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I scheduled surgery with Dr. Satterwhite in 2017, while he was still a surgeon at Crane Center and regarded as one of the best surgeons. I was one of his first patients at his independent practice in January 2019, after he left Crane Center.
I had seen complaints about his bedside manner online in the months leading up to my surgery but hoped those stories were one-offs. Unfortunately, most of those complaints proved true. He was always late to appointments, generally about 45 minutes to an hour. When he was present he spoke very quickly and did not spend much time with me as a patient. It was not a setting where I had time to process information to formulate questions, but overall I felt confident heading into surgery. Surgery itself and recovery were not bad. I was up and about within 2 weeks and had no major medical complications.
The problems I've had are functional and cosmetic. My vulva does not look like a vulva. I feel butchered, both aesthetically, and functionally.
Penetrative sex is essentially impossible. There is far too much erectile tissue to accommodate penetration, and when I become aroused, my vaginal canal essentially seals shut. Penetration is always painful. Dilating is also difficult, and even with regular dilating I have lost at least 1" of depth over 5 years.
Urination is also a mess. My urine stream does not point down, instead aiming to the right and my urethra is covered by my labia majora. When I urinate, my urine sprays inside the labia and runs down my thigh.
I am in the process of seeking a revision with another surgeon, but wait times for revisions with Dr. Bluebond-Langner are nearly 5 years. I have also requested a consultation with Dr. Ellie Ley, and I am hopeful she will have a shorter waitlist.
Thank you for sharing an incredibly difficult experience. It’s easy to see the good results and think surgery is sunshine and rainbows, but it’s good for everyone to see the range of possible outcomes.
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Thanks.
To clarify, I wouldn't say Dr. Satterwhite doesn't know what he is doing. The opposite is probably true. But even when doctors are considered the best at SRS, the complication and poor outcome potential is still there and it's not uncommon. That's just how it works and everyone needs to know that going into these procedures.
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What the fuck is wrong with you? "Welcome to womanhood" is such a garbage sentiment, you CLEARLY aren't trying to welcome anyone saying that, and dismissing her valid concerns isn't being helpful, much less an ally.
If you don't have anything constructive to say, don't.
My biggest frustration is the inability to have penetrative sex. And it doesnt look like a big clit to me (my clit is actually tiny). The problem is the protrusion of the vestibular bulb, which is 2 inches below the clit and which gets hard like an erect penis inside of my vaginal canal.
I think you're trying to be supportive but the issues are a bit more severe than just an unsteady urine stream. If it was just that I'd be very satisfied. But my sex life is completely dead because of this.
consider Dr Rajveer Purohit at Mt Sinai in NYC. He has a calm, patient bedside manner and took the time to answer all my questions. His work is amazing and I am very satisfied with my cosmetic and functional outcome so far 1 month postop. My wait time from initial contact to first consult was 2 months, and from consult to surgery was about 8 months
Rajveer Purohit
Thanks. I will contact his practice to see if he can handle this type of revision. He appears to be in network with my insurance.
Has Mt. Sinai's staff improved in terms of transphobia at all? I've heard from numerous people that nurses will consistently misgender trans patients there.
Stay away from Mount Sinai….Dr Jess ting did my SRS back in 2017 and it was a horrid experience! The aftercare is SPARSE…communication with them sucks and my SRS is subpar plus Ting doesn’t give a damn about you unless you’re a celebrity (even though he butchered Jazz Jennings)
Personally I dont see it as coming from transphobia, but the hospital staff were definitely very inconsistent with gendering me. I use they/them pronouns and only one nurse bothered to ask and to consistently use it. I do not pass as a woman whatsoever. I also dont go out of my way to correct anyone. So it was weird for all my doctors to refer to me as "she", nurses used a mix of both "he" and "she", and hospital staff (like cleaners and food service and transport) who didnt see my chart just referred to me as "he". Very confusing.
Did you have surgery with him at Align? You should see if you can get a revision from Dr. Pang. He’s been providing a lot of good results lately.
Thanks for the advice. Unfortunately, Align Surgical is not in my current insurance network. I am sort of stuck with Dr. Bluebond-Langner and Dr. Ley as my only in-network options for this type of revision.
You could potentially seek a gap exception and get coverage for any surgeon you trust to revise. Those wait times are f***ed
Dr Ellie Ley was AMAZING. She helped my mess look so much better and she removed the excess erectile tissue. She’s so sweet too
I’m getting both vaginoplasty and ffs with Dr pang in a few months. Do you have any other thoughts about any of his work you would like to share that could help me?
If you can get insurance cover, Dr Heidi Wittenberg in San Francisco seems to have a quality reputation and shorter wait times than RBL, plus she is a urologist by training so should be particularly well suited for functionality issues.
I am sorry for this outcome and thank you for sharing. Hope you find the right Dr to fix things.
Sister, I'm so sorry for your issues. For both functionality and aesthetics, you may want to consider vulvoplasty and colon revision with Dr. Theerapong in Thailand. Wish you the best.
Oh yikes, I’m rethinking my upcoming FFS consult with him now. So sorry to hear this outcome :-(
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Penetration is painful. The "divot" in the vestibule near the clitoris is sore often as well, like a cut.
I’m so sorry to hear of your experience. 🫂 I really hope you can get a much better revision soon.
Im really sorry to hear about this. I actually have my SRS scheduled with him in 5 months but this is giving me second thoughts. I'm quite scared to reschedule with a different doctor though, I already started paying for the place I plan on staying at and I'll have to go back through all of the work I've done getting letters of approval and working with insurance. I know no one can decide for me but would it be worth it to hold off and look for a different doctor?
Talk to him more than I did. Ask him specific questions about whether he has figured out how to avoid the issues I've highlighted.
Dont be afraid to lose money. I had the same hesitations but went through with it. I regret that choice.
Only you know what's right for you.
Thank you for your advice, I'll formulate a list of questions and call his office to obtain his email. Would prefer to ask him the questions before I finish paying off everything I need to. I wish you the best for your revisions ❤️
I'm quite confused there is no text to this post but from seeing a few comments I presume something went wrong? Without seeing the comments I would assume it was successful.
The pictures have captions to explain the issues.
I'm also shocked by the amount of people who look at this vulva and think its successful. The appearance and functional issues have been dealbreakers with multiple partners, women especially. Most partners have expressed discomfort touching me because they cant figure out my anatomy and because penetration is so difficult/painful.
I'm sorry about your experience.
I did want to say though that your first picture with the wristband made me feel euphoric. "F" ❤️
Very jealous
Are you getting a revision? Cheers to you. Looks good. Thanks for sharing your journey.
I hate the mentality of complimenting everything and everyone. How is anyone supposed to know if they pass or what surgeries they may need, specifically when asking for advice or posting that they aren't happy with a surgery. Being so disingenuously polite just makes everyone blind.
Exactly!! It also doesn’t do anything to help our community as a whole when it comes to demanding good outcomes for life changing (life saving) surgeries.
I would be devastated by this result and complimenting and saying it looks good is essentially just gaslighting.
Looks good? She’s obviously posting this because of the issues she’s having
I wasn't being a jerk. I knew that, but the whole result doesn't look bad. Downvote?
the down votes are because your compliment, in this particular circumstance and context, comes off as unbecoming.
in this moment, it'd be like trying to enthusiastically compliment someone's dress during a funeral when everyone is crying - maybe good intentions but poor timing turns out to faux pas.
reason is that the original poster included multiple images, and a description both in the captions of the images as well as in a comment.
if you didn't catch that detail it's possible you accidentally misunderstood.
the key problem is that OP is suffering from functionality problems due to unhelpful revision.
Misunderstood. Cheers
Absolutely
Frustrating when that happens.
Even more so when it happens face to face
Especially when coming from good intentions.
:3
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