Emily Gavaldon says she was never satisfied with her labia. she told Yahoo Life.
“I was still upset about the appearance of my labia,” explains the 23-year-old from Colorado. “I would ‘tuck in’ when I was in my bathing suit and never let my boyfriend look down there.” I was so scared to reveal myself to anyone. ”
It wasn’t until I went to cosmetology school and talked to one of my buddies that I heard about labiaplasty, a plastic surgery procedure that alters the inner folds of skin that are part of the vulva called the labia minora. The outer layer containing hairs called the labia majora. Gavaldon’s colleagues performed the procedure themselves, leading Gavaldon to conduct his own research. She remembers thinking, “Don’t I have to live with this forever?”
“Hearing how embarrassed she was about her labia made me feel a little better.
Gavaldon went to a plastic surgeon for a consultation. A week later she underwent labiaplasty. The surgery made her feel like a “whole new woman.” She says her pain was “manageable” except for urinating, which was difficult because of her sutures.
“When I was shown the before and after photos, tears welled up and I couldn’t thank the doctors and staff enough. They did a great job,” she says.
What is labiaplasty?
According to Dr. Gordon K. Lee, a plastic and reconstructive surgeon and professor of surgery at Stanford University School of Medicine, labiaplasty itself can be done under local rather than general anesthesia, depending on the patient’s pain tolerance. It’s a simple procedure.
“Usually the area is numbed with an injection of local anesthetic,” Lee told Yahoo Life. There is the wedge method (a method of removing a triangular wedge to hide the scar), he adds: “Patients can usually go home the same day.”
Patients are advised not to do anything strenuous, including sexual intercourse, for about four to six weeks, because “anything that strains the sutures can obviously open the wound,” Dr. Lee said. says most patients can return to an office-type desk job “within a few days.”
Why do women undergo labiaplasty?
Labioplasty is on the rise. Nearly 19,000 labiaplasty procedures will be performed in 2021, a 36% increase from 2020, according to statistics from the National Data Bank of Cosmetic Surgery. It’s a trend that the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists expressed concern in 2017, especially given her teens’ growing interest in surgery.
Some have accused pornography of playing a role in influencing people to undergo surgery. However, some workers in the porn industry argue that there is no single idealized labia appearance in the industry. We found that only two women cited this as the reason they sought labiaplasty. Instead, the reasons they gave included looking at “before” photos on the surgeon’s website. Not only can this lead to women undergoing labiaplasty for strictly cosmetic reasons due to the erroneous belief that something is wrong with their genitals, but they also get negative comments about labiaplasty. It also includes The appearance of one’s labia and physical discomfort.
The rise in tight clothing, especially when it comes to exercise leggings, is also a factor when it comes to patients seeking labiaplasty, Lee points out.
“Sometimes when you look at the area you can see extra tissue sticking out, which can make people feel self-conscious,” he says. If there are people who do, some like to wear tight-fitting clothes to the gym. I am supporting the surgery.
For Zully Azuero, 23, from Chicago, it wasn’t about aesthetics. She says the physical discomfort caused by her labia was affecting her “everyday life.”
“My left labia was bigger than my right labia, so it was frustrating when I sat down, wore jeans, or wore certain underwear,” she told Yahoo Life, noting that she regularly suffers from yeast infections and She added that she contracted a urinary tract infection. Azuero first learned about labiaplasty in 2022 when her gynecologist recommended it.
“To be honest, I always wanted to do it, but I didn’t know it was a problem,” she says.
Azuero had an outpatient labiaplasty. “Recovery was difficult at first,” she recalls. “The first week was the hardest. I had to refrain from physical activity for four to six weeks. He added that he found it difficult to sit for long periods of time and was unable to return to work for four days.
Still, she says. “I would totally recommend this procedure to anyone in a position I used to be in. It has changed my life and made me feel so comfortable in what I wear on a daily basis.”
Like Azuelo, McKayla, who lives in Indianapolis, asked to keep her last name down, but said she wanted surgery because she was exercising every day and feeling physically uncomfortable.
“I have always struggled with my labia and they are very long. My right labia was longer than my left labia,” she told Yahoo Life. “It was always noticeable and very uncomfortable. I have to tuck it in.”
McKayla chose to have surgery under general anesthesia. “It was a very easy surgery because she was so excited to have it and fix this problem,” she says. “I didn’t really care how much pain it would cause, but it wasn’t that painful.”
What are the potential risks of labioplasty?
Like any type of surgery, labioplasty is not without risks. bleeding, removal of too much or too little tissue, infection, scarring, and decreased sensitivity. .
That’s what 36-year-old Jessica Ping, who lives in San Francisco, knows firsthand. It was when Pin was in her teens that she found a photo of her labia online. She noticed that her own labia minora drooped lower than what she saw in her photos. It was the first time I thought she might not be “normal” and I started looking through other pictures to find a vulva image that looked like mine. She says she found some images in textbooks.
Ping went to her mother’s gynecologist to reassure her that she was perfectly “normal.” But she didn’t believe it. Pin says he didn’t realize that having the inner lip of the vulva protruding past the outer lip is actually perfectly normal and very common. 50% are said to have longer labia minora than labia majora.
When Pin was 18, she told her father, a plastic surgeon, that she was having pain in her labia minora. He set her up with the hospital’s gynecologist who performed her labioplasty. But Ping said she wasn’t trained to perform the surgery, and her surgeon performed a clitoral hood reduction, which “cuts” her labia minora and removes excess skin around her clitoris. Claiming – all without her consent.
The surgery severely affected her sexual function, including her ability to orgasm — potential risks she was not informed of at the time. “I’m not advocating a ban on labioplasty,” she says. “I advocate informed her consent and a reasonable standard of care.”
According to Lee, overablation means that the patient needs to be informed that removing too much tissue can lead to deformities. “Injury to the nerve to the clitoris is a complication that should not occur if performed by an experienced American Board-certified plastic surgeon,” he says. This is because the nerves leading to the clitoris must not be damaged during the operation.”
As with any surgery, “there are still risks,” Lee says.
It’s also important to consider why women undergo labiaplasty, says Lee. “And we want to make sure the patient is doing it for themselves and not for someone else, such as a partner.”
Most of Lee’s patients seek labiaplasty after experiencing pain or discomfort during exercise or sexual intercourse. But for those who want surgery strictly for aesthetic reasons, it’s important to understand that the vulva comes in many different shapes and sizes, he says.
As for the vulva, “I think it’s very helpful to know that there are different types of normals,” says Lee. “Not everyone’s labia look exactly the same.”
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