Posts have been pretty few and far between recently I know, this is because we are flat out catching up with as many people as possible before we go back home to Australia and unfortunately there will be lots of people I would have liked to have seen that we just simply won’t have time that see so I apologise for that in advance. We are however back in just over seven months so it won’t be too long to wait.
On the whole most of the people we have caught up with have been lovely, today we had coffee with some ex colleagues from Drakes which was just lovely and there have been lots more enjoyable experiences over the last week or so. Sadly there have been a couple of disappointing ones which for what ever reason haven’t been as positive, one in particular caused a considerable amount of distress and upset by claiming to have been my mother’s best friend and that there couldn’t possibly have been anything wrong with me when I was born as she would have known about it, well obviously she wasn’t as close a friend as she thought because I can assure you I didn’t make it up, firstly i had the scars to prove it and because they are no longer there I did take photos of them just in case something like this ever came up, secondly I have a letter from my specialist confirming that I was born intersex and thirdly I went through a very unpleasant grilling by a psychiatrist on several occasions to make sure transitioning was the right thing to do so I certainly didn’t take kindly to being accused of making the whole thing up. If that wasn’t bad enough the same person then asked me why at 18 I then started dating girls if I wanted to be one, once again this is a prime example of ignorance, the confusion of gender and sexuality, the two are just on different pages and so many people don’t understand that and spout forth in ignorance. As one of my very good friends told me, gender is who you go to bed as and sexuality is who you go to bed with, the two are completely different but so often confused for one reason or another. One thing for certain, if she had been on my Christmas card list she certainly would not be now!
That said, I have had some really positive reunions over the last few days so will not let this uneducated person cloud my holiday and I’m sure the rest of the people we are meeting with while we are in Yorkshire will all be positive. One thing my psychiatrist taught me is that if someone has a problem with what I have done it is exactly that, their problem and I simply don’t need them in my life, thankfully I have not had a single negative reaction back home in Australia so as we spend the vast majority of our lives there that is the most important thing.
One of the most surprisingly pleasant experiences has been the banks, both here and back home I have had the most amazing treatment. I have already posted about my experience at home but the people who have looked after me at Santander both In Driffield and in Guildford have been amazing, the Driffield one sorted the whole thing out with a minimum of fuss and in a very pleasant manner. If I can find a place to give feedback when I get the online banking set up I will certainly mention both of them by name as they have been an excellent example of how to look after customers.