Yeson voice feminization surgery

[kathyp]

Hi
   Well no pain yet so I might be alright, Thanks.
Jenny & Abby did you remember what station you met the tour at? We were told the station no. the first hour on Monday and we can't remember if it's station 2,3 or 4 and no one wrote it down, Jessie or us.
Problem is we have no way of contacting them until Mon morning and the tour is Sat a.m.. I'm not sure whether they adjust the meeting place to where you are staying or it's a set place irregardless.
Kathy

[Jennygirl]

Kathy- I hope everything is going well! I'm sure it is

If you told Jessie where you were staying, I'd bet that she told the tour company your address.

If I remember correctly, my friend took a call the evening before to confirm the time from them. I was picked up at my hotel at around 8:20am, if that helps!

Have fun! Really excited that people are sharing their experiences like this, because I can mentally put myself there in a heartbeat... And it makes me want to go back to Seoul to see more.

The tour will be good because you'll get a primer and then know which places you might want to see more of... I did my tour at the end so it ended up being a little redundant because we'd already been to some of the places. The palaces are awesome though, it's a really cool tour. Wear good walking shoes

[anjaq]

I am somwhere halfway through this ultra long thread and just wanted to say that you made me cry. Those voice recordings just a month after your visit in Korea were so amazing and incited in me a longing that I have not felt for over a decade. I dont know what to make of that experience yet, just wanted to say that. Sigh

[Jennygirl]

I am somwhere halfway through this ultra long thread and just wanted to say that you made me cry. Those voice recordings just a month after your visit in Korea were so amazing and incited in me a longing that I have not felt for over a decade. I dont know what to make of that experience yet, just wanted to say that. Sigh

Well let's just have a big cry party, then I am already there with you. I was just looking through pics from months ago, and the changeover after voice surgery is obvious to me even in the pictures. As soon as my male voice left for good, a part of my past left for good as well. For me, not having gone through SRS yet, it was the moment when I knew there would be absolutely no turning back- and it progressed me as a person and as a female.

Just tonight, a VERY close friend of mine (actually the closest of all right now ) told me how he noticed over the past week that my "voice has gone up higher"... Something I had not noticed at all. The results from this surgery keep getting better and better. I'm almost in tears thinking about it!! I can't imagine going back. And sometimes when I think maybe my voice sounds low one day, I listen to my pre-op voice and I'm like hooooollllyy s!@#. "How did I ever sound like that..." I can't even make those noises anymore.. at all.

Recently, life has been good. I mean... really really good. Seeing the changes from HRT and simultaneously feeling my voice become stronger has been a very uplifting experience, and I wouldn't trade my decision to transition for the world.

[anjaq]

As soon as my male voice left for good, a part of my past left for good as well. For me, not having gone through SRS yet, it was the moment when I knew there would be absolutely no turning back- and it progressed me as a person and as a female.

Yes - this is definitely what happens. I noticed that this is different for different people - sometimes it is SRS like it was with me, sometimes it is FFS or voice surgery, whatever comes first I guess. It is the point the irrevokable (well at least to 99% or so) decision is made to really be on the female side. In the cases of people being happy afterwards, I think almost all of them had that moment - often before any surgery when the decision really was made with the impacts after the surgery coming to pass. I called this in other posts a rite of passage and that is what I think it is. At that point one can (is allowed to, does not need to do otherwise, maybe even is forced a bit in a gentle way) let go of shreds and bits of a former "male" self presentation. And this is incredibly liberating - knowing that one can discard of so many things now that they are really no longer needed because the final decision was made to live in a way that does not have a use for them.

And sometimes when I think maybe my voice sounds low one day, I listen to my pre-op voice and I'm like hooooollllyy s!@#. "How did I ever sound like that..." I can't even make those noises anymore.. at all.

Thats wow. Incredible how sometimes not to be able to do something (a diminished choice in a way) can be really liberating . Ah that sounds great. I am back at voice training for myself the next weeks. Just ordered microphone and such. I treid experimenting a bit now as people tell me I have a low pitch voice quite often. I wondered and found that yes i am doing many of the things described in various voice training videos and such already. So I mustered up all my courage and tried to get to my very very old voice. I barely managed but when I did I found that yes it is holy >-bleeped-< even so much deeper down O.O - so then I thought well, I have come a long way already but its far from good. And then I listened to your recordings and cried.

Ah sorry for being writing so much and whining a bit - I will finish that thread reading now - 12 more pages to go. dont wat to write too much before knowing what was already said

[Paige]

JennyGirl thank you so much for starting this thread.  I always thought the voice issue would be the one thing that would make life extremely difficult transitioning.  Now I can actually imagine myself sort of passing if I ever get the courage to do it. :-)

Also, I keep wondering when this surgery is going to take off in North America.  It seems so much better than all the other options.

[barbie]

Jenny & Abby did you remember what station you met the tour at? We were told the station no. the first hour on Monday and we can't remember if it's station 2,3 or 4 and no one wrote it down, Jessie or us.

Kathy,

If nobody yet called you, then you may try to wait in the front of Entrance #2 of Apgujeong Station (do not go down to the stairs). Entrance #2 is closest to Yeson clinic.

barbie~~

[anjaq]

I am looking forward to hear more recordings. These voices are beautiful. I kind of dread tomorrow when the mic comes and I will do some testing on how I sound now without effort, how with effort to raise pitch and how with effort to actually go to the male voice I have not used in years. I dont know what it will be like and how bad it really will turn out to be. Even more scary for me at least is the thought that I will actually have the desire to follow your examples here as voice is such a major issue for me still - its IMO close to 100% of the reason I get misgendered. I did only a bit of voice training years ago with the Melanie Ann Phillips way - I think I am not too bad in terms of resonance but I dont know really. So I have a question. Is there a way to get all these voice qualities analyzed at the PC? Like the pitch range, average pitch but also see somehow if resonance is good or not?

Meh it is weird. I am scared at listening to my own voice, quite afraid of doing any voice surgery that basically reduces my pitch range and maybe other properties of the voice - but I am even more hurt by people misgendering me and I have a hard time to use a high pitch - it is straineous and I somehow dont really feel comfortable using a higher pitch with other people. I think listeining to my higher pitched voice in my head only and not in recording makes it sound higher than it is, so I feel like talking Mickey Mouse but once I recorded it with the cellphone and it was not that high at all. But the emotional response I had when listening to the Audio here was of a quality I did not have in a time - and when it comes to trans-issues I didnt have it in 13 years actually, so yeah - I dont know what will happen. I think first I need to look for a voice therapist and see what they can do. But the whole "not being able to speak like a man again ever" or the "not being able to pass as a man" statements really strike me as something I WANT. -

Confused,
A.Q.

[anjaq]

I have come up with a question I want to ask about this surgery. I knew a person who had this surgery. She did it in the early years of the last decade, must have been 2002 or so. I dont know where she went but she had this technique done that is described here with the fusing of the voice cords with a suture to reduce length to 2/3 or 1/2. Now I think she was th eonly one in our support group that got a voice surgery, everyone else was scared and I have to admit I was not enthusiastic about the outcome. I think the pitch was too high and she sounded squeaky at first. It did settle down a bit but I am still not thrilled although I heard much worse examples on the net. So while just now as I was talking about surgeries and such my best friend who always told me to not do anything in terms of surgeries except SRS felt that this topic is tough for me told me if I could "not just get this done by a surgery" I was baffled and in a way relieved that there will not be opposition on that end if I should decide for that, but that result of the other friend I have not met in a decade, only heard the voice on the phone was what kept me from investigatin any of this for over a decade now. This is why I wrote above that i am scared, despite the great results shown here.

[Lexi Belle]

I have come up with a question I want to ask about this surgery. I knew a person who had this surgery. She did it in the early years of the last decade, must have been 2002 or so. I dont know where she went but she had this technique done that is described here with the fusing of the voice cords with a suture to reduce length to 2/3 or 1/2. Now I think she was th eonly one in our support group that got a voice surgery, everyone else was scared and I have to admit I was not enthusiastic about the outcome. I think the pitch was too high and she sounded squeaky at first. It did settle down a bit but I am still not thrilled although I heard much worse examples on the net. So while just now as I was talking about surgeries and such my best friend who always told me to not do anything in terms of surgeries except SRS felt that this topic is tough for me told me if I could "not just get this done by a surgery" I was baffled and in a way relieved that there will not be opposition on that end if I should decide for that, but that result of the other friend I have not met in a decade, only heard the voice on the phone was what kept me from investigatin any of this for over a decade now. This is why I wrote above that i am scared, despite the great results shown here.

You should probably be familiar with which surgery she ACTUALLY got.  I didn't actually know this place was doing TG vocal surgeries for that long? Could be wrong?  But anyway, if I'm not mistaken when I investigated Yeson's site and searched different outcomes it seems to be by far the very LEAST invasive vocal operation I have come across and it's success rate is reaaally high.  Every example I have heard has sounded very natural.  I think your fear, as well as your support group's fear is of the OTHER vocal operations as they are all very invasive and much of them have a very poor chance of a good success.  Yeson, as far as I know is the ONLY place that does what they do as far as the operation goes.

[Jennygirl]

I suppose there is a chance she had it done at Yeson. From what I understand, 2002 or shortly thereafter was around the time that Dr. Kim initially began performing VFS.. It wasn't until 2007 that he presented it, though.

I haven't heard any examples of voices sounding squeaky or too high coming from Yeson, but I have heard a few that sounded like resonance hadn't been worked on much. Still, it wasn't enough of a problem that I would have gendered their voice male at all. Going into it I knew I would still have a lot of learning to do with the new pitch. Heck, I am still learning It's a very rewarding experience.

I had a great day today because of my voice, actually. This morning I was on the phone with the DMV and had to identify myself as my previous identity to match the registration on the car... Even after the woman saw my file and that I'm still in the books as male, she still called me ma'am twice later on in the conversation! I didn't tell her I was trans or anything suggesting that. She didn't even catch herself to say "I'm sorry about that" with a correction. That to me was the most affirming experience I have had talking to someone random over the phone, and it tooootally made my day.

On top of that, today I noticed that the super high squeak register I discovered months ago has officially made its way into my laugh. I was almost shocked when I heard it this evening because it came out completely involuntarily. It is MUCH easier to go into that register now... I never used to be able to do that I'm excited.

Today was a great day!

[anjaq]

You should probably be familiar with which surgery she ACTUALLY got. [....]it seems to be by far the very LEAST invasive vocal operation I have come across and it's success rate is reaaally high.  Every example I have heard has sounded very natural.  I think your fear, as well as your support group's fear is of the OTHER vocal operations

Oh I did not want to say that this is not the case - and from what I got from a friend of mine who met her lately the voice is good and I dont think there have been complaints. I didnt see her in a long time as after 2002, we all more or less disappeared from each other and the TG stuff - many moved away. Anyways I dont know as of now her surgeon or EXACTLY what was done except that IIRC she got a procedure that was rather new at that time and that involved taking the vocal cords and basically "sewing them together" to make the opening for the air smaller and the active part of the vocal cords shorter. This sounds to me like what Yeson is doing, so either it is just close to that or some other surgeons performed this as early as 2002 or she actually was one of the very early patients of Yeson (which would also mean that very likely the procedure was further developed since then). I think I even remember that she did a short presentation at the support group about this - with the ususal sceptic reactions (that group was sceptic to everything which sounded like an easier way - laser hair removal, RLT without skirts, early HRT, FFS, ...). So what I remember from back then was that the voice was very squeaky at first - really high pitched and she did not control resonance well so it sounded not really great (I cannot be said enough that #1 priority is to get resonance trained). I found the pitch to be too high for a woman of her stature - rather tall and as many TS people not overly femme in face and body, so I think I perceived that a bit as a mismatch - that pitch would have me expect a smaller, tinyer, more feminine woman. And from what I gathered the pitch is still really high now after 10 years (so on the upside this is a good hint that the effects of the surgery are long lasting). I have to meet her again to see how things are and ask her some things about it if I really should consider this, which I am absolutely not sure but rather scared about. Oh and that scare - it is only to a minor degree a scare about maybe lack of success in the result - from what I hear here, the results seem to be awesome. Its also that I just generally am scared of surgery (the last one I had was SRS and that did not go that well) and I am scared of doing such a step now - being 13 years post op and all that - how would I explain to anyone what I did without coming out again. So thats mostly about me. My fear of surgery comes in part of me often getting nerve problems - does this surgery potenitally injure any nerves? I hear somethign about the tongue being numb? I tend to be among the fraction of a percent in such cases in which nerves do not regenerate well. Once I pinched a finger too hard and it took over 2 months to regain sensitivity .
Regarding the surgery resulsts - from how I understand it, it basically reduces your vocal pitch range, restricts it to the upper half. I guess that is all right as who wants to use the lower half anyways except if one is a singer or actor. But did I get that right?

Oh and one more - Do they have at least a guess as to what happens long term? I mean like 20 or 40 years out? they cannot know anything about more than 10 years of course because there was no such surgery before but do they have a guess? Will pitch stay, come down a bit, could the modifications cause some other problems in old age with breathing or therelike?

I suppose there is a chance she had it done at Yeson. From what I understand, 2002 or shortly thereafter was around the time that Dr. Kim initially began performing VFS.. It wasn't until 2007 that he presented it, though.

I dont know where she went or how she got the information. I would have to meet her again and ask. It was outside the country though for sure.

Again - what I heard was the initial result more or less some weeks after surgery, so that was not well trained. What I noticed was that I thought the pitch would be too high - well in a female range of course but IMO unusual for a woman like her in this country. By the way I tend to think, I would be interested if someone has info on that, that women in different countries use different pitch. In Germany a lot more women seem to use a lower pitch than in the US and rarely I hear some of the very high pitched voices here in Germany that are at least common in the US media. Maybe that is also why I thought the pitch was too high because of the context - maybe it was more like a US woman than a German woman.
(EDIT: Found a study on that: www.qmu.ac.uk/casl/PitchRange/Mennen_et_al_ICPHS07_final.pdf‎ - it says that there is an average 5 Hz difference plus a difference in the pitch range used... )

Going into it I knew I would still have a lot of learning to do with the new pitch. Heck, I am still learning It's a very rewarding experience.

That sounds cool. I can imagine that it is much more fun to learn with a voice that is in the right range than to try and learn the same thing with a voice that "breaks off" to the low range. I really was so put back in the one face to face voice lesson I had with a trainer because she wanted me to go into my deeper voice to feel the resonance - by that time I really did not want to hear that sound coming out from me....

EDIT: Jenny, you mentioned that you wrote something about how to use the praat software for voice training, can you give the link? I just tried and its quite complicated program. If I get this right, my pitch range seems to be 90-420, original voice is at 110-120, regular voice now (the way I am using it without having to think too much about it) is between 125 and 160, if I make some effort it seems to go in the range of 200-210 (though to me this is already the point I scare away of using it outside training). But I'd like to know more on the program as I am not sure I am using it right. I am recording and looking at the blue numbers at the bottom in the voice pattern image after zooming in to 10 seconds.

[Lena from Kiev]

I dont know as of now her surgeon or EXACTLY what was done except that IIRC she got a procedure that was rather new at that time and that involved taking the vocal cords and basically "sewing them together" to make the opening for the air smaller and the active part of the vocal cords shorter. This sounds to me like what Yeson is doing, so either it is just close to that or some other surgeons performed this as early as 2002

rarely I hear some of the very high pitched voices here in Germany that are at least common in the US media.

In Germany (perhaps Berlin) Dr. Manfred Gross did what he called "anterior web creation" - the same surgery as Yeson does. Ask here.

[abbyt89]

Hi everyone I thought I would share a few more voice clips with you all.

Reading the rainbow passage, my natural speaking voice is now up to about 177hz, and can be heard here: http://vocaroo.com/i/s0sG1qZuozcq

And here's me reading the same passage but trying to elevate the pitch a little bit. I am not trying super hard here, and definitely not straining my voice at all - just a comfortable elevation. It is at 210hz: http://vocaroo.com/i/s0pkZJttqIud

I'm about 5.5 weeks post-op and my voice is getting better every day. I still am resting my voice and trying to use it as little as possible, as they recommend that until the 8 week point. At that point I can start my vocal exercises and I'll post another update.

My normal conversation pitch is a bit lower, at around 160-165hz, but part of that is I think mental and part of that is I also need to work on my inflection a bit, as the rainbow passage really forces you to use a wider pitch range. So when using it in public, my voice doesn't sound quite as feminine but at least it is gender neutral. Considering I still have a while to heal and I'm still getting used to my new voice, I'm very very happy with where I am right now.

[Shantel]

Hi everyone I thought I would share a few more voice clips with you all.

Reading the rainbow passage, my natural speaking voice is now up to about 177hz, and can be heard here: http://vocaroo.com/i/s0sG1qZuozcq

And here's me reading the same passage but trying to elevate the pitch a little bit. I am not trying super hard here, and definitely not straining my voice at all - just a comfortable elevation. It is at 210hz: http://vocaroo.com/i/s0pkZJttqIud

I'm about 5.5 weeks post-op and my voice is getting better every day. I still am resting my voice and trying to use it as little as possible, as they recommend that until the 8 week point. At that point I can start my vocal exercises and I'll post another update.

My normal conversation pitch is a bit lower, at around 160-165hz, but part of that is I think mental and part of that is I also need to work on my inflection a bit, as the rainbow passage really forces you to use a wider pitch range. So when using it in public, my voice doesn't sound quite as feminine but at least it is gender neutral. Considering I still have a while to heal and I'm still getting used to my new voice, I'm very very happy with where I am right now.

Amazing progress, both tracks very feminine Abby and such a huge change from the former voice! Even as it sounds now in either clip no-one would ever suspect your birth gender, couple that with your terrific looks, you're good to go doll baby!

[anjaq]

Yes, totally agree that the latest audio clips are great. The first one is really a bit on the lower range, could be considered a bit neutral in terms of pitch, though as you control resonance there, it's good and female sounding. The second recording obviously is quite distinctively female. But as I understood it the goal of this surgery is to elevate the pitch you are having without having to raise it. Or is it now quite easy to get to the second pitch compared to pre-op?

Which brings up a general question about this - did you Abby and Jenny have the same voice as you have now in the recording post-op also pre-op during voice training when you consiously elevated pitch? I mean can you compare a pre-op voice recording at lets say 220 Hz with a post-op recording at the same pitch?

In Germany (perhaps Berlin) Dr. Manfred Gross did what he called "anterior web creation" - the same surgery as Yeson does.

I think thats probably it, yes. According to the article he started to do this in 1999, which is a few years before the time I mentioned, which was somewhere between 2001 and 2003 I believe. And it makes of course sense then that there was information on this going around in the support groups. He does not seem to promote that on the website though, or I have not found it yet. I wonder if they actually do this on insurance cost as some of the other procedures. It will be a bit harder to get a good set of before and after recordings and personal evaluations of patients I can imagine, but I might actually check this out.
But this also means that Yeson is neither the first nor the only one who does that surgery - he may still be the most experienced one as usually in Germany doctors doing gender surgeries of all kinds perform mostly other tasks and only a small percentage of their operations are gender related. I doubt anyone of them could get to 500+ gender-related surgeries in a few years.

Oh and thanks Lena for the "shortcut" voice article. Its is intersting. I could probably not have learned resonance from that one, but it does explain it in medical terms. I never knew what exactly I am doing there . I must say for me it is still a bit of a strain to do this all the time. I sometimes get a bit of a weird feeling in the throat if I do the resonance control all day long. It is a lot worse when I try to elevate pitch. Both of them have lead me over the years to become a person that does not speak a lot and I have sort of lost the initial high pitch low resonance voice as it was somehow too straineous to keep up. Both is not good - I would really like to talk more with people.

[abbyt89]

Thank you Shan!!

Yes, totally agree that the latest audio clips are great. The first one is really a bit on the lower range, could be considered a bit neutral in terms of pitch, though as you control resonance there, it's good and female sounding. The second recording obviously is quite distinctively female. But as I understood it the goal of this surgery is to elevate the pitch you are having without having to raise it. Or is it now quite easy to get to the second pitch compared to pre-op?

Which brings up a general question about this - did you Abby and Jenny have the same voice as you have now in the recording post-op also pre-op during voice training when you consiously elevated pitch? I mean can you compare a pre-op voice recording at lets say 220 Hz with a post-op recording at the same pitch?

Yeah, the overall goal is to elevate the pitch so I don't have to focus on it at all. That was the first recording, me just speaking at a normal pitch. It has gone up quite a bit and if I see the average increase by the time it is fully healed (another 2-3 months, everyone heals differently) then that normal speaking pitch should be up around 200hz.

And yes, the pitch of the second recording was me putting very, very little effort into raising the pitch. Before surgery, my normal speaking pitch was 125hz and my feminine pitch was 170hz. I could do 200hz but not sustained for any period of time as it was very straining on my vocal chords. Compared to before, getting over 200hz now is a breeze, and it should be where my natural voice eventually ends up.

Edit: Oh and it's good to hear that the resonance sounds good in my recordings, since I'm not even focusing on it at all!! That's why I really can't wait until I can start my vocal exercises because I know that will improve my resonance a bit on top of the pitch still increasing.

[Jennygirl]

Seriously sounding great Abby I know how you feel with looking forward to vocal exercises. I couldn't wait! They really help so much. I kind of slacked doing them for a few weeks in August because I was waking up late and was off of work (I would normally do the exercises in my car to/from work). I feel kind of weird doing the exercises when I know my roommates can hear Lately I haven't been caring as much what they think because I love hearing my voice get better, and it still is.

anjaq- to answer your question, I second what Abby said. I think my starting voice was just shy of 20hz higher than hers, and the shift I have experienced pre/post op is almost exactly the same. Pre-op normal speaking range for me was 130-140hz and w/ practiced female voice up to 220 for short periods of time. Post-op normal relaxed speaking range 190-200hz and rainbow passage at 215hz... up to 235hz comfortably raising pitch thinking about it. The 235hz has pretty much stayed the same for me, it's the average speaking pitch that has gone up noticeably. I guess I am just more comfortable with the sound of my voice now, and I've been adding vocal inflections all the while.

I think when I first started talking, in conversation my voice was around 170-180 on average- but it was just a voice training thing. Every time I would record something (not talking to people) my voice jumped up to 210-215. Like I said, now my conversational voice is up to 190-200.

I guess I should really do another recording. The last time I recorded something and posted it was from 2 months post-op, when I did my interview video. That was just after I had started vocal exercises. I am now 4 months post op!

[Jennygirl]

Also, Lena- it looks like the endoscopic version of the web creation procedure detailed in the link you most recently posted is exactly the same procedure that Yeson offers. I'd be interested to know if the technique differs at all when it comes to how the "web" is created... i.e. placement of the sutures and how much is tied off. average increase of 81hz sounds right on the money to Yeson's 75hz. However, there haven't been any reports of weak or breathy voice coming from Yeson... so that's why I wonder about whether the technique is slightly different.

[sarahb]

Abby, you're sounding very good! How much talking do you do these days being only 5.5 weeks post-op? I know you mentioned that you're trying not to talk too much until at least 8 weeks, but how much talking does that mean you limit it to?

Also, when you do talk is there any pain or anything? Do you have to strain to talk or does it come out pretty easily? I'm just curious if after the surgery and until it's healed enough if you're always in a little pain or have to actually strain to talk at all.