This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious
Based on the provided comments, this account appears authentic. There are no serious red flags suggesting it is a bot or a bad-faith actor.
The user's comments display:
- Complex, nuanced, and emotionally charged personal experiences consistent with the stated history of detransition, internal conflict, and mental health struggles (BPD, OCD).
- Consistent internal logic across posts, even when exploring contradictory feelings.
- Specific, idiosyncratic details about relationships, sexuality (autoandrophilia), and personal history that lack a scripted or repetitive quality.
- A supportive and empathetic tone when giving advice to others, which aligns with a genuine member of a support community.
The passion and anger expressed are consistent with a real person grappling with a difficult and stigmatized experience.
About me
I grew up with an abusive mother and was never taught how to be a girl, which made me feel like I was failing at being a woman. I misinterpreted my deep attraction to men as gender envy and transitioned to live as a man. I realized I never actually felt like a man and that my feelings were better explained by autoandrophilia. Detransitioning was a relief and helped me understand my struggles were from trauma and internalized misogyny. I'm now learning to accept myself as a masculine woman who is attracted to men.
My detransition story
My whole journey with this started when I was really young, but I didn't understand what was happening. I grew up with an abusive single mother who constantly trashed the men she was with. I never saw a healthy relationship between a man and a woman, and I was never given a proper sex talk or any guidance. I think this really warped my view of myself and men.
I was also never taught how to be a "girl." I wasn't shown basic hygiene, skincare, or anything feminine like how to curl my hair. I was socialized more like a boy – told not to cry, to be tough and strong. Because of that, I never really identified with being a woman. I felt like I didn't know how and that I was failing at it. People called me ugly and a lesbian from a young age because I wasn't feminine, which made me feel gross and wrong.
At the same time, I was still treated like a girl in the worst ways. I was catcalled and preyed on by older men. It was so confusing. I felt this deep, profound attraction to men, but I had no framework for what that feeling was. I turned to fantasy and for a while, I thought I must be a lesbian because my mom kept trying to push me to date men and I resented it. But that didn't feel right either.
I discovered online communities and trans ideology, and it felt like an answer. That profound attraction I felt towards men? I was told that wasn't romantic attraction, it was gender envy. I thought the reason I couldn't relate to being a woman was because I wasn't one. So, I decided I was a trans man. I socially transitioned and started using a new name and pronouns. I didn't take hormones or have any surgery.
Living as a man, I realized I never actually felt like one in my daily life. I just felt like me, but with a new label that was also starting to feel like a cage. The constant overthinking about my identity was exhausting. I have Borderline Personality Disorder and OCD, which means I have a very unstable sense of self and I need to be 100% certain about everything. This made the whole process agonizing.
What finally made me detransition was realizing that my feelings could be understood in a different way. I learned about autoandrophilia (AAP) – where a woman is aroused by the thought of being male. That fit my experience perfectly. With porn, I could only get off if a man was involved. Watching gay porn or straight porn, I wasn't imagining myself as the woman; I was imagining myself as the man, feeling what he was feeling. I realized my deep attraction to men was romantic and sexual, but it got all tangled up with this arousal at the idea of embodying them.
Detransitioning was a huge relief. I no longer had to constantly analyze whether my attraction was envy or not. I could just be a woman who is attracted to men. But it left me with a lot of struggles. I still often feel too masculine and manly to be deserving of a man's affection. I'm in a relationship with a man now, and it's complicated. We both have our quirks; I think he might have autogynephilia himself. During sex, there's sometimes a disconnect because I'm focusing on what he's feeling, putting myself in his place, rather than being present in my own body as a woman.
I've come to realize that a lot of my struggle was rooted in internalized misogyny. I hated my breasts and my body because it didn't fit a perfect feminine ideal. I believed I couldn't be a woman because I wasn't good at performing femininity. But I'm learning that I can be a gender-nonconforming woman and still be loved. My boyfriend even calls me "Daddy" sometimes, and while it was triggering at first, I'm starting to see it as something beautiful – that I can be a masculine woman in a relationship with a man.
I don't regret exploring transition because it led me to a deeper understanding of myself. But I do regret that I ever felt I needed to change my body to fit a feeling. I now believe that my discomfort was a mix of trauma, autism, OCD, and internalized homophobia (thinking my attraction to men was wrong), all amplified by what I was reading online. I benefited from stepping away from all the labels and just trying to exist as myself. Medication has helped calm the obsessive thoughts enough for me to see things more clearly.
My thoughts on gender now are that it's incredibly complex, but we don't always need to have it all figured out. We can just be who we are without having to justify it with a perfect label. I'm a woman, a masculine woman who loves men, and that's okay.
Here is a timeline of my journey:
| Age | Event |
|---|---|
| Childhood | Grew up in an abusive home with no positive male/female dynamics. Socialized in a masculine way, oppressed for not being feminine. |
| Early Teens | Felt profound attraction to men, misinterpreted as something else. Thought I was a lesbian briefly. Influenced by online communities. |
| 19 | Socially transitioned to male, believing my feelings were gender dysphoria. |
| 21 | Realized I never felt like a man in daily life. Learned about autoandrophilia and began to understand my attraction differently. |
| 21 | Detransitioned socially back to living as a woman. Felt immense relief from no longer overanalyzing my identity. |
| 22 | Entered a relationship with a man, navigating complexities of sexuality and self-image. |
Top Comments by /u/Free-Orange8841:
You can still be a woman and have all of the same personality traits you have rn and find a man who would love you and treat you as an equal. Lots of bi and even straight men love masculine and hairy women. There is an entire fetish dedicated to hairy women. It would be hard to find someone, but that just means the man who finds you would be even more meaningful and worthwhile of a connection. What helps me when I feel I’m not feminine enough or desirable enough to be with a man is look at role reversal content and stories (not porn) and see that there genuinely are masculine men who love masculine women. It just takes a while for your brain to grey from the black and white thinking of internalized misogyny and sexism.
My bf is pretty masculine outwardly but very gentle intimately. He has even taken a liking to calling me Daddy recently and while it was initially triggering I’m starting to like it, and realizing it’s ok and even something beautiful to be a gnc woman in a relationship with a man.
I think it’s 100% true. Especially in my case. I also hyperfixate on my sexuality way too much to the point where it’s unhealthy and I’m bisexual. It almost always happens when I have nothing to fixate on, when I’m fixated on someone or something it’s a lot easier to rationalize who I am/want to be and what I’m not/don’t want to be. In my head it’s like well i need to figure this out NOW or I’ll never be ok!!! Like you really don’t have to figure out your sexuality you can just exist bro. I guess it was like that with trans since i never left the house when I decided I was.
Can I give you an honest opinion here? And don’t take this please as criticism of you or saying that what you’re feeling is bad or anything. But I think you’re in a really high emotion/anxiety state here, and it’s not always within your best interest to make huge declarations like breaking up with somebody and deciding you’ll go mute.
I think your boyfriend wasn’t doing anything inherently wrong. He can’t help his dreams he has, and although I don’t think it was appropriate for him to tell you about it, you can’t be angry at him for having a dream. People can’t control what they dream about. Part of his subconscious still has a memory or perception of you as a man because you WERE a trans man once in the relationship. For some people this takes time getting used to, just like it takes us time to get used to it too. I was very sensitive about once identifying as a man when I first detransitioned too because I didn’t want to be reminded. But it’s a part of us, our story, and if we go running from it our entire lives without stopping to take the time to really make peace with the fact it happened and accept it, it’ll come out in explosive ways like this.
Deciding to go mute isn’t the answer here. It’ll just cause you subconscious pain every time you do want to talk, it’s a prolonged choice every time someone talks to remind yourself of your self hatred, and choose to close a part of you off. Please use your voice. For every detrans woman. Your story and your voice deserves to be heard, and met with compassion.
Your boyfriend loves you for you, regardless of your voice, regardless of if you were a trans man. I think you should consider talking to him when you’re in a much more calm state. Having someone who still supports you and loves you knowing about your transition and detransition is rare. But nobody is perfect and always adapts to it the same way we do. It’s ultimately up to you. I don’t know if any of my advice here is unwarranted or inappropriate, your life isn’t mine. But I will say, for anything in life, it’s not wise to make huge decisions while you’re in a state of emotional distress.
I hope things get better for you either way. None of us should have ever felt the need to change who we are, but none of us should feel the need to hide or run from our experiences either. We have to accept them and be kind to ourselves.
I feel the same way. It’s why labels are genuinely harmful. I feel like even for me that basic sexuality labels have been harmful for me. I felt so much better when I first detransitioned because I no longer had to think about whether my profound attraction to men was gender envy or comphet or whatever the fuck. But I got reminded and I’m just sick of it all. I’m resentful of it. I just want to act how I want to act and feel however I want without needing to word it or justify it to myself or anyone without feeling like I’m lying to myself or being disingenuous but I have so much of this crap ingrained into my brain. And I don’t know who I am except the person who I want to be. Maybe that’s all we need.
I am autoandrophilic as well and I’m doing pretty fine. I talked to my bf about it and he laughed. I think he has autogynephilia in his own way (would never admit it to me but I KNOW) and he’s not trans either.
Trust me when I say that there is 100% a person out there that will work with what you have and enjoy it. For now though I think it’d be honestly healthier to work on your relationship with your self before running and looking for relationships with others, unless you’re doing pretty ok in that regard. For all the straight/bi women that love feminine presenting men there has to be some guys that are totally into women that read 100% as guys. People sometimes are really into a mindfuck.
Is it that you’d like to be called a woman but still present as male?
Regarding your last statement, I have bpd so I have a very unstable identity. Partner that with OCD and needing to be 100% about things is very hard for me. The only thing that really seems to calm it down is medication where I’m not really given the chance to be overthinking.
I find this post interesting bc I was raised and socialized stereotypically pretty much how a male would be. Don’t cry, don’t show weakness, be tough and strong. I learned very basic hygiene care (to the point where I had to find out on my own at an embarassing age you are supposed to wipe when you pee if you’re a woman), I wasn’t taught anything about femininity like curling your hair or brushing or skincare. I still don’t know how to curl my hair. And I don’t know anything about skincare. I have to learn all of these things on my own and I struggle constantly with learning femininity to the point where I feel like what trans women probably feel - that I’ll never be a woman. I never identified with being a woman bc I wasn’t taught or socialized to be one. If I were to transition I’d probably act as a privileged male because that’s really all I’ve known.
But when I was a young girl I was oppressed still, no matter how boyish I was. I was catcalled, I was preyed upon by older men, I was called ugly and a lesbian since grade school. You know Meg from family guy? That’s pretty much how I was treated. I was gross for not performing femininity properly. I’ve seen trans women enjoy being ogled at and all it is really is them enjoying having their performance validated. Sadly I can say for myself, when I get male validation it’s the only thing still reminding me I’m a woman.
Most trans people have expressed initial desire of wanting to be the opposite gender. They do not want to be their birth gender, because they don’t “feel” it. But what comes down to the feeling is misogyny and hatred towards those who are gender noncomforming on both ends. Or even just bad parenting.
Growing up I lived in a home with an abusive single mother who would constantly trash talk the men she was with and abuse them. I never had a sex talk or any examples of what a healthy m/f dynamic was, so I’d turn to fantasy and for a while I thought I was strictly lesbian. But there was a profound/deep attraction I’d feel towards men that I never felt towards women that somehow ended up translating to me wanting to embody them. It wasn’t just admiration. It really is a profound feeling that unfortunately trans ideology made me think I was trans. I was never taught that these feelings could be romantic, I had nobody to tell. me or show me what that even felt like. plus I had my mom constantly trying to get me to date men which I resented. I frequently had fantasies though of wanting to be dominated by a man.
With porn I would find that I can only get off to porn if there is a man involved. Gay porn or straight porn was really the only thing getting me going. If I watched porn of a man masturbating I felt extremely turned on and imagined myself as him, almost feeling what it’d be like to jack my dick off. Pov porn with a woman was less about what the woman felt and more about how the man felt inside of the woman. I would love getting nudes from my bf of him jacking off to the thought of me because I’d be able to imagine what he’s feeling.
While my aap is helpful in relationships with women, because I can take the role of a man, I’ve struggled with my boyfriend. Because I think he might be autogynephilic himself we both take a LONG time during sex, there’s a lot of pauses, he’s focusing on how I’m feeling having him inside of me, but I focus on how he’s feeling, how it feels to be inside of me, what he’s thinking… He doesn’t want to be pleasured but I get off so much on pleasuring him and he gets off on pleasuring me. I’m probably just describing normal sexual stuff here but the disconnect I feel about being a woman during sex isn’t something I can ignore.
Idk. It’s weird. I don’t like the thought of myself as a man in daily life anymore, and truly never did, and frequently wish I could just be a normal straight girl, because I really love men. I want to be the object of their affection but I feel too weird/manly to be deserving of it.
I think I have far too many masculine features for a woman, neurologically and physically for it to not be something hormonal or biologically wrong. I don’t want to be trans, I don’t even feel like I’m trans but literally a man so I’m just trying to figure out what the issue is here.