My journey with all of this is complicated, and looking back, I see a lot of things I didn't understand at the time. I was never someone who medically transitioned, but I had my own experiences that made me question everything, and watching a close friend go through his transition was a big part of what changed my perspective.

When I was a kid, around seven years old, I was the one who had what people might call dysphoria. I begged my parents to tell me I was a boy. I insisted on using the boys' bathroom and even tried to pee standing up. I was deeply uncomfortable with the idea of growing up to be a woman. But then, something shifted when I hit puberty. I just… grew out of it. I’m still a tomboy, I’ve never been a feminine person, but that intense childhood feeling faded away.

Because of my own past, I used to be very supportive of trans activism. I tried to ignore the things I was skeptical about because I thought questioning it was "transphobic." That changed when I found this community. I was expecting hateful stuff, but instead, I found people with real stories that made me think.

A huge part of my "peaking" moment was because of my FtM friend. Hearing his story made me realize that not everyone transitions for the same reason. He had no dysphoria as a child. His feelings started when he was already in his twenties. What made him feel "dysphoric" was a specific event: he felt arousal from dressing up as a male character he really adored. To me, that sounds like a fetish, not a lifelong identity. It’s hard to watch him now because he tries to look exactly like that character, and it genuinely grosses me out. It’s so different from my MtF friend, who has been strongly dysphoric her whole life. I don't get the same creepy feeling from her at all.

Seeing his journey made me question a lot of the common beliefs. He thought the idea of a "real life test"—living as your preferred gender for a year before getting medical treatment—was old-fashioned and harmful. He supports the faster US model. But seeing as he transitioned suddenly as an adult without a childhood history of dysphoria, I guess his position makes sense for his situation. He even argued that transwomen are more likely to be killed before hormones, so they shouldn't have to wait. But that argument doesn't make sense to me. You're just as vulnerable socially whether you're on hormones or not; the first shot doesn't make you pass magically.

It bothers me how obsessed the trans community can be with hormones. They sometimes sound like drug addicts. I read about a trans woman who said her dysphoria vanished after her first shot of hormones, even though she didn't look any different. That seems more like a psychological rush than a real solution.

My thoughts on gender now are that it's mostly environmental. I don't believe hormones make you inherently masculine or feminine in the way of liking hunting or cooking. I think a lot of it is social conditioning. My own childhood discomfort was real, but it passed. For my friend, his seemed to come from a different place entirely, related to arousal and escapism into a character.

I don't have regrets about a personal transition because I never went through with one. But I do regret not questioning things sooner. I regret just accepting the activist narrative without critical thought. Watching my friend has made me cautious and sad. I worry that for some people, transition is a way to cope with other issues, like low self-esteem or fetishistic feelings, rather than a solution for a deep-seated identity problem.

Here is a timeline of my key experiences based on my memories: