Long, emotional post: I had stage one 2/20/25, it’s been not horrible so far. I’m an avid journalist and I email my therapist when I have trouble. This is what I wrote him six days post op. I wanted to share it because recovering from surgery is rough and it’s not something you can really mentally prepare for. I was very distraught and ultimately was glad I was too tired to actually do anything at the time, but I was truly convinced I had made a horrible mistake.
“I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. I’m kinda regretting getting surgery. I can’t even sleep. I’m tense and anxious and tired and hot and cold and I hate it. It’s not even between my legs, it’s my soul. I’m wrong, this was a waste of time and resources. I’m gonna fucking kill myself eventually so why did am I do this? I’m such a fucking moron. I’m so sorry. Why did I do any of this? It’s so fucking pointless. I can’t keep doing this anymore.”
[Therapist: Would you like to talk?]
“I don’t want to take up your time. I’m just stressing out. It’s just stupid, I’m stupid. I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking, “at peace with my body”? Wtf is that supposed to mean anyway? How could I feel at peace with it when I have tubes and stitches and swelling down there? I can’t even fucking see what’s going on cause I’m so fucking fat. I could have a massive infection or wound separation at the vnectomy site, I will never know. I also don’t know if I have an addiction to it or what but I’m having dreams about masturbation, literally, I can’t even stop thinking about it when I’m asleep. I dreamt I bled all over my vibrator. I just, like, I’m useless now? I literally took the one thing I was good at (sex) and made it impossible for me to do it. Not just now, during recovery, but forever. I took that from myself. I took the one thing that made me special, worth fucking, and I deleted it. Just like that. I didn’t gain anything. There was no trade off, no swap, just a ton of pain and discomfort to make myself a freak of science. My scrotum is a fucking joke too.
That’s the only thing I “gained”. First off, yes, it’s fucking empty and pointless, it’s swollen and ugly right now and it’s still fucking tiny but it’s just different and big enough to get in the way when I wipe my ass from the front, so now I have to contort and stretch just to take a shit, which like, the experience of having a bowel movement right now, for me, is horrible and stressful. It makes me feel like urine is going to come out, it makes me relax and then I feel other things relax and it’s just not okay. I don’t like this feeling, I don’t want to feel this way. But I don’t have a fucking choice, this is my life now, I wanted this, I begged for this. I wanted to be a freak without genitalia. I wanted to have six plus weeks of abstinence, I wanted people to not be able to fuck my pussy.
And don’t get me wrong, I know this is what I wanted, I know it’s what I worked so hard for and it is a relief that no one will rape me now, but why would anyone want to be with a freak like me anyway? Why would anyone want me bad enough to rape me? (Which I know rape is about power not sex, but the times I’ve been sexually assaulted, we were into it, he wanted me.) I’m just going to be a disappointment to anyone who would be interested in sleeping with me because I so don’t live up to the standards for what gay men will tolerate sleeping with, what they want. I mean, yes, gay men want dick, which I still don’t, won’t ever have; but some gay men slept with me anyway because I had a vagina.
What possible good am I to them now? What possible attraction would they have to me now? There’s absolutely no transphobic gay men who would consider me more now than they did last week. Let’s be real, I’ve been in this body a week and I can’t stand it. I find my body to be disgusting so why would anyone else ever be into it. Like, I can’t even date other trans people cause we know that doesn’t work. If I couldn’t be enough for [my ex, a trans man who cheated on me when I had my hysto] even before, how will I ever be enough for anyone else? Like seriously, if anyone would have been understanding of my position, my need to validate my identity through my body, it would’ve been with another trans guy, right? Even [trans girl fwb] I wouldn’t expect to want me now, and we kinda had a thing going. It was ridiculous and misguided of me to think this was going to be some big magical solution for me. I fucked up, I’ll fully admit that and I accept total responsibility. I have to now. I don’t have a fucking choice. I guess part of me was hoping I would die under anesthesia, preferably after the vnectomy, so I could die a man, but not have to live with the consequences of being one. Which, to be clear, I’m not. I can try, I can pretend, but I can’t be that, I’m not.
At least before I was identifiable as something, I had something, but now what? I wish I had realized all of this before, I wish I had realized this years ago so I could have taken care of the problem then instead of wasting everyone’s time, energy, and resources. I’m not sure if I could have though, like, transitioning is supposed to make things better, so I figured if I kept going, if I kept transitioning, things would get better. But I’m kinda at the end of the line here and there’s…. Nothing.
I reread my entries post-op and, while yes, I do feel some relief at not having a vagina, the rest of me is freaking the fuck out. I should’ve known, I wish they’d canceled on me and I’d just killed myself a week ago, or maybe when I was with [my ex], he could’ve talked me into it. Maybe he still can. I feel badly that I’ve wasted so much of other people’s time and energy on my transition to get here and just hit a fucking wall. I guess I couldn’t have been sure before, not really, and I kinda needed to be sure, but I’m pretty sure now. I’m also almost out of acetaminophen and ibuprofen so I’m not going to be feeling better physically or anything. This is just it now.”
It’s important to note that I was off T and my anxiety meds at the time. I’m back on them now. And while I made some good points, I recognize that I am still healing right now so I don’t even know if UL worked yet and that’s definitely something I should stick around and see the results of that first. Physical trauma, like surgery, just kinda messes with you regardless of what kind it is. I also have written extensively about my expectations for this surgery, especially this stage; relieving dysphoria. Specifically the dysphoria around having a vagina and from not peeing out my phallus. I did not expect to have the look of a penis, especially not from stage one, I knew my minimal length would not be revealed, I knew I would still have the look of a vulva, still have trouble standing to pee, not be able to clear a fly, and not be able to top (which is more mental than physical for me anyway). I just kinda wish it had done those things, that I did get a working penis out of it. Right now I have a vulva that ends in a small, tight scrotum, I cannot see the vaginectomy site but I can feel that they performed the procedure, which is a massive relief.
Even though I was freaking out about not being able to have vaginal sex anymore, I don’t like vaginal sex, it gives me dysphoria which this surgery was meant to relieve. Vaginal sex, to me, is icky and squishy and moist and feels like I’m being impaled while sticking my fingers down my throat; I made a big deal about having vaginal sex for the last time and I’m fine to never do it again. But I also incorporated it into almost every hookup I had because I thought I had to (my ex shamed me for liking anal sex so I felt like I was obligated to do it so people would have anal sex with me); it will be an adjustment to explain that “yes, I am trans, no I do not have a vagina, or a penis”. I don’t really mind not having a penis either as I wouldn’t know what to do with it.
I want to reiterate that I’m doing much better now, just had a rough day; honestly, if I have another rough day, I’ll handle it better. But I thought I should share sense if I went through it, someone else might too. I think it is really important to document how you’re feeling before surgery, why you want it, what your reasonable expectations are before surgery, not because you need to justify it or anything, so that if you do have a freak out or post surgical depression you can check yourself. With the exception of not being able to see everything going on because I have limited mobility, I have had no surprises during recovery. Well, the “regret” was a bit of a surprise, but what are you going to do?
