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Reddit user /u/burn3rphone's Detransition Story

Transitioned: 19 -> Detransitioned: 20
female
low self-esteem
regrets transitioning
depression
influenced online
puberty discomfort
started as non-binary
only transitioned socially
This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
On Reddit, people often share their experiences across multiple comments or posts. To make this information more accessible, our AI gathers all of those scattered pieces into a single, easy-to-read summary and timeline. All system prompts are noted on the prompts page.

Sometimes AI can hallucinate or state things that are not true. But generally, the summarised stories are accurate reflections of the original comments by users.
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, nuanced opinions on complex topics like trauma, misogyny, and media representation.
  • Consistent perspective across comments, focusing on societal pressures and the conflation of gender non-conformity with dysphoria.
  • Emotional resonance and personal reflection, such as missing a past identity ("I absolutely miss 'him' too").

The passion and criticism align with expected viewpoints from a genuine desister or detransitioner.

About me

I'm a 21-year-old woman, and my discomfort started during puberty when I began to hate the unwanted attention from men. I think my feelings got mixed up with a deep discomfort with how women are often treated, which I saw reflected in the manga I read. I briefly identified as non-binary and transitioned socially, but it felt like a costume I was wearing to escape misogyny. I realized my problem wasn't with being female, but with the way society treats females. Now, I've accepted that I can be a gender non-conforming woman and that I don't need to change my identity to be worthy of respect.

My detransition story

Looking back at my whole journey, I think my feelings about gender got tangled up with a lot of other issues I was dealing with. I was born female, and for a long time, I felt really uncomfortable with that. A big part of it was seeing how women were treated, especially in relationships. I used to read a lot of shoujo manga, but I started to get repulsed by how often the female characters were treated badly by the male leads. It made me feel like being a woman meant you had to accept being degraded.

That’s when I got into Boys' Love (BL) manga. It felt like an escape. I could enjoy romantic stories without having to see myself in the female character who was being mistreated. I think I unconsciously started to believe that being in a relationship as a man, or at least not as a woman, would be safer and more respectful. I see now that a lot of BL stories still have the same power dynamics, just with a "feminine" male character taking the place of the woman. But at the time, it felt like a better alternative.

I also saw this happen with friends. I remember one friend who suddenly started talking about having dysphoria and wanting to use non-binary pronouns. But when she explained it, her reasons were all about not liking the unwanted attention she got from men because they saw her as a woman. It sounded less like a problem with her body and more like a problem with misogyny. I started to wonder if my own feelings were similar. Was I trying to escape from being treated a certain way, rather than dealing with a deep-seated identity issue?

I never medically transitioned. I thought about it a lot, but I only ever transitioned socially for a short while. I cut my hair, changed how I dressed, and asked a few people to use different pronouns. But it never felt completely right. It felt like I was putting on a costume to solve a problem that was actually outside of me. I missed the idea of just being a gender non-conforming woman, but it felt like that option wasn't really talked about. It seemed like you had to pick a side: fully transition or stay as you are.

My thoughts on gender now are that it's very complicated and often gets mixed up with society's expectations. For me, a lot of my discomfort was linked to puberty and developing a female body in a world that often sexualizes and diminishes women. I think I had low self-esteem and some depression, and transitioning seemed like a way to become a completely new person and leave those feelings behind.

I do have some regrets about that social transition period. I regret that I felt I had to change my identity to feel safe or respected. I wish I had had someone to talk to who could have helped me separate my feelings about my body from my feelings about how women are treated. I think I would have benefited from therapy that explored those root issues instead of just affirming a new gender identity.

I don't regret exploring my feelings, because it eventually led me to understand myself better. I understand now that I can be a woman and reject the parts of womanhood that feel oppressive. I don't have to change my body to be worthy of respect.

Here is a timeline of the main events I remember:

My Age Event
Around 13-15 Started feeling intense discomfort during puberty, hated the attention from men. Stopped enjoying shoujo manga because of how female characters were treated.
Around 16-17 Discovered BL manga as an escape. Started to unconsciously associate being male with safer, more equal relationships.
19 Briefly identified as non-binary and transitioned socially for about a year. Changed my style and pronouns.
20 Started to question my social transition. Realized my discomfort was more about misogyny than a true identity. Stopped identifying as non-binary.
Now (21) Have accepted myself as a gender non-conforming woman. Focused on separating societal treatment from my own sense of self.

Top Comments by /u/burn3rphone:

7 comments • Posting since July 15, 2022
Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) comments on the conflation of gender dysphoria and aesthetic preference, citing a manga artist's statement that was labeled as a "trans egg."
41 pointsJul 20, 2022
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Saw the same thing with this mangaka who made an old manga about a guy wearing cute clothes and was mistaken for a girl by everyone and when the mangaka said something like "this character would be me if I was a girl" tons of people inmmediatly said "egg" in the comments section and I think people confuse actual dysphoria with aesthetics.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) comments on a friend's nonbinary identity, suggesting it stems from a desire to escape misogyny rather than true dysphoria.
17 pointsJul 21, 2022
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I usually hang with women and there's one who started suffering "dysphoria" and that she wanted to try being nb. The problem is when she started explaining her reasoning it all boiled down to "I don't like how men treat me because they see me as a woman" she presents in an androgynous way and is present in tons of anime/art groups so of course she would get some unsolicited male attention there. But is that enough justification to change your pronouns and way of talking? (we all speak spanish which is very different to talk in nb), it sounds more like she's trying to escape misogyny and I don't blame her, but being nb isn't going to stop men to stop seeing her as her assigned sex. I just don't get it.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) explains how avoiding heterosexual romance media helps prevent associating being female with degradation by men.
16 pointsSep 16, 2023
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I understand how you feel. I avoid reading/watching heterosexual romances because most of them will have the ML treat horribly the FL and my mind will just associate "being born female = being degraded by men" and my conclusion will be "if I was a man I would never experience this" which is factually wrong of course.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) explains why a user received death threats for writing fiction, suggests finding better friends, and recommends therapy to address societal issues with womanhood over dysphoria.
14 pointsJul 15, 2022
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Your story really resonated with me. Specially the part of writing something related to your trauma but changing the character's gender to make you more comfortable. First, I don't think you did anything wrong there, it's fiction, I understand if people got offended, but that shouldn't be a reason to send you (a real person) death threats or gore, you definitely didn't deserve that.
Second, I would suggest getting a better group of friends that don't diminish women just for being women, I think it's messing up with your perception about your relationship with womanhood.
And lastly, I hope you get a therapist that can guide you through this thought process of yours, it sounds like you have more issues with how women are treated by society than dysphoria imo.
I wish you the best of luck.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) explains how reading yaoi/BL manga allowed a disconnection from her sex, making its often problematic power dynamics seem less personal than in shoujo, and how it unconsciously shaped her view of relationships.
10 pointsJul 16, 2022
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To be fair, I think one reason girls or ftm became so enthralled with yaoi is that there is some disconnection from your sex that let you enjoy these erotic stories.
I used to read shoujo until it repulsed me how many abusive guys ended up with the female MC. Then I started reading BL, and somehow it never struck me as problematic as shoujo since I could easily disconnect from these male characters, and unconsciously made me think that maybe I prefer this kind of relationships. But almost all of BL follow the same structure of "passive" and "active" where you can obviously see which character has more feminine traits and that he would (usually) be treated almost the same way girls are treated in shoujos.
The other side of the coin is that there are also BLs where the couple are treated with much more respect and nuance than many other romantic hetero stories.
I still enjoy BL, but now I read them knowing that almost all of them are made my women for a reason.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) comments on missing her former male identity and critiques the idea that one must choose between being a man or a woman, expressing frustration that being gender non-conforming is no longer presented as a valid option.
9 pointsJan 31, 2023
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Same, I absolutely miss "him" too. The worst part for me was that in the reveal video she talked about a male fan who watched her as another alternative to being a man, but now it looks like you either have to be one or the other and that apparently you can't live your life as GNC.

Reddit user burn3rphone (desisted female) discusses their confusion over the distinction between gender roles and gender expression.
3 pointsMar 15, 2023
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I never refer to "sex" though, I was just asking your pov in gender. And I see, in my opinion I always thought gender roles are somewhat linked to gender expression so I got confused on how you denied one but accepted the other. I won't lie, I am still confused by that term but if it works for you then more power to you.