Time to Face the Music

If you’re reading this, then I’ve already been knocked out and had a sharp sterile scalpel taken to my forehead.

Let’s back it up just a bit and catch you up first.

Prior to today, I sat in anticipation of a date that seemed so far off. I knew eventually I would end up here and quite honestly I didn’t think it would be this soon, but it happens to be a perfect time to be where I am. About 4 months ago, I decided to take that one step of my journey that would include the clean up of some of the things that needed to be done to my facial features.

In the process of discovery (mainly by others of what I was contemplating), I heard the same tired cliche over and over, “This is the face God gave you and what right do you have to change it?” This has been explained before in my FAQs for a similar but parallel thing, but the thing most people don’t realize (I didn’t until I did the research and talked with my doctor), is that testosterone is a mutagen. This means it mutates the body.

Every human starts off down a path towards female and unless this mutagen is made available, every human would be born a fully functional female. But testosterone literally gets into the bloodstream and begins the process of mutation. For the most part, this change happens in-utero and then goes dormant for about 12-14 years before shooting through the subject once again at puberty. Once a human goes through puberty with testosterone, they begin to achieve all sorts of fun mutations that are irreversible without medical intervention. Part of this is the human skull and face.

Since I’m rolling back the hardware installation so it can move forward properly with the software I’ve been given, so to speak, part of that rollback isn’t just the reversible parts of the body being done by my hormones, but also the ones that need surgical intervention. So when it came to my skull and facial features, I decided to speak to a handful of doctors to find one that would work the best for me. Doing research on the internet and reviewing others’ testimonies, I narrowed my list down to 3 doctors and did a consultation with each where they could see me and my face.

For the sake of being open and honest without publicly criticizing any given doctor, I will not be using their names or any personally identifiable information, except for the one who is working on my face today.

Doctor #1

Doctor #1 was able to do a consultation over email by having me take 5 pictures for him to review. I started by sending him a frontal face shot, profile shot from the right and left and a 45 degree angle shot from left and right. Once he had a chance to review them, he sent me back a very nice email explaining everything he thought would be needed to remove the mutations that testosterone had caused over the past 25+ years. I responded with a few questions and he replied with answers very quickly. One of the things I liked about this doctor was he gave me his personal email and was very nice about everything. Very personable. One of the biggest drawbacks was the fact that he was changing his practice up and was not going to be doing surgery himself, but consulting with a younger protege and the younger doctor would actually be performing the surgery.

Doctor #2

Doctor #2 did a Skype consultation which was actually a little more interesting because the feedback was faster but it was also harder to stew on any additional questions beyond what I had already prepared. During our consultation, the doctor told me a little more detail about his practice and how he handles surgery. He then had me show him all the same 5 angles of my face as the first doctor so that he could see what types of procedures he thought would be beneficial to me. We talked a little bit more about how those procedures he thought would be best for me, would play out in actual surgery. Overall it was a good chat. The pro was that his office was the closest to my home and was drivable, but the con was that he had not been anywhere near as experienced as the other doctors in my list.

Doctor #3

Doctor #3 did a Skype consultation as well. We chatted for a little bit about myself, who I was, what I like to do, and more. Once we got into the medical side of things, he as well had me do the whole “different angles” of my face so he could see them much more clearly and then he proceeded to tell me what different aspects of my face he could see right off the bat that he thought could help take away some of the more masculinizing features of my face and give me a softer, more feminine look. The next day he provided me with a very large list of procedures. I actually did a little more research and found some of the procedures could be held off until a later date and some that may not even be needed by the time everything is said and done.

Picking My Surgeon

In the end, I ended up with 3 quotes from 3 different doctors with a low, middle and high price point. I ended up picking Dr. Jeffery Spiegel, MD in Boston for a few reasons. Dr. Spiegel had some amazing work in his gallery on his website. While his original price point was the highest for everything he recommended, he ended up being the middle price point once I narrowed down what I knew had to happen now versus later. Dr. Spiegel also had an amazing bedside manner when it came to interacting with me. He was compassionate, caring, wanted to know me as a person. I wasn’t just another patient to work on.
The other 2 surgeons had one big mark against them in my selection process. One had changed up his practice to no longer be a surgeon but a consultant training a new surgeon to take his place. I’m sure the new surgeon was competent and experienced in his craft but I didn’t like the idea of seeing this history of great work by a great surgeon, only to get someone else working on my face. The other, in my opinion, was just too inexperienced in the type of procedures that I was looking for. He had done a lot of plastic surgery, but that is completely different from facial feminization surgery which is more than just making you look younger. It’s about changing the subtle cues that help the rest of society identify you without even thinking about it.

I’m looking forward to expounding on my experience with my surgery and healing processes, but that will have to wait for another time. Oh yeah, that will include before and after pictures as well.