If you don't want to go on T, than don't do it. Talk to your endocrinologist what is possible and what you need to stay healthy. Taking a low dose of T or E while not having your gonades anymore can be risky, because these hormones are important to store calcium in your bones and other things that don't have to do with a specific look.

It's also possible to take E and T, I know some de/trans people who are experimenting with this, because the most bodies are running on more than one sex hormone.

I'm trying to be real with you: I think the surgery traumatized you. Do you have contact to a therapist you trust?

When I had my mastectomy and hysterectomy I got post-surgery depressions. It was the hell. I was fed up with the stuff and living like that. A surgery like you had on your genitals, following the feeling of helplessness, vulnerability, isolation and the healing complications including painfully penetrating yourself can led you straight to trauma and disconnection with your body and identity. That's what I experienced, just less intense and not for so a long time.

My advice is: reach out, seek help and don't hate you for struggling with something you have literally no power about. You are still you. You are whole. I only wish you the best.

This is something I've always criticized in ftm-groups. On the one hand I understand that being read as a butch lesbian feels like misgendering, on the other hand I saw trans guys telling each other to not wear eyebrow piercings or baggy pants because it hurts their passing and that they would look like a lesbian, which is meant to be insulting, therefore it's clearly homophobic. I don't think there is an answer which fit all, but there is indeed a problem with misogyny, homo- and femmephobia in many communities.

Hey, I'm nonbinary and detrans. Assigned female at birth. Still don't identify with being female or whatever, so I feel you. It's hard to give advice if it comes to gender without pushing in one direction. What helped me was to take a break from labels and just standing still for some time and thinking about what I want and what I feel. Nobody should force you to identify or "be" something you have zero connection or desire to. Feel free to message me if you want.

Hello friend. It will get better, I promise. I took T, I had top surgery and a hysterectomy and I still struggle sometimes, even with 18 months in detransition. I know it's hard. The grief feels endless and it will take time. But like other people already told you are not ruined or mutilated or disgusting. You are complete, desireable and your body tells a story of exploration and strenght. Your pain will not last forever.

With 13 she (or what pronouns does she use now?) will barely get on hormones soon. She saw trans people feeling good about themself and she is now searching for the possibility if that might something she could relate to.

This is the girl whose whole room had to be princess pink and who wore tutus to class.

I think we agree that genderroles are bullshit. I don't believe that you would have any different opinion if she were very tomboy-ish and anti-girly.

But what I'm trying to say is: respect her experiencing her identity, because she will notice if you want to push her in one specific direction and she might stopping open up to you. I have a little sister myself and I've made a similar painful experience: me, having an eating disorder and she, going for one diet after another and I tried to force her going to therapy more than once. So she talked less to me about anything in her life. Some years later now she is willing to go to therapy.

I know how we want to protect our younger siblings against things that hurt us, but they are allowed to learn life on their own, we can not take that away from them. Just be there for her.

Hey, I don't know where you are now in your life, but I hope I can give you some hope for your future. I'm not that inspirational, I guess, but I'm at peace with myself. I begun to detransition 2 years ago and I'm lucky that I had such a supportive nonbinary community and great medical and psychological help around me that I started to recover from the shock very quickly. Tbh, dating is kinda complicated, because for the rest of my life I need to out myself at some point as detrans and my body is visibly altered. But that doesn't stop me from living an authentic life as a queer dyke and I still meet so much wonderful people who can't even imagine how my body would have looked like a couple of years ago, and I recognize my body as mine when I'm standing naked in front of a mirror and that's everything I wanted. You will never be alone and everything will be okay. ♥

Hey, thank you to tell us your fears and struggles. This isn't easy at all, but you made it and I think, what you told us could be pretty manageable.

You are scared and that's okay, It's normal. And you don't need anything to do right know, even if it feels like that. Try to calm a little bit down, settle your plans and ideas what might be the next steps from here.

Many things can change, and that fact alone is really scarry, because mostly we want a neverchanging, stable enviroment and identity, but that's not how life works. You are fine. It will be okay and you will figure out how to do what you need to do. ♥

The bodies of trans and detrans people are in no way a "Frankensteinain nightmare" and reading things like that don't help me personally to heal at all. I like to feel good about my body and about the surgeries I had, even if I no longer identify as trans male. Tbh, I really love my body now. That's my take on this.

"and pump their body with the opposite of hormones"

This is where I need to disagree, because testosterone and estrogen are not opposites. Estrogen develops from testosterone and most people have individual levels of BOTH hormones in their bodies, with or without HRT.

But back to what you are actually saying. I can understand how you feel, because I relate. It's hard for me personally not project my feelings into every person I want to see as butch or GNC women, because I don't want anyone to feel as I feel sometimes now. It helps me to think about that I managed to transition even with all the gatekeeping in my country, so this is not a guarantee for more "successful" transitions, and that at some point butch women will not disappear if they feel at some point that their transition was not helpfull (anymore). They will come back if they are what they are. I like also to read the history of butch lesbians who socially or medically transitioned to a time where I wasn't even born and how genderroles got broken all the time. Leslie Feinberg and hir book Stone Butch Blues was a huge help when I started detransitioning.

Elliot also never said, that they will (medically) transition. He also never said he is a man. I think we are easy to erase AFAB nonbinary, genderqueer and transmasculine people who still identify as lesbians and have lesbian relationships. I hope something of what I wrote helps, if not it's also fine. :)