Chapter 42

"So what now?" Mum asked as we ate our breakfast. "Has the GP made you an appointment?"

I'd woken with no memory of getting to bed but feeling ready for the day so after my morning walk, as we ate our breakfast, mum and dad got the details of yesterday's doctors' appointments (minus my more emotional moments).

"I'm calling Mr Pitt and Litara. She's the one who knows how to arrange things and I want Mr Pitt and the surgeon who operated 3 weeks ago. Although the GP didn't think they would operate again until the new year in the meantime I want to give my body the best chance possible."

Surprisingly the number I had for Mr Pitt was his own mobile and after I described the GP's examination he said he'd be delighted to cooperate and make arrangements through Litara who I gave my authority once I'd brought her up-to-date.

Dad and I went to the yard together where mid-morning we were joined by Bill who was full of himself with the progress being made on the new hull which he thought could be delivered in January for Dad's work to commence. In particular he liked what sounded like a car's roll-bars which went over the cockpit. These were important to Dad who had been waiting for their real dimensions to order solar panels to fill the space between the arches so as well as providing power they would create an open sided roof over the cockpit

"I think 'Bubblegum Pink'." I interjected. That halted them in their tracks and they waited for an explanation. "Dad, you're covering the boat in equipment, Bill, you are so keen on carbon fibre that you have forgotten that carbon fibre is black. I'm the one who has to live on this boat and Litara has to think in terms of attracting an audience so I thought maybe we should paint it 'bubblegum pink'?"

"Over my dead body!" sums up the reaction of both Dad and Bill, for once in complete agreement although they did see that black wasn't a real option. A colour chart 'happened' to be on the work bench and I gave them space to argue colour schemes with a little guidance such as pointing out that plain white was too bland to be memorable.

About 40 minutes later it was agreed that tangerine and white with a very thin black line seperating them would work and I pulled out some photos from my bag of a butterfly to symbolise sails, and a paper nautilus (known as an argonaut which is an octopus in a boat-like shell named after Jason and the Argonauts who sailed the Argo).

Bill was over-the-moon at the images, one or both of which he could see as a logo for the boat if it reached the production stage. My Da just looked at me… "How did you ever persuade me that you were a boy?"

It was over 2 weeks before anything disrupted our peaceful Welsh lives when Litara, after a weekend in Cardiff drove me on the Monday morning to the London flat, which by now I was convinced must belong to her unknown lover - I admit that between shopping, cleaning and exploring the area I did look for clues but to no avail!

I'd been warned that my appointment the following day with Mr Pitt would be similar to my first at the clinic with scans and biopsy so no breakfast, but there would be other doctors also actively taking part in the examination. Litara made an early start Tuesday morning on driving me to the clinic and seemed nervous, explaining that two of the doctor were particularly interested in my unique anatomy and I shouldn't expect much in the way of bedside manners but if I phoned her when they were done she'd treat me to a decent meal.

Charles met me in reception and as we reached the imaging department before the others arrived he took time to describe my surgeon, "She has the hands of an angel and demeanour of a dockworker." This surgeon was a specialist in Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome (MRKH) which results in 1 in 5000 women being born with an underdeveloped or no vagina and uterus and with her was a research scientist who specialised in the artificial growth of human tissue. Go to the butcher's and buy a piece of steak. Once back home lay it on a board and pound it with a hammer. After an hour with my doctors that steak is what I felt like both in the sense of pounded and of hungry.

After the examination and tissue extraction, alone again with Charles, he summed up the situation. "A human body is a construct of organs and glands held in place and given shape by connective tissue. The skin is an organ and in your case genetically XY. Ovaries and the uterus are also organs which in your case are genetically XX. Connective tissue both holds in place and separates the organs and glands and your genetically XX(y) connective tissue has done a good job in maintaining your jigsaw puzzle body.

Today we have seen not only that you have healed well and your uterus is what we would expect in a 9 or 10 year old but you have a cervix which wasn't obvious before. This gives choices, none of which are perfect but doing nothing is no longer an option:-
1. even if you choose to live as an infertile male, or an infertile female with the best sexual reassignment surgery available (SRS), you will still need a hysterectomy as menses is likely to start in about a year;
2. from cells harvested today the scientist will be trying to grow tissue on a collagen fibre base which, if you choose to attempt to live as a fully fertile woman, we hope will be accepted as a graft by both your cervix and a vaginal opening we can construct from your penis and scrotal skin in time consolidating to give full female fertility, but however with a high risk of serious infection leading to tissue damage or even death;
3. if the graft fails you will then need a hysterectomy and the vagina formed by surgery will be blind ended and due to skin loss probably not as deep as that created during the more normal vaginoplasty of SRS.

This is a big decision to make Venus but please let me know your decision as soon as possible as the artificially grown tissue created from today's harvesting will be ready in 6 to 7 weeks, just after New Year.