Colovaginoplasty

[Apollymi]

I was wondering if anyone has had a colovaginoplasty? I'm looking at having revisionary surgery and my surgeon recommended having colovaginoplasty. I don't know if it's something I'll do or not but I'd really like to talk with someone that has had this surgery.

[Jill F]

I have yet to have SRS, but I have had my sigmoid colon removed with an end-to-end anastomosis performed, which is exactly what you'd need to recover from.  This is major surgery with a long, painful recovery.  I had the fortune of having it done by a wizard who could do it laparoscopically, so I didn't have to be sliced completely open, which is more common.   I had to spend a full week in the hospital, but I heard recovery can take as much as 2 weeks.  The first day it felt like I had been run over by a truck.  My mouth was so dry that my lips cracked wide open and they would not even give me ice chips.  I also discovered at this time that I could not handle morphine and demanded that they take me off of it.  Gas began to collect in my gut, but I had no way to pass it until day 4-5.  This was excruciatingly painful to say the least.  I was finally able to feel human again about 2 months later.  This was the worst week of my life, and I wouldn't wish that recovery on my worst enemy.

[Apollymi]

Jill,
Thanks for the info! I'll have to ask the surgeon about your experience and ask if they are planning on using that type of procedure on me.
To give everyone some back ground on why I'm thinking about have this done. I had GRS surgery in 2007 and had a bad reaction to the anaesthesia. I got really sick started throwing and the packing they used for the vaginal cavity came out. The doctor replaced it with a small dilator but the damage had been done. So the end result was I ended up with less then an inch in depth and a lot of depression and regret.
Now I'm finally ready to have revisionary surgery and appreciate any advice I can get.
Thanks
Dana

[Emily1996]

I know that girls usually stay away from this procedure because it causes a nasty smell to come from there and there is too much lubrificant produced so yeah but I'm not even on hrt so that's only info I got from other gals

[Susan522]

I originally had my SRS in 1973.  They used the standard penile inversion method with a skin graft taken from my buttock to insure adequate depth.  This worked well for me as I was sexually active soon after my surgical recovery.

As things turned out, I was sexually inactive for a period of several months between my first and second marriages and after years of regular sex I never did get back into regular dialation.  The end result was that I lost what had been up to that point, more than adequate depth.

So....right around 1985, I sought out and found a Dr. Neal Wilson who used approx. 8" of my sigmoid colon to create a new vaginal canal.

My experience was pretty much the same as noted above except for the unpleasant odor.  The worst part was the gas pains which were as noted above excruciating.  However, once the initial recovery period past, the results were better than I could have ever imagined.

I have not dialated in decades and continue to enjoy a regular and extremely satisfying sex life with my loving husband.  The only negative side effect of the surgery was/is a tendency towards constipation and an apparent intolerance to fatty foods.  The upside of this is that I must eat right and exercise regularly or suffer the consequences.

In balance though, I consider that a small price to pay for the ability to engage in spontaneous sex without any need for lubricants.  Also, I do tend to produce a fair amount of "lubricant" during sex and for a short time post coitus and so I usually wear a sani-pad immediately after sex.  Again...no big deal.

Hope this helps to answer your question. 

Oh one other thing.  I have "heard" that Dr. Supporn uses a technique where he inverts the penile tissue to provide a mucous lining for the new vagina.  I don't know much more about that other than the 'hearsay', so you would have to do your own research on that.

[Apollymi]

Susan,
Thank you so much for responding to this post!
Hearing from someone that has had revisionary surgery is fantastic. This puts my mind at ease a little and gives me more questions to ask the doctors. I have been working with Dr. Loren Schechter in Chicago, he was recommended by my doctor. I don't know that much about him, just what little I've found here and from his website. If anyone has experience with him I'd love to here about it.

[Susan522]

Not sure if Dr. Wilson is still practicing but way back when, he had an office in Detroit, MI.

[Flan]

Not sure if Dr. Wilson is still practicing but way back when, he had an office in Detroit, MI.

It doesn't appear he's practicing anymore. At least not accepting new patients. Might have had something to do with a lawsuit a patient filed over reassignment surgery regret.

[Susan522]

It doesn't appear he's practicing anymore. At least not accepting new patients. Might have had something to do with a lawsuit a patient filed over reassignment surgery regret.

What a shame.