Hello all, I have had a SRS and Tracheal Shave one year ago with Dr. Chettawut in Thailand. But I have a problem, I lost my unique voice or rather the range and some kind of volume. When I found old recordings of my voice i became sad. I was able to hit notes one octave higher than I do now. I visited otorhinolaryngologist but everything looks normal. I am trying to train voice for over a month but with minimal results. Do you know of any training which might help to recover range? Now when i try to go for high notes it is just pure air coming out, no sound and since this is already a year there wont be improvement . Or is there only another operation needed for it? IF I would know that I would loose one octave, I would wait for tracheal shave .

Hi Michelle 🙋‍♀️ Welcome to Susan's Place!  I'm Jessica, a transgender woman.  I am just learning about voice correction right now, but there have been a number of threads lately that discuss this.
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Quote from: Michelle3 on February 28, 2018, 01:14:00 PM
Hello all, I have had a SRS and Tracheal Shave one year ago with Dr. Chettawut in Thailand. But I have a problem, I lost my unique voice or rather the range and some kind of volume. When I found old recordings of my voice i became sad. I was able to hit notes one octave higher than I do now. I visited otorhinolaryngologist but everything looks normal. I am trying to train voice for over a month but with minimal results. Do you know of any training which might help to recover range? Now when i try to go for high notes it is just pure air coming out, no sound and since this is already a year there wont be improvement . Or is there only another operation needed for it? IF I would know that I would loose one octave, I would wait for tracheal shave .

I've read that a common complication from a trachea shave is that if they trim to close to the voice box, the vocal ligament can become detached or loose which effects the "tightness" needed to control range. Obviously, I'm not a doctor, but based on the symptoms you described this could be the case and may be worth checking out. I'd suggest researching an ent familiar with pitch surgeries and having it looked at. There are procedures that can correct this. Dr. Thomas in the states has done corrections and I'm sure there are others.

I'm too lazy to post the link, but if you YouTube "James Thomas feminization" check out the longer video (around 20 minutes long I think) and there is a case towards the end where a patient with a trach shave had this sort of detachment and Dr. Thomas was able to reaatch the cords and get her back to normal singing levels.

Welcome to Susan's Place. A continuation on the above post is the structure of the larynx can be compromised if excessive material is removed. One possible solution is a Crico-Thyroid Approximation where the shape is restored by compressing the larynx to restore the original shape to the larynx. This was one of the original voce surgeries so it's likely multiple doctors are aware of the procedure and may have preformed it. For more information on the procedure you might want to look at Dr Haben's web site.

Thank you both for answers. Yes it was kinda aggressive approach, but if I would know of loosing that much of the voice I would never do that. At least I know that by operation it can be kinda fixed, but it will take a year or 2 for me to be able to get money and go to USA for it. In my country not even tracheal shave was possible.

Btw, does raise of the pitch means raise of the range?

Sorry you're having this issue; Dr. Chettawut wasn't very aggressive with my tracheal shave, and it looked flat after the surgery, but I had a neck lift in 2015 (not Dr. Chettawut), and my Adam's apple was prominent again, so I had to have a trach shave revision (different surgeon) to remove more cartilage.

One of the reasons CTA isn't a common surgery today is that it limits your frequency range. That's why it's not recommended if you want to sing. However in this case, it's a little different. As you were happy with your previous range, the surgery only needs to be enough to restore the original shape of the larynx but not enough to boost your pitch above that point.

I suspect the United States isn't the only country who has surgeons who can preform this surgery. As I am located in the U.S. my knowledge is mostly about the U.S. so that's why I refer to them more often. In this case, look at different countries and research your doctor carefully so you get it right the first time.

Thank you again. Yes, i was very happy with my voice before and the range as well. I was able to hit G5, now i can do max F4 and i dropped from avg of 230 Hz to 175 Hz. I loved my voice before and it was totally passable now it sounds different a little, like no full strength of the voice and range very altered.

I am from the Europe, do you know of any reputable surgeon who is performing such a procedure?

I know I lost part of my vocal range. I was a horrible singer before, and got worse. When I try to sing the scales, my voice will jump a range. For a while, my voice sounded more masculine than I did pre-op. Voice training fixed that.

I had a tracheal shave a year ago.  My resting voice is a little deeper and I sound like a pirate when I laugh. If I eat anything really spicy my voice is even worse the next day.

When I 'sing' my voice goes silent with just the sound of air passing in my throat.


Beautiful Tracheal shave though.  Completely flat, and the scar is very hard to see.