Update

A couple of quick things:

1. I haven’t been able to pin down what’s happening with the site. I (and other folks) have occasionally needed to reload various browsers to make it appear. It’s a new phenomenon for me. I’ve got another WordPress blog hosted on the same cloud, and it’s not experience the problem. I’m looking into it.

2. Holy fuck. As of this writing, I’ve raised just under $900. I don’t really know what to say– that’s just a hundred billion hot dogs of awesome. I have to admit being a bit choked up when I was sending out thank you notes.

3. My life is busy, but I’ve got a bunch of posts in my head that should come out in the next week or two. A lot of these will involve hosting discussions about what A Cunt of One’s Own is, how folks can participate in it, and what y’all would hope to see from it (the site, not the organs).
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Having already raised $900 will allow me to make progress on some preoperative stuff, notably hair removal. I’ve got some comments about that in the works. I can’t say I’m looking forward to that process, lol, but the very business of having to scrounge the Earth for a hair-removal professional (done!) ties in quite nicely (albeit craptacularly) with how so many people with marginalized bodies are required to be experts on their own medical care.

I don’t know how much hair removal will cost, nor how long it will take. That’s part of the “fun”.

I have a much better idea about the process of getting a second letter confirming that I’m sufficiently responsible to become eligible for cunt ownership. I’ve budgeted $500 for that process. Bloody hell.

I’m even less tolerant of the cost of demonstrating the unnecessary now that I’m potentially using other peoples’ money.

Like, I suspect, most people, I’m pretty resigned to spending a buttload of money on medical procedures. I like to classify my expenses into three categories:

1. Okay Fine. This thing needs to get done, and I have the money to pay for it.

2. Heh. This thing needs to get done, but I don’t necessarily have the money to pay for it. Y’all should send me a bill, and we’ll see how that works out.

3. Not Going to Happen. This a huge category of medical care that encompasses things that a civilized society would afford to all its members, but oooooooops I don’t live in a civilized society, and oooooooops my bank account.

For years, the second letter has fallen under the third category. I’m not going to pay money I don’t have to convince an “expert” of what I already know.

Here’s the thing. A lot of folks out there, virtually all of whom have never met me, have made sacrifices to pay for my medical care, and that’s amazing.

But. That $500(ish) is going to demonstrate the obvious. It’s a step that can be skipped. Drugs cost money. Surgical supplies cost money. Practitioners’ time costs money. Getting me from here to there costs money. There’s no getting around any of that. Somebody has to pay some sort of cost for all of those essential things.

It is not necessary to make me pay money to demonstrate the obvious and inconsequential. And yet, here we are.