This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious
Based on the provided comments, the account appears authentic. There are no serious red flags suggesting it is a bot or inauthentic.
The user demonstrates personal investment, nuanced reasoning, and a consistent, passionate perspective that aligns with a genuine detransitioner or desister. The language is natural, and the arguments are complex and self-reflective, which is not typical of bot behavior. The account shows no signs of being a propaganda tool.
About me
I was born female and my discomfort started as a teenager when I hated the changes of puberty. I thought transitioning was the answer to my deep self-hatred and depression, so I took testosterone and had top surgery. Achieving the body I wanted only left me feeling empty and forced me to confront my real issues. I now see I was trying to escape the pressures of womanhood instead of healing my mind. I've stopped hormones and am learning to make peace with my body, though I live with permanent regrets.
My detransition story
My whole journey started when I was a teenager, feeling completely out of place. I was born female, and when I hit puberty, I developed a deep discomfort with my body, especially my breasts. I hated them. I felt like they were this foreign, wrong thing that had been put on me. I didn't feel like the other girls, and I definitely didn't feel like a boy, so I latched onto the idea of being non-binary. It felt like a safe, in-between space where I didn't have to be anything I was uncomfortable with.
Looking back, my reasons for transitioning were a messy mix of things. I had really low self-esteem, depression, and anxiety. I was also struggling with an eating disorder, and I think a lot of my body hatred was tied up in that. I was deeply influenced by what I saw online; the communities I was in celebrated transition as the ultimate solution for anyone who felt different. My friends at the time were all exploring similar identities, and it felt like the only path forward to be accepted.
I started socially transitioning at 19, asking people to use they/them pronouns for me. It gave me a sense of relief, like I had finally found an answer. That feeling didn't last. The social transition wasn't enough to quiet the discomfort, so I convinced myself I needed medical intervention. I started testosterone when I was 21.
Being on T did change things. My voice dropped, I grew facial hair, and I felt a sense of control I hadn't felt before. But it was a superficial fix. It didn't touch the underlying issues of my depression, anxiety, or my eating disorder. It just gave me a new thing to focus on. After about two years on hormones, I pursued top surgery. I was 23. I was so sure it was what I needed to finally feel whole and complete in myself.
The surgery itself went fine, but the aftermath was when things started to really unravel for me. I looked at my new, flat chest and instead of the joy I was promised, I felt a profound and terrifying emptiness. I had achieved what I thought was my goal, and I felt nothing. It was like I had been chasing a mirage. This forced me to finally look at why I had done all this.
Through a lot of difficult introspection, and with the help of a therapist who wasn't just there to affirm my choices but to help me question them, I began to understand. My desire to transition wasn't about an innate gender identity. It was about escaping the discomfort of puberty, escaping the pressures of being a woman in a misogynistic world, and trying to fix my deep-seated self-hatred and body image issues by changing my body instead of healing my mind. I realized I had internalized the idea that if I wasn't a stereotypically feminine woman, then I couldn't be a woman at all. Transitioning felt like the only way out.
I stopped testosterone when I was 24. I consider that the start of my detransition. Coming to terms with what I had done to my body has been the hardest part. I am now infertile, a permanent consequence of the hormones I took. I have serious regrets about my transition, specifically the medical aspects. I regret that I wasn't encouraged to explore my eating disorder or my mental health issues first. I regret that I was so quickly given a prescription for hormones instead of being asked why I felt so uncomfortable in my own skin.
I don't believe in gender ideology anymore. I think it's a harmful set of ideas that, in my case, convinced me to medically alter my healthy body because I didn't fit a stereotype. The truly radical act, for me, would have been to learn to love myself as a masculine woman. I've been called every name in the book for saying this—a Nazi, a TERF, a transphobe. I've received death threats and people have tried to dox me. But I don't hate trans people. I just hate the ideology that I believe misled me and causes real harm. It feels like a cult, and leaving it meant I had to question everything I thought I knew.
My perspective now is that sex is real. I was born female, and no amount of surgery or hormones changed that. I am a woman who has been through a very difficult experience, and I am finally learning to make peace with the body I was born with.
Here is a timeline of my journey:
| Age | Event |
|---|---|
| 12 | Started feeling intense discomfort with puberty and developing breasts. |
| 19 | Began socially identifying as non-binary and using they/them pronouns. |
| 21 | Started testosterone hormone therapy. |
| 23 | Underwent top surgery (double mastectomy). |
| 24 | Stopped testosterone and began my detransition. |
Top Comments by /u/SimonAmayaPrice:
I have been called a Nazi, a transphobe, a TERF, received death threats, people have tried to dox me, etc… just because I talk about my personal experience and don’t believe in gender ideology. I don’t hate trans people any more than the next guy, but I do hate the ideology.
Gender ideologues identify with the ideology, so any attack on their ideology is perceived as an attack on them personally. I honestly think it’s a cult. Congratulations on leaving, and make sure you surround yourself with people who either don’t care about trans stuff or at least aren’t in the cult still.
You’re right. There isn’t such a thing as “real” transgender people.
TRAs can’t even rigorously define what a “real” transgender person is. They’ve lowered the bar so far that the best you get is: “a transgender person is someone whose gender identity doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth.”
If I say that I’m trans, per their worldview I’m just as trans as Hunter Schafer. The delineation between “real” transgender people and “not-real” transgender people literally doesn’t exist in their minds.
All of it is made up. Why? Follow the money and see where it goes.
This ability to take the perspective of someone whose shoes you were once in is what I think differentiates productive discourse critical of gender ideology from that which gets us nowhere.
If you take a step back and realize that you were wrong about one of the most fundamental things about yourself and reality, you start to ask yourself what else you’re wrong about.
These two things when combined lead to both growth and healing. For me, that means being able to extend my empathy to people who are still in the cult, while also not being as attached to my beliefs, so I am able to keep level headed while being challenged.
Again, I hear you, I really do. I know you care about these issues, but this is not the subreddit to debate fascism or Israel-Palestine. If you really want to talk with me about either of these topics, send me a dm and we can find a more appropriate venue.
I encourage everyone here to go out and talk to people you disagree with in good faith. If we were wrong about being trans, what other things could we be wrong about? Only until we are able to steel-man (the opposite of straw man) the other side will we know the most effective way to oppose what we are against, and more importantly what we ought to be against in the first place. People believe things for reasons.
I hope that we all pursue friendships in which we are able to disagree respectfully and have substantial disagreements politically. If we don’t pursue this, we risk falling into the same line of thinking that led us to be trans, just in a different direction.
I hear you. Both of the things you bring up are issues with both parties in the US’s two party system, and would exist regardless of any Detrans activism that any detrans folks engage in.
Within every bad situation, there is good, and within every good situation, there is bad.
I prefer to focus on things that I can have a positive impact on. I’m not the guy who’s going to solve Israel-Palestine or the shortcomings of our democratic system. To think that anything I could do would significantly impact either would be nothing more than a manifestation of narcissism.
There is a real danger to getting too caught up in these big issues which one can’t do much about. It externalizes the locus of control. Your life may become so dictated by your fear of fascism or your thoughts on what’s happening in a country on the other side of the world, that you are rendered incapable of making positive change in your life and the lives of others.
Ironically, this is exactly what the people in power want.
I have been nothing but respectful, yet you have repeatedly doubled down on being conceited and adversarial. Anybody has the ability to see that. If you at some point are ready to have a good faith conversation, let me know, but give it a couple days at least.
A big part of the issue here is that "being trans" is based on regressive stereotypes - most clearly evidenced by the DSM V childhood gender dysphoria diagnostic criteria.
In your original comment when you mention things like "being read as male" or "assigned tasks with machines and heavy lifting at work" - these are both experiences which aren't unique to "being a man." There are many butch women who are regularly mistaken as men or who are assigned highly physical tasks or who work typically male jobs. That doesn't mean they're not women, or that their way of being women is wrong.
I have met many detrans women who will tell me that they were trans because of internalized misogyny, because they were told that "women don't do x or y." By transitioning, one implies that every woman to the right of an arbitrary line along the femininity-masculinity scale is too masculine to be a "real woman," which reinforces misogynistic beliefs in society.
The truly rebellious act would be to be a woman who does things or acts in such a way that isn't typically associated with womanhood, while apologetically owning one's sex and reveling in the discomfort of those who take issue with this affront to sex stereotypes. This is not an easy path by any means, but it is a rewarding one and a path to true authenticity. Or at least that's what I've heard from GNC women. I, of course, am not a woman myself, so feel free to take all of this with a grain of salt.
“Detransitioning is mostly tied to trans people detransitioning not because they are not trans, but because they don’t get any support where they live.”
This is an easy way forward for detransitioners who know that gender ideology is made up, but who aren’t read to be ostracized, sent death threats, and doxxed by TRAs.
What does “being trans” even mean? In my view, being a smoker isn’t an inherent identity any more than being trans is, and it is a good thing if people are encouraged from not engaging in maladaptive behaviors regardless of their identification with those behaviors.
From what you've written, your 12 year old self was a girl in a world that wanted to force rigid expectations on her just because she was a girl.
Is it healing to tell that 12 year old girl that she was really a boy, and that she has to take testosterone and undergo surgeries just to fit in?
Or is it healing to tell that 12 year old girl that there is nothing wrong with wanting to dress how she wants, and that she was born perfect the way she is?