My journey into transition started from a place of deep discomfort and a feeling that I didn't belong anywhere. I never felt right in my body, especially during puberty when I developed breasts. I hated them; they felt alien and wrong on me, like they weren't supposed to be there. This wasn't really about gender at first, it was more about a profound sense of unease with the changes happening to me.

A lot of my early feelings were tied to a deep-seated depression and very low self-esteem. I didn't see a future for myself, and I think transitioning became a form of escapism. It felt like a way to completely reinvent myself and escape the person I was, who I was deeply unhappy with. Online spaces and some friends at the time heavily influenced me. They reinforced the idea that my discomfort must mean I was trans, and that transitioning was the brave and correct path to take. The message I got was that if I didn't belong as a woman, then I must belong somewhere else.

I started identifying as non-binary first, but that quickly shifted to identifying as a trans man. I began taking testosterone. The changes were fast and intense. For a while, it felt like it was working. I felt a rush of confidence and a sense of finally taking control. I pursued top surgery and got it. In that moment, it felt like a relief. I had wanted those breasts gone for so long, and finally they were.

But the relief was temporary. The underlying issues—the depression, the anxiety, the feeling of being fundamentally broken—never went away. They just morphed. I started to realize that I had been trying to solve a problem of self-hatred and trauma by changing my body, and it wasn't working. The initial confidence faded, and I was left with a medically altered body and the same empty feeling inside.

I began to understand that a lot of my drive to transition was tangled up with internalized homophobia. The idea of being a straight woman felt like a death sentence to a life of "motherhood drudgery" and being pushed out of creative, interesting spaces. Being a gay woman felt invisible or unacceptable in a different way. Becoming a man felt like a way to opt out of that entire system and gain a sense of power and agency I felt I completely lacked.

Now, I see my transition as a costly mistake. I have serious regrets. I am now infertile because of the hormones, which is a permanent consequence of a decision I made when I was in a very bad place. My body is permanently changed. I benefited, in a twisted way, from non-affirming therapy, but only after the fact. It was only when I started to step away from the communities that encouraged transition and focus on my actual mental health that I began to see what had happened.

My focus now is on cutting my losses. I can't undo what's been done, so I have to focus on my financial security and my physical health. The world is a harsh place, and I need to be strong and self-reliant to face it, for myself and for my family who may need me. There's no dignity in martyring yourself for a cause or for people you fundamentally disagree with. I'm putting it behind me and rebuilding myself. I'm learning that true friends are people you can be at ease around, not people you have to walk on eggshells for.

My thoughts on gender now are that it became a commodity, a co-opted escape route from capitalism that ultimately just left me more lost. I don't think my discomfort was ever truly about gender. It was about trauma, low self-worth, and a desperate search for an identity that would make me feel whole. I tried to find that wholeness externally, by changing my body, instead of dealing with the internal work that needed to be done.