like no big deal – it can be fixed. One thing though does have me worried: it seems to me that some muscle may actually have been taken out, along an axis crossing through the nipple, on the right side.
I’ll just continue to document the changes or lack thereof. Such as: neither areola is actually a circle. I’m being told that they will change into circles. I highly doubt that. I’m concerned that down the road, it’s going to be a struggle to get anyone connected to this surgeon to acknowledge that I might need revisions. If that’s the case, I envision myself getting opinions from other surgeons, and going from there…
All this is far away though. Right now, I’m enjoying focusing what I am happy about: wearing t-shirts!!! This was the number one thing I was looking forward to. I’m thinking I’ll start a short series where I write about some of my favorite t-shirts. Here’s one (this is the one I wore out, yesterday):
It says, “MUSIC LIVES ON TDK.”
I have found that to be true – most of the blank tapes I’ve gotten to make mix tapes have happened to be TDK! I found this at a thrift store about 12 years ago. I used to wear it a lot, under flannels and hoodies. Nowadays I rarely wear it, not because I stopped liking it, but because it started to get pretty threadbare, and I don’t want to wear it out. I have a couple of t-shirts like that – I love them and have worn them too much and now I don’t really get to wear them. (Largely because they were worn so much before I got them, too. I’d guess this shirt is at least 30 years old.) It is 50/50 (so soft!), which is way better than 100% cotton, in my opinion, but I wonder if that contributes to it not holding up so well. Also, it is a size large, which always gets to me with vintage clothing, because people used to be so much smaller back then?!? I am a present-day small.
I just did a google search for this t-shirt, and found one on etsy selling for $146.06 Canadian dollars, which is currently $113.34 US dollars. Dang! That’s a keeper.
janitorqueer 
Fantastic shirt! Kind of makes me miss TDK.
Maybe you could ask around in Facebook transguy groups about your results. At some point I came across a photo of someone who had chest surgery but it healed with a dent – I believe they had a revision and it turned out okay.
Not 100% sure though -iit was a while ago – but it might help you to talk to some guys who have had a similar experience.
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That’s reassuring to hear – that the dent turned out OK. Yeah, that is good advice to ask some people their opinions… I think I’ll do that down the road. Not quite ready yet…
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I don’t doubt that at this point the assistant did give you stock answers to your concerns. I wouldn’t worry about that. I’ve heard that doctors sometimes make the nipples oval at the beginning, knowing that they will stretch and round out as the skin stretches and heals. And, I am at about 3 months out now and I have a lot of lumps and bumps and my surgeon is saying the same thing to me….wait for at least six months to see the beginning of what it will look like in the end. I know it’s hard to not judge it right now, but it will continue to change with time. I thought I was going to have bad dog ears at the beginning, but that has mellowed out a LOT now and in another 3 months I might not have them at all. And I had a really large pucker in the middle of my chest in the beginning that concerned me that is almost completely gone now. Time truly does heal, especially when it comes to surgeries. I’m sure that Dr. Rumer will do what she can to make sure you’re happy in the end with your results.
Also, back when I used to make a lot of mix tapes TDK was the gold standard for me. Love the shirt!
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Thanks for the encouraging words! That’s awesome that yours changed so much, and is continuing to change. I will be patient and see what happens… And about the oval nipples – that sounds right, I’ve heard that before too, but these nipples are already ovals in the wrong direction, like oblong horizontally, the direction they would naturally stretch anyway! We’ll see…
Yeah, TDK is awesome! It’s cool to hear it was the gold standard!
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Awesome! Enjoy your summer of t-shirts!
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Thanks!
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I’m a fellow lover of t-shirts and love the idea of doing a series post top-surgery about your favorite ones! Looking forward to reading more and following your experience of top surgery.
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Thanks Raye! Yep, more to come soon!
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T-shirt with no bra/binder/bounce is the best thing ever – also having a slim side profile. I bought some new T-shirts post surgery – for years I didn’t want any logo’s or sayings on my chest because I was so self conscious of it – I only wore solids (and no stripes until I started binding).
My oldest shirt is from 1989 (Silence = Death).
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Oh wow, that’s amazing you still have that shirt. Was that part of ACT UP?
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Silence=Death was created by Gran Fury which was a small collective of gay male artists. They “gave” the logo to ACT UP and we used it from the very beginning (1987) onward. My shirt is threadbare and I wear it only once or twice a year.
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I’m glad that you’re focusing on the positive. Great t-shirt by the way. Peace.
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Thanks! I love your style!
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Thank you! I wish I could have your writing skills. Keep up the good work. 🙂
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