Puberty 2.0

My Scintillating Electric Toothbrush

A story of joys and frustrations…

I’m sorry for the delays in between stories lovely readers, my life has become quite busy; busier but better believe me! Working with a few other transgender writers, we’ve started a new publication here on Medium, Transpiring, that I’d invite you all to check out.

I’m helping admin a Discord server for Trans people; which you can read more about here from my dear friend Kitty Whitemore:

And I’ve met someone who means the world to me, but I’ll write more on her later, as she deserves her own story entirely; and so much more. 💕

This is my story of joy and frustration; a story of experiencing true pleasure in life. A story involving an electric toothbrush; if you catch my meaning. 😜 But first a little background.

For a great deal of my life I was drifting, aimless, no purpose, no connection. You’ll find this true of many a transgender person before they’ve found acceptance of themselves. I was dysphoric and dissociative; depersonalized. And because of this, I only took the bare minimum care of myself; only the smallest of effort; only what I had to do to get by in the eyes of society.

Then the pandemic hit. Showers, laundry, the brushing of teeth all hit an all-time low. Gross, I know. My depression was at a new high and I had resigned myself to a slow death; barring the few times when I wanted to speed things along. And then my egg cracked! You can read more about that here:

As you’ve probably picked up in my writing, I have a new lease on life. I have reason to live. I’ve found purpose, joy and love. So, now I have to deal with transforming this body from something neglected into the beautiful temple I deserve to inhabit.

One of the most neglected aspects of myself is my mouth. My teeth aren’t terrible, but there is room for improvement. I’ve quit smoking, my last cigarette was nearly a month ago, and I have less than a fortnight before I’ll be done with the nicotine patch. 🥳 I did this for my teeth, but also because nicotine and HRT do not mix well.

I’ve gone from only brushing my teeth once a day, maybe, to brushing 2–3 times a day, mouthwash twice a day, and flossing frequently. I’d say my teeth are at least three shades whiter; at the very least, not tobacco yellow. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I had been using a standard, manual toothbrush. A friend of mine has been harping on me to go electric for over a decade. So, a new sense of well-being about me, I broke down and bought one.

This is where the frustration enters the picture. I just cannot seem to get a handle on this thing. It has several settings that I need to explore, but not until I can first figure out the initial one; Cleaning. In this mode, it runs for two minutes with a brief pause every 30 seconds. The instruction manual recommends spending half a minute in a quarter of the mouth; ok. The first quadrant goes mostly fine. Moving onto the second, tiny specks of saliva and paste fly everywhere. So I try closing my mouth more and I hit my teeth with the thing. But the real frustration happens when I try to rotate up into the third area. I end up smacking my teeth; it’s quite grating. 😬

I refuse to give up, however, and will fight through these frustrations until I have conquered the electric toothbrush. I take pleasure in working on bettering myself these days and becoming someone I am proud of. But any advice or suggestions from y’all would be greatly appreciated!

What? I was misleading? You were expecting something more titillating? Perhaps you conflated the words scintillating and titillating. My teeth are on their way to being quite scintillating. Thanks for reading! 💜

And now I’m going to feed two birds with one bit of bread. My fellow writers at Transpiring keep asking for a writing prompt. And feel free to take up this prompt even if you don’t write for us; link me your story. So here goes:

Tell me a story of joy and frustration that has happened to you while transitioning. Bonus points if you can play with the readers’ expectations or assumptions.

You know what they say about making an assumption. You make an “ass” out of “u” and “mption.” 😘

Whimsical regards,

💜 Victoria Quinn 💜