I am a 28 year trans woman from NJ.
I had the surgery one week ago. I was in the hospital for five days. Currently home recovering. I’ll be posting more of my when I have a bit more energy. I’ll answer any questions people have too.
SRS Vaginoplasty with Dr. Bluebond-Langner & Dr. Lee Zhou at NYU Langone.
Yay!! I’m going with her July of next year! I can’t wait! How was everything for you?
Congrats! Nothing but positive things from her and her staff. Literally the nicest people I’ve ever dealt with. My only complaint was some of the nurses not knowing enough, but the new hospital is a few months old and her staff was actively teaching them so I can’t complain.
I’m currently two days after getting the catheter removed. So the only pain I feel is when I’m peeing. Kegel exercise has been helping greatly.
Wow. Do you live in New York?
North NJ, so I’m really close!
I’m down in Baltimore city so I have a ways to travel. lol.
Oh wow! Let me know if you want any visitors when you are at the hospital! Their LGBTQ+ liaison is trying to set up a system where people that have gone through the surgery already help those that are going through it.
I would love that! Still 9 months out but yeah! You would be damn near a year post op.
Are you able to see aesthetics yet?
It’s hard to say because I am still very swollen, but from what I can tell everything looks good and I have about 7 inches of depth.
That’s awesome! I’m worried about depth. When I went in for my consult, she was like, “average material” and I was like damn! Back when I actually cared about my size that would have been a slap in the face. I’m by no means an Adonis down there. But I always thought 7.5 was more than average. So I’m a little worried about my depth.
Haha you’ll be fine. I had about 6 and a half inches to work with. (Used to be more but hrt shrunk it lol) the most important part is dilating. Which I’m on day two of currently and it is a struggle.
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Could possibly have something to do with circumcision? There'll be more to work with on people who haven't been.
did you always know you wanted srs? pain level after surgery? why are you struggling with dilating?
congrats on getting the surgery done
I’ve always disliked my previous anatomy pre accepting myself. It wasn’t until I started allowing myself to imagine what it would be like that I wanted srs more and more. Pain level varied just like any other surgery. I’ve been told I have a high pain tolerance, so for me it stayed at mostly a 3 with an occasional spike. I was also taking very little narcotics. I’m all swollen! Of course dilating is gunna be uncomfortable for the first few days. I’m only on day 2 of dilating lol. In a week I’ll be fine. To clarify, I can get it in and out with no problems, it’s just uncomfortable.
Congrats! I've got a consult with her next year. What made you go with them? How long was their wait list?
She was actually a recommendation from a friend that went to her for his top surgery. She is under my insurance and pretty close to me. I really like how her method is traditional and robotic assisted. I really like the fact that she is constantly pushing for medical advances in the field for us.
I got pushed up because there was a cancelation so I waited about 6-7 months. I heard she is booking very fast though.
Was 6 months enough time for hair removal?
Was 6 months enough time for hair removal?
That was one of my concerns as well but they said it would be fine. I might have to get some hair removal after the fact and it might mean I have to clean more but that’s okay by me.
Can you elaborate on that? Do you mean remove internal hair?
I have surgery with her in April, and I was talking with my electrologist yesterday and we were curious if BBL scrapes or cauterizes the follicles during surgery like some surgeons do. It's kinda hard to get answers from her office staff, do you know if she does this?
I'm obviously still going to get as much hair removed as I can between now and then, but it'd be nice to have some extra assurance that things will be clear inside.
I spoke with one of their Nurse Practitioners during one of my pre ops. He assured me that less hair the better for hygienic purposes but it will not cause any complications. They have worked on people in the past that have done no hair removal at all. It is completely normal trans or cis to have hairs inside of your vagina. Our job is to make them as few and far between pre surgery so we don’t develop hair balls inside our canal. They didn’t mention anything about cauterizing hair follicles during any of my visits but I could always ask during my post op. If I remember correctly that is normally done Thailand but they don’t really do it in the states, don’t quote me on that.
There’s definitely surgeons in the USA who cauterize donor hair before using the graft to line the canal. My doctor for GCS was based in NYC (I went with Dr. Avanessian at Mount Sinai) and she cauterized my hair during my procedure. I don’t see why Dr. Bluebond-Langner wouldn’t do the same. I had laser hair removal prior, and limited growth, so I think that took care of it. I haven’t noticed any hair growing internally, or on my vulva.
If you could ask and let me know, I'd be super grateful! I know it's common for some surgeons to "scrape" the follicles during surgery, and it'd give me some peace of mind. I reallly don't want to deal with hair in the canal. A bit around the vulva, ok, that's easy enough to fix, but not inside...
How long are you restricted from flying / travel post surgery? My top two choices are both in NYC and I'm trying to get a feel for how crazy high my lodging bill might end up, since I live too far away to drive.
I see BBL in April and I live in Albany, which is only a few hours away by train. She still wants me to stay somewhere locally (within an hour) for three weeks after the surgery. I'll have ~6 days in the hospital for recovery, and then another 2 weeks at a hotel.
I'm planning to stay at the Best Western in Newark, NJ. It's reasonably close and seems more affordable than most. It's still gonna cost ~$2k, though :/ Seems like insurance should pay for it, but they won't...
I don’t know about flying restrictions but I would suggest you attend all of the weekly post op appointments which go about 4-5 weeks out.
If you are worried about money try to find a hotel in NJ because it’s a lot cheaper.
Sure, I wouldn't be looking for an expensive hotel, but round-trip flights can be had for ~$220, and if you include other flight-related traveling expenses, I'd pretty much need to find a hotel for less than $40 a night for it to be cheaper, and it would definitely be less comfortable than spending most of the week at home, even accounting for paying for a one-night hotel in the middle of every trip.
Quick search tells me that even the cheapest hotels in the area don't really go that low.
But I have to lose more weight before any surgeon will take me, so I guess I have time to save up...
My suggestion is to not skimp out on lodging, the first few weeks after the hospital are super crucial. You will be thrown in to a routine whether you like it or not. Maybe an Airbnb or something could be better. There is also a ton of people that sublet their apartments for a month or two that are in the city.
I'd definitely prefer somewhere nice, but my home definitely is, and if I'm paying closer to $100/day for a "more ritsy" place, being able to travel by plane for just the last two weeks of it would save me almost $1000... probably more considering food would be a lot cheaper.
Guess I haven't really checked out Airbnb, though... I guess I've never been a big fan of the idea of it.
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