This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious
Based on the provided comments, the account "OtterWithKids" appears to be authentic.
There are no serious red flags indicating it is a bot or a bad-faith actor. The user presents a highly detailed, personal, and consistent narrative over a long period. Key points supporting authenticity include:
- Consistent, Detailed Story: The user repeatedly shares a specific, complex personal history (e.g., detransitioning a decade ago, a specific medication regimen, having children, a late autism diagnosis) that remains consistent across many months of comments.
- Personal Investment: The comments show a personal investment in the topic, offering emotional support, sharing vulnerable experiences, and engaging in nuanced debates, which is atypical for simple propaganda accounts.
- Natural Language Variation: While the user often repeats their core story about sertraline and Vitamin D (which is expected when giving advice), they do so with slight variations in wording and integrate it naturally into different conversational contexts. Their other comments on a wide range of topics (parenting, religion, media, definitions) show a breadth of thought.
- No Inconsistencies: No major factual inconsistencies in their backstory (timeline, family, medical history) are evident in the provided text.
The account exhibits the passion and strong opinions expected from someone with this lived experience.
About me
I was born male and first felt I should have been a girl when I was four. I transitioned in my 30s, but the hormones caused more problems than they solved, so I detransitioned at 40. A couple years later, severe anger issues led to a depression diagnosis, and a prescription for an antidepressant and Vitamin D completely eliminated my lifelong gender dysphoria. I was later diagnosed with autism, which helped me finally understand my experience. I am now almost 50, happy, and fulfilled in my life as a husband and father.
My detransition story
My journey with gender has been long and complicated, and it took me decades to understand what was really going on. I was born male, and my first memory of feeling like I should have been a girl goes back to when I was just four years old. I was an unathletic, overweight kid, which made me a target for bullying in school. I remember wishing I was a girl because it seemed like girls didn't have to be athletic to be accepted. I started crossdressing in private, and that continued for decades.
I wasn't a Christian when I started, but I eventually found faith. For a long time, I believed transitioning would be wrong. Then I learned my church didn't have an official position on it, so, in my 30s, I decided to try transitioning to see if it would help the dysphoria. I started hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and began living as a woman at work and online, while still mostly presenting as male at home for my family. The HRT did help reduce the gender dysphoria, but it caused a lot of other problems. I started making really poor decisions that ended up costing me my job and forcing my family to move to a less desirable house, which we're still dealing with today. I realized the transition was causing more harm than good, and around the age of 40, I decided to stop the HRT and go back to living fully as a man.
Even after detransitioning, the gender dysphoria was still there. A couple of years later, when I was about 42, I started having severe, illogical anger issues. I'd get so furious over small things, like my young daughter stealing a cookie, that I'd feel chest pain. I went to my doctor, who diagnosed me with depression. She put me on 50 mg of sertraline (an antidepressant) and, crucially, a 2,000 IU Vitamin D gelcap to help with absorption.
The results shocked both of us. Within two weeks, not only was the anger gone, but my gender dysphoria was about 80% gone. We adjusted the dose up to 100 mg of sertraline, and at that level, the dysphoria virtually disappeared. I've been on this combination for over eight years now, and it's been a lifesaver. I've learned it's very precise: if I miss a single day, or if I take Vitamin D in tablet form instead of gelcaps, the dysphoria starts to come back. At age 44, I was also diagnosed with autism, which finally helped bring the whole situation into focus for me. I never needed to transition; I was an autistic man with a chemical imbalance and a vitamin deficiency.
My thoughts on gender are shaped by my faith. I believe we have a Heavenly Father and Mother, and that men and women are two essential, complementary parts of a whole. I don't believe it's my place to judge anyone else's journey, but for me, understanding my eternal identity as a man was key. I also have strong opinions on the current social climate. I feel like the LGBTQ+ movement has become very militant and tries to homogenize thought, often redefining words in a way that shuts down conversation. I believe detransitioners like me are also "trans," because we've transitioned, and our voices deserve to be heard.
I do have some regrets about my transition, primarily the permanent physical changes from HRT, like breast growth, and the financial and emotional toll it took on my family. However, I don't regret the journey itself because it led me to the truth and to a treatment that actually works for me. I'm now almost 50, and I am happy and fulfilled in my life as a husband, a father, and a man. My relationship with my wife is stronger than ever. The medication gave me my life back.
Here is a timeline of the major events:
| Age | Event |
|---|---|
| 4 | First experience of gender dysphoria. |
| Childhood/Teens | Bullied for being unathletic and overweight; began crossdressing in private. |
| 30s | Started medical transition (HRT) and social transition at work and online. |
| 40 | Stopped HRT and detransitioned, returning to living as a man. |
| 42 | Diagnosed with depression; began sertraline and Vitamin D treatment, which eliminated gender dysphoria. |
| 44 | Diagnosed with autism. |
| Present (almost 50) | Living happily as a man, husband, and father with managed dysphoria. |
Top Comments by /u/OtterWithKids:
If you have a physical handicap, you can qualify for the Paralympics.
If you have an intellectual handicap, you can qualify for the Special Olympics.
So, if you have a gender handicap, you can qualify for the Trans Olympics.
Some people may say, “But I just want to be seen as a normal woman!” Well, too bad, honey. The paralyzed and intellectually disabled people want to be seen as normal, too. They’re not, and neither are you. Quit wishing you were something else and be proud of who you are.
I wouldn’t say “ick”, but I strongly suspect that the great majority have really screwed themselves up. It’s not my place to judge any given individual — I have neither right nor responsibility to do that — but I definitely feel sorry for them. Statistically speaking, I think they’ve probably made a huge mistake; and on the off chance that they haven’t, it’s still a horrible life to have to live.
I experienced gender dysphoria from age four. During grade school, I was unathletic and overweight, which made me the victim of frequent bullying and made me wish even more that I was a girl, since girls don’t have to be athletic to be accepted. I crossdressed for decades, though usually in private. Finally, in my 30s, I got up the courage to transition at work and online; but around age 40, I realized it was causing more harm than good and switched back.
At age 42 I was experiencing severe bouts of anger and was diagnosed with depression. Surprise! The medication and vitamins I was prescribed suddenly killed my GD! Then at age 44, I was diagnosed with autism, which finally brought the whole ordeal into focus.
I never needed to transition; there were plenty of other factors at play. I’m now pushing 50 and am quite happy as the husband, father, and man I was always supposed to be.
Definitely. I’ve experienced it myself, and all three of my children went through a gay and/or trans phase in fifth grade. Probably the best example is my youngest, who had a trans-identifying friend that year. Within a few weeks of meeting her, my youngest changed her name with some teachers—so much so that the teachers referred to her by that name in emails, and my wife followed suit.
Now in sixth grade, my youngest is no longer in the same class as that child and has dropped her masculine name completely. She’s very much a girly girl again, and thank goodness for that.
Late to the party, but from a guy’s perspective, you’ve got nothing to worry about. I’m sure what you feel inside is way different than what you present outside, but from my perspective, that’s a feminine woman in those pictures. Is she as feminine as the highly photoshopped supermodels in magazine ads? Nope, but neither are 99.99% of the women that have never presented male in their lives.
I do agree that you look better without the wig, though—which is saying a lot, because I love long hair on women. Just be yourself. You’ve got this, girl.
I hear you. I’ve become extremely discerning with my media consumption because, as you said, it’s really hard to get away from certain subjects (including transgenderism). One thing I’ve discovered is that the older the medium is (whether book, TV show, etc.), the less likely it is to have problematic content. You’d be amazed how addictive some series are, despite being 20–50 years old.
Anyway, so sorry you’re dealing with this. {{hugs}}
Honestly, it sounds to me like you’re depressed, and I’m going to be brutally honest with you: transition does not cure depression. There are so many people that commit suicide after transitioning; it’s not a viable solution.
Talk to your doctor. See if medication is right for you. When I got on antidepressant to treat my depression, it surprised both me and my doctor when it also cured my GD. Maybe it will work for you too!
It’s not transphobia to wonder if a trans person has made a huge mistake; I frankly assume most of us have, but would never deign to assume that of any specific person.
Transphobia is being afraid of transgender people and/or culture. What you’re doing is recognizing your own mistakes and hoping that others don’t have to suffer as you do.
I still call myself trans. In fact, I’m more trans than most trans-identifying people: I’ve transitioned twice as many times as they have!
The hardest thing about modern society is Newspeak. If you’ve ever read George Orwell’s 1984, you know what I’m talking about: eliminating perfectly good words while concurrently adding definitions to other words. It’s an an effective form of brainwashing: by using the same word for two things that are similar but different, you reduce or eliminate people’s ability to distinguish between the two.
A perfect example of this is marriage vs. garriage: in 1972, a couple petitioned SCOTUS to declare garriage (the union of two people of the same sex) equivalent to marriage (the union of two people of opposite sexes). SCOTUS wouldn’t even hear the case! So, for the next 40 years, the so-called “gay rights” movement managed to eliminate “garriage” from the lexicon so completely that when another couple went to SCOTUS in 2015, the justices truly believed that the plaintiff’s garriage literally was a marriage. It wasn’t that the majority suddenly thought garriage was protected just like marriage; they were literally incapable of distinguishing between the two!
Now, we can certainly debate whether SCOTUS should have redefined “marriage” in that way, but as I’m sure there are different opinions among us, that’s a political discussion that I suspect would not end well. The point is not the result per se but the method used to achieve it. If we want to have a voice in this debate, we need to use the newspeakers’ tactics against them. We are trans too, and don’t you ever let people forget it.
They’re not even nonbinary. They’re either male or female with a birth defect.
I have a friend that was born with partial arms and useless fingers. Does that make him a different (gender/species/etc.) than the rest of us? If a nonbinary person were a third sex, s/he would be able to reproduce in a manner differently than males or females. While I don’t deny that that could happen in theory, I would challenge anyone to come up with an example of it actually happening.