Here are some basic facts:
- method was penile inversion
- I opted for full-depth rather than a vulvoplasty
- surgery took 3 hours, though recovery took another hour
- I went under general anaesthesia and had to be intubated and put on a ventilator
- I’m currently admitted in the hospital and bed bound, discharge is scheduled for Friday
- so far pain is between 1 and 3 for me, most of the time it’s between a 0 and 1.
Ask me anything!
my hospital is very pushy with the chaplain, but there was a way for me to kinda opt out by disallowing the staff from putting my surgery info on a whiteboard where the chaplain goes to find patients to prey on. This also meant my spouse wouldn’t get updates from that same board, but we agreed it was worth it to avoid the chaplain, lol
sorry you had to deal with that, I think there is a lot of transphobia still and it’s weird to me that chaplains are pushed so hard with gender-affirming surgeries 😬
It’s weird that chaplains are pushed so hard, period. This has been driving me nuts in clinicals - they’ll just drop into a patient’s room completely unsolicited and start asking religious shit. Like… dude, did that patient request a chaplain? No? Then get the fuck out! I can see the value in having a chaplain available to patients who want one, but until that request is made, stay in your damn office!
I actually opted out so the chaplain couldn’t find me and somehow they still ended up dropping by during my recovery. Luckily this chaplain was pretty chill, it could have been a lot worse - but it was still a stressful event for me and against my explicit wishes and choices.
I wonder - what do you think the purpose of a chaplain is - all of this has made me think more about chaplains and their role. I tend to be cynical and think the worst, that being that chaplains are basically there to try to convert people when they are vulnerable (after a surgery can be a traumatic time, and a significant number of religious conversions occur after a trauma). There is also the opportunity to convert before death, so that might be playing a role too. But I need to actually read up on the history and context, maybe my cynicism is misplaced here.
It’s part of a whole-health or holistic model of healthcare. It’s good in that it acknowledges that there’s more to a person than the specific issue(s) they’re checked in for. We have a tendency to become kinda desensitized and lose sight of the human vs the ‘lap chole in room 4’. Spiritual health is one of the pillars of that model, and that’s what chaplains are there to provide.
The problem is that “spiritual” is just assumed to be religious, and religious is just assumed to be Christian, at least here in the states.
The other problem is that chaplains assume they’re part of a patient’s healthcare team by default, so they tend to just waltz into patient rooms and start talking to them as though they’re automatically welcome. Many patients lean on their religion when they’re stressed, and if that makes them feel better, then fuck yeah that’s cheap medicine. Some of them are so distressed that they want to speak to a religious official - enter the chaplain. Ideally, the chaplain functions like part psychiatrist and part liaison, tackling whatever it is that’s causing the patient spiritual distress and then connecting them with the people or resources needed to put that at ease. In other words, it shouldn’t matter if you’re a Christian or Satanist or astrologist or Pastafarian or anything in between - the chaplain should be able to see to the needs of each with equal competence.
In actual practice? “…well that’s why Jesus di–” OMG SHUT THE FUCK UP!!
Even looking at them through the lens of “they’re healthcare providers” it’s still super fucked up that they just butt into the patient’s space unsolicited. Like, imagine if a urologist did that… “Hey it looks like you’re here for a lap chole? Nice, nice… anyway, you’re a human with a prostate, so don’t mind me, I’m just gonna… get… up… in there… Alrighty that’ll do it, have a nice day!”
…and given the state of healthcare in the US, that’ll probably come back as $1700 extra on your bill that your insurance won’t cover cuz that doc was out of network.
But yeah, imo the chaplain should stay in their office unless a patient specifically requests to see them. Not every patient feels empowered to say no when the fucker just drops in right next to them and asks if they want to talk about whatever god they’re trying to push.