My surgeon told me not to get phalloplasty bc it’ll look like “a Frankenstein penis”
(TW for medical/transphobic speak)
Just met with my surgeon for a hysterectomy, not even a phalloplasty, and he went on and on about how the current methods aren’t good, and the results are crap. (Preface: I don’t agree with any of this)
I am extremely disappointed and discouraged after having met with him. Right off the bat he told me how he likes to treat his trans patients as normal people, I hope that would be a given? It was strange he went out of his way to make a point that he accepts and treats trans people, I would’ve expected that to be the case considering he is going to operate on me. The primary surgeon and assisting surgeon both expressed to me their disapproval of keeping one ovary, but my endocrinologist told me it would be good to keep one in case I can’t get access to T (which given US politics, seems horrifyingly plausible). But then he said more major things that bothered me. After discussing the procedure, he asked me if I plan on pursuing phallo, which I do, and he told me I should hold off on it. At first I figured he meant I should have time to heal between hysterectomy phallo, but no he meant wait for better developments to come along because these guys “have butchered arms” and their “results are not good” and they end up with a “Frankenstein” looking penis tissue attached to them.
I understand that he was trying to make a point that some men are unhappy with their surgery outcome, which is very sad, but he just tore the whole surgery to shreds. My surgery is next week but if I had more time I would probably find a different surgeon. These guys didn’t pass the vibe check, but they’re experienced and will be able to accomplish what I need.
I’ve been trying to change the way I think about phallo for a while now, there’s definitely an initial disappointment when you first learn of phallo and see that the results are very rarely cis passing, but if it’s all we got we need to make the best of it. Besides I have seen some pretty great outcomes too that give me hope. I’m very disappointed in the way in which he spoke about trans men’s bodies and surgery results (even if his heart was in the right place) and now I am feeling discouraged in my surgery and future phalloplasty