genderaffirming.ai 

Reddit user /u/L82Desist's Detransition Story

Transitioned: 22 -> Detransitioned: 45
female
took hormones
regrets transitioning
trauma
got bottom surgery
got top surgery
serious health complications
now infertile
This story is from the comments by /u/L82Desist that are listed below, summarised with AI.
On Reddit, people often share their experiences across multiple comments or posts. To make this information more accessible, our AI gathers all of those scattered pieces into a single, easy-to-read summary and timeline. All system prompts are noted on the prompts page.
User Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious

Based on the extensive and highly detailed comments provided, the account "L82Desist" appears to be authentic. There are no serious red flags suggesting it is a bot or a fake account.

The user demonstrates:

  • Deep, consistent personal history: The narrative is rich with specific, painful, and medically detailed experiences spanning decades of transition, life stealth as a man, and a long detransition process. This includes specific medical procedures (hysterectomy, mastectomy, laser hair removal), medications (T, estrogen, lamotrigine), and their long-term effects (chronic UTIs, voice changes, breast regrowth).
  • Complex emotional reasoning: The user provides nuanced explanations for their transition (internalized misogyny, trauma, sexual assault, social alienation) and detransition (craving female community, processing trauma, ideological disagreements, health issues). Their emotional state is complex, shifting between grief, anger, hope, and resolution, which is consistent with the traumatic experience they describe.
  • Consistent worldview: Their critique of trans ideology and the medical establishment is developed over many comments and rooted in their personal experience of it failing to cure their dysphoria, which they claim was only resolved through self-acceptance of their female body.
  • Ordinary personal details: They mention hobbies (gardening, hiking, painting), their profession (teacher), age (54), and family life (adopted daughters, a long-term partner), which add credibility and depth.

The passion and anger expressed are consistent with a real detransitioner who feels profoundly harmed and stigmatized. The account shows no signs of being a caricature or propaganda tool; its arguments are too personal, self-critical, and internally consistent.

About me

I was a tomboy who started fantasizing about being a boy as a child, which I now understand was a way to cope with trauma and internalized misogyny. I transitioned in my twenties, lived as a man for over twenty years, and had surgeries, but the dysphoria never went away and I felt like a lonely fraud. In my mid-forties, therapy helped me see that my desire to be male was a coping mechanism to escape the trauma of being female. I detransitioned seven years ago, and while I deeply regret the permanent changes to my body, my gender dysphoria is now completely gone. I have finally found peace by accepting my female body and rejecting the harmful ideas I once believed.

My detransition story

My journey with gender started when I was very young. I was a major tomboy and from a young age, I fantasized about having a penis. I felt deeply uncomfortable with the idea of growing up to be a woman. I now see this was rooted in a few things: trauma from being sexualized by men from a very young age, and a sexual assault I experienced when I was 15 that I didn't even fully process as rape until decades later. I also had a lot of internalized misogyny; I saw being female as weak and inferior, and I wanted to escape that.

In my early twenties, I discovered that transitioning was a possibility. It felt like the answer to everything. I was diagnosed with what was then called Gender Identity Disorder under the old, strict gatekeeping system. I started testosterone and began living as a man. I was determined to do it right. I passed very well and lived "stealth" for over twenty years, meaning almost no one in my life knew I was born female. I had a successful career, got married to a gay man, and from the outside, my life looked like a happy, successful trans story.

I had a double mastectomy and later a full hysterectomy. I thought each step would finally cure the dysphoria, but it never did. It was like a moving target. Even though I was seen as a man, I always felt inadequate because I would never have a functioning penis. I felt like a fraud, and it was incredibly lonely. I missed female friendships desperately. Women would shut down when I was friendly because they saw me as a man, and I had to listen to men say awful things when they thought no women were around. I felt guilty about the male privilege I had in my career. I was editing my past and feeling like a liar all the time.

The turning point came in my mid-forties. I was processing my childhood trauma in therapy and started to understand that my desire to be male was a dissociative coping mechanism, a way to hide from the trauma of being female in a misogynistic world. A pivotal moment was when a group of women invited me, as "the gay guy," to a women's ceremony at a hot spring. I was so ashamed of my surgically altered body that I couldn't participate, and I left feeling utterly alienated from the female connection I craved. Around the same time, the Me Too movement happened, and I couldn't share my own story because I was living as a man. I also started having serious health issues from long-term testosterone use, like chronic UTIs and vaginal atrophy from the tissue thinning.

I realized that as long as I wanted something I could never have—to actually be male—I would be unhappy. The only path to peace was to accept the reality of my female body. That realization was like a freight train hitting me, followed by immense grief. I decided to detransition about seven years ago.

Detransitioning has been the hardest thing I've ever done. Coming off testosterone was brutal; I had no natural hormones because of the hysterectomy, so I had terrible hot flashes and felt hopeless. I now take a menopausal dose of estrogen and a micro-dose of testosterone to feel balanced. I had full-body and facial laser hair removal, which was painful and expensive but absolutely necessary for me to feel at home in my body again. Seeing the masculine hair gone was a huge relief.

I regret my transition deeply. I regret the surgeries, especially the mastectomy. I lost a nipple graft to infection and have horrible scars. I wish I had my breasts back, but I can't face more surgery. I wear a padded bra now, and it makes me feel more whole. I am infertile, and while I love my two adopted daughters more than anything, I grieve that I never experienced pregnancy. My body is permanently changed.

But the most important thing is that after all this, my gender dysphoria is completely gone. For the first time in my life, I love my body. I see now that I was brainwashed by a misogynistic society to hate my femaleness. Accepting that I am a woman, and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, has been my liberation. I don't feel dysphoric anymore. I feel powerful.

My thoughts on gender are that it's a hierarchy, not a binary, and that women are placed at the bottom. Transition was my attempt to escape that, but it didn't work. True peace came from accepting my sex and rejecting the harmful ideas I'd internalized. I don't believe in "true trans" anymore. I think gender dysphoria is a mental illness, and for me, it was healed not by hormones and surgery, but by therapy, self-acceptance, and confronting my trauma.

My life now is quiet. I'm a teacher. I love gardening, keeping chickens, hiking, and making art. I wear comfortable clothes like leggings and tunics. I'm finally just me.

Here is a timeline of my journey:

Age Event
Childhood Felt like a tomboy, had fantasies of being a boy. Experienced sexualization and assault.
22 Started testosterone and began living as a man.
20s-40s Lived stealth as a man for over 20 years. Had a career, got married.
30s Had double mastectomy (top surgery).
40s Had a total hysterectomy.
45 Began processing trauma, realized the truth about my assault, decided to detransition. Stopped testosterone.
45-54 (Present) Began estrogen replacement therapy. Underwent full-body and facial laser hair removal. Legally and socially detransitioned.
54 Living as a woman, free from gender dysphoria.

Top Reddit Comments by /u/L82Desist:

251 comments • Posting since May 11, 2024
Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains how a radical feminist's statement that "It's not a binary. It's a hierarchy" caused her "peak trans" moment, leading her to detransition and overcome dysphoria.
144 pointsJun 18, 2024
View on Reddit

Grudge lurking at “TERFs” on Radical Feminist sites is what brought me to my “peak trans” experience (the point of no return for being able to accept trans ideology).

Specifically- they were talking about the “gender binary” and stated, “It’s not a binary. It’s a hierarchy.”

And just like that, I saw with absolute clarity- how logically it would follow that FTMs internalized the messages elevating men and denigrating women. Obviously.

And like pulling a yarn on a sweater, every single thing I looked at about my female upbringing and my trans identity started to unravel.

And when I untangled that shit, the message was clear: I am a woman. And the grief hit me like a freight train. But I survived it and accepted detransition.

And now I have ZERO dysphoria. I love my body!

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains why providers should not have performed a life-altering surgery on a young person with a diagnosed mental illness, comparing it to not indulging an anorexic person's desire for liposuction.
68 pointsNov 21, 2024
View on Reddit

Please be kind to yourself. There’s no way a person with a diagnosed mental illness (Gender Dysphoria)should have been allowed to have a permanent life-altering procedure at such a young age. It’s not your fault that you live in a society where you were persuaded that it was a viable treatment for your condition and that providers were more than happy to profit from your suffering in the name of pseudoscience.

People with anorexia are not encouraged to restrict their calories or have liposuction to conform to their distorted body image. But somehow trans people are indulged in their desires to become a simulation of the other sex.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains how mass downvoting and sharing detrans content on trans sites could backfire and lead others to question their transition.
61 pointsOct 4, 2024
View on Reddit

I’m interested in knowing how this is going to backfire for them. Because the first step for me in becoming gender critical was hate-lurking on radfem sites and realizing (shockingly) that I couldn’t argue with their analysis on certain/many issues.

I would love for some of my posts to show up on trans sites and for people to be appalled at me for talking about my alienation and invisibility as a trans man, my continued dysphoria, and my compounding side effects from testosterone and for some baby trans guy(s) to have that lightbulb moment where they can realize the truth in a way they can never unsee or unhear it again.

LMFAO

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains her experience of initially appearing as a happy, well-adjusted trans person, but later realizing her identity was built on an unstable foundation that she had to deconstruct.
60 pointsJun 17, 2024
View on Reddit

I have definitely known a handful of trans people with fulfilling lives who were genuinely happy and well-adjusted and weren’t toxic people.

But here’s the thing- if I would have surfaced, let’s say about 10 years ago, I would have been considered one of those people.

But I basically built a beautiful house in a swamp with no foundation and it rotted out from underneath me in a slow, insidious way. And instead of trying to keep bailing out the muck and painting over the mold and fungus- I took my house apart and started rebuilding it again on solid ground.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains the potential for a pregnant trans man to experience profound dissonance, grief, and a re-examination of identity and trauma as his pregnancy becomes visible to others.
55 pointsJun 21, 2025
View on Reddit

Your husband, like it or not, is going to start ‘showing’ and will soon experience the dissonance of being a pregnant ‘man’ in a culture that will neither expect nor understand it- and at that point, his feelings about being perceived as male instead of female may change entirely. He may start to feel the magnitude of his choices and this may lead to grief and loss. At the same time, he may be examining his trauma in a way that underscores this grief. He is lucky to have a partner who supports him no matter what. It is very likely that he will need it. Sending love and light to you both.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains the devastating long-term consequences of being a 'gay trans man,' detailing her marriage to a gay man who is only tolerant of her body and the profound rejection and threat to her self-esteem it caused.
52 pointsNov 17, 2024
View on Reddit

Having gone down the “gay trans man” route I can tell you that the constant rejection from gay men was demoralizing to my psyche and sense of self.

Eventually I did meet (and marry) one willing to look past my lack of male anatomy but he’s never been super hot for me- just tolerant(?). For the duration of our marriage I have been waiting for the other shoe to drop and I still feel rejected by his lack of interest in my body.

I know I sought this out because I couldn’t deal with the power dynamics of heterosexual relationships and I wanted to stay within the queer bubble.

But it has come at a cost to my self esteem. And now that I’m reidentifying as female- it further threatens to unravel our bond. He never signed up to be married to a woman.

If I could do it all again, I would have looked for a bisexual guy less hypermasculine and more likely to be attracted to my gender non-conformity but still loving my female body.

All these FTM femboys make me incredibly sad because they have no idea what the long term consequences are of what they’re signing up for. It’s been personally devastating to my life.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains how to find a trauma therapist and advises reporting a "woke" therapist who promotes trans ideology for an ethics violation.
50 pointsJul 16, 2024
View on Reddit

I definitely advise a trauma therapist who is not “woke” and going to promote a trans ideology- which BTW is unethical. Screen them carefully.

There’s no room in therapy for the provider’s bias steering you away from your stated therapy goals and needs. They broke several ethics codes and you have grounds to lodge an ethics complaint.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains how a "successful" transition didn't cure her dysphoria, describing it as a dissociative act to avoid reality, and how detransitioning allowed her to finally feel at home in her body.
49 pointsOct 25, 2024
View on Reddit

Thank you for your honesty In speaking out. It’s devastating what has happened to you. The truth is that even if your transition was an “absolute success” you still might’ve regretted it.

I was accepted by my family, passed stealth, had a marriage, career, all the things that outwardly made it look like my transition was utterly successful- but it never cured my gender dysphoria. I always felt inadequate, alienated, and fraudulent.

My decision to detransition came when I realized that I would never be happy wanting something that I cannot have (to actually BE the opposite sex).

My happiness came when I accepted the fact of my birth sex and body and learned to love it without trying to make it something that it isn’t.

Transsexualism for me was a way to dissociate from reality and create a parallel universe where I could playact an imaginary new self to avoid aspects of myself, my history, and reality which I wanted to bypass. It worked for a while but then it stopped working.

The trouble was, I fell into denial and then I got stuck there. Then when I finally realized I was on the wrong track, it seemed like it was too late.

I can’t tell you what to do, but I can tell you that I risked everything I have to detransition and so far- I lost nothing.

But what I gained was being at home in my body without gender dysphoria for the first time in my life. I no longer feel like a fraud. I have the inner resources to deal with my trauma without an exit plan.

I hope the very best for you. I assume by the fact that you have posted this here that even though detransition is off the table for you now- at least you know it exists in the realm of possibility and that there are happy, productive people on here- ready to help.

Sending love.💕

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains that a trans man cheating with men under his deadname is a major signal he may be exploring a return to a female identity, driven by feeling "too far gone to go back."
48 pointsNov 20, 2024
View on Reddit

Cheating on you with men while using his deadname is a HUGE signal that he’s already exploring returning to a female identity- even if he’s in denial about what this behavior means to him.

It’s very likely that he feels “too far gone to go back.” This is a common perception that keeps many of us who are deeply medicalized stuck in our trans identities long after it’s stopped working for us.

There’s no need to tiptoe around the issue because he’s obviously seen you embrace your womanhood. Just come out and say what you need to with as much courage, candor, and kindness as you can muster.

Even if it backfires, you are planting a seed. There’s fertile ground there.

Reddit user L82Desist (detrans female) explains how detransition, not a successful transition, cured her lifelong gender dysphoria, leading her to reject the concept of a "true trans" identity.
47 pointsNov 21, 2024
View on Reddit

I was absolutely a textbook case of trans since early childhood and received a diagnosis of GID from back in the day when there was true gatekeeping. I had a very successful transition by outward appearances but it never cured my dysphoria. Detransition cured my dysphoria. That’s why I am persuaded that the notion of “true trans” is just a fallacy.