I called Dr. Shaffer’s office two days ago to set up a post-op examine and check-up to see how things are going. Dr. Shaffer is herself post-op, and has seen many post-op patients, so I figured she would be the best person to see. The appointment was this morning, so I grabbed a few files at work to occupy my time this afternoon while I was away from the office.
We went over the basic info before she had me take off everything below my waist. She put the stirrups in place and I crawled onto the examining table, placing both feet in the metallic arms and spreading my legs wide.
She started at the top with the clitoris and said I had definite granulation tissue around it that needed to be treated with silver nitrate. Granulation tissue, as she explained it, is skin that isn’t quite able to heal like normal skin. She said it was the same reddish skin found under scabs if they are pealed off too soon. She explained that the silver nitrate was a chemical cauterizing compound that allowed the skin to heal properly.
I laid back as she began to apply the silver nitrate. She wanted to test it out on me to see if I needed to be numbed up while she worked on the area. It definitely stung, with about a quarter to half the pain associated with electrolysis, but this continued to sting. Luckily, it does diminish after a while, so she was able to work without having to numb me. (Plus, I’ve heard horror stories about her numbing techniques, so I really didn’t want her shooting me up.)
After that, she then moved to the urethra and said that it looked fine and was healing OK.
Dr. Shaffer then lubed up a duck-billed speculum. I laid back and tried to concentrate on keeping my muscles relaxed, but she seemed to have it in before I could fully concentrate. Getting it in was no problem, but when she opened the vagina, whew, there was a bit of pressure...especially as she moved it around. Connie, my former SRS ward-mate, said that the dilators made her feel like Connie-on-a-stick...but this speculum thingy made me feel like Kara-the-joystick as she jolted me around.
Anyway, she said the vagina looked pretty decent. I think she said that I didn’t have much sloughing or something, and that it appeared like the skin had adequate blood supply. “I haven’t had much sloughed skin come out with the douching,” I told her.
The next thing she said really surprised me. “You need to cut down on lube because I’ve just dug 5ml of it out of your vagina. You also have a small yeast infection. Use some Monistat to clear that up,” she said. In hindsight, I should have asked for a little more clarification on the whole Monistat thing since I’ve obviously never used it before.
I told her that I had been using only a sufficient amount of lube to get the dilators in and out, but that they had been a little sticky lately. I’m betting the yeast infection was the cause of the dilators sticking in there, especially since I’d seen a little bit of white stuff on the end of them lately. I thought it was residual lube, and had started douching a little more often, but it appears that it was probably the yeast infection.
Finally, she ended on a rather positive note as she inspected the bottom triangle area. She noted the small area where I had torn, but said that it had healed up OK and would not need any silver nitrate. She said she could see why I had torn because the ledge in that area was pretty tight to allow the dilators into the vagina.
Tonight, when I got home and looked in the mailbox, I found #5. I thought about naming it Tiffany or Britney, but I’ve decided to go with Brutus. Nah, just kidding...April Fool. Hey, since it arrived on April Fool’s Day, I think I’ll simply go with April. Somehow I knew that I wouldn’t know what to name it until it arrived. So, now I have Bob, Rosie, Arnold, Buster, Helga, and April.
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