The explanation, according to Brassard's nurses, is twofold : risk of infection, and risk that the skin will grow *around* it while it's healing. (I got the impression that something like that might be safe a few months later, but by that point, why would I trade one 20-minute dilation a day for wearing something all the time?

)
Dena, we have the same muscles cis women do (in fact, those PC muscles are what make dilation a pain early on). I can definitely both clamp down on the dilator and push it out with them. Of course, they're not the same as the anal muscles, in cis women or in us, and they *do* get tired.