Hi everyone!

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I made this throwaway account to journal my experience getting bottom surgery in Argentina since it seems that there's little information about SRS Surgeons from Argentina, there are only experiences and reviews from FFS Surgeons like Dr. Rossi and Dr. DiMaggio.

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A little background info about me, trans woman, 32 y/o, HRT for the last 9 years, working in tech.

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There are two major SRS surgeons in Argentina, and then there are several others based in another provinces/cities but I don't have much info about them. The two major ones are Dr. Belinky based in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Dr. Fidalgo based in La Plata, Argentina (around 50km/30mi away from Buenos Aires).

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Both have 15+ years of experience performing SRS be it Vaginoplasty, Phalloplasty, Metoidioplasty, Orchiectomy, etc...

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I chose to have surgery with Dr. Belinky for several reasons:

• It was covered by my Health Insurance without any cost from my end
• I have seen results pictures and talked with several patients and they were satisfied with the results
• Both the Hospital and the Dr. Office are only 15 mins away from home
• He's WPATH certified and keeps improving his technique year to year

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The procedure to have surgery with him was very simple, I had a few consultations with him at his office and we agreed a surgery date (4/12) he gave me some orders to do some pre surgery checkups (EKG, Blood Test) and come back with those results. At that last appointment he checked that everything was good and gave me some papers to present to my healthcare provider so the Surgery could be approve. The approval from the healthcare provider was super fast, in only 4 days I got the notification that the surgery was approved and I was good to go.

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The day before surgery I had to do the bowel prep with Monophosphate/Diphosphate sodium two times, first at 2PM and then at 8PM. The taste is gross, I diluted the liquid with some Gatorade Cool Blue to make it a little bit more palatable. I spent the rest of the evening going to the bathroom every 20/30 mins or so at the end it should only come clear liquid from your BM. In the morning the day of surgery I had to shave and do a antiseptic bath.

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Surgery was planned for 2PM, and I had to be at the hospital one hour earlier for the admission process.

Admission process was quick and I was sent to my bedroom for the next week, once there checked my vitals, asked me if I had any piercings, necklaces, etc. and asked me to take another antiseptic bath and put on the hospital gown, and wait. Around 2 PM I was taken in a wheelchair to the OR Reception and I waited there 15 mins while they were cleaning the OR from the previous surgery and prepping the tools, etc... Meanwhile the doctor checked on me and asked how I was doing. After the OR was ready I was wheeled in and I was place on the OR table, I was greeted by the Anesthetist and the other Doctors assisting the surgery. I mentioned that I had a spinal fusion surgery and since they wanted to check that I was comfortable they put me on Lithotomy position while awake to see if it was comfortable or not, also meanwhile the put me some bandages in my legs to prevent clotting. At this moment the Anesthetist already placed the IV on my left arm and injected the induction anesthesia, I started to feel dizzy and I blacked out pretty quickly.

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I woke up already in my room around 8PM, shivering a lot, the nurses placed a few blankets over me, I only felt shivering thankfully, no pain nor nausea whatsoever. I felt some pressure on the surgery area (and also like a phantom penis feel, like no surgery was performed, lol) but that was that. After a while the shivering subsided and the Dr. came in to the room, he mentioned that everything went fine but had to use an additional groin skin graft to achieve proper depth, which makes sense since my genitals were very small after 9 years of HRT. He mentioned that he would come back tomorrow to change the wound dressing and check how it's going. Incredibly I was with a lot of energy after the surgery, I talked a lot with my Boyfriend, for hours, listened some music and I finally went to sleep around 2AM.

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Next day I woke up and the pain was a little bit more intense, but manageable, around 4/5, they were administering IV Ketorolac every 8 hours. However past noon the pain flared up and it went up to 7/8 and the Nurse came and administered IV Tramadol, that worked great and the pain subsided and I was able to sleep a few more hours. Later that same day the Dr. came back to check on me and change the wound dressing, he removed the dressing and he asked me if I wanted to see, of course I said yes, and it looked great already! since it was less than 24 hours before the surgery the swelling didn't kick in so you could see a more well defined shape, I really liked the first impression, he showed me the details, labia majora, minora, clitoris, etc... and he told me that of course during the following days the look of the vulva would change due to the tissue inflammation process.

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Next few days were uneventful, on Wednesday I had to take IV Tramadol again due to a pain flare up but that was it, rest of the time I was and I am for now with IV Ketorolac only. Today is the first day that I feel I'm recovering some of the lost energy, I still get tired quickly but I managed to stay awake most of the day, I'm still in the hospital but by Sunday the Dr. will remove the Foley Catheter and the Vaginal Packing and we will check the dilation process, if all looks good I will get the hospital discharge by then. Another good thing to mention is that I already have sensation in my clitoris, but it's kind of a raw feeling, I think that with enough time that will change.

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To sum it up so far so good, it was not as terrible as I imagined it was going to be from reading other experiences, but yeah, the pain threshold is very personal and thankfully I always fared well in my previous surgeries. We'll see how I fare with the dilation process, during the first 6 weeks is 4x20 minutes a day so it's going to be rough I guess.

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I will be performing weekly updates and once my vulva is more healed I will be uploading some pictures.

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If there's any questions just ask! =)