My whole journey with transition and detransition was messy and complicated, and it took me a long time to really understand why I did what I did. I was born female and for most of my life, I never felt like I fit in with other girls. I was always called a tomboy, bullied for not being ladylike, and I felt like a weird, mannish outcast. Looking back, I think a lot of my discomfort started around puberty. I hated the changes in my body, especially developing breasts. I felt like I couldn't connect with my own reflection; it was like I was disassociated from myself.

When I was about 15, I started presenting in a more masculine way, and by 16, I came out as trans and began living socially as a male. It felt incredible at first. Suddenly, I had a community. I found myself in a heavily LGBT friend group that was incredibly supportive and accommodating. For the first time, people liked me. They praised me for being trans, and that positive reinforcement was huge for me. I felt like I finally belonged somewhere. I told myself and everyone else that I had always been a boy trapped in a girl's body, and it just made sense to everyone based on how I'd always been.

But underneath all that, there were other issues. I've struggled with depression and anxiety my whole life, and I had a lot of trauma from past abuse that I never properly dealt with. I blamed all my unhappiness on being born in the wrong body. I thought if I could just medically transition, everything would fix itself. So the minute I turned 18, I pushed to start testosterone. I was so desperate for it that I even lied to the doctors, omitting my history of trauma and internalized misogyny because I was terrified they wouldn't approve me. I remember being suicidal when my initial appointment got pushed back a month.

When I finally started T, I was overjoyed. For the first six months, I loved the changes. My voice dropped, I felt stronger, and my mental health seemed to improve drastically. I thought it was because I was finally aligning my body with my identity. I was the model trans guy—I was so sure of myself that I watched detransition videos and couldn't understand how anyone could ever go back. I was planning my top surgery and thought I'd be on testosterone for life.

But around that six-month mark, things started to shift. I began watching those detrans videos again, and for the first time, I saw my own story in theirs. I heard women talk about never connecting with other women, about internalizing abuse and misogyny, and about using transition as an escape from deeper problems. It hit me like a ton of bricks. I realized that my mind had latched onto transition as an easy fix for my trauma and low self-esteem. Testosterone didn't fix my problems; it just masked them for a while. The stability I felt was more about the placebo effect and the confidence boost from achieving a big goal, not from actually being a man.

A huge moment for me was when I tried on a bra again and felt a deep sense of discomfort and confusion. I threw it off and refused to think about it because I was so scared of being wrong. I had doubled down so hard on my transition that admitting I might have made a mistake felt impossible. But the feeling kept nagging at me. The lockdown period was actually a big catalyst because I was alone without the constant outside affirmation from friends and strangers praising me for being trans. It gave me the space to really sit with myself and question everything.

I eventually realized that my transition was largely driven by internalized misogyny, trauma, and a desperate need to feel safe and purposeful. I didn't want to be a man because I was one; I wanted to be a man because I thought it would protect me from being a woman in a world that had taught me to hate being female. I also had a lot of internalized homophobia; I think part of me was uncomfortable with the idea of being a masculine woman who liked men.

I decided to stop testosterone after seven months. The first month off was hell. My body had no sex hormones while it waited for my ovaries to wake up, and I felt awful—no appetite, low mood, and horrible intrusive thoughts. But slowly, my estrogen came back. My face softened, my hips came back, and my skin got glowy again. Emotionally, I reconnected with myself. I hadn't realized how numb testosterone had made me; I couldn't cry on it, I just felt frustrated and angry. Now, I feel everything deeply again, and I love that.

The biggest permanent change was my voice. It had dropped significantly into a male range, and that caused me a lot of distress. I was determined to get my female voice back, so I threw myself into voice training. I learned from online resources, especially Transvoicelessons on YouTube, and focused on resonance rather than just pitch. It took consistent practice over months, but I completely retrained my voice. Now, I sound exactly like I did before testosterone, and I don't have to think about it at all. It was hard work, but it gave me my life back.

I also experienced some serious health complications from testosterone. I had debilitating vaginal atrophy within six months and was even offered a hysterectomy at 19. Thankfully, my menstrual cycle returned after stopping, but there's no telling what permanent damage was done to my reproductive system.

Socially, detransitioning was mixed. My work was incredibly supportive, but I lost my main friend group—the LGBT ones who had cheered on my transition dropped me and talked behind my back. My other friends and family were mostly just relieved and supportive; many admitted they never really supported my transition in the first place.

Now, I'm living my life as a woman again, and I'm happier than I've ever been. I have a wonderful, loving partner who knows my whole history and doesn't care at all. I don't regret socially transitioning because it gave me the confidence and self-advocacy skills I have today, but I deeply regret medically transitioning. I had everything I needed before testosterone, and I created permanent problems for myself by taking it. If I could go back, I'd tell my younger self to wait until at least her twenties and to deal with the underlying trauma first.

My thoughts on gender now are that it's a personal journey, but medical transition is a huge deal with permanent consequences. It shouldn't be rushed, and there needs to be better therapy and support to help people figure out if their discomfort is truly about gender or something else. For me, it was about trauma, not gender. I'm just a masculine woman, and that's okay.

Here is a timeline of my journey: