I am so nervous, in a few days I have my voice surgery with Dr. Haben. Altough I booked the triple I may be opt for the glottoplsty. My very comfortable speaking range is 150Hz to 200Hz. Maybe glottoplasty boosts this comfortabke range to the female range of 180Hz and up.

I fly backhome at Dec, 23th. I hope I can say some words to my twins on x-mas.

If you natural voice works at 150 Hz, I don't think you will need a triple. You should be able to get a 60 Hz boost which would put you up to 210Hz which is in the feminine range. You might even get a bit more out of it.

As for speaking at xmas, don't plan on it. I just started speaking at a little over 2 weeks and some went longer before they could speak. On the other hand, some could speak at 8 days. It depends on how lucky you are.

Be careful about christmas and new years! Those are events that can challenge your voice a lot, especially if kids, friends, pets and family is involved. This makes it very challenging to keep absolutely silent for that time or even to restrict yourself to y few sentences a day... A friend of mine got herself into a situation where she had to shout during those days and that was also only shortly after a glottoplasty - you definitely want to make sure that there is no chance of this happening...

Congrats and best of luck!

Quote from: Dena on December 09, 2015, 08:14:10 AM
If you natural voice works at 150 Hz, I don't think you will need a triple. You should be able to get a 60 Hz boost which would put you up to 210Hz which is in the feminine range. You might even get a bit more out of it.

As for speaking at xmas, don't plan on it. I just started speaking at a little over 2 weeks and some went longer before they could speak. On the other hand, some could speak at 8 days. It depends on how lucky you are.

It would be great to get a 60Hz boost for the comfortable range. I can speak in the range of 200Hz to 250Hz but it takes some effort and my prosody is munch worser than.

My Christmas wish is to be able to use my new voice than. I will try to heal fast with good nutrition and some careful walking as I did after my previous surgeries.

I am so nervous waking up after surgery without voice. I hope the nurse will help me. I am alone there.

Lara:

Best wishes to you on your surgery. Listen carefully during your pre-op consult and go from there. Not sure where you are coming here from but do keep in mind it IS THE cold and fly season and be extremely careful to always wash your hands before touching your face. A simple thing to over look. Day 2 recovery for myself of 7 we need to spend in the area... I had the triple and originally was at 160 htz daily speaking voice to start FWIW...

Be safe
Elaine

Hi Lara,
I had not intended on posting until after surgery but I see you are scheduled on the 16th same as me and I am here in Rochester.
Feel free to get back to me if you need any help or just want to grab a coffee?
I also have a car with me and a Friend to help post op.

Jamie

Lara and Jamie-
Best wishes for surgery for both of you!

Welcome to Susan's Place Jamie. I hope you find the site useful and feel free to ask if you have any questions. As you are a new user, we have a little light reading for you.

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So I just had surgery and I am back in my room. People are all very kind. Overall I feel good. But I had the feeling when swallowing something. That is an experience I do not to have a second time in my life. I hope it will fast getting better.

I ate something soft and swallowing a pills works.

Not being able to talk really consumes time for a conversation. The erasable "chalk" board from my kids just helps a lot.

Dr. Haben said one week voice and four weeks of minimum talking. I am looking forward seeing him tomorrow.

Glad everything is going well.  Best of luck with recovery!

I wasn't sure I could get an erasable chalk board through airport security so I used paper and pen. My conversations are immortalized on paper for the future to see. It's kind of fun flipping through the pages and remembering the conversation that caused me to write what I wrote.

It will take a few days for the swallowing to get better but I hope your recovery is speedy.

Thanks I am okay. I just hgpave to cough and that is a huge concern. I usually do not have problems with healing, it may help that I eat a healthy diet and during these says I eat a lot.

But CTA and Glottoplastic is definitely a new experience. Not able to talk is not an issue for me as thought before. With a chalk board, paper, my small cards and a Text to speech engine it is easy to communicator. And a smile always helps 😁 The anaesthetist surpringly spoke well German.

I now stay in the Hampton near the Marriott. Which is nice but much cheaper.

Two tricks for reducing coughing. The first is to lean forward and exhale fast with your vocal cords open to blow the accumulation out of your throat. It isn't as good as a cough but it can greatly reduce the desire to cough.

The second is keep ice water with a soda straw in it. At regular intervals take a small sip, warm it in your mouth for a few seconds and then swallow. Doing this often reduces the need to cough and the discomfort. You will find yourself going to the bathroom often if you are doing this often enough.

If you need the cough medicine, use it. If you find you are running out, Dr Haben can provide a refill but it's very powerful so make sure you don't take more than the recommend amount.

I didn't need the cough medicine but other people do so do what you feel is best.

Good luck on the healing then Lara - its interesting that now people from here in Germany also go to Dr Haben, up to now I only know of a very few going outside Germany at all and so far it was about 4 or 5 to Yeson and one considered going to Remarcle.
But Of course Dr Haben is the only one offering the double procedure of CTA plus Glottoplasty, so if that is what you need and want, there are little other choices yet, I guess?

I thought about ging to Dr. Kim or Dr. Remarcle too. I heard some impressive results from Dr. Kim. But I decided to go for Dr. Haben because my natural voice voice was very low and I want to be in the female range. My trained voice was not too bad but as a Managing Director of a company a have to speak alot. And I still had issues with my voice and not all countries are so transgender friendly as the Germany.

And maybe the surgery is covered by the public health insurance. For Dr. Kim it would not be possible.

Quote from: Lara1969 on December 18, 2015, 06:19:56 AM
I decided to go for Dr. Haben because my natural voice voice was very low and I want to be in the female range.

I understand. Yes, getting CTA in addition to glottoplasty probably ensures that the pitch increase will be enough.

QuoteI still had issues with my voice and not all countries are so transgender friendly as the Germany.

Sadly not, thats true. Germany is ok, although even here one can get into troubles. And also I would not always want to be "out" and depend on the tolerance and acceptance of everyone around in daily life.

QuoteAnd maybe the surgery is covered by the public health insurance. For Dr. Kim it would not be possible.

Really??? How does that work? The USA is outside the EU just as Korea is. I was told that the best bet to get it covered is to do the surgery in Germany, there is some chance of getting it paid for if it is done in Europe, which would have to be Prof Remarcle, and very little chance to get it paid if it is done outside the EU - how do you think you can convince your insurance to pay for it? I am still trying to get my surgery covered, but its quite a struggle because they say it was done in Korea, which is not Germany and not even Europe, so they deny coverage.

Quote from: anjaq on December 18, 2015, 07:13:26 AM
..., there is some chance of getting it paid for if it is done in Europe, which would have to be Prof Remarcle, and very little chance to get it paid if it is done outside the EU - how do you think you can convince your insurance to pay for it? I am still trying to get my surgery covered, but its quite a struggle because they say it was done in Korea, which is not Germany and not even Europe, so they deny coverage.

Yes maybe I get it back. The point is that his combination of CTA and Glottoplastic is unique. The medical service of the insurance recommended my surgery but of course I should have made this in Germany. They are currently not fully convinced that I needed the double. If they are convinced the insurance has to take over the costs for this surgery. I get support from my ENT which worked for Prof. Nawka and my speech therapist Thomas Lascheit which is also very experienced in transgender issues.

But it is likely that I have to go to court like for my FFS and beard epilation or the import of the Estradiol injections.

I feel much better, swallowing is mich easier than yesterday. I love it to pass after just putting some cloths with any make-up. I hope my voice will pass in future also as good.

Drove to a outlet mall for shopping. One woman thought I was a female singer and therefore I had the surgery. Bought a lot for my twins at home.

I have the feeling drinking tea helps. I only in deep fears because of my coughs yesterday. Today it is much better.

My neck looks much smaller than before. Dr. Haben said he shaved a good part of the Adams apple even if it was not so prominent before the CTA. But after CTA it became more prominent before shaving. Now my neck looks much more feminine than before.

I hope only these coughs did not any damage....I am sure the result is usually great.

There will be some mistake so don't worry about them. The important thing is you want to avoid coughing fits. I even mistakenly said a few words when I shouldn't have but it didn't do any damage. Just control all you can and don't worry about the rest.