#transbucket

[gayhenrycreel]

tumblr is full of misinformation about sex reassignment, so heres a link to transbucket, a site where people upload their results to aid in researching sugeries. its got photos for different types of top surgery, phalloplasty, vaginoplasty, metoidioplasty, nullification, anything you can think of.

[transgenderteensurvivalguide]

Lee says:

TransBucket has been an invaluable resource for me throughout my medical transition.

I would spend hours on the site looking at photos that I’d already seen because it helped me prepare for my own medical transition and it helped me feel like what I wanted was a possibility.

Seeing the ‘before and after’ photos from other trans people who had gotten top surgery and phalloplasty gave me so much hope at a time when I was really struggling with dysphoria and depression.

I’m someone who has benefited in ways that I can’t even fully express from the post-op community’s generosity. I don’t know if I would have the life that I have now without it.

After I had my top surgery and hysterectomy, I chose to upload my photos to TransBucket to give back to the community (in a small way) and help others as I had been helped.

This is largely why I hesitated in sharing photos of vulnerable moments depicting surgical healing, although I ultimately did upload several photos showing the early weeks and months of recovery.

I didn’t upload any photos after I had fully healed and gotten tattoos to hide my surgery scars because I was worried about my privacy, which is something I still struggle with, and I ultimately decided to not upload photos of my genitals after phalloplasty for the same reason.

While I always knew TransBucket was publicly accessible, the mention of the site in the news made me reconsider whether I wanted to continue having my images hosted there.

The site being down for the past couple of months has given me some pause, but today, 5+ years after getting top surgery and making my first TransBucket submission, I have gone back and deleted some (but not all) of my post-top surgery and post-hysterectomy images.

I’m still considering what the best way is for me to protect myself from transphobic cisgender people who might use my images in ways that are incompatible with my views and how I feel about my body, and also protect myself from some of the hate coming from within the community as many of the most hurtful comments about about post-op bodies like mine are often made by pre-op and non-op trans people.

I became a mod on this blog when I had just turned 16 and I had top surgery at 18. I shared things online that I probably wouldn’t have shared if I had been if I had become a mod at my current age in my early 20’s, but the internet is forever and I can’t take it all back, even if my feelings on my online privacy have changed.

I would like to encourage our followers to take a moment and reevaluate their internet privacy as well, and think about what things they’re comfortable with sharing going forward.

I’m not saying that you should delete your images from TransBucket specifically— I might even end up reuploading mine there at some point, with some redactions for privacy. But you should think about what photos you are okay with sharing online a lot longer and harder than I did.

All that said, I’d like to circle back to my original point— that TransBucket has been an incredible resource for me (and many others) and it continues to be one of the first things that I recommend to anyone who is considering gender-affirming surgery (and is not a minor in the jurisdiction in which they reside as the site hosts images of genitals and it is against the terms of service for minors to join).

I would like to thank the admin of @transbucket for all the work they’ve done, and encourage our followers to assist them if they are able to:

[angelusargent]

It's inhumane what the trans community did to phalloplasty. I've never seen a whole surgery cyberbullied off the internet.

[transgenderteensurvivalguide]

Lee says:

TransBucket has been life-changing for me and if you’re able to help the admin out, I’d highly encourage you to do so!

12/4/22 - Out of Maintenance Mode

There’s many considerations that go into maintaining this site. Despite many “offers” by volunteers and organizations over the last decade, no consistent help has ever materialized. The admin maintains it alone. As a result, the site is structured to run as independently as possible, with ad revenue to pay for its server cost (literally tuned to just cover it), and a moderation system that allows members to police the site themselves for inappropriate content. This works surprsingly well most of the time.

Unfortunately, during the summer of 2022, an article in the most read newspaper on Earth was written about transgender care with a mention of the site by a journalist who did not reach out beforehand. Traffic immediately 10x’d and then 100x’d. Dozens of people contacted the admin: some overwhelmed with relief to find the resource, others absolutely terrified that it was now more widely known.

At the same time, the site admin’s father was dying of cancer. To make matters worse, a famous trans streamer was the focus of a targeted harassment campaign that led, after weeks of intense and dangerous struggle that itself made international news, to the takedown of a significant site that organized and supported attacks on trans people and resources.

So, the article was not great timing, to say the least.

Out of an abundance of caution in that risky climate and lowered ability to attend to the site, the admin chose to take the site down entirely. Was that the right choice? It’s hard to be sure: it meant no access to those who needed it, but also no access to those looking to harm us.

In September the same year, months after the traffic spikes had decreased to nothing, the admin’s father died. The busiest months of the work year followed. Now it’s two months later in December, and after some consideration, the admin has taken the site out of maintenance mode.

Just as taking the site down is a choice that can’t please everyone, bringing it back up is also rightfully controversial. There will never be a 100% risk-free way to present the resources on this site. Even if we switched to removing broad access and began hand-approving every new member to the site, the reality is that someone who identifies as trans today may not in months or years from now, and may not be motivated to protect these resources in the future.

The goal of the site was to maximize access to information about our experiences getting care, and that means a much looser screening process than you’ll find in other private groups. Sharing on this site is an incredibly courageous and generous act that hundreds of trans people have done over many years. Each one of them is potentially sacrificing their privacy so that someone else can benefit. When you use this site, when you share it, when you discuss it in articles, you should ask yourself: have you made a sacrifice to your community equal to that sacrifice? Are you honoring what was done for you?

The admin is still committed to the site, but there is no way to promise it will be up or even should be up forever. It may be that in the years to come, private groups on Facebook or Discord, even with the inevitable data loss that happens as they change over time, is preferable to a site at a fixed address. Time will tell.

If you are able to code and can contribute to feature development, especially in security, please reach out (use our normal contact mechanisms).

[lucisevofficial]

just got out of a showing of The Substance and my overwhelming response was "movies are so fucking back"

[thereisnofood]

it is insane to me the amount of trans people that barely know anything more than surface level info about SRS. like i see transmascs criticize meta and phallo and complaining about how theyre ""the only two options "" while not actually knowing about how many techniques and variations there are, for each of those surgeries, depending on an individuals wants/needs. someone on twitter was describing their ideal surgery as if it didnt exist, like they straight up described extended metoidioplasty to a tee and they have no fucking idea that thats a thing you can do. like bro spend any time at all reading posts from post-op trans people and surgeons im begging you

[trans-seraphim]

omg i hit 1k guess i gotta post coochie

[thatweirdtranny]

half my dysphoria self care was browsing r/phallo, and ever since it got axed i feel the need to say we really can’t overemphasize how much reddit is basically the library of alexandria of trans healthcare information

[hypermascbishounen]

Ime a lot of it is just that people either don't know lower surgery for trans men exists, or, even more likely: they've exclusively heard old terf propaganda scaremongering, that those surgery are bad and "nonfunctional" and thus no one would ever want them.

These myths circulate even within transmasc spaces ime, which also creates an environment where no one who has had or wants these surgeries, feels comfortable talking about it. Bc every other conversation is going to be slowly and patiently debunking someone immediately effectively saying "WOW I WOULDN'T GET THAT AWFUL MUTILATING SURGERY BECAUSE I LOVE MY BODY THE WAY IT IS GOOD FOR YOU THOUGH" who often get defensive when told they are misinformed, and being rude.

Like you'll do it a few times, but then realize it's going to be an uphill battle every time, and that some people genuinely don't even want to listen. So you either stop bringing it up, or leave. Either way, it's pretty alienating.

(No excuse for why it overlaps so heavily, with willful ignorance about pre-op trans men topping cis men tho, lol. That's just "how do lesbians have sex/women can't top men" levels of bad faith. Like, use your imagination sweetheart, or shut up.)

I find it interesting how people don't seem to know about or expect trans men to get bottom surgery or other masculinizing surgery and treat top surgery as *the* surgery. Like, I saw my anthropology mentor today and I hadn't seen her since before I had surgery, and she said something along the lines of like "it must be such a relief to get *the* big surgery over with", as if top surgery would be the only major surgery I could feasibly get over the course of my transition. And you see this a lot with people equating trans men with having a vulva, using terms like "boypussy" (a personal ick) when referring to sexual experiences involving trans men, as if trans men couldn't possibly have other genitalia. And of course facial masculinization surgery is also a thing many trans men opt for, but it is never talked about as even a potential resource for trans men, despite it being a valid option.

Personally, I think top surgery is it for me. I would love to be able to get bottom surgery, but unfortunately I have genitourinary disorders and I don't think it's a good idea to mess with anything down there. But if I didn't have those disorders, bottom surgery would not be off the table. And getting a hysterectomy or something similar certainly is *not* off the table, I would like to get some sort of sterilization procedure at some point.

I don't know if this is part of people thinking trans men somehow have an easier time "passing" than other trans people without significant intervention (we don't) or people being uncomfortable with the idea of trans men "ruining" our femalehood, or maybe it's a combination of both ideas and others, but it's just such a frustrating phenomena.

[gorbagegorl]

crazy how even if a post about surgery starts with info for both transmasc and transfem people, the additions will be dominated by info for transmascs

[drdemonprince]

Gender nullification anon here ^-^

I have a urethral opening in between my legs, and a nerve graft just above it that's under my skin. Functionally the nerve graft is similar to the glans of a penis or a clitoris. It's a huge source of (a)gender euphoria for me and I'm very happy I was able to get it done. I've found that lots of trans people who are interested in gender nullification or similar "nonbinary gcs" don't know they are possibilities so I try to spread the word where I can No mistake, having to draw a diagram for new sexual partners is a little silly but ultimately it's really improved my life in that department too ;)

this shit's crazy (complimentary, excited). i gotta get on transbucket to see if I can find some pics of what the nerve situation looks like if anything, though from your description it sounds like it's pretty smooth. i also wonder like. do you still have orgasm contractions? inside?

[puc-puggy]

Uncensored Genital Photography

The Great Wall of Vulva (plaster casts) and their Labia Library (uncensored photos) Comfortable In My Skin — “Flip Through My Flaps” (vulva) and “Solicited Dick Pics” (penises) Large Labia Project Labia Library Breast Gallery- Nonsexualized Images of real, anonymously submitted breasts Critique My Dick Pic [tumbex archive]- real submitted dick centric nudes

Sex Ed-General

Our Bodies, Ourselves Scarleteen

Trans-General

Trans Bodies, Trans Selves TransBucket- account required, before and after pictures of gender confirmation procedures Trans Digital Archive- historical trans materials r/TransSurgeryWiki -surgery info & reddit-centric link drop DIY HRT Guide

Trans Men/Masc

r/GrowYourTDick (bottom growth) r/Transmascdicks (prosthetic penises) Body Alchemy: Transsexual Portraits by Loren Cameron, which includes images of genitalia in its "Genital Reconstruction" section, page 46. Portraits of clothed trans masculine people other than the author begin on page 34 in the "New Man Series." A Genitoplasty Diary by Lou Sullivan (1984-1987) (no images but fascinating)

Trans Women/Femme

Transfeminine Science r/TransBreastTimelines in-browser recreation of a 90s mac in order to run a 90s trans information CD-Rom

Intersex

InterAct's Intersex FAQ InterAct's collection of informative brochures & guides Intersex Human Rights Australia: Celebrating Intersex Firsts on TV JSTOR: Intersex Narratives: Shifts in the Representation of Intersex Lives in North American Literature and Popular Culture, by Viola Amato Human Rights Campaign: Understanding the Intersex Community GLAAD Media Reference Guide: Intersex People my post with appropriate disclaimers, includes instructions on navigating hostile spaces to view genitalia imagery

Genital Art

The Vulva Gallery for LOTS of educational content, community questions, and vulvas of all kinds, including queer and transmasc people The Body Diversity Gallery for genitals, penises, bellies, bums, bodies, breasts and chests of all kinds conscious_euphoria / Ocean Grove for more queer, nonbinary and transmasc centric content. Similar setup to the vulva gallery with lots of educational content too along with some occasional kink education content (linktree)

[hypermascbishounen]

A ton of stuff casually circulating about bottom surgery is straight up terf propaganda, especially for phallo and meta. Meanwhile, a lot of real information has to be kept in private groups bc of transphobic harassment.

I think we could all better unlearn the white feminist co-opted version of "body positivity" that's just reskinned God Given Natural Body christianity stuff. It's wild how even other trans people who are transistioning, suddenly start bodyshaming goals they see as undesirable, and frame pursuing bottom surgery as a failure to love or accept yourself. Like that isn't just repeating what every terf says about any act of transition, for transmasculine people especially.

i wish ppl didnt shit so hard on (transmasc) bottom surgery man. i feel like i wouldve looked into a metoidioplasty a lot sooner if i hadnt seen all of the negativity and stigma surrounding phallo and metoidioplasties. but as soon as i actually looked into it i realized it was something i want! extremely bad! and i feel like a lot of other transmascs would want bottom surgery if they actually knew more about different types and results

[spitblaze]

If anyone is trying to see pictures of certain types of GRS/GAS/transgender surgical procedures and doesn’t want to be subjected to the flood of gore on Google image search, transbucket is a good resource for a lot of that as well as the doctors who perform the operations

[matter-for-mass]

inspired by the phalloplasty post going around but not really relevant enough to add as a rb

frankly it’s kind of crazy that bottom surgery for trans men is actively stigmatized in a way that no other trans surgery (from my perspective) quite seems to be??

like, yes there are gonna be people being gross about any trans surgery. but you straight up cannot openly talk about bottom surgery in any kind of positive light as a trans man without people coming out of the woodwork to talk about how it’s gross, it’s functionless, it’s not cis passing, it’s useless, it’s unnecessary, tdicks are real dicks so why would you even want that, etc etc etc. a lot of the time people will phrase this as “oh you do what you want :) but *I* could *NEVER*…” as if that isn’t still a nasty fucking sentiment to have about somebody else’s choices surrounding their body.

like one, it’s incredibly obvious none of these people have done any research in the first place. spend an hour on transbucket or on phallo blogs or the subreddit or talking to the actual real human people who have had phalloplasties(/meta but I’m mostly talking abt phallo here) and you’ll notice that 1) shitloads of them are cis passing, 2) there can be EXTREME differences in appearance between early surgical stages/recent surgeries and late stage/fully healed results, 3) there are probably dozens more options and combinations than you are imagining for virtually any reasonable surgical outcome you would want, with like, two or three exceptions (non assisted erections/having foreskin/ejaculating, but even those have asterisks.)

and I realize that in some circles “be nice about phallo” is beating a dead horse, but that is VERY much not the case in the wider trans community, AND outside of trans spaces.

posts about phallo in general ftm spaces (r/ftm, etc) get overwhelmed with unsolicited “oh *i* wouldn’t get phallo but i’m happy for you op” at absolute best, and actively admonished at worst. trans men— YOUNG trans guys, frequently— will say the most disgusting shit about other people’s bodies and other people will rally around them to reassure them they’re valid as if they didn’t just heavily imply if not outright claim that people with phallo won’t pass as male/don’t have “functional” anatomy/are unfuckable/are disfigured/etc etc. like hey! you’ve looped back around to being transphobic! you are indistinguishable from a conservative!

and this shit has made its way back to cis people! i’ve had well meaning cis friends probe me about whether I’d “ever” want bottom surgery and spout weird (i assume from tiktok or some shit) talking points about how bottom surgery isn’t “advanced enough” yet. (hello, real flesh-and-blood penis and balls with a dope ass pump insert that can give me an insta erection at any point sounds pretty advanced to me!)

this isn’t a terminally online thing either. i have had irl people telling me this shit. i have had TWO partners discourage me from seeking bottom surgery, one of whom was literally a trans man. real in-person friends I sincerely care about have barely hidden their judgement about me needing bottom surgery because of this stupid shit.

at some stage, “it’s ok & valid if you don’t get phallo” became “wanting phallo is gross and unnecessary and uh. idk. toxic masculinity?” like… what? the m in ftm means male. i’m not saying it’s at all necessary or a requirement to get bottom surgery to be male. but it’s fucking crazy that trans men are being discouraged from certain elements of surgical transition, frequently *by other trans people*.

(getting off on a tangent, but it’s a really concerning trend in the trans community in general that “you’re valid if you don’t do x” has morphed into judgement against people who DO need x to the point of discouraging them from actually pursuing things they need.)

anyway, young trans people especially, I implore you to do *actual* research. stumbling on a photo of a phallo dick you didn’t like (that was in all likelihood stage 1 and immediately post op) doesn’t count. clicking through a couple pictures of meta results and deciding it’s icky doesn’t count. reading fear mongering posts or taking other random equally uneducated trans people’s word for it doesn’t count. there is an abundance of literature and surgical resources and photo albums and blog posts and everything under the sun about phallo and other surgeries. if it’s not for you? great! not everything is. that usually is a cue to not speak over people who it IS for with any degree of authority unless you have a great damn reason.

it’s really sad and really tiring to see people absolutely shocked when they stumble on a result they find impressive or hear about a relatively common combination of procedures they didn’t know existed. like I do understand and to a degree sympathize with this stuff not being talked about super openly (partially for the aforementioned reasons of phallo being seen as shameful). and i’m not saying it’s like, a moral failing or whatever to not have heard of something. but I promise you, the information really is out there, and you will have to sift through some of this anti phallo shit first, but it isn’t particularly hard to find at all.

[intersex-support]

hi! i have known i am intersex for a while now but it wasn't until recently that i learned i possibly had surgery done on me as an infant, as i had to stay in the hospital for a few extra days for supposed lung issues when i cried just fine, and did find out later i am intersex. that being said, i know one tell tale way of knowing is looking for scarring or anything else off. i tried really hard to look online for any indication of what exactly to look for or what scarring might look like 25 years after the fact, but found nothing. i had my partner look and she really couldn't tell since she didn't know what she was looking for. on someone who has a vagina, what would be some defining features to look for? i already know my enlarged clitoris and inner labia are related to me being intersex, i am just looking for signs of surgery having been done!

Hi anon 💜

Unfortunately, I have a really hard time answering asks about how to tell exactly what scarring looks like, and I wish I had better resources and answers to share. Part of this is because scars look different on everyone depending on what type of surgery you potentially received, how long it's been, and also just depending on your body. I don't feel comfortable linking to medical journals with surgery or scarring photos, because most of those are all children and I have serious doubts about whether doctors actually received consent for that kind of medical photography, and I don't want to continue to perpetuate that exploitation. I'm familiar with what some types of scars look like, but I have a very hard time trying to figure out how to put it into words in a way that makes sense.

This recent ask from someone else trying to figure out answers about surgery talks a little bit more about the types of intersex surgeries, if you are interested in researching more in depth in the medical literature about those surgeries. It can also be easier to find results of some of those surgeries (such as vaginoplasty) that were performed on consenting trans adults in places like reddit, transbucket, etc. I'll also say that gonadectomy scars are usually more visible and higher up on your pelvis or abdomen, rather than on your genitalia.

Even if you're not really able to visibly determine if you have scarring, sometimes we can figure out that we have scar tissue--either external or internal--based on the sensory experience, sensation, pain, factors like that.

If you've had frequent UTIs, that can be another piece of the puzzle.

Researching your medical records can also be another way to try to get more information, but I know how difficult that process can be.

I wish I had better resources or answers to share with you, but I'm sending so, so much love and solidarity. I know that for many people exploring the possibility of surgery can be an emotional and overwhelming process, and we're always here if you need to vent, need support, advice, anything. Truly wishing you the best, anon, and I hope you're able to find the answers you're looking for.

💜💜💜