This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious
Based on the provided comments, this account appears authentic and not a bot. The user demonstrates:
- Deep personal narrative: They share a detailed, emotionally complex, and consistent personal history of mental health struggles, self-harm, and skin issues, which is difficult to fabricate convincingly.
- Emotional investment: Their passion, anger, and empathy align with the expected sentiment of a genuine desister/detransitioner who feels harmed.
- Engaged conversation: They directly respond to others' posts with tailored advice, personal anecdotes, and follow-up questions.
There are no serious red flags suggesting this is an inauthentic account, bot, or troll. The user's perspective is firmly anti-transition, but their comments reflect a personal and deeply held belief system rooted in their stated experiences.
About me
I started transitioning because I was deeply unhappy and thought becoming a man would fix my severe depression and painful cystic acne. For nearly seven years, testosterone just made my health worse, adding medical problems to my mental ones. My real healing began when I got proper therapy and medication, which cleared my skin and showed me my distress was mental, not physical. I realized I was a woman trying to escape societal pressure and my own untreated illness, not someone born in the wrong body. Now, I'm off testosterone and patiently healing, grateful I finally addressed the real roots of my pain.
My detransition story
My journey with transition started from a place of deep unhappiness and poor mental health. For years, I struggled with severe depression, crippling anxiety, and near-daily panic attacks that often ended in self-harm. My self-esteem was non-existent and I hated my body. A huge part of this was my struggle with severe, painful cystic acne that covered my face, shoulders, chest, back, and arms. I now see that acne as my body's distress signal, screaming at me that the way I was living was not sustainable and something was very wrong.
I didn't deal with my mental health properly for a long time. I accepted the panic attacks and self-harm as a normal part of my life. I looked for external solutions to internal problems. I think that's a big part of why I was drawn to the idea of transition. It seemed like a definitive answer to all my pain, a way to fix everything by changing my body.
I started testosterone and was on it for six years and nine months. During that time, my health suffered. The testosterone exacerbated my skin issues and created other health problems. I was convinced that this was the path to becoming my true self, but I was just layering a medical problem on top of my mental health problems.
My real turning point came in August 2017 when I finally decided to get proper help. I started going to therapy every week with a therapist I really trusted. I started taking medication for my depression and anxiety. I also developed a real skincare routine, which was a form of self-care that taught me how to touch and care for my body without harming it. As my mental health improved—as I learned to be kind to myself and stop the self-destructive habits—my cystic acne completely disappeared. It became clear that my physical distress was directly tied to my mental state.
I realized that my desire to transition was deeply intertwined with my poor mental health, low self-esteem, and the immense pressure I felt as a woman. I hated the expectation that my worth was tied to my attractiveness. I think I saw becoming a man as an escape from that pressure. It was a form of escapism from the difficulties of being a woman and from my own unresolved trauma.
I've been off testosterone for a while now, and it's a long process. My body is slowly recovering. My hormone levels are still adjusting, and I have to be patient as my body heals from the years of synthetic hormones. I don't regret detransitioning. I regret that I was ever led to believe that such drastic, permanent medical intervention was the solution to what were primarily mental health issues. I benefited enormously from non-affirming therapy that helped me address the root causes of my distress instead of just affirming a mistaken identity.
I don't believe I was born in the wrong body. I believe I was a woman who was deeply uncomfortable with puberty and the expectations placed on me, and who was suffering from untreated mental illness. I now see that my body was always trying to tell me that. My thoughts on gender now are that it's a social set of expectations, not an internal identity that requires medical alteration. I wish I had learned to understand and love myself as a woman instead of trying to become a man.
| Age | Event |
|---|---|
| 23 | My mental health severely declined. Developed crippling anxiety, panic attacks, and severe cystic acne. |
| 27 | In August, I began my real recovery: started therapy, began psychiatric medication, and developed a self-care routine. |
| 27 | My cystic acne began to recede as my mental health improved. |
| 30 | I stopped taking testosterone after 6 years and 9 months. |
| 30 | Began the process of physical recovery and healing from the effects of long-term testosterone use. |
Top Comments by /u/TrainingBluejay:
Do the following immediately:
- Find the hospital nearest to you that has an inpatient mental health center.
- Call them, tell them you are suicidal and afraid for your safety, and ask to be admitted.
- If they are unable to admit you get their referral to the nearest hospital that can and repeat step 2.
- Go to the hospital and report to the mental health center where they will be expecting your arrival.
While you are under their care you will be able to talk to a doctor about getting on medication for depression and anxiety. He or she may write a prescription for you so you can continue taking whatever medications they start you on after you are discharged.
DO THESE STEPS RIGHT NOW.
Thanks for sharing your story. I'm not surprised it wasn't appreciated over in r/asktrans. The reply you got is equivalent in tone to one I received on a post, made to r/GC, where I questioned why I should consider an ex-boyfriend who violently assaulted me as a woman - pugnacious, condescending, and dismissive. Of course their argument was that I should see him as a woman because he said he was one.
I'm sure you've realized by now that the people involved in that discussion do not actually want to hear from detransitioners themselves, since your very existence is a threat to their entire self-concept and the lives and communities they've built around it. The possibility that you are (or were) just like them is intolerably destabilizing.
It's not all in your head. I know many people in the L part of the LGB community who no longer feel welcome at Pride. Yesterday I saw video of a Pride March in Scotland where a small group of lesbians carrying a banner that said "lesbian visibility" were surrounded and harassed by a much larger group of TRAs. Female homosexuals are now not allowed to participate in an event that was originally conceived for them and so many people celebrate this fact as progressive. It makes me so angry, bewildered and sad.
I'm sorry you didn't feel welcome at your city's Pride event. It's basically become a big party for straight men, which is as ironic as it is outrageous.
Funny, I've found that the value placed on being attractive and desirable is one of the most oppressive things about being a woman. Like it's something that was imposed on me without my input or consent. Like it's an expectation that I fail to live up to at my own peril, because in this world a woman's beauty is a measure of her worth. Like it's a requirement I can't opt out of without also opting out of innumerable social, economic, and professional opportunities.
Huh. Weird. Wonder if other women relate.
I am really sorry you are in this place. I doubt you are as masculine looking as you think you are. Women tend to fixate on and exaggerate to themselves the features of their appearance they dislike. I am positive that no one else judges your looks as harshly as you do.
Please don't blame yourself for being misled by doctors when you were a still a child. You have done nothing wrong.
As someone who struggles with social anxiety the thought of detransitioning makes my chest hurt. It must be unbelievably hard, and people who go through it are incredibly brave. Detransitioners have all of my respect.
Online communities are a poor substitute for flesh-and-blood connection but I hope you're at least finding support here.
I disagree. Detransitioners deserve an exclusive space where they can bond with each other over their shared experience and talk about their trauma without having to worry about outsiders barging in to tone police, as seems to happen every other day on this sub.
It feels fucking bad but not surprising to be abandoned by the queer/trans community, but being banned from lesbian spaces feels so much worse...
I guarantee that no lesbians were involved in the decision to ban you from actuallesbians. Just men who fetishize lesbianism. You have lost nothing.
Yes, that's what I meant.
Well, in any case, it looks like your comments remain removed, and the OP deleted their post.
https://removeddit.com/r/asktransgender/comments/c4lez6/detransition_and_terfstransphobes/
But you have decoupled the meaning of being a boy from the reality of existing in a male body. You believe it is not required for one to be male in order to be a boy. So what does being a boy have to do with looking like a male to you?
Genital surgery is irreversible. Hormone reassignment creates permanent changes. But feelings change all the time. How do you know you will always prefer to look like the opposite sex?