peb

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disabled chimera thing
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Baltimore MD

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ok um
maybe it is a thing
maybe there's a highly rated place an hour away from me that does it
and maybe my insurance would very likely cover it as an in-network surgery


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in reply to @peb's post:

i have another friend who wants the same thing and is looking into getting a zero depth surgery bc it's the closest thing, i might honestly look into getting that too (whenever i'm done paying off my orchiectomy :v)

I mean,
the caveat you've described is just the caveat to pursuing genital reconstruction surgery in general. Everyone's gotta pass through trans healthcare's gatekeeping system and that means having contacts and paying each of them their toll.

I don't know where you've gotten your $100,000 figure from though! Surgery funding is nightmarish to be sure but even in the US I don't think you're ever going to see a figure like that for bottom surgery. What I've seen a couple of examples of as well is that you're likely going to find "nerve-preserving nullification" (I'm not a fan of the term "nullification" but it is the term surgeons are using) to be cheaper, in terms of surgeon's fee, than a vulvoplasty. Because of course, right? In terms of surgical technique for AMAB patients it can be functionally described as "a vulvoplasty with fewer steps". That's what I've seen reflected in the figures shared by trans people who have gotten this bottom surgery as it is "a thing".

It was a thing trans people were seeking out and receiving first and "an impossible and also horrible 'fetish' thing" second.

you're good

i live in a state with one of the biggest and best rated hospitals in the country, i was able to get an orchiectomy just fine and if i wanted a more traditional type of GRS i'd be able to get it no problem, but when asked about this type of surgery the only reply i ever got was "we do not offer that"; my friends who wish they could receive the same type of surgery who asked about it in different states and even countries were given the same answer, some ended up settling for zero-depth vaginoplasty as a compromise

the $100k figure was an exaggeration to express how impossibly expensive it is for most to seek out one of the few surgeons in california who are willing to do this type of surgery and have it done with them as insurance would not cover it. if my research about this is wrong then please educate me as it is very much something i'd be interested in getting if it was a realistic possibility.

also, if not null, what other term would you prefer? it's a gender thing for me, not a kink, but that's the only thing i've ever heard it referred to as

Okay, so.

As long as we're talking about finding surgeons in the US, I can at least name several surgeons in US states including Illinois, Ohio, Texas, and Oregon as well as California. Accessing those surgeons might still demand interstate travel of you and your US-based friends, and, well, that's just as fucked as you'd expect from the trans healthcare system but it isn't as dire as I think you've painted it to be. I can go ahead and actually list these surgeons if that would be helpful but I've left them out of this post for the sake of brevity.
I will say also that when you're making inquiries to try to find surgeons there's a question to be had as to how you're going about that - is it "I'm looking to have this surgery called 'nullification' performed" (dropping this particular word on a gatekeeper, frankly, is liable to raise a red flag to them) or is it "I'd like to consult with surgeons about whether they can perform a specific aesthetic variation on a zero-depth vaginoplasty for me"?
Even if your ultimate consultation with a surgeon gets made on the basis of your pursuing your "compromise" option, I'd still like to strongly urge you to express your actual surgical goals to the surgeon at that point - their job is to work with you in order to understand and bring you to your surgical goals, after all. This whole process is firmly on my mind at the moment as a friend and I are working to pursue our surgeries together (... I say "together" although she has a healthcare budget and I don't) on our end in Australia.

When it comes to dealing with insurance... so I've never heard good things about the US health insurance industry, in general, but I wouldn't say that you can't expect insurance to cover your gender-affirming surgery. I'm in a genderqueer bottom surgery support group on Discord in which navigating the US insurance industry is a frequent topic of discussion and I could send you their way on that. I can assure you now though that getting insurance coverage for a non-cisnormative transition is not out of the question - this Discord group will give you first-hand proof.

"If not null, what other term would you prefer?" I don't know. I'm just a trans person who's gotten very weary of trying to reclaim this old slur in the time since we've last talked.

... one more thing though: I'm coming into this whole conversation from a place of seeing trans people tell me how they've let themselves be given inappropriate treatments because they thought trans healthcare's gatekeeping systems weren't going to let them achieve their actual transition goals or because systemic transphobia in general had convinced them that their actual transition goals "aren't real". Please tell me that's not what's going to happen to you and to your friends.

i'm really glad the situation is not as dire as i thought it was, but even with the new facts the surgery is no more accessible to me currently. it's not completely impossible, and i likely will pursue it at some point in the future if i can afford it (i'm still not 100% on whether i want it), but compared to the more "standard" GRS procedures there are basically no resources and you have to research everything on your own - there isn't even a word for this type of surgery (i'm not going around calling it "null" in front of doctors).

honestly i spent like 20 minutes trying to find the right words and failing, but basically it's totally possible technically, just impossibly hard and expensive for most, but that doesn't mean that if it's something you really want you shouldn't try (and i will)

i wish you and your friend the best of luck (also i just realized who u are jkdhfgjkd i didn't recognize u before hi)

as far as i understand, my friends don't care enough to go through the hell that is trying to get a non-standard surgery and they'll be / are just as happy with the alternative, but personally i'm not going to have anything done unless it's exactly what i want (plus i need to pay off the $3000 i owe for my orchiectomy after insurance so i'm not getting another surgery anytime soon :v)

i will say though, i'm from a country where there was a single GRS surgeon performing a single type of surgery, so having all these options at all in the us makes me very happy and hopeful i'll be able to achieve my goals eventually

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