I had voice feminization surgery at Yoskarn Clinic
I had thyroid cartilage and vocal fold reduction surgery. I still have some swelling so I’ll write a post about it once I’ve recovered.
I paid 240,000 THB for the surgery. The doctor initially recommended CTA because he said my vocal folds were already short but when I told him that I wanted thyroid cartilage and vocal fold reduction he agreed to perform that surgery.
On the first day I had some difficulty breathing and at one point I couldn’t breathe properly while sleeping. A nurse stayed with me around the clock for three days and she helped by turning my head to the left which relieved the problem.
Some unusual things I experienced were delirium after waking up from anesthesia, facial swelling after surgery and a lot of phlegm and coughing.
I still had difficulty breathing on the second day. I don’t think the doctor was lying when he said that my vocal folds were already short. His recommendation that I get CTA instead because this surgery could be risky didn’t feel like he was just trying to push me into getting CTA.
My pitch was actually lower immediately after surgery at around 100 Hz compared with about 130 Hz before surgery. I’m now two months post-op and it has recovered to around 180 Hz although I still have some swelling.
I had difficulty breathing for roughly a week after surgery. I didn’t measure the exact duration though so it may have been closer to two weeks.
Overall I don’t think the surgery itself was that bad but that’s still very subjective. Since I’m still recovering I don’t think I can give a clear assessment of the final result yet.
At the university hospital I was told that there was still swelling but that my vocal folds were making normal contact during phonation. They said that as the swelling goes down my pitch should naturally become higher.
The university hospital also told me that my oral cavity is relatively narrow and that my nasal passages are narrower than those of most people. I wondered whether this might somehow be consistent with what the surgeon said about my vocal folds being short although these things may not actually be related.
One thing I regret is that I don’t have any endoscopic images of my vocal folds from before the surgery so it’s difficult to make a direct comparison with how they look now.