After a huge amount of thought and discussion I have made a decision on who will carry out my revision surgery, helped in no small part by a 40 minute long Skype conversation with the person concerned, that being Dr Kathy Rumer in Philadelphia! It was big decision but in the end it came down to the fact that I know her and she knows me, she did the original job so knows what she is up against and even though it’s a massive journey (55 hours traveling) it will not actually cost any more than going to Sydney as Kathy will not charge me for the surgery itself and will give us two weeks accommodation in the same recovery suites we used in june so the only costs will be getting there, a hire car, the hospital fees and a small amount of accommodation at each end of our stay. Not that the financial part of things is the most important as I needed to be comfortable with the surgeon and confident that it will be done well, so it’s done, I have booked the surgery and confirmed we will use the recovery suite, all that is needed now is to organise the flights, hire car and initial accommodation before the surgery.
So the challenge is on! I have just seven weeks to get fully prepared and get back down to my optimum weight of around 75kgs, it will not be as easy as it was in may as I am not able to use the bike for obvious reasons so will have to rely on eating well and getting as much gentle exercise as possible. I have made an encouraging start, on the morning after we arrived home I weighed a portly 84.1 kgs, more than I have weighed since we arrived back here in 2015 after almost 5 months of traveling but this morning I came in at 80.7 so only around 6 kilos in seven weeks which will be hard but I’m up for it as I had no problems with the surgery in may and I’m sure getting to a good state of fitness helped that. There is also the job of getting into the right state of mind for the surgery, I think that is also under control as I am confident that I have made the right decision in going back to Philadelphia but as a back up I do have my psychologist Hayley to call upon and will be seeing her before I go. She has been a massive help to me over the period of my transition, just knowing that she is there is a comfort in itself.
One of the challenges of going back to Philadelphia was that I would need to apply for another visa as the one I got in February for my original trip was now invalid due to changing my name. This was a job which I was really not looking forward to as the first one was an unpleasant experience to say the least. Anyway an appointment was eventually made for 10am on Wednesday. I set off in good time at 6.30 and had the best run up to Perth I have had in years, had a toilet stop at the services just south of Perth and headed into the city. There were a couple of times I was down to around 30/40 kph but was never stopped completely, had no problem getting a parking place and set of on the 2 km walk to the American Embassy. Even though my appointment was not until 10am I decided to head up to the security section on the fourth floor as we were waiting there for quite some time when we went in February, this time though I was shown straight into security, had my bag scanned and placed in a holding locker, walked through the body scanner, checked in with the guard then taken to the lift and up to the 11th floor, I couldn’t believe how easy it had been up to now and was expecting a hold up once I got to the interview place, not so! I was told to go to desk 4 and a lovely lady asked how my day was going, took my finger prints, checked the details on my application form and told me to take a seat and wait till my name was called out, once again I was expecting a long wait but not the case, I had hardly started to read a magazine when my name was called out and I went to the desk, he asked me where I was heading, why I was going, was actually sympathetic about my having to return! He asked how I was paying for my visit so I told him and he replied “you’re good to go, your passport will be mailed to you in due course” I couldn’t really believe how easy it had been, much more pleasant than the first one. I was taken back to the lift and went down to the fourth floor to pick up my bag, again very easy, back into the lift and down to the ground floor. By the time of my appointment (10am) I had ordered a coffee at the cafe on the ground floor and was reading the paper, very pleased with my morning! To round off my visa application, my passport arrived at 7am the following morning having been sent by courier, all in all a very pleasant experience.