Peace everyone!
I’m Elektra and I’m hoping to raise some funds for Facial Feminization Surgery (Revision) recovery! My surgery is scheduled on August 1st, 2025 with Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez at NYU Langone and I can’t wait! I am raising funds to sustain me throughout the month of August (which I’ve itemized below), and to also make up for wages missed from a job I was unethically fired from this month that I was initially planning on using for building a recovery fund. I will be unable to work for two weeks minimum, but most comfortably would like to take the month off because working with a bunch of stitches in your head and your face looking like tenderized meat is not really an option, let alone having to run errands like go to the grocery store or take the train.
Just to tell you a little bit about my journey — I got FFS done once before in 2023 and it didn’t go so well. When the cast for my nose came off, I noticed the cartilage had been set at an unnatural and super strange angle. The right edge of my nose was literally almost a 90 degree angle. It was horrifying. The surgeon had me come back after six months of having to walk around like that and shave the cartilage down in his office. I had to be kept awake during the procedure and since it was non-surgical, I wasn’t allowed any anesthesia. They injected lidocaine into my septum, carved into my nose with a scalpel, and then inserted a surgical version of a nail file and filed away, all while I was awake and trying to have a conversation with my doctor to ignore the pain and discomfort. Additionally, I got an infection in my chin about a month after surgery and they had to remove my implant. I had a weird, watery bubble underneath my chin until the emergency procedure, and even today, the skin in the area where the infection was on my chin is depressed, as if there’s a hole still. Because of the quick turnaround between the initial surgery and the emergency procedure, I also have a lot of scar build up in my chin tissue and it makes it hard to smile and speak sometimes.
Ever since then, I still experience harassment and violence on a daily basis on the street. I get publicly ridiculed on a consistent basis and have even had people try to push me onto the train and pull knives on me because they clock me as a trans woman. Many still refuse to recognize that I am a woman and continue to call me a man, and beyond that, the social ostracizing in the workplace and society at large has made it difficult to maintain any semblance of social support or stability. In this current political context, trans people have only become even more of a target. I had the hope that after my first FFS surgery, the harassment would stop, which was may be naive, but the dolls out here who “pass” (even though the whole concept is archaic) absolutely experience less transphobic street harassment than those of us who don’t. I hope that with this revision, I will wake up feeling more aligned to who I see in the mirror and not feel like a botched monster every time I see my reflection.
As stated above, I currently work one job (was fired from my second job at the beginning of June). The job I was fired from was a job at Starr Bar, a bar supposedly dedicated to supporting grassroots organizing and leftist political movements. I’d brought to managements attention several transphobic things that had happened to me during my time there, and the pervasive social transphobia of many of the patrons, only to have one of them tell me “well if you feel that you need to leave, just give us notice.” They were dismissive and apathetic to my concerns, and I was fired one night when my boss asked me to perform a bunch of tasks unrelated to the job I was on the clock for and I tried to set a boundary. I told her the bar was busy and I was on the clock as a bartender and not supposed to be managing events or acting as the floor manager and that since she was in town and in the space and had her hands free, she could do it. She took that as insubordination and fired me on the spot, yelling at me in front of the all of the patrons and customers. I’ve never been more publicly shamed or dehumanized by a manager in my entire adult life. It became clear in that moment, that trans liberation for many people is not included in their politic, and not even something they care to think about on any deep or critical level.
Getting fired from this job was particularly painful because it was the first time I truly felt financially stable since moving to NYC. It was my main source of income, and I was planning on using my wages between this job and my job at the New York Public Library to save up money for my surgery recovery. Since I am not salaried at either position, time off is unpaid, and the amount of wages I’m missing out on from getting fired unethically is truly putting me into financial turmoil. It is impossible to search for another job when I need to take the entire month of August off for recovery and so I thought this would be a great place to crowdfund and get some community support!
Lastly, my lease is up at the end of August, and my landlord wants to renovate so I have to leave the apartment. Moving while also navigating surgery recovery is going to be super complicated, so I wanna make sure the journey is easy and I can hire movers and not have to do all the heavy lifting myself! Particularly since I was also just unethically fired from my job at Starr Bar, it will make it even more difficult to find an apartment in the city if not impossible, which means I may also need to move somewhere else in the country. There’s so much up in the air right now because of the loss of this job, but I’ve included all those costs in the itemized breakdown below!
SO, thank you for getting this far and hearing a little bit about my experience, and for considering donating to my recovery fund! I’ve listed the itemized amount that justifies the total sought above, and I just want to thank all of you who donate. Supporting trans people is a crucial step towards our collective liberation, and taking active steps like this matters so much. Trans people in general are already at a much higher risk of job instability, housing instability, and social isolation, and donating will absolutely keep me afloat for a little bit. Thank you all so much <3
ITEMIZED FUNDRAISING AMOUNTS:
August 2025 Rent: $1500
New York Public Library Job August Wages: $1700
Lost Wages from Starr Bar for June and July: (appx. $400 per week x 8 weeks) = $3200
Average Moving Fee for a 1 BD: $1000
Total: $7400
