"You really get sold this entire delusion that this is the core reason for all ur problems and ur life will be better as the other gender."

EXACTLY this. And I realize it really sounds like some dangerous sects our parents tried to warn us about. Except we weren't prepared for it, because there were no money directly involved, so our vigilance/defense system didn't get triggered.

The worst part with this phrase is that, after 6 years my problems are still there, some even worsened, and I lost 6 years in my emotional development. I'm 33 but have the emotional maturity of a 27 yo man.

I've had srs one year ago. And yeah, intimacy is not gonna be easy now... Congrats one-year-ago-me, you messed up beautifully. I'm grieving not being "normal" anymore. I was depressed for 6 months, now I'm slowly finding a new balance. It's still a struggle. You're not alone.

Hi, I could have written this.

I'm a 33 yo mtftm male, and I've had a vulvoplasty 10 months ago.

When I did this surgery, I didn't realize it but I was kinda desperate, couldn't envision a detransition, even was idealizing death sometimes. But hey, I seemed fine, and happy with this project, and my shrink gave me the papers for the surgery after only one session. I have a people pleasing/over adapting/very influenceable type of personality, meaning that I can do things for the wrong reasons if I'm not deeply careful with my true intentions. So yeah, I too wish the therapist I spoke to ONE time told me "I think we need to meet more before I approve you for this surgery. It is unethical for me to diagnose anyone with anything after one session."

There are people who tried to talk me out of it. But I couldn't listen, I was blinded by the idealization of the resulting feeling. And since my youngest days I felt a strong animosity towards men, and perceived them as evil, I couldn't envision being one. Some people told me I was doing the right thing, and.. they naively believed in my ability to make such drastic decisions for myself. I resent them for that (though not openly), even though this is my responsibility. Moreover, the day before the surgery I was in the hospital, I had doubts. But a trans woman came, and said it made her life so much easier.. and she was so happy not to have a penis anymore. And I was like "oh god this exactly what I'm here for!", and so my doubts went away. I too didn't pay a single dime.

"I looked in the mirror and thought"

When I saw the result of the surgery my first thought was: "this looks like my mother, I'm not like my mother, I'm not a woman". I never felt the euphoria I had idealized and was longing for. The first days I couldn't eat or sleep, I thought I was gonna die, that was a very weird feeling. Also, my mother, she didn't text me or talk to me for 3 months afterwards... I was like "you just don't understand! Why can't you support me?" (because at the time I was still convinced everything was fine), but now I'm like "I'm sorry".

So yeah, first 4 months felt like slowly going back on my feet and everything felt kinda okay (but were not).

Then it hit me like a truck. This was a mistake, what did I do...

I started envisionning detransition. The summer was extremely stressful. I could barely feel at ease, and any time I was not being distracted, I had this intense lump in throat. I was in CONSTANT distress, feeling awful, and like I've detroyed my ability to connect with others.

At +8 months, the lump went away out of the blue. It still comes by sometimes, but I feel it's getting less intense, and less omnipresent.

I'm seeing a therapist now that really helps me, I see him twice a week.

I'm still feeling weak, but I feel ready to go back to work and I've had a couple of job interviews.

In terms of hormones, I'm a bit scared of the chaos I've created for myself. I'm working with my therapist on getting T.

I question if anyone will ever want to be in a relationship with me. I worry that I'll die alone because of this.

Yeah.. this is scary. I'm scared of that as well. That sexually it will be like hell. Or that I won't be wanted. That I'll be rejected. But I think we'll be fine. People are humans, understanding, and kind. But that probably is not the right timing!

Recently I've seen myself being intensely triggered when my friends talk about sex or romance. It just makes me go numb because it reminds me of the difficult situation I've put myself into.

"half my chest is numb"

I have a lot of numbness down there, this isn't nice, at all. But it will pass, in a year or two (or so I read). Nerves are slowly reconnecting.

I can't go back in time and tell myself that this "easy, one hour surgery" would cause the year from hell.

I have these thoughts as well. "If only I had listened to my doubts", "if only I had listened to my roomate's mother", "if only I had spoken out this burning question I had in my mind right at the end of the session with the hospital therapist one week prior: do you think I'm making a mistake?", "if only I had listened to that gut feeling that my father was making a mistake by supporting me in this surgery", "if only I hadn't refrained from looking away when the surgeon told me that the last thing he want is doing a mistake and making someone regretful", "if only I hadn't refrained from going on r/detrans because of how scared I was it might open a pandora box"

I believe this is a form of bargaining. Have you heard of the 5 stages of grief?

1. denial

2. anger

3. bargaining

4. depression

5. acceptance

So far, it has felt like I have gone from denial to depression to bargaining. I'm not the kind of person who gets angry at all, so not sure I'll go through that part. Acceptance next?

Just made a quick google search because it felt like I was oversimplifying things. And as it happens, human beings are indeed more complex:

How we grieve is completely individual and it's different for everyone. There are no set stages that we all go through. And our feelings and emotions do not follow an order – they will come and go over time. You may experience some of the things in the stages of grief model, or all of them – or you may have quite different emotions. For example, you may at first feel relief after the death of the person you loved, if they had been in pain, or if caring for them had become very difficult. Most of us find that our feelings come and go – this may feel chaotic or out of control, but usually these waves of feeling will become less intense over time.

I hope this will help you feel less alone. In any case, it felt nice to share.

I hope you have a nice day

You can detransition. It's never too late. I understand the pressure it is not to, and the shame that comes with it.

Personally I wouldn't transition, so I pushed and pushed and pushed and ended doing a bottom surgery 10 months ago that I deeply regret. And only afterwards I détransitionned.

That is to say two things. First, it's never too late to detransition. And second, the mind wants resist détransitionning, and that can be dangerous (for me it was).

I'm a postop detrans male.
I've heard about autogynephilia and it reasonates with me... But I am and have been questionning my sexuality my whole life. I've been as teen for not being masculine at all. I've developped a very rigid and mute body language to hide that feminity, and I had to find my freedom of body expressivity back through dance, acting and arts. I've been very scared to be gay for my whole life, but when at 23 I finally admitted I was, although it was such a relief, I still didn't act on it, and didn't really got attracted by men. It's not helping that I had the deep rooted core belief that men were evil and didn't have a heart or emotion and wanted to harm me (thanks dad, or whomever seems to have done something to me at a very young age I can't remember). And now you can see why the belief that I was a trans woman was so easy to embrace...

Having sex with women always felt blank, kissing them too. Maybe I'm autistic and have other issues, idk, but as you can tell, living my life is navigating a very blurry fog. Oh, and as of now, I'm 33 and have never been in a relationship, I think I'm an incel, as they say, but it's okay, I'll work on loving myself and we'll see from there. No need to rush, there's too much going on rn for me anyway. I got a lot of support from friends and family, that helps.

I don't believe I was trans. I was biased and influenced and had many reasons to transition (most of which were unhealthy, trauma related, self centered, and hidden to myself). I know how much one can push oneself believing a lie and being blinded by it. Are there any other trans people going through the same shit? Certainly. Most of them? That's a bold assumption.

So as far as I can tell, I know I lied to myself to gain some privileges, attention, and other things. But I won't assume anything about others, because I'm biased. They're not me.

Thank you, that sums it up pretty well.

But then, once you go past the early transphobic reaction and go back to being understanding of trans folks, it now raises the question... How many of them actually are in my case? On the wrong path for wrong reasons? 2%? 5%? 10 %? 20%? 50%? More?? Someone pointed out in another comment that there was a pretty significant overlap between various mental illness (sorry if I use the wrong words) and transness. And that it wasn't healthy to give a quick fix solve it all solution to someone who's looking solution in the wrong place. What I'm trying to say with my convoluted phrasing is that there's a chance we should have been more careful at giving easy access to hrt and that we might be on a dangerous path. 

This is such an unexplored and controversial topic, as a result we have low information about it. 

But the bubble could blow and back fire against trans folks. If the raise of numbers of trans folks is indeed a trend, we might end up having a huge wave of detrans. 

I can share my experience. But each experiences are different and I can't give you solutions, but you have my full support and feel free to message me anytime.

I got my surgery 1 year ago. It was a turmoil, a storm, a rollercoster, it lasted for months, my throat was tight, and I was very low, like 0.5/10, then months went by, and it very slowly gradually went better and better (well, "less worse" would be a better phrasing).

June is when it hit me, when I realized my situation and what I had done... I plunged deep inside the muddy toxic water filled with crocodiles... so yeah, summer was horrible. Then september came around and I suddenly got my head out of the mud and grasped for oxygen, many crocodiles all around, then october, I wasn't drowning anymore, then november, less crocodiles, still drowning at times, december, the water got slightly clearer, and now as of january, the swamp is now a pond and I only see crocodiles occasionaly. Oh, and I'm walking in the pond ! Water is at my knees. Well, I'm still stumbling and limping, but that's an improvement! Of course there's always the possibility I might fall into the swamp again, but as of now, I'm enjoying the view.

When did you get your surgery? I have had dreams as well, it's hard, but eventually something settles. This is a journey that really feels like grieving. Have you heard of the 5 steps of grief?

I'm accepting being a man without a penis because that's what I am, there's nothing to accept. Sorry, that was clumsy, what I mean is, find ways to be kind with yourself, and give yourself time. There really is nothing else to do. I promise you balance will come.

I could have written this. I've just read old notebook of when I started transition, and the clues that it wasn't genuine were very present. It's almost infuriating. It's like, the idea to miss the fact I could be trans and not transition and be unhappy because of that was so overwhelming that I had to transition. And yeah if only people had challenged the belief... And yeah, I forgot along the way I could detransition, or question my situation. I did srs. I think without it I would have never detrans, because I'm stubborn and detransition was so so terrifying to embrace (admitting you were wrong for 5 years, you changed your body for nothing, and you need to take the difficult road of socially détransitionning).

I think it was trauma too. What were your traumas?