June 2024 – Beeshive

Hormones……

Well, I realized that the results of my latest blood test were posted on my health account for me to view.

At first I was a little concerned as when I logged in the system said that there was a test that was outside of normal limits.

Not sure what was wrong, I clicked on the link to see my lab results.

The Alanine Aminotransferase at 16 indicates that my liver seems to be doing fine.

The estradiol at 179 pmol/L indicates that I have elevated levels of estrogen in my blood stream, but not yet near the upper limits for men. For trans females the ideal range for estradiol in my blood stream will be 367–734 pmol/L so I can stand to go up some more.

But the reading that I am the happiest about, and it is the reading that got flagged by the system, is my testosterone levels. At 4.95 nmol/l I’m below the range acceptable for males which is 6.30 nmol/l at the lower limit. The target for this seems to be 3.4 nmol/L to 1.04 nmol/L.

So, I’ll have to see which way things go on my visit to my doctor next week.

Hopefully I can get my estradiol dosage upped a little.

And it would be nice to look at the possibility of androgen blockers.

It just keeps repeating over, and over, and over again.

When will the federal government ever learn that the Canadian Armed Forces are incapable of operating their own police service.

The Canadian Forces Provost Marshal has absolutely no business whatsoever investigating or prosecuting for any criminal code offence.

Since my first tango with the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal and the Military Police Complaints Commission in 2013 I’ve always said that there is massive fuckery afoot within the confines of the Provost Marshal’s office.

What type of batshit insane lunacy allows for the provost marshal to determine what, if any, information will be handed over to the military police complaints commission?

Nothing more than poorly written legislation that allows the provost marshal to do so at whim.

Now, I fully understand that there will be those amongst you that will say “But Bobbie, why didn’t you tell the MPCC about the missing information”.

That’s not how it works.

That’s not how any of this works.

When a person makes a complaint about a military police investigation, the first place it goes is to the exact agency that you’ve made a complaint against.

And actually, a person such as myself can’t complain about an investigation or the outcome of an investigation. The only persons who can complain about interferance in an investigation are the investigators. But the MPCC pointed out previously that relying on the investigators themselves to make interferance complaints on their own may be impossible as the investigator themself may be completely unaware of any interference if the interference occurs high enough up the chain of command.

All a person like me can complain about is the actions of specific investigators.

If the investigation went off the rails due to “lawful” commands from up the chain of command, the last thing that the provost marshal will do is publically announce that the Vice Chief of Defence Staff or someone higher up gave instructions to the CFNIS about the investigation.

Remember, under the National Defence Act the Provost Marshal is directly subordinate to the Vice Chief of Defence Staff, and that the VCDS has the full authority under the National Defence Act to issue instructions to ANY CFNIS investigation.

The provost marshal has absolutely no interest in covering themselves with shit. So the first thing they do is they take the information in your complaint and use that to sanitze the complaint investigation. They know that you’re more than likely going to make a follow up complaint to the Military Police Complaints Commission so they take all of the information they have at hand and then package it up in a pretty little package with a pretty little bow on top.

Even gift wrapped, it’s still just shit.

And as luck would have it, the Military Police Complaints Commission has to accept whatever documents the provost marshal choses to pass along to the MPCC. During a complaint review the MPCC cannot subpoena documents, it cannot subpoena witnesses, it cannot administer oaths.

As recently as 2015 the Military Police Complaints Commission said that it really didn’t know how the Canadian Forces Military Police Group operated as it had never been given access to the orders and procedures governing the military police. And this means that the MPCC might not even know what evidence to ask for.

Globe and Mail interview with then chairman Glenn Stannard

From the interview of Glenn Stannard by Gloria Galloway

It’s not very confidence inspiring when the agency overseeing a particular agency doesn’t know how that agency is supposed to work.

When I was interviewed by the MPCC in July of 2012 I seriously felt sick to my stomach after the interview. I went for a very, very long walk and it took ever fibre in my body to keep from jumping off the Granville Bridge.

The two MPCC interviewers from Ottawa basically gave me a lecture on why they weren’t going to find any fault with the CFNIS investigation. They came to Vancouver with their minds made up already. The sad thing is, they’re retired civilian police officers who viewed the CFNIS as just being a military version of the civilian police and therefore their “brothers in blue”.

When I filed for Judicial Review in February of 2013, the CFNIS was required to forward to me a certified copy of all of the documents that the Provost Marshal had given to the MPCC in 2012.

It was fucking disturbing just how many records were missing and how many “errors” there were in the SAMPIS.

What an absolute fucking joke this was.

Basically what the Provost Marshal submitted to the MPCC was that I was a cheap two-bit conman looking to milk the Canadian Armed Forces for some easy money.

The MPCC really should have known better. But as it turns out it’s not allowed to know better.

“But Bobbie, why didn’t you introduce all off these missing documents during your hearing for Judicial Review”.

That’s the problem, you can’t.

Under the rules for MPCC Judicial Review you CANNOT introduce to the court ANY document or evidence that was not before the MPCC while they were conducting their review.

And the Chief of Defence Staff knows this.

And the Vice Chief of Defence Staff knows this.

And the Provost Marshal knows this.

The CDS, the VCDS, and the CFPM know that they can sell any bullshit story to the MPCC as the MPCC doesn’t have the power or authority to question what they’re being told.

And if the MPCC doesn’t like what it’s being told and instead wants to have an inquiry? That requires the permission of the Minister of National Defence.

Inquiries have too much potential to damage the Canadian Forces Military Police and that’s why they’re held so very infrequently. Just look at how damaging the MPCC review of the CFNIS investigation of the death of corporal Stuart Langridge was. The ass-whooping the CFNIS received from Michel Drapeau could never have happened anywhere outside of an MPCC inquiry.

The military chain of command does NOT allow for independent investigations.

Yes, you’ll have the provost marshal and the Chief of Defence Staff and the Minister of National Defence tripping all over themselves to exclaim that investigators with the CFNIS are free and independent of the chain of command.

This is absolutely B.S. and they know it.

There are absolutely no exceptions to the service offence of “Insubordination” in the National Defence Act. All members of the Canadian Armed Forces are subject to being charged with having committed the service offence of “Insubordination” if they disobey the “lawful” command of a superior.

And yes, there is a significant difference between “lawful” and “legal”. Basically “legal” infers that the command does not violate any criminal code statute. “Lawful” just means that the person issuing the command has the authority to issue the command, lawful does not vouch for the legal status of the command.

Insubordination is the most serious service offence that a member of the Canadian Forces can commit. Insubordination comes with an automatic sentence of life in prison or a lesser sentence.

In between when I became ensnared with the defective military justice system in 2011 and now we’ve had the External Review conducted by Madame Marie Deschamps, a retired Supreme Court justice.

Then we had another External Review conducted by the Honourable Louise Arbor.

Both reviews basically said the exact same thing. The Canadian Forces Military Police are inept and unskilled when it comes to sexual assault investigations.

Then we had the Third Independent Review of the National Defence Act conducted by the Honourable Morris J. Fish, a retired Supreme Court justice.

While Mr. Fish makes some very powerful recommendations it would appear that Mr. Fish was shielded from the fact that the CFNIS and the Provost Marshal often overstep their jurisdictional boundaries and involve themselves with investigations involving only civilians. This runs counter to the spirit of CFPM 2120-4-0.

These reviews resulted in the Minister of National Defence instructing the military police in 2021 to hand over all sexual assault investigations to the civilian police. The investigation into my complaint against the man in the sauna was retained by the CFNIS with no explanation as to why other than that I was told by the CFNIS that the CFNIS was the only police agency able to work on historical military cases.

And before my time there was the military police fiasco in Bosnia and then subsequently the military police fiasco in Somalia which led to the elimination of the CFSIU, the creation of the Provost Marshal, and the creation of the CFNIS.

And who can forget the “CFB Gagetown Rape Controversy”.

The CFB Gagetown Rape Controversy is well worth the read, and it highlights all of the long standing flaws in the National Defence Act and how civilians are an afterthought to the military justice system and how civilians are at a substantial disadvantage when navigating the military justice system.

And as the offences that are alleged to have occurred during the CFB Gagetown Rape Controversy occurred pre-1998, even if the RCMP were to become involved with this investigation they’d have to hand it right on over to the CFNIS as these offences occurred on a defence establishment making them service offences. And as we all know, there is a 3-year-time-bar on all service offences that occurred prior to 1998. Yes, Rape was a crime that was specifically excluded from prosecution by the military tribunal system, but there was nothing stopping the military police and the CFSIU at the time from investigating this matter. In fact as this occurred on a defence establishment it would have been well within the mandate of the base military police and the CFSIU to investigate. So yes, the 3-year-time-bar would apply. And as these service offences occurred prior to 1998, the commanding officer of the accused would be required to review the charges before sending these charges to the provincial crown prosecutor. There was no mechanism in the pre-1998 National Defence Act to allow for the military police or the CFSIU to bypass the commanding officer and go straight to the provincial crown.

And as luck would have it, the Military Police Complaints Commission is not allowed to look at or review pre-1998 military police or CFSIU investigations.

So here we are again. It’s now 2024 and the CFPM, the CFMPG and the CFNIS still exist.

How many more years of dysfunctional and unaccountable military police will Canadians be willing to endure? Or is this a case of “out of sight, out of mind”?

Will the recommendations from Deschamps, Arbour, and Fish amount to anything or will the MoD, the CDS, and the VCDS slap a fresh coat of paint over the mildewy wallpaper without addressing the rot and disease underneath?

The Provost Marshal and the military police, including the CFNIS need to be scaled down. They need to have their responsibilities limited to offences of a purely military nature. Any crime of a civilian nature that occurs on a defence establishment or involves someone subjected to the Code of Service Discipline, especially if the victims are civilian, needs to be handed over without question or delay to the outside civilian authorities having jurisdiction.

Sure, you’re going to get a lot of naysaying from those involved with the Canadian Forces. But that’s only because the people making those complaints understand the need for the military to retain its own police agency in order for the military to hide secrets from the civilian world.

Many of our NATO allies currently operate with civilian police attending to civilian matters and the military police attending to purely military matters. Doing the same in Canada shouldn’t be out of the question, and its definately preferable to allowing the military to keep doing its own thing.

Soft………

Well, one thing that I’ve noticed over the past few weeks is how soft my skin is now.

Since I started taking estrogen a few weeks ago my skin has become noticeably softer and smoother.

And yes, this was to be expected, but I didn’t think that it would have been this noticeable.

My breasts are noticeable, but not that noticeable. I’ve seen guys with bigger Molson boobs than what I currently have.

They’re just barely large enough to show through my tops, but they are large enough to snag the shoulder strap of my laptop case.

I don’t think I’ll have to resort to the Judy Blume exercises…….

But hot damn my nipples are super sensitive.

My body fat feels different too. It’s a lot more squishy and jiggly.

Mood?

My mood is different. Can’t quite explain it, but it’s different.

I’ve got an appointment with my doc next week.

See how well my kidneys and liver are taking to the new hormones.

This will be the first of my never ending blood tests and we’ll see how much estrogen was in my bloodstream on the final day of the four day period for my patch.

We’ll decide if I stay with the same patches or if I go up in strength.

And we’ll eventually decide if I go on androgen blockers.

Then I’ll know for sure what the mood difference is between androgen and estrogen.

Sometimes when I go to apply a new patch, the exposed portion of the patch will fold over and touch itself. Because of the adhesive I can’t get that half apart. I wasn’t sure what to do with the 1/2s that were good. Well, I can actually cut off the stuck together part of two different patches and then use the good parts as one patch and cover them with Tegaderm. Just like new!

Well, that was quick

After I posted my last post, I reached out to one of my followers that had been married to a member of the Dagenais clan. She put me in touch with her daughter. And her daughter sent me links to a marriage licence and a census report.

So, I’ve made decent progress on the maternal side of my family now.

I don’t know how much luck I’m going to have with the paternal side of my father’s side of the family. I have made out pretty good with the maternal side of his family. I should know everyone up to the my great-great-grandparents on the maternal side of my father’s family.

And here’s what I’ve been able to piece together for Susan’s family.

I don’t really know much if anything about Sue’s side of the family.

Whenever she’d go shopping at Knob Hill Farms in Oshawa we’d always stop in for visits with her parents on Gibb Street so I spent far more time with her parents that I did with my father’s father.

I’m pretty sure that both of her parents spoke English, but with very heavy Dutch accents.

Even when Richard was with us we’d never go visit Arthur Herman Gill.

Not once.

After we moved to Canadian Forces Base Greisbach in Edmonton in October of 1980 we inherited uncle Jimmy’s samoyed dog named Lady.

Uncle Jimmy lived in Fort McMurray and had worked on the tug boats on the Athabasca river hauling tar sands from the pits to the refiners.

Jimmy was having health issues and he couldn’t look after Lady any longer. And Lady had always been an outside dog with little discipline.

On Greisbach she was always getting us in trouble with the base officials as she’d dig up the lawn around the PMQ and in the spring and summer she’d shed her massive white coat.

But once we moved to Canadian Forces Base Downsview in April of 1983 Lady was sent to live with the Zwolle family out in Oshawa.

I think Lady died sometime around 1986.

The Zwolle house is long gone. It looks like it was possibly bought along with the two other houses on the patch of land they occupied by the Oshawa school board to allow the expansion of the school grounds.

So far as my background, it looks like this.

First Nations relatives.
German relative.
French relatives.
Scottish relatives.
Icelandic relatives.
Irish relatives.
And a bit of Scandinavian thrown in for good measure.

No wonder when I used to ask my father what my background was as a kid he’d always say that I was a mutt. Not an “Indian” like my grandmother, not Irish like my grandfather, not French like my mother.

Just a mutt.

Family tree

So, getting a little bit more details about the maternal side of the family now.

My maternal grandmother was Alma Viola Zong.

She was not Chinese.

She was German.

Even though I know Alma’s name I still don’t have a birthdate for her.

Still have no idea the name of my maternal grandfather.

But that’s the same as on the paternal side of my family.

I have a pretty good tree on the maternal side of my father’s family, but the paternal side has drawn up blanks so far.

I know the connection between Arthur Herman Gill, Ladeen Gill, and the Zwolle clan in Oshawa.

But beyond that, not too much.

So, I’ll have to keep slogging away.

In other news

My legal matter involving the CAF, the DND, and the DOJ is still proceeding.

Had a bunch of documents to read and approve this week.

Had a good phone call with the law firm.

Still awhile to go before this matter is over, but at least it’s still progressing.

Interesting.

Okay, so I’ve been playing around with Ancestry.ca for a few days.

Came across some interesting information.

My stepmother’s parents were Mr. Teunis Zwolle and Mrs. Willemina Zwolle.

1980’s voter roll for Oshawa, Durham Region, Ontario

133 Gibb Street, Oshawa, Ontario
Zwolle houshold

And due to the voters roll, I now know the address for Richard’s father, and his stepmother Aldean. When I tracked down my mother in 2013 I asked her what the name of Arthur Gill’s second wife was. Marie said that her name was Ladean. Wasn’t. Her name was Aldeen.

Arthur and Aldeen Gill.
258 Drew Street, Oshawa, Ontario

In 1982, when Richard flew us out to Ontario for the Christmas holidays, we stayed at Arthur’s and Ladeen’s house. I remember walking back and forth between the Gill house and the Zwolle house.

A quick check of google maps shows that they are well within walking distance of each other.

Pretty straight walk.
And as kids we walked a lot, so this walk wouldn’t have been too much at all.

After the initial stay with Arthur over xmas ’82, we never did go see Arthur again.

My father was posted to CFB Downsview in April of ’83 to avoid my apprehension by Alberta Social Services.

When we lived on Canadian Forces Base Downsview in North York, we’d go visit Sue’s parents frequently. Almost every second weekend. For sure once a month as Sue liked to shop at Knob Hill Farms.

50 minute car drive from 223F Stanley Green Park on Canadian Forces Base Downsview
to
133 Gibb Street in Oshawa, Ontario

No matter how many times we went to see the Zwolle’s, we never once ever went to see the Gill’s again.

According to my social service records, Richard was trying to pawn me off on to his father. I guess by that time Arthur had moved on with his new family and he didn’t want to look after the kids of his son from a previous marriage.

All I remember about Arthur and Ladeen is that they liked my brother and I but Arthur was really dismissive of Richard and really didn’t want anything to do with him.

The physical closeness of these two families in Oshawa also lends a bit of credence to another issue that may have caused the estrangement between Richard and his father.

Both Arthur’s and Ladeen’s daughters went to school with Susan. Apparently Arthur and Ladeen were none too impressed with Richard having used his stepsisters, their daughters, to hook up with Sue on one of his visits to Oshawa after we moved to CFB Namao in the summer of 1978.

So it really wasn’t a coincidence that a girl from Oshawa ended up living in Edmonton with a man with relatives from the girl’s hometown.

Through my DNA test I have found a few members of the Dagenais clan in Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritimes that appear to be on the order of 2nd or 3rd cousins.

One unexpected blast that I discovered is my paternal great grandmother was born in 1899 and married in 1913 at the age of 13.

My paternal grandmother, Margaret, was born in 1923 when Caroline was 22.

I wonder if grandma was some older siblings that haven’t been found yet.

I haven’t yet found Norman, the older brother of both Richard and Doug.

Richard was born in 1946 when Margaret was 23. What I remember about uncle Norman is that he was about 6 years older than Richard.

So, I’ll keep shaking the family tree to see what else falls to the ground.

On vacay for a while

So, I’m on vacation until July 2nd, 2024.

Don’t really have any plans for this year.

My coccyx seems to have healed, so I’ll be able to resume long bike rides again.

A cracked coccyx is not a fun thing.

I have my first blood test tomorrow to see how my body is adapting to estrogen.

I had no idea that a woman’s breasts went under their arms. As mine are developing I can feel breast tissue growing under my arms.

I still don’t really have much to show, but I did notice yesterday for the first time as I was out walking and drinking a coffee that as my arm swept upwards on my chest I could feel my arm lifting my breast.

I might go to Whistler for a few days after the Whistler gondola opens for the season.

Might also pop down to Seattle, Portland, or maybe even L.A..

Other than that I have nothing really planned for this year.

Probably do a lot of bicycle riding and scooting locally and put my camera to good use.

I’m tired this year.

I think the legal frustrations and fights that I’ve endured over the last 12 years are finally eating away at me.

On one hand, learning the truth about how things really were back then, and the number of cracks that I fell through, and the number of rugs that I got swept under has somewhat freed me from the past, the past has still taken a significant toll on me.

No matter what I’ve learnt about the past I will still be plagued by all that I missed out on and all that I was never given an opportunity to experience and enjoy.

So far as the “question of the day”.

I don’t know what my taglines would be.

I suppose that my taglines would change drastically prior to March 5th, 2011, and after March 5th, 2011.

DNA test is in.

My results from my DNA test finally became available today.

An interesting makeup.

I’m not surprised about the England, Northwestern Europe, Scottish, and Irish.

The England & Northwestern Europe group also contains the French, so that’s where the Dagenais would have originated from before settling in Eastern Canada as the Acadians.

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Northwestern_Europe

The fact that Germany, France, England, and other regions are all lumped together really isn’t that surprising.

For the last 10 thousand or so years the people that lived in these regions would invade and conquer their neighbours on a never ending rotating manner.

For example the people know as the Brittons today only share a tiny bit of DNA with their original ancestors from just 5,000 years ago.

The Brittons got bred out.

The Indigenous Americas would be from my paternal grandmother.

I received a bunch of notifications about potential relations, most from the Dagenais and Waniandy side of my family tree. Nothing from the Gill side.

It does look as if my grandmother might actually have only been 1/2 Cree and not full Cree. Her mother’s maiden name seems to originate from Albania. Have to do some more digging.

Anyways, that’s enough for now.

Ignored, written off, and talked-over.

One of the things that I’ve had to endure over the years is the constant talking over

I’ve had many instances of being written off and ignored.

In the past I had always hoped that I was just misunderstanding.

But often it’s not.

People have said that I don’t exert myself enough.

One of the most startling episodes of this was when we had an outside management company managing the physical plant at the hospital where I work.

When I started working at the hospital in 2005 I re-opened the welding shop. No one had the ability to weld since the last person with welding experience left. So I started welding. One of the managers would absolutely refuse to ask me to do any type of welding work for him even though there were lots of projects. The other manager blamed this on my “flamboyance” and that I was flaunting it too much?

I was thinking to myself “what the fuck?”

I wasn’t yet out of the closet.

But then again at that point in time it was almost 10 years since a Vancouver Police Department officer wrote my mugging off as a “gay trick gone bad”.

And then I started to realize that a lot of what I had been through in life up to that point in life was due to some sort of “queer vibe” that I had exhibited.

To this date I’ve never figured out what this “vibe” was. But it must have been noticeable.

Was this the same vibe that put me in the sights of Captain McRae and his teenaged accomplice?

Was this the same “vibe” that got the shit beat out of me numerous times at school because I “walked like a girl”, “didn’t have a girlfriend”, “looked like a faggot”?

Was this the same vibe that attracted numerous adult men to me for sexual favours while I was under 16?

Was this the same vibe that caused another manager that I worked for to constantly refer to me as “Freddie Mercury” and to constantly remind me that gay sex leads to AIDs.

Was this the same vibe that caused the son of a company in St. Albert, Alberta to exclaim that there’s no place for fags at his father’s company?

Was this the same vibe that caused Ed from Classic Billiards to poke and prod me to admit that I had a same sex attraction?

Is this the same vibe that allows service contractors and vendors to ignore me even when I’m the one who called them in for service?

It’s so much fun at work dealing with contractors who ignore you and instead start talking to someone else who has no idea of what’s going on or what the service call is about.

But Bobbie, you’re the Chief Engineer!

Surely people have to take you seriously?

No.

Things are great when I’m communicating via email.

Things go off the rails when I deal with people face to face.

It’s those “queer vibes” apparently.

And in the macho “trades” field that I find myself in, these “queer vibes” are an outright turn-off to a lot of guys.

The only reason that I’m at where I’m at is my knowledge, my skills, and my abilities.

There are numerous people over the years who would have gladly destroyed me because of my “vibe”.

And I know it’s that “vibe”.

The was one guy at the hospital that used to turn to me for advice and knowledge and help with getting projects done.

But after management was brought back in house an I was promoted to the non-management position of Chief Engineer which allowed me to dress more appropriately for my gender identity, his opinion of me soured to the point where he was sticking a knife in my back on almost a weekly basis.

And I have absolutely no doubts that if I were to meet some of my previous co-workers and employers that their opinions of me and their attitudes towards me would change drastically from what they were before.

Yeah, okay, fine.

In the last couple of years I’ve switched over to dresses, I do my nails, and I’m more often than not in heels.

Does that make my knowledge worth any less?

Apparently so.

VPD Constable Gil Puder

VPD constable Gil Puder was the investigator assigned to my mugging.

I was working the Tuesday through Saturday 14:00 to 22:00 shift at the bowling centre that I worked at.

If I left work at 22:00 sharp, I could make it downtown to watch the late shows at either the Famous Players Capitol 6 or the Cineplex Granville 7.

This fateful weekend I went to see a movie called “Congo” at the Capitol 6. I’ve covered the mugging elsewhere, so I won’t get into the details.

But, the end result is even though I had located a video tape that showed me, my two assailants, and what triggered the mugging, VPD constable Gil Puder refused to pick up the video tape or to even just go and view the video tape and speak to the theatre manager.

Gil Puder told me right to my face that until I admitted the “truth”, that I had picked this guy up in a bar and that this was a “trick gone bad”, that he wasn’t going to help.

So, there never was an investigation.

Puder defended.

A few years later when I had moved into commercial property management one of the plumbers that worked for us knew Gil Puder.

This plumber and I were having coffee at a local coffee shop discussing some upcoming projects that I had for him.

This revelation only came up because the plumber used to play ice hockey with Puder and Puder had just died due to a brain tumour.

I asked the plumber if this Gil Puder that he played hockey with had been a VPD officer, the plumber said that yes, Gil had been a VPD officer.

I gave the plumber my opinion of Puder and explained to him what caused me to have this opinion of Puder.

The plumber seemed quite taken aback and then the plumber started to justify what Puder had opined.

“Bob, you gotta admit, you don’t have a girlfriend or a wife, and you don’t exactly come across as a ladies man”, and “Look at it from Gil’s point of view, you got mugged on Burrard at Georgia, the gays are down on Burrard and Davie, so what else what Gil supposed to conclude?”

There was also a general contractor that was used frequently that did tenant and building renovations.

I was the first power engineer that had ever worked for this employer, as such there was now a requirement to adhere to provincial and municipal codes. And this caused quite a row between the contractors and I. They were now required to pull permits for electrical, plumbing, construction, demolition, and asbestos abatement.

The general contractor would often wait until it was just him and I with no one else around and then he’d unleash on me with every homophobic slur and stereotype.

When I’d go talk to the general manager about this, the GM would talk to the contractor, and the contractor would profusely deny that he had said anything.

Thick skin.

It took me years to grow a thick enough skin to ignore these opinions of my worth.

And as much as I am able to ignore them in the modern day, the problem is they still have the ability to cause me to endure significant issues.

Employment is something that I can’t just up and change if I wanted to.

Do you have any idea how long it took to work up the confidence to start dressing the way that I wanted to and to even start on hormone therapy?

Do you realize how severely I have limited my future?

In 1980 the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service investigated Captain McRae for having committed “Acts of Homosexuality” with young children on Canadian Forces Base Namao. At the time “homosexuality” was viewed as a “victimless crime”. That tarred and feathered everyone involved with Captain McRae as a “homosexual”.

This is why I spent time in the care of Captain Terry Totzke receiving “help” with my “homosexuality” that I had exhibited.

In 2011 the CFNIS conducted an investigation into the actions of the babysitter.

As I’ve said elsewhere, the CFNIS had in their possession both the CFSIU investigation paperwork and the courts martial transcripts. The existence of which the CFNIS withheld from the MPCC and the Federal Court of Canada.

They knew what Captain McRae had been charged with, and they knew that it was the investigation of the babysitter for molesting numerous young children on base that triggered the investigation of Captain McRae.

But the CFNIS in 2011 would have been exposed to a report that was written back in 1980 when the attitude was that Captain McRae, the babysitter, and all of the other kids involved were “homosexuals” with perverted minds willingly participating in the victimless crime of homosexual sex.

Is this why the 2011 CFNIS investigation was such an abysmal failure?

They had the CFSIU investigation paperwork and the court martial transcripts that implicated the babysitter in the direct molestation of young children, but the CFNIS still had the audacity to call me a liar.

Anyways, enough for now.

Gotta get ready to catch my bus back to Vancouver.

Fears……

What fears have you overcome and how?

WordPress sometimes prompts me to write about a certain topic. It’s geared towards “family” type events.

There are very few that actually seem to apply to me.

Today’s prompt was somewhat interesting.

I think the biggest fear that I had in my life was my father.

I overcame that fear somewhat in 2006 during a series of phone calls that I had with him.

Then there was his death in January of 2017.

That was a major relief.

My brother thinks that I’m over exaggerating my fear of Richard, but as Dr. Gabor Maté observed, “no two children have the same parents”.

The most significant fear that I had of Richard was his temper. Richard had very poor impulse control and very poor control of his anger. He also couldn’t take into account the difference in physical strength between himself and the person he was lashing out at.

My fear of Richard only grew more intense when I became involved with military social worker Captain Terry Totzke.

Richard is dead and gone. And the world is probably better off for this. But his effects still haunt me and have left their traces upon me.

My grandmother was another person that I feared as a kid.

Her anger and her impulse control were worse than Richard’s, but at least she lacked the physical strength of Richard.

Alcohol. I’ve always feared being an alcoholic.

Both my father and my grandmother were intense alcoholics. Both were happy drunks for the most part. Conversely both were intensely angry people when they were sobering up.

I’ve had so little alcohol in my life I can almost remember every exact time.

The last time that I had a drink was back in July of 2011.

Before that it was January of 2010

Before that it was August of 2006

Before that it was September of 2005

Before that it was May of 1994

Before that it was sometime in the winter of 1990 in Gagetown, New Brunswick.

Before that it was sometime around 1986.

I can’t remember all of the “sips” that my father or my grandmother would give me when they were drunk.

I do remember the beer that grandma made me drink in the summer of 1984.

Most of these were just casual get-togethers when I was changing jobs and moving up the so called ladder.

But becoming an alcoholic has always been one of my fears.

Growing up on military bases I was exposed to a significant amount of alcoholism. It was as if being an alcoholic was a requirement to join the Canadian Forces back in the ’50s through the ’90s.

Being a “homosexual” and subsequently growing up to be like the babysitter was always a major fear of mine. Both Captain Totzke and my father would keep telling me that if I didn’t stop kissing, hugging, and being interested in other boys that I would grow up to be just like the babysitter and the priest from Namao.

Imagine the type of fear that would instil into a 9 to 11 year old.

Being told that you’d be going to a psychiatric hospital or jail for “allowing” the babysitter to do what he had done.