Just wanted to give a little update for folks who have been wondering. I just have to say, the support I've gotten on here is beyond incredible. Thank you all for being here and being patient with me. It all means more than you know.
I wanted to show people what the progression looked like through my initial surgery and two emergency surgeries. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of my penis before surgery #2, I literally got wheeled into surgery as I was waking up the day after my first surgery.
Day 1: Surgery went well, Doppler was great, penis looked good, everything was normal. Instant (and I mean instant) dysphoria relief. I love my penis. It's amazing. Pain pops up to a nine out of ten a little bit after waking up, but I get Dilaudid and I feel so much better. Pain is manageable all day with low dose oxy, Tylenol, and gabapentin.
Day 2: As I wake up, plastics is coming in to check on everything, and apparently overnight my penis swelled an insane amount and turned purple. They start cutting out stitches right there in my hospital room, send some pictures to RBL, and eventually decide I need surgery right now. I go into surgery, they take more skin from my thigh to graft onto my penis so it has room to swell. They get my vein back up and running and things look good. Out of surgery, pain is manageable, freaked out but still feeling positive.
Day 2, but 11 pm: Doppler check goes from good one hour to hearing NOTHING the next. Penis goes from pink and alive to completely white. Those pictures of it are not a result of flash being used, my penis died. Got rushed back in to surgery and at this point, I really wasn't doing well at all. I was sure I was going to wake up to them having to do ALT on me (which I consented to, but really could not bear the thought of another full thickness graft) or worse, no penis at all. RBL and Dr. Levine apparently pulled out all the stops and did some crazy shit none of the residents had seen before. The head resident is working on his second residency so these doctors are not newbies and he said he had never seen anything like it. Essentially, no one knows what happened, but my artery and vein both stopped working. They took new veins from my thigh and fixed me up.
Day 3: My worst day by far. Weak, low morale, lost a not insignificant amount of blood, feeling terrible. Had essentially given up hope even though surgery went ok. Got a blood transfusion and felt better. They said I didn't technically NEED it, but they thought it would make me feel a lot better, and it did.
Days 4/5: Boring rest days.
Today (Day 6): It's been over 48 hours since I got out of my last surgery and I still have a great pulse when they check my Doppler. I'm feeling very hopeful, and I was able to stand up today and shift my weight from foot to foot. They gave me this neat shower cap thing that allowed me to shampoo my hair in my bed which made me feel so much better. They've been able to wipe me down and change my sheets, and my thigh graft is exposed to the air which hurts but also feels better. I know that doesn't make any sense, but that's how it feels. Everyone around me has a very optimistic attitude. It's starting to rub off on me, but I still feel really really traumatized from the whole experience. I've kicked my visitors out of my room for now just because I need to be alone and reconnect with my body. Don't get me wrong, I'm feeling positive and upbeat today, I'm just really tired of people coming in and touching me and poking me and looking at me. I'm also on heparin so I have to get my blood drawn every six hours, and I'm running out of veins. I want to wear clothes lmao. But other than all that, it looks like I'm on an upswing.
Again, thank you all so so much for the amazing support I've received here. The comments, the messages, and even just the upvotes make me feel heard. I feel like this doesn't need to be said, but please no questions at the moment. I think later on I will definitely be up to answering questions but right now I just want to get all this information out there. I also want to say that this is a really rare thing to have happen, and it's very unlikely that it would happen to you. I would still highly recommend my surgeon, my team, and my hospital. I also want to say that I still totally stand behind my choice to have phalloplasty. With my alone time I've been able to look at my penis and it's really just amazing to be at this point. Everything I went through was 100% worth it. If I rewound the clock and have the knowledge I do today, I would still do it. I needed this surgery, and I'll continue to do anything I need to do to finish it.
ftmrffphallo.wordpress.com
she posted a link to her 
