This all started on December the 15th, 2001. I arrived in England from the United States of America, the land of the free, the home of the brave. I contacted my doctor, and within days, had an appointment whereupon, the diagnosis of Gender Dysphoria was responsible for my needs to address my Gender Identity and become the person I am, a female. My Meds were  issued and the reason for them accepted. That was the first and last time the National Health Service got it right.

I jumped through hoops, spent a fortune on Psychiatric Care, spent months waiting for appointments, suffered at the hands of the inept employees of the Health Service as letters failed to appear, appointments failed to be made and the waiting list grew and grew.

I might have been forgiven for thinking that once I got my surgery, the nightmare would recede and life as I know it, might start. How wrong can I be.

Fuddled and muddled systems that are not joined up, people who don't talk to each other, and hospital staff that treat you as though you lived in the same town as they lived in, suggesting you come in and see the Specialist as though you did not have to organise time off work, transportation, care for others. The National Health Service is lucky I am only a mere patient, and not a member of parliament, for I tell you, as a business, the NHS is right messed up. It needs a massive kick up the pants. We need to reduce the number of pen-pushing administrators and not so civil servants that act as so called administrators.  Bring back the Matrons, give them the power, the responsibility and the incentive to do what only they can do, run a hospital.

The stress of all this is telling on me, and the relationship I hold with my partner, as I get more angry, so the strains tell upon her. She takes the brunt end of my anger and sometimes, throws it back to me to make me more angry, and sometimes she behaves as only she can and I make an ass of myself and upset her more than I care to. I will kill myself before I deliberately hurt her.

Following an exceptionally violent and angry telephone call to my surgeon's secretary, I have got her to make an appointment for me, something that was promised me some weeks ago, but never had materialised. I had to shout, scream and be quite vile on the telephone before she would take responsibility. Such an effect it had on my partner, I doubt she will forgive me for some time.

What should I do now, now I have the appointment with the Surgeon in the City of the Blue Clock

Do I let him administer a repair that could cause my bowel to become damaged and end up on a colostomy? Do I take to the surgeon's couch and let him cut me up with his knives and trust to the luck and good mind of the anaesthetist to wake me up? Do I let myself lie sickly for five days while the catheters drain the puss and MRSA once again swells up and robs me of the ability to heal for three months? Do I jump under a truck and go straight to hell for even contemplating that I can have what is in essence, just my fair share of the National Health Contribution I have paid all my working life?

I know if I have to wait for yet another cock up to be resolved I might just take a butchers carving knife to my damaged and useless vagina and resolve the issue for once and for all, such is the depth of Anger that I have for the so called National Health Service.

My Doctor, bless, told me that it was the same for everyone. I do not believe my doctor. My GP is on at least one hundred thousand pounds a year, trained at the taxpayers expense, married to another GP also possibly on 100 000 a year, so much money that negates the need to ever go on a waiting list, what would GP know about waiting lists and how the service grinds so slowly. No One Cares anymore, no one takes ownership, no one accepts responsibility. They do drive fancy four by fours, have many holidays and go to exotic places at our expense, and oh dear, they possibly have to live in a huge private house with acres and acres, dogs and a lady that wot comes in at the weekends and does the cleaning.

My advise, if you are contemplating Gender re-assignment surgery on the National Health, go to the railway station and stand in the tracks while a train does its work, find a tall bridge and leap from the rail, take an electric fire to the bathroom and stand under a shower as you switch on, grab an imitation firearm and point at police officers in central London, Take the ferry to France and step off half way over, drink a bottle of scotch and connect a hose to the exhaust pipes. Al of the above are infinitely preferable to getting mixed up with the National Health Service.

People say they care, but for the most part, I have to recall the phrase, Caveat Emptor, let the buyer beware, or as a salesman once told me as I tried to work things out, Buyers, are liars. I have tried to be good but the more I try to be me, the 'old' me creeps back in, the aggression, the anger, the frustration. The National Health Service is no longer 'National', it does not even have a simple computer system that is joined up, it is all little gods in their PCT's lining their own pockets while all the time shirking responsibility. They need shooting at dawn. Anyone who works in the NHS, or for the NHS or with the NHS should be unable by LAW  to have private health care and be forced to endure the product they are destroying, then maybe we would see a change in the NHS.

It is no longer a Health Service, it is a meat factory, they cut you up, make sure that you have stopped bleeding, more or less, then they kick you out, that is not a service! It was once a good service, and many senior Nurses remember it with pride. Cleanliness was important, appointments were kept and staff were respected. Successive governments and mindless politicians have changed all that. National Health Service, its a joke parodying the movie, Carry On Doctor. Sadly, the only ones laughing, are the senior managers, and they are laughing at our expense, all the way to the Bank.

Kaela