I'm afraid of SRS

[Alice Borealis]

It probably won't be any fun, but the rate of complications and risks are relatively low from an expert surgeon these days. Still, you should be prepared to deal with the possibility of a rough recovery - not that you need to stop being anxious, as I said, I was frightened too, just that if you brace yourself despite your fears you should be ready to cope with what happens.

I'm happy everything turned out really good for you. I will keep that in mind. The lady with the lily as a picture said something similar. Thank you for sharing your story.

[Alice Borealis]

No problem. I'm thrilled to talk about my experience if it will help. The pain was no big deal. I had six weeks where I couldn't do anything strenuous, which meant someone had to shop and do my laundry. The early dilation episodes were onerous - 4x a day is a lot, but now that I'm down to 1x/day, it's part of my daily routine.

The biggest problem is that I can't seem to climax - I can get close but not all the way there. Other than that, I love my VJ.

4x a day does seem like a bunch, but I guess I could put up with that for the little bit of time I have too, it's nice knowing it didn't hurt much for you. I know someone smarter already replied but i'm sorry you can't quite get there. I've heard orgasm is hard in natal girls sometimes too. At least you know you do have that sensitivity and i'm glad you're happy

[Dena]

When I had the blood draw in the hospital for SRS, they took it while I was sitting up and I was so nervous that I could feel myself starting to pass out but I was able to lay down and didn't. My fear of needles dates back to the first surgery and whenever the Endo wanted to draw blood, I insisted on laying down before he started. To live with the needle, I think of something else or try to blank my mind almost like I am trying to go to sleep. That's a little trick I had plenty of practice with when I was undergoing electrolyses as you have to live with an hour of pin prick like burnings

The irony of my fears is my first surgery was intended to correct cross eyes. The problem was if you don't learn to use your eyes together by age 3, you can never use them together to from a single image. They didn't know this so they waiting till I was about 4 so I would be bigger and easer to work on surgically. The operation was useless and so were the years of eye exercises and a second eye surgery at age 12 to correct the other eye. More or less, I was a surgical ginny pig in eye research and both my parents an I paid the price

[Alice Borealis]

When I had the blood draw in the hospital for SRS, they took it while I was sitting up and I was so nervous that I could feel myself starting to pass out but I was able to lay down and didn't. My fear of needles dates back to the first surgery and whenever the Endo wanted to draw blood, I insisted on laying down before he started. To live with the needle, I think of something else or try to blank my mind almost like I am trying to go to sleep. That's a little trick I had plenty of practice with when I was undergoing electrolyses as you have to live with an hour of pin prick like burnings

The irony of my fears is my first surgery was intended to correct cross eyes. The problem was if you don't learn to use your eyes together by age 3, you can never use them together to from a single image. They didn't know this so they waiting till I was about 4 so I would be bigger and easer to work on surgically. The operation was useless and so were the years of eye exercises and a second eye surgery at age 12 to correct the other eye. More or less, I was a surgical ginny pig in eye research and both my parents an I paid the price

That's a good way to cope with that, I usually try to look away and sing some dumb song in my head or think about my girlfriend holding my hand or something when I get blood draw. I still get really close to passing out, but I get juice and crackers after, and my endo is 2 hours away, so I can lie down and sleep on the way home.

I'm so sorry about your eyes, that's awful

[Serenation]

they come and took my blood every single day in hospital after srs, but it was the least of my worries at that point. On the bright side vacutainers have made drawing blood so much easier than it used to be with syringes.

[Valwen]

that deadline thing is tough. I may face something similar, for most of my life SRS was a impossible dream more expensive than I could ever imagine, even now in my 30's it would take me decades to even think about saveing that type of money but I recently learned that my insurance may cover it. that made me really think hard about how I felt, I know I was terrified for a long time though it has faded as I have read story after story of things working out well for everyone involved. Most trans women who where orgasmatic before regain that ability at some point, though it can in fact take years, some of it is physical, sometimes hormonal, sometimes its totally mental (a lot of the feelings from before are in diffrent places and work in new ways so its easy to confuse your mental pathways making it difficult till you unlearn what you have learned. Bet yoda never thought his lessons would apply to transsexual climax :-P) So I learned that I might be able to get it covered and I realized that if I waited I might lose the insurance before I decided what to do. I realized that if that happend, if I had a chance to have GRS and by waiting lost that chance I would never forgive myself, so I resolved that when I reach the point where I am ready if I can have it, I will. Though that decision could easily change I am sorta flighty and random.

as for needles when I was young i had a seizure and they then spent the next decade or so sucking blood out of me regularly, at this point I Just don't watch when they push it in and I am fine, i even sorta like watching the blood fill the tubes.

Serena