so, I should start by saying vaginoplasty significantly reduced my genital dysphoria, and in general has helped me feel more like a woman - it’s overall quite clear it was the right choice for me (and same with transition overall).
… but I’ve struggled a lot with continued bottom dysphoria and anxiety that I made a mistake or the surgery was problematic or wrong in some way
for example, my labia continue to look and feel like scrotal tissue, and I feel insecure about this - they can sag and look wrinkly at times, which makes them look scrotal to me.
I also seem to have no labia minora as far as I can tell, or perhaps it’s too early post-op to tell, the clitoral hood is just a tighter part of the same labia majora - so maybe as swelling goes down there will be more of a sense of inner folds vs outer folds?
Anyway, lots of insecurity and concerns that my genitals are still male. Any time I’m aroused and my clit becomes engorged, it feels so much like an erection that I become dysphoric and I struggle to stay in the moment and maintain arousal.
Last night I had a dream that a stitch popped or something changed in my recovery overnight, and I woke up with my labia sagging even more and bunching into an empty scrotal sack, and my clit when engorged would become erect and push out several inches into an erect penis. It was very distressing in my dream, I was panicking and trying to find a private place to capture photos to send my surgeon. (In some ways this nightmare was clarifying or affirming - knowing my unconscious is not secretly coveting having male genitals again makes me feel more confident I made the right choice.)
I guess I never expected to have so much bottom dysphoria post-op, or to struggle so much to see my vagina as female. Sometimes I even wonder if this is what it’s like to be a trans man, to “feel male” internally and to have female genitals (though obviously this isn’t how trans men feel, trans men generally want to feel male in body and mind, something I don’t experience - and my “feeling male” is more like insecurity and imposter syndrome than whatever trans men experience).
It still hasn’t been six months since my surgery, and I’m so early in my transition in general - I just trust it will get better over time … but right now anyway, I am struggling more than I expected with challenges I perhaps naively expected or hoped the surgery would just immediately solve.
I have noticed that the dysphoria I would feel when I lay on my back and twist my lower body in a way that allows me to feel the length of my clit embedded in me, and it would feel like my penis was sewn onto me, has gone away - with the healing I think inflammation has gone down and I no longer notice that sensation of length in me, and when I do twist or pull in a way that seems to engage my clit, it feels more “normal” and doesn’t create dysphoria. So already the dysphoria I had earlier in my recovery is subsiding, which is good!
I think this was mostly a vent post / brain dump, but I did want to ask about others’ experiences - I wanted to invite general sharing of what surgeries were like for others (esp. what wasn’t expected or isn’t commonly discussed).
If anyone has advice for me, I’m completely open. Thanks for reading 😊
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One thing to note is that a clitoris is erectile tissue and stiffness when aroused is something that cis women experience.
The clit extending inside as well
I am neither transfemme, nor am I in a position to receive surgery for my own dysphoria. But I’ll tell you this. As someone who has had a few good relationships with some incredible, sensitive, confident, and emotionally intelligent trans women who have had insecurities about being ‘woman enough’, I want you to know this.
No two women have the same body either. Tell you a secret, skin down there has a lot in common because, hormonally, they respond to the same triggers.
Trust your endocrinologist. Trust your surgeon. And trust your own heart. I know that is hard, for reasons that I promise you, I struggle with similarly.
You are woman enough for yourself. That is all you have to be. Only an abuser would expect you to be perfect, so don’t abuse yourself when you’ve done so much to love who you are.
there’s no one single vagina; vaginas look and feel different to every woman :)
but to answer your question, i did have a bit of dysphoria but mostly just because it was the end of my “transition” journey and it was the last thing I was looking forward to and from that point out there wasn’t any tangible milestones to look foward to. i didn’t have any regrets; it just was the first time i had no major milestones to mark to have tangible “proof” of my transition path. maybe you’re feeling that too?
That happened to me, right when covid hit. I had ticked all the medical and social transition boxes I wanted to do, and now, it was time to work out what my new normal is. And then covid came along and erased the idea of “normal”. They were a rough few years
ooh i had mine in covid too. we were scheduled for may 2020 in 2019 but then covid hit and they called to cancel and i was so sad but they were able to get me in in june so me and my mum had all the hotels and everything and the best thing about it was nyc was so quiet (my mum was driving not me but i get so anxious and stressed in crowds) plus i remember it was right the last week of june and when i woke up and got taken back to my room i had a perfect view of the empire state building lit up for pride and i thought it was appropriate for the occasion :)
I had bottom surgery a couple of years before covid. FFS was the last real “goal” I had, and I had that done in December 2019, so I had returned home from Argentina and just got through the worst part of my recovery when the first lockdowns started happening
Keep thinking and feeling and talking. You’re gonna be okay. It’s gonna be okay. 🫂
I love you. Be safe.
thank you! 🥰
Bestie, you deserve love, care, and support. 💜
Well said
Look at 1 and 2 year progress pictures, it takes some time. I was where you were and I had to breath thru it but it will be be better as time goes on
Still waiting for approval for surgery here, but thank you so much as always for talking about your experiences. It’s really helpful to know what I might have to face going forward.
It does sound like your brain is playing tricks. Hope things calm down soon <3
Damn! You got a labia with yours?? Fr tho I would trade you, they didn’t give me one.(probably because im a little over weight, but still.)
well, technically it seems like just outer labia - I’m also overweight, and I don’t know enough to discern whether it played a role in the seeming absence of inner labia …
here are some pictures of results very similar to mine from the same surgeon (warning, NSFW images):
nsfw
currently my outer labia tuck in where the clit is, and at the clitoris the skin is pulled tighter down. The tighter skin forms the clitoral hood, but the tightened skin doesn’t continue all the way down to form inner labia - at least not currently (maybe after a year of healing the swelling will go down and it will look different?) … also just not sure how common this is, I feel somewhat dumb for not asking more questions or doing more research on this part (apparently I’m not alone).
