by Violet-C » Mon Aug 13, 2018 12:27 am
Part 14
Over the next few weeks Frank had taken me out for afternoon tea more than once and even down to Brighton where we walked along the seaside. I was appalled when a gust of wind blew up my flared skit and I though he had a brief glimpse of my incontinence pants, If he did he was thankfully too much of a gentleman to mention it, but it was very embarrassing.
I thought I needed to speak to Jenny to tell her about this unexpected turn of events and how I really liked him but was so scared of being found out and also hurting his feelings. I was petrified of him kissing me and although my latex face looked convincing enough it was not going to fool the touch of anyone’s lips, I found myself crying on the phone to Jenny that Frank was so sweet and I simply couldn’t bear to hurt him.
Jenny was as usual sensible and asked me the most obvious question, did I want to be Mildred or did I want to be Sophie. With tears rolling down my face I almost screamed out I don't want to be Mildred, I am Mildred, Sophie doesn’t exist anymore, but I don't look how I feel I need to look. I can’t go on with this fake bodysuit forever. I want, no I need Mildred’s body and face to be mine but I just don’t know how. “Am I going mad?” I screamed at her.
Jenny was her kind understanding self and felt that the best idea was that I came to stay in her nursing home again. As before, Sam could bring me down and that would give her a good chance to look at me and see how I was. She also felt that she could get a psychiatrist that she knew to visit me once or twice in the home. He could then advise as to whether I needed to stop this alternative life once and for all or hopefully advise that I was perfectly sane but just wanted to live the life of my own choosing and that it would then be up to me to decide how practical or realistic that option could become.
I choked back my tears and apologized to Jenny for my overly emotional outburst on the phone and explained how I didn’t want to be a continual strain on her and she surprised me by replying that I wasn’t to worry we can’t help getting old and we’re all likely to need support at sometime and she’d be there for me as long as I needed her, as would Sam.
The next few days raced by, as I got ready to return to the home in Penarth. Sam came over a few times to make sure that all my make-up essentials were good enough to stand up to sustained observation and I couldn’t help but look forward to the total loss of control and the overall feeling of comfort and safety that I remembered the home providing on my last visit.
Then on the day of our trip Sam arrived in her full Goth/Punk garb looking quite stunning and unrecognizable in her own unique way to accompany me. As before, she’d organized all the travel and this time being so much more relaxed after taking my sleeping pill first thing, soon found myself being shaken awake by Sam as the train approached Cardiff station. The whole journey had been a blur that I had slept my way through. I was horrified when Sam told me I had snored loudly for most of the way to the amusement of a number of passengers seated close by. I was now quite accepting of such indignities as simply being part of getting older and compared to the dampness I felt in my pants as we got off the train a few loud snores was nothing to be ashamed of.
Sam comfortably wheeled my large suitcase and carried the smaller one whilst again holding my arm as I shuffled along the platform beside her, stick firmly supporting me on the other side. With her in her wedge heels towering over her stopped grandmother.
We were soon in the taxi driving through the Cardiff suburbs to the home and I now felt wide awake with the excitement of seeing Jenny again and settling in. We had decided that I was to pretend that my dementia had increased slightly and I was to display no signs of remembering having been at the home before which gave me an extra thrill of further descending into a world of total dependency.
This time shortly after we emerged from the taxi I saw Jenny walking down the small flight of steps from the home to meet us. She shook hands with Sam, jokingly admiring her rather striking image and then greeted me with a warm hello, telling me I had absolutely nothing to worry about and I was to think of it as a wonderful holiday.
“oh, hello” I replied “Where am I, is this a hotel and where are you staying Samantha?”
“Don't worry” I was reassured as I was led through the door and seated into the familiar chairlift to be taken to my room.
Once we got there, Jenny and I were able to have a conversation regarding her plans for me, which came as something of a surprise. She said that she’d arranged for a psychiatrist friend of her’s to visit me in the home under the pretence that he was a distant relative. He would spend some time with me in my room and make an assessment. Clearly, this had no medical standing as he was doing it as a favour for Jenny but she felt it would help understand my feelings.
I offered a token resistance asking if she thought I was losing my mind but actually I was relieved to have the opportunity to meet someone other than Jenny or Sam and to discuss how I felt and to hopefully receive some re-assurance of my mental well-being.
Jenny told me that he was called Dr. Sanderson and that he did not know my real name so I had nothing to worry about but knew I was a young geriatric researcher who was living incognito as an elderly woman and wanted to know how far she could safely take this new life that she’d created. I was told I had absolutely nothing to worry about but it was imperative that I was totally honest with him about my feelings toward Mildred.
The first two days in the home went exactly as before, I dozed fitfully through the day, eating the monotonous bland food and having brief meaningless conversations with the other residents. Other than insuring that my make-up and costume was applied correctly I had nothing to worry about and had long stopped caring about my little accidents as I and referred to them.
On the third day after our lunch, a rather tasteless meat stew, just as I was settling into my favourite armchair one of the staff told me that my nephew had come to see me. I was initially confused but then remembered about Dr. Sanderson coming incognito.
“Hello Aunt Mildred” he introduced himself. “I’m your nephew John, it must be almost 20 years since we last met, do you remember me?”
“Of course I do” I lied.
He suggested we go up to my room and with the help of one of the staff I was taken to the stair-lift and off we went.
I sat in the one chair in my room whilst he sat on the edge of the bed opposite me and the nurse said she’d bring us both tea.
Once she left, he reminded me that he was Jenny’s friend Dr. Sanderson and that we should make some pleasant small talk until the tea had arrived.
Once we’d started drinking our tea he said I was to treat our conversation as being entirely unofficial and completely confidential.
He had a wonderfully warm comforting manner and I felt totally relaxed in his presence and trusting enough to pour my heart out more willingly than I even did even to Jenny.
He didn’t probe into who I really was but asked me about my childhood and how I’d got to where we now were.
We discussed my body and how happy I was and I believe that I told him honestly that for some reason I felt far happier but even more importantly more content as Mildred than I ever did in my younger persona and that Mildred felt far more like the real me than I’d ever felt before. I told him that I’d become so accepting of my new life that I simply didn’t want to return to my old younger life and that I felt a blissful contentment sitting in a comfortable armchair dozing off wearing my cozy slippers, but I'd rather do that without the confines of the disguise I was force to wear. I took a deep breath and told him “I really need Mildred’s body to be mine, I know that’s insane but I want the wrinkled skin, aching joints and arthritic fingers she has. I feel the need to suffer as so many elderly women have to, to not just pretend anymore”
I couldn’t believe I’d actually got that off my chest, and to a total stranger. Deep down I knew from almost the first moment I set up home in Mildred McManus’s run down flat in Fulham that this was who I needed to be and now I’d said it.
He looked a little surprised at my comments but maintained his professional composure whilst pressing me subtlety as too how long I’d felt like this etc etc.
Our conversation went on for some time and finally after a wonderful afternoon speaking, he said he felt he could get a colleague of his to meet me who was a specialist in body dysmorphic disorders just so I could be re-assured that this wasn’t what had driven me to my current status. Clearly, long before embarking on this journey I had spent time studying that and how people were so dissatisfied with their own body and constantly searched for perfection or the need to make changes, but I felt confident I was not a sufferer.
With that he got up off the bed and said he’d better go, but Jenny would let me know when the specialist would be able to see me. He was based in London but he knew I’d be returning there before long so it shouldn’t be too inconvenient for the two of us to meet. He then asked if I wanted to come back downstairs and I told him that I’d stay in my room for a while longer on my own.
The next few days passed in a joyous blur of half completed conversations, bland food, sleepy afternoons and trips to the toilet, that were, sometimes a little too late. The staff as before were simply wonderful and I didn’t want for anything and on this visit had so happily taken to my stress free life at the nursing home that I could gladly have stayed forever and I spent the entire time wearing the incredibly comfortable slippers, the thought of struggling to wear heels ever again just seemed totally alien to me now.
Jenny regularly stopped to talk to me and when I was in my room asked how I was feeling and whether I was as genuinely as happy as I seemed, to which I could only reply in the affirmative, with my only concern as being discovered, but I was utterly content with this new elderly life.
But most importantly she told me that Dr. Sanderson had been in touch and when I returned to London I could see Professor Rutherford his friend and colleague who was a specialist in body dysmorphia. She told me that he was a private consultant and so I would have to pay to see him at his Harley Street practice but he would be able to advise me as to whether I should give this up or what if any treatment I should receive.
I picked up on the word “treatment” and hoped that my hearing aids hadn’t let me down.
“What do you mean by treatment Mrs. Griffiths?” I asked, trying to stay in character.
“I hope you don’t think I’m going mad?”
“Well from what I’m led to believe” she replied, “He’s not only very well thought of in his field but he doesn't believe that the best treatment is some kind of psychological assessment to get to the bottom of a patient’s so called problem. When he’s been genuinely convinced that the patient has a real rational need to modify their bodies then he’s happy whenever possible or practical to refer them to the most suitable surgeon”
“What are you saying, I could actually have surgery to become Mildred?”
“Well let’s not get ahead of ourselves” she cautioned me
“Its just that from what Dr. Sanderson told me, it is actually surgically possible, but obviously no reputable surgeon would perform the many procedures involved without being absolutely convinced that it was the right course of action and I imagine the cost would be considerable, although I imagine in your case it would still be affordable”
For a moment I was dumbstruck, whilst I had dreamt of such a possibility I had always snapped myself out of such thoughts as being impossible, could this actually be achieved I now asked myself?
“Jenny that’s amazing I had no idea I was potentially so close. When can I see Professor Rutherford?”
“I’ll make contact with his office on your behalf, but I believe within a couple of weeks, but is this what you really want and also don’t think it will happen. He may not be willing to help you at all”
“No I realize that” I replied “but I do need to try, I don’t believe what I’m feeling is some passing fantasy and I have no doubt that he’ll be convinced that my need is genuine”.