Facial feminization surgery and keeping a stiff upper lip

FFS. Yes, in online gaming, this can mean “for fuck’s sake.” But although it’s not an abbreviation most people ever come into contact with, it can also refer to a procedure called facial feminization surgery. As the name indicates, this procedure is designed to reduce the prominence of cues in one’s facial structure that suggest or communicate biological “maleness.”

For me, few things trigger painful feelings of dysphoria like seeing photos or reflections of my own face in which the strength of my jaw and chin or the prominence of my forehead and brow are emphasized. 

I’ve spoken to other trans women who had similar feelings and underwent FFS, and they have reported marked reductions in feelings of dysphoria as a result. So for a long time, FFS has been a goal of mine. I’ve saved up money for years, and finally, with the money I’ve saved and the generous contributions to a fundraiser I ran a while back, I’ve finally been able to reserve a date with a respected surgeon in Thailand in January of next year. 

(To be very clear, I don’t think that these features make me “less of a woman” or that the surgery will make me “more of a woman.” I am a woman, and I’m not doing this to make anyone else happy. I’m doing this for me.)

Part of the consultation process involved me sending photos of my face to the surgeon. He then replied with a list of procedures he suggested and recommended. Of course, it’s a business for him, and understandably, he wants to make money, so perhaps not everything he suggested is something that I really need. The only things I’d really wanted were those procedures that focused on reducing the “male” cues in my forehead/brow and in my chin/jawline area. One of the other suggested procedures was rhinoplasty/alarplasty. Yes, I have a rather strong nose, but if the amazing Steffi Graf can rock a prominent nose, then I sure can, too. 

There were other procedures on the menu, too, like cheek implants (pass) and trachea shaves (no thanks). And then there was one that I’d never heard of before: lip lifting. The doctor’s accompanying note read, “The distance of your upper lip (between the base of your nose and top lip) is long, this procedure will help enhance the feminine lip appearance." 

This was so strange to me. Never in my life had I consciously considered the distance between the nose and upper lip on anyone’s face. After reading this, I found myself scrutinizing this distance on my own face in the mirror, asking myself if it was particularly long. I’d look at strangers, women and men, just to examine the distance between their noses and their upper lips and try to determine if the distance on my face was significantly greater than that on the faces of the women I encountered, if it was above-average even for men. I became deeply concerned about it, about this thing that I’d never once before in my life paid any attention to.

Being perceived and treated as a boy while I was growing up, I never felt any of my physical features was called out as a flaw. I never sensed any standard of attractiveness that I was pressured to live up to. But now, all it took was this one comment for me to become oddly obsessed with this detail. I can’t even imagine what it’s like to grow up being perceived and treated as female and feeling the cultural pressure to achieve some absurd standard of beauty as this tiny aspect of one’s appearance or that one fall under a spotlight of scrutiny and are considered "flaws.”

Ultimately, I concluded that if this thing had never troubled me before, there was no sense in letting it trouble me now. I put it out of my head. I think I’ll be quite happy with just those two procedures that I’ve wanted and worked towards for so long. 

Thailand, here I come.