Hi,

I had GRS with Bowers about 10mons ago..

What I had to begin with was really, really small.  When she examined me she said "Oh my..  This could be a problem."
And she was right.  They gave me the smallest set of dilators and didn't give me the largest one of the set.  So I got the three smallest of the smallest set.. 

I only have an inch, maybe two of depth and it's horribly tight, it hurts like hell to dilate using the smallest one.  I can not use the other larger ones.  I doubt it will ever even be possible.

The dilator I use is about the size of a quarter and it's really painful.

I don't believe I will ever be able to have sex with a guy because of this.  Anal, is not happening.
I'm afraid that my only chance at having sex now is for me to go lesbian.  And that would not be my first choice.

I'm also not too happy with the appearance.  I took a good look at it with a mirror and some bright lights and it's just plain old UGLY...
It doesn't look right to me.  I have no labia and my clit is buried deep inside.  My clit does work and I can get off by rubbing it but it just doesn't look normal or right.
So I'm wondering, can any of this be fixed?  I'm not too happy with things but I don't lay the blame on the doctor, I knew before I ever got on the waiting list that there wouldn't be much there for her to work with..

Thanks! 

Namaste....

by the sounds of it you got the short end of the stick by not getting a secondary skin graft during initial surgery...

which means colon segment graft as the usual way of revision (*could use oral mucosa graft but none of the known srs surgeons do it)

best bet would probably be Peter Walker in new zealand

Quote from: Flan on December 12, 2011, 01:48:23 AM
by the sounds of it you got the short end of the stick by not getting a secondary skin graft during initial surgery...

which means colon segment graft as the usual way of revision (*could use oral mucosa graft but none of the known srs surgeons do it)

best bet would probably be Peter Walker in new zealand

OMG.....  I'm in the US, there is no way I can travel to NZ..  Might as well be Mars.. 


Oh. And she did say that she MIGHT do a graft with dead people skin but she would make the determination during surgery.  I expressed my disgust with that option and she said she wouldn't do it unless she had to.
I do not trust flesh from a dead body being sewn into me but I told her that I would reluctantly go along with it if it were absolutely necessary.
After surgery she told me she didn't need to do it and that she thought I would have enough depth.
But the tightness, I don't know why that has to be.  It's BAD..

there's probably a surgeon in the US who can revise it but it'll cost ya (a lot), neal wilson in detroit comes to mind as somebody who can hack it

if she thought she ahd given you enough depth then take her word for it and accept your problem being due to pain barrier being very low.
I had 7 inches immediately bandages were removed but a month later I was so sore I had to stop dilating for a couple of weeks which made it worse so eventually surgeon said lay down, take a deep breath, and he just shoved the medium dilator in to full depth.
I yelled loud enough to alert the entire clinic. 

Once home I made sure to take aspirins half hour before dilating as I find they work superbly with me and managed to keep the depth and size.

Quote from: Sandy2012 on December 12, 2011, 01:42:40 AMI'm also not too happy with the appearance.  I took a good look at it with a mirror and some bright lights and it's just plain old UGLY...
It doesn't look right to me.  I have no labia and my clit is buried deep inside.

Isn't labiaplasty usually done separately from vaginoplasty?

Quote from: Rain Dog on December 12, 2011, 04:21:12 AM
Isn't labiaplasty usually done separately from vaginoplasty?

for bowers yeah, supposedly it's (vaginoplasty) "good enough for most" but she offers it as a separate procedure (as do a lot of surgeons who otherwise do one step techs).

(unless i'm confusing her for what another surgeon has said)

Quote from: lilacwoman on December 12, 2011, 03:43:10 AM
if she thought she ahd given you enough depth then take her word for it and accept your problem being due to pain barrier being very low.
I had 7 inches immediately bandages were removed but a month later I was so sore I had to stop dilating for a couple of weeks which made it worse so eventually surgeon said lay down, take a deep breath, and he just shoved the medium dilator in to full depth.
I yelled loud enough to alert the entire clinic. 

Once home I made sure to take aspirins half hour before dilating as I find they work superbly with me and managed to keep the depth and size.

I met Dr. Bowers and many of my girlfriends have been to her.  I chose Dr. McGinn, because she seemed a little tougher on her patients and is more demanding in what she requires you to do. 

      She requires dilation 5 times a day (yes, that's a 5) for quite a while initially.  There's no time left for anything else.  She said that the first 30 days or so wouldn't be too painful, but after that, it will become very uncomfortable.

       That was an understatement.  I remember crying like a little girl over the initial pain of insertion of the dilating tools.  To say it hurt like crazy would not do it justice, it was worse than that.

       I've heard and seen of many patients who refused to do it and either left early or simply avoided dilating.   I knew I had one shot at this and had dedicated myself to do every last thing that the Dr. told me to do, knowing she was my friend and coach.  I only got the smallest 2 dilators from Soul Source, the OP probably got the same ones:

       http://soulsourceenterprises.com/html/products_grs.html

       I started with the smallest one (#1 purple) and the Dr. told me to go to #2 before I went home.  After I was home a short time, she told me to try #3.  Each time I went larger, it was more painful for a while, then I got used to it.  I'm on #3 (green) regularly now and am about where the OP is timewise.

       Just in the last few months has the pain mostly subsided and I've missed very few dilating sessions. 

       I've known a number of other post-ops with some similar problems and the answer is just what you said:  overcome the pain and dilate more often.   Yes, it hurts, it hurt me a lot.  More surgery will hurt more and may not be any better.  It's better to do what you can right now.  Skin does stretch eventually.  There may be minor bleeding, that's not unusual.

       Dilating now is easy for me and there's virtually no pain at all.  I'm even able to skip a session a few times a week and I'm fine.

       Try toughing it out and even going to the next size at the end of a session. 

       Regarding your "ugly" appearance--most vajayjays aren't pretty, anyway.  )    Getting that fixed may not be a big deal, getting more depth is and may cause more problems than you have now.   Sometimes the cure can be worse than the disease.

        This is probably not what you want to hear, but I think it may work.

those soulcentres look a better job than my solid hard acrylic.
my smallest is 25mm or just under 1 inch and almost 7.5 long.
     medium is  30                     1.2                     8
     large     is  35                          1.4                     8

I find that I have to attack from a low angle to get under the darn pubic bone but even so at 10 months post-op I still get a little pinkness from slight bleeds from stretching the tissues.
I think the largest is always tearing things as next morning it will feel grittyy in place and ff I don't use the biggest for two days it feels smoother inside so basically I think 35 is right at the top size for me with the rigid ones.
Just need to try a guy with a soft jelly willy.

Those who give up dilating from pain are making it harder to get it working without further medical aid?

Quote from: lilacwoman on December 12, 2011, 03:43:10 AM
if she thought she ahd given you enough depth then take her word for it and accept your problem being due to pain barrier being very low.
I had 7 inches immediately bandages were removed but a month later I was so sore I had to stop dilating for a couple of weeks which made it worse so eventually surgeon said lay down, take a deep breath, and he just shoved the medium dilator in to full depth.
I yelled loud enough to alert the entire clinic. 

Once home I made sure to take aspirins half hour before dilating as I find they work superbly with me and managed to keep the depth and size.

Not possible..  At 2 inches it bottoms out.  We're talking about hitting the proverbial brick wall.
The medium dilator, will not enter.  I can barely get my finger in.  Last time I inserted my finger I bled, a lot, for a week.  I am pretty darn sure I penetrated the penile skin inside with my fingernail.  It didn't hurt, it just bled a lot.  And I think I felt the end of my finger go through a hole, like when you put your hand in your coat pocket and your discover there's a hole in the lining that eats coins and keys.

Well anyway, it eventually stopped bleeding, I wore pads for a week, ugh, and after awhile it quit.  After that I didn't dilate for two months, I was afraid to, I didn't want to rip the hole any bigger.

But yeah, all I can do is the smallest one, the middle one is almost impossible and hurts terribly.  With a great deal of pain and distress I can work it in about an inch but that takes almost 30 minutes to get it in that deep.  It won't hit bottom, it's too big around to get that far in.  The biggest one, I may as well throw it in the trash.  It will NEVER enter my body.  It's enormous and it will not go in, at all.  It is physically impossible.
And the fourth and largest one, they never even gave me that one.  They removed it from the package before I even woke up from surgery.

Here's a few photos of my dilators (nothing freaky) and a quarter next to the only one that does go in to give you an idea of scale.  http://imgur.com/a/qjhq9

And seriously, when I say it goes in two inches, I'm probably over exaggerating it by half.
I would bet that in reality it only goes in about an inch.  In my vag there's an open "pocket" that's at least an inch deep in of itself alone.  Inside there are three ugly holes, one with my deeply recessed but functional clitoris, my urethra and then my vaginal canal.  They all look the same to me.  There's no labia at all.  Just ugly holes.  $22,000 I paid for that sh*t...

I guess my saving grace is that at least it in no way resembles male parts and it makes me legally female now.  But outside of that, it's useless for sex, unless I want to go lesbian and then I don't think a natal female would want to be with me anyway, especially after getting an eye full of my alien gash..

Quote from: Flan on December 12, 2011, 04:25:38 AM
for bowers yeah, supposedly it's (vaginoplasty) "good enough for most" but she offers it as a separate procedure (as do a lot of surgeons who otherwise do one step techs).

(unless i'm confusing her for what another surgeon has said)

I was told that it was to be a one stage operation combining Labiaplasty and Vaginoplasty in one single procedure.  For $22,000 mind you...

Quote from: Re: Joyce on December 12, 2011, 04:48:11 AM
I met Dr. Bowers and many of my girlfriends have been to her.  I chose Dr. McGinn, because she seemed a little tougher on her patients and is more demanding in what she requires you to do. 

      She requires dilation 5 times a day (yes, that's a 5) for quite a while initially.  There's no time left for anything else.  She said that the first 30 days or so wouldn't be too painful, but after that, it will become very uncomfortable.

       That was an understatement.  I remember crying like a little girl over the initial pain of insertion of the dilating tools.  To say it hurt like crazy would not do it justice, it was worse than that.

       I've heard and seen of many patients who refused to do it and either left early or simply avoided dilating.   I knew I had one shot at this and had dedicated myself to do every last thing that the Dr. told me to do, knowing she was my friend and coach.  I only got the smallest 2 dilators from Soul Source, the OP probably got the same ones:

       http://soulsourceenterprises.com/html/products_grs.html

       I started with the smallest one (#1 purple) and the Dr. told me to go to #2 before I went home.  After I was home a short time, she told me to try #3.  Each time I went larger, it was more painful for a while, then I got used to it.  I'm on #3 (green) regularly now and am about where the OP is timewise.

       Just in the last few months has the pain mostly subsided and I've missed very few dilating sessions. 

       I've known a number of other post-ops with some similar problems and the answer is just what you said:  overcome the pain and dilate more often.   Yes, it hurts, it hurt me a lot.  More surgery will hurt more and may not be any better.  It's better to do what you can right now.  Skin does stretch eventually.  There may be minor bleeding, that's not unusual.

       Dilating now is easy for me and there's virtually no pain at all.  I'm even able to skip a session a few times a week and I'm fine.

       Try toughing it out and even going to the next size at the end of a session. 

       Regarding your "ugly" appearance--most vajayjays aren't pretty, anyway.  )    Getting that fixed may not be a big deal, getting more depth is and may cause more problems than you have now.   Sometimes the cure can be worse than the disease.

        This is probably not what you want to hear, but I think it may work.

I could not even force myself to dilate twice a day.  It hurt so f***ing bad that I would only dilate about 2 times a week on average.

When it came time, I would sit there on the edge of the bed and cry for half an hour just in anticipation of the unbearable pain that I knew was coming.
At first they gave me pain pills but they did not help at all and after the script ran out they wouldn't refill them anymore.

It got to where I was so depressed I became suicidal (well, thinking it at least) and went to dilating about once a week then every two weeks and now about once a month.  After I injured myself internally I quit for about two months completely and have only dilated two or three times since then.

It just hurts too much.

She warned me during examination that my cooch would not be up to par and that it would be abnormally small.  But what choice did I have?  Say no and keep that horrible thing that was there?  NO WAY...
Even all jacked up like it is, I would rather have it than not.

I just wish I could USE IT...  I really want to have sex someday and I do NOT want it up the butt!  I want to have normal sex with average guys, I don't want to have to put an ad on Craigslist, "Wanted, one guy with a shrimp d*ck."

This is really depressing. 

Thought about a skin graft?  I'm pretty sure they can do that, which avoids the nasty side effects of the colovaginoplasty, and the scar's no worse than the colovaginoplasty scar: usually they'll use abdominal, groin, or thigh tissue to make a tube of skin to put in there. 

OK hon,
for what ever reason it hurt you in the first place and you had VERY little dilating, the result is both lack of depth AND of course width.
I find it interesting to read this since in my case with Dr. Sanguan I went from #1 to #5 (he say #6 maybe later) 1 DAY after my 'wall-papering' op (6 days after the main op).
Ever since I go 3 times RELIGIOUSLY from #1 through #6 and it hurts a bit at times.

Two of my friends had 'colo' did not dilate really and now can't even insert their small finger.

Lastly, YES you can go for revision and have both depth and width fixed.

Axélle

Quote from: Axélle on December 13, 2011, 03:19:44 AM
OK hon,
for what ever reason it hurt you in the first place and you had VERY little dilating, the result is both lack of depth AND of course width.
I find it interesting to read this since in my case with Dr. Sanguan I went from #1 to #5 (he say #6 maybe later) 1 DAY after my 'wall-papering' op (6 days after the main op).
Ever since I go 3 times RELIGIOUSLY from #1 through #6 and it hurts a bit at times.

Two of my friends had 'colo' did not dilate really and now can't even insert their small finger.

Lastly, YES you can go for revision and have both depth and width fixed.

Axélle

See, that's what I was wondering about..  How the hell do they get inside there and make it deeper and bigger around?  Would they have to cut into me through my abdomen?  I can't imagine that they can just pull it back out, modify it and stuff it back in.  I would think by now my vaginal canal which was formerly that 'bad part', has now fused into my insides.  I just can't figure out how they can fix it and google hasn't been of any help at all. 

with the lack of vaginal vault (sorry) to work with, revision could be as "simple" as doing vaginoplasty all over again (with tissue graft from thighs or abdomen) or as complex as the various techs used on people born intersex.

Quote from: Flan on December 13, 2011, 03:42:40 AM
with the lack of vaginal vault (sorry) to work with, revision could be as "simple" as doing vaginoplasty all over again (with tissue graft from thighs or abdomen) or as complex as the various techs used on people born intersex.

Those are usually through skin grafts, though, unless they're harvesting parts of the labia majora and minora to add depth, and that sounds kinda scary.

Quote from: Flan on December 13, 2011, 03:42:40 AM
with the lack of vaginal vault (sorry) to work with, revision could be as "simple" as doing vaginoplasty all over again (with tissue graft from thighs or abdomen) or as complex as the various techs used on people born intersex.

I'm mystified as to how they can do it.  I mean what is the procedure?  How is it done?  How do they get inside to add depth?  My mind can not grasp how these things can be done.
The initial GRS was simple to understand and I had seen a very high resolution, very detailed video of Dr. Bowers doing the surgery, step by step.  The things were on the outside and she did a little origami on me then stuffed it up inside.  But now that it's inside, I presume it's in permanently now, fused into my insides.  I can't imagine that she could just fish it all out, chop-chop modify it and stuff it back up in me again.

Also I wonder how traumatic it would be.  I couldn't take another go of the post-op nonsense, three days in hospital and three days in recovery prison. (I did NOT enjoy my stay at the recovery house, at all..)
And then I wonder about the costs...  Surely it couldn't cost nearly as much as the initial GRS..  I would hope the hell not!

Quote from: Sandy2012 on December 13, 2011, 03:53:03 AM
I'm mystified as to how they can do it.  I mean what is the procedure?  How is it done?  How do they get inside to add depth?  My mind can not grasp how these things can be done.
The initial GRS was simple to understand and I had seen a very high resolution, very detailed video of Dr. Bowers doing the surgery, step by step.  The things were on the outside and she did a little origami on me then stuffed it up inside.  But now that it's inside, I presume it's in permanently now, fused into my insides.  I can't imagine that she could just fish it all out, chop-chop modify it and stuff it back up in me again.

Also I wonder how traumatic it would be.  I couldn't take another go of the post-op nonsense, three days in hospital and three days in recovery prison. (I did NOT enjoy my stay at the recovery house, at all..)
And then I wonder about the costs...  Surely it couldn't cost nearly as much as the initial GRS..  I would hope the hell not!

I mean, it's not that hard to get, for example, a vaginectomy done, even when there's connective tissue keeping the thing stuck to other pieces of the body.  I'd imagine it would simply involve a resection of the scar tissue, harvesting of the donor skin, and a recreation of what was done the first time around.  It's not as complex of a procedure as it sounds to do that, but in terms of recovery, while it wouldn't be nearly as bad as the first round of SRS (with the trauma of cavernosal corporectomy, orchiectomy, and radical rearranging of scrotal and penile tissues), the most intensive part of SRS is still there...and it'd likely involve a vaginal stent and potentially recatheterization.  I'd put a completely baseless estimate with no possible sources to cite of the price to be about $7,000 USD, but that could be completely wrong.

Quote from: Wonderdyke on December 13, 2011, 03:58:57 AM
I mean, it's not that hard to get, for example, a vaginectomy done, even when there's connective tissue keeping the thing stuck to other pieces of the body.  I'd imagine it would simply involve a resection of the scar tissue, harvesting of the donor skin, and a recreation of what was done the first time around.  It's not as complex of a procedure as it sounds to do that, but in terms of recovery, while it wouldn't be nearly as bad as the first round of SRS (with the trauma of cavernosal corporectomy, orchiectomy, and radical rearranging of scrotal and penile tissues), the most intensive part of SRS is still there...and it'd likely involve a vaginal stent and potentially recatheterization.  I'd put a completely baseless estimate with no possible sources to cite of the price to be about $7,000 USD, but that could be completely wrong.

$7k is doable...  Unfortunately I recently came into enough money to put me in the dreaded/hated 1% range.  My mom passed away.. 
While I can afford the surgery I really don't look forward to the extreme discomfort and inconvenience of it all.  BUT, if they can fix my stuff and make it look right and also be functional and usable, I'm willing to go through with it. I guess I need to call Dr. Bowers office..  I know last year they were shut down pretty much the whole month of December so I'll put it on my list to call them next month.  Not to set it up but to start asking questions.
I have many questions...