Dr. Haben, voice feminization surgery, Rochester, NY

[peky]

Hi, All,

I found that Dr. Haben performs voice feminization surgery... Anybody has experience or knowledge of Dr. Haben... price is about $ 7,000.00

http://professionalvoice.org/feminization.aspx

[Jennygirl]

I briefly checked this place out before deciding to go with Yeson. Their technique is slightly different, and includes an incision, and I could not find examples of their work.

If you don't mind the incision and you can get voice samples and are happy with them, I would say the procedure itself sounds viable to be successful.

Also I would be sure to ask what the patient satisfaction rate is combined with how long & how many of these surgeries the doctor has performed.

Maybe someone else here has more info? Voice surgery still carries a rather large stigma, and so far Yeson seems like the only one that has been able to make some progress breaking it... It would be great to find yet another good option for people and here in the US. My fingers are crossed for you

[FinallyMe84]

I've been looking into voice feminization options recently, and of course I knew about yeson (Jenny, your voice sounds fabulous btw, I saw your youtube video on it). But I just came across this option, and if it is legit that would be so perfect! I am like 5 hour drive from where they are. I will be looking into it, while in the meantime still practicing my voice!

[Buterfly99]

Hi,
I have consultation with DR. Haben next week on July 10th.. Then following surgery in a couple of weeks..
I will keep update of my surgery regularly..

Cheers
Butterfly99

[Myarkstir]

A few things i found while searching on the subject. also as background i do phone costumer service 35 hours a week asnd have been dpoing so for years. Only very recently did i resolve my voice issue completely and without surgery.

1)dr belanger when i assked for the voice surgery plainly said their failure rate is very high and refused to do it without a 1 year trasining schedule with a voice specialist.

2) succesful surgeries often involve cutting your vocal cords and reattaching them. Scares me to death.

3) proper training alone can give tou a perfecly female range voice. I did it, thouhg i put 15 yeasrs of work into it.

I read 1 article that gave me the answer. It was in french so linking it would not be useful. Will try to give a quick version someday if needed . But it solved my 1 issue. My voice can go from very low to very high and i did not know what was causing it. Learning which muscle wass responsible fixed it. I got not 1 sir sunce then.

Update : I recorded my voice and it measures btw 175 and 235 hz quite happy actually   

[Donna Elvira]

A few things i found while searching on the subject. also as background i do phone costumer service 35 hours a week asnd have been dpoing so for years. Only very recently did i resolve my voice issue completely and without surgery.

1)dr belanger when i assked for the voice surgery plainly said their failure rate is very high and refused to do it without a 1 year trasining schedule with a voice specialist.

2) succesful surgeries often involve cutting your vocal cords and reattaching them. Scares me to death.

3) proper training alone can give tou a perfecly female range voice. I did it, thouhg i put 15 yeasrs of work into it.

I read 1 article that gave me the answer. It was in french so linking it would not be useful. Will try to give a quick version someday if needed . But it solved my 1 issue. My voice can go from very low to very high and i did not know what was causing it. Learning which muscle wass responsible fixed it. I got not 1 sir sunce then.

Hi there!
Je fais partie des personnes ici qui parlent français et suis très intéressée par le lien! If the article is not too long, I may even translate it for the benefit of all.
Thanks
Donna

   

[Myarkstir]

Hi there!
Je fais partie des personnes ici qui parlent français et suis très intéressée par le lien! If the article is not too long, I may even translate it for the benefit of all.
Thanks
Donna

Here you go / et voila

http://www.abc-transidentite.fr/content/f%C3%A9miniser-sa-voix-en-par-la-r%C3%A9%C3%A9ducation-orthophonie

[Donna Elvira]

Here you go / et voila

http://www.abc-transidentite.fr/content/f%C3%A9miniser-sa-voix-en-par-la-r%C3%A9%C3%A9ducation-orthophonie

Merci bien! Un peu de travail pour faire la traduction mais,  en faisant le tri entre l'essentiel et l'accessoire , peut-être pas si énorme que cela.
Bises
Donna

[AmyBerlin]

Cet article en Anglais est bien connu: https://web.archive.org/web/19970620011052/http://heartcorps.com/journeys/voice.htm. Melanie Anne Phillips l'a écrit dans les années 1990.

Amy

[Donna Elvira]

Thanks Amy. I saw your post just a little too late as I had already translated all of the following text. However, at least translating provided me with an an opportunity to really think about the content...    As it happens, it all does make quite a lot of sense!
Hugs
Donna

Pitch
What do Bonnie Tyler, Marlène Dietrich, Cher and Patricia Kaas have in common ? They all have very deep voices. In fact they have deeper voices than many men. Yet, no one ever takes them for men!  Their type of voice is often even considered to be sexy. The average difference in pitch between a man's voice and a woman's voice is only half an octave. That's all!  It isn't the pitch which makes for a feminine tone of voice but resonance!

Since all of us have a range of at least one and half octaves  and most of us two octaves or more, there is overlap in the higher range of both sexes and overall there is only half an octave difference.   

This means there is only half an octave in the upper range which certain women have, but not men, and another in the lower range which certain men have, but not women. It is not how high a voice is that makes the difference but where it comes from!

Once you make your voice come from the right place there is no reason to worry about pitch. Furthermore, once you have discovered the secret of resonance, you can easily go up two or three notes (even if it's not the most important issue). Let's  move on and have a look at this .

Resonance
What is Resonance? Imagine an orchestra. Now, imagine the same note played by a violin, a trumpet or an oboe. Even though they all play the same notes, they have different sounds.  This is because the sounds they play are "modulated" in different ways. Each has its own resonance. In a trumpet, it's created in the bell. In a violin or a cello, it is created in the body. This body is a chamber in which the sound can vibrate, mix and interact to form complex sound waves with numerous identifiable harmonics. This chamber is like our larynx.

Men have a wide larynx. This is what explains their bigger Adam's apple and adds deeper final resonance to their voices. Women have a smaller larynx and the result of this is that the deeper resonances are lost. In a way, this means that men have more harmonics available to them than women. This is lucky for biological males who wished to be perceived as women. The only thing that needs to be learnt is how to limit the intrinsic capabilities of our voices. You have them already, you use them  already.  You don't actually need to add anything but rather suppress some of these intrinsic capabilities.

The problem is that when men use a falsetto voice they suppress all the harmonics, resulting in a stupid, high pitched voice which is the surest way of being clocked.
Having said all of that, let's try a little experiment to find out where the deeper resonances come from.

Position a finger of one of your hands on your larynx, on the crest of your Adam's apple. Position one of the fingers of your other hand on the lowest part of your larynx, below the Adam's apple. Now speak with you normal masculine voice. When you speak, you will notice that the top and the bottom of the larynx vibrate together and in the same way. Keeping your fingers in the same position, go to falsetto and continue speaking. You will notice that there are small vibrations in the top or in the bottom. The exercises that we are going to learn will allow you to acquire a voice where only the bottom vibrates but not the top.

Doing this cuts the part of the larynx that is used in two and in this way, we lose the lower harmonics obtained exactly the same range of harmonics as the genetic female. That's the secret.

Exercise:#1: The female voice that I discovered appears to be "behind" your normal voice. After using it for a while, I found two easy ways to locate it – in a place that is not accessible when you speak normally. The first technique uses the falsetto pitch, the second, gargling.

Falsetto: Start with your highest falsetto voice. If you are speaking like a cartoon character with big round ears who lives in Anaheim, you've got it! Now, take this voice and take it as low as possible WITHOUT BREAKING YOUR VOICE. You see, if your let your voice break, it will come back to the foreground and you will use all of your larynx for modulation, exactly what you don't want to do.
Position your voice as low as possible in the falsetto range, that's your task. You will notice that neither the top nor the bottom of your larynx vibrate very much, if at all.
Now, before I explain what to do once you have done this,  let's look at the other method. If you try both , one will certainly work better for you than the other. On top of this, by trying both, you'll have a better idea where your voice should be placed.

Gargling: Go down your throat as if you wanted to gargle and generate a typical gargle sound. When you do this, you automatically tighten your throat. You will discover that your voice comes from exactly the same place, whether you are using the lowest falsetto range or a gargle. In any case, with the gargle, you can really feel the top and the bottom of the larynx vibrating together.

The place you are looking for to get your feminine voice is half way between your gargling voice and your lowest falsetto voice. Lots of people like to imitate voices for fun. If you can pull off the voice of an old man or old woman, speak with the synthetic voice of the "Q38 spatial modulator" or the wicked witch of the West, you're almost there. The first time that I found this voice, it was by accident.

What you are learning here is to use certain muscles of your larynx without using the others at all. It's a difficult exercise, a bit like trying to wiggle your ears or stroke your scalp while also stroking your stomach. It requires training, a LOT of training. But don't overdo it to start with. Once you have found your voice, it's like a magical experience that you won't want to let go of. But you will quickly discover that only using the bottom muscles will make you very hoarse. This is your body's way of letting you know that you should stop for a while.

I discovered that the first week that I used my voice. I could only use it for about half an hour before getting hoarse but I had the sense to let my voice rest. It's like any physical exercise. If you want to avoid injury you should avoid overdoing it. In my own case, it took me six months to get to a point where I could use my voice all day. Then it took me another six months to completely develop power and dynamic.  But, with patience and practice, they come too.

I imagine that over time, if not used, the muscles at the top of the larynx get weaker .  However, for those of you who use both voices, both will remain stable. Even in my own case, after four years , I can still find my former voice if required. As it happens, I didn't have to for a year  when I needed to demonstrate to a friend that it was still possible.
   

[anjaq]

I think talking about voice surgery as if it was one thing is not that great. There are several techniques and they differ radically. Not all of them have the same risks and outcomes. So one has to differentiate. Also the failure rate I have seen in this forum seems to be not high at all. So I am actually questioning that "wisdom" of 15 years ago when voice surgery was a bad thing and I never would have considered it back then. Its 15 years later and the same thing as with laser hair removal hold there - things actually can improve and get better with time. I know, some people prefer to stick to electrolysis, penile inversion, high dosage estradiol hormone therapy with antiandrogens, no FFS and voice training only. What has worked 20 years ago should work now as well, right? But we'd be missing out on progress then

Peky - have you checked what the differences are between that place and others like Dr Thomas, Dr Kim, the surgeons in Germany, Dr Remarcle etc?

[peky]

I think talking about voice surgery as if it was one thing is not that great. There are several techniques and they differ radically. Not all of them have the same risks and outcomes. So one has to differentiate. Also the failure rate I have seen in this forum seems to be not high at all. So I am actually questioning that "wisdom" of 15 years ago when voice surgery was a bad thing and I never would have considered it back then. Its 15 years later and the same thing as with laser hair removal hold there - things actually can improve and get better with time. I know, some people prefer to stick to electrolysis, penile inversion, high dosage estradiol hormone therapy with antiandrogens, no FFS and voice training only. What has worked 20 years ago should work now as well, right? But we'd be missing out on progress then

Peky - have you checked what the differences are between that place and others like Dr Thomas, Dr Kim, the surgeons in Germany, Dr Remarcle etc?

No I have not. All I know is that beside Dr. South Korea (I cannot recall his name at this point), there is a surgeon in Rumania who also uses the through the throat laser surgery. I do not think there is a an American surgeon following that technique.

As far as I am concerned, and in my case, the voice training techniques are of no help, tried them all.. no hope

[Hikari]

It seems promising, one thing to note though Dr. Haben's Medical license is under probation in the state of New York and revoked in the state of Illinois: http://df7s0hkt8o8r9.cloudfront.net/media/english/pdf/sanctions/HGPYF1BEDF4D84215431705202013.pdf

I read the sanction and it was his practice submitting fraudulent billing codes in order to make more money from insurance providers. No where does it question his ability nor could I find any malpractice stuff online. To be honest since insurance doesn't factor into anything I would be interested in from him, it is a nonissue from my point of view. but it could be worth noting if this sort of thing worries people.

[anjaq]

No I have not. All I know is that beside Dr. South Korea (I cannot recall his name at this point), there is a surgeon in Rumania who also uses the through the throat laser surgery. I do not think there is a an American surgeon following that technique.

As far as I am concerned, and in my case, the voice training techniques are of no help, tried them all.. no hope

I would be careful in expectations then. As others have stressed before - voice training is needed in combination. But maybe voice training will be easier after a surgery as some aspects are then easiert to control.

In respect to Dr Habens LASER method - I really really would like thos considering to go there to find out what exactly it consists of. Sepcifically if it is a Wendler glottoplasty, like Dr Kim does it - with creating a suture or fusing of the vocal chords - or if it is a tightening of the vocal chords like several others including Dr Thomas do it. See the link provided below. Those are radically different techniques with very different outcomes.
http://voicedoctor.net/surgery/pitch/laser-vocal-cord-tuning

[Jennygirl]

According to the ENT doctor I saw for a 1yr post/op checkup, anterior web creation with laser is standard operating procedure for about any otolaryngologist. They do this to treat a number of voice defects.

She did say though that it usually doesn't turn out perfectly, that there is usually more volume loss due to slight asymmetry or improper healing. She had never heard of someone using Dr. Kim's method with a micro scalpel which seems to differentiate his process.

I think laser is the gold standard and very common, as is the anterior web creation procedure.

[anjaq]

Ok, I was not aware that this anterior web creation is such a common procedure, given that I rarely hear it in voice feminization - everyone likes to do CTA it seems. Are you sure they really create a web? Does it not have to be fixed until it has healed with sutures? Both clinic in germany who do such a web creation using laser also suture it, but use dissolving thread.

[donnalove]

Hi, All,

I found that Dr. Haben performs voice feminization surgery... Anybody has experience or knowledge of Dr. Haben... price is about $ 7,000.00

http://professionalvoice.org/feminization.aspx

I had the laser option done back in the september with Dr Haben. I lost a lot of volume, people cannot hear me in loud places. My voice still does not pass. There might some marginal improvement but not worth 5k and the trip. People say my voice is low and ask me to speak louder but i cannot speak up. Some men still "refer" to my voice as husky..if i could travel abroad, i would rather go to the Korean place, but was not in the cards for me...i know it is a surgery very results vary greately...ever wonder why korean place only has a few youtube examples despite years of practice? maybe i got short end of the stick?