genderaffirming.ai 

Reddit user /u/opniaoinstavel's Detransition Story

Transitioned: 20 -> Detransitioned: 22
male
low self-esteem
took hormones
regrets transitioning
influenced online
serious health complications
now infertile
anxiety
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 an inauthentic persona.

The comments display a consistent, nuanced, and emotionally complex narrative of someone who medically transitioned, experienced significant negative effects, and now passionately rejects the concept of medical transition. The writing has a personal, introspective, and sometimes raw quality that is difficult to automate or fake convincingly. The user describes specific physical and mental health issues, social consequences, and a detailed internal struggle that aligns with the known experiences of some detransitioners/desisters. The passion and anger are consistent with someone who feels they have been harmed.

About me

I started transitioning in my early twenties because I thought becoming a woman would fix my unhappiness. The hormones made my mental and physical health worse, but I was in denial about the cause. I realized my dysphoria was really about deeper issues like low self-esteem and anger, and that I couldn't change the body I was born with. After stopping hormones, I began to feel like my real self again as the mental fog lifted. I'm now focused on healing and learning to accept myself as the man I am.

My detransition story

My journey with gender started a long time ago, but it really took off in my early twenties. I was deeply unhappy and uncomfortable with myself, and I thought a lot of that came from being a man. I had always wished I was born a woman, to be feminine in a way that felt natural and right. I found a lot of comfort in online spaces that told me these feelings meant I was transgender. It felt like an answer, a way to finally fix what was wrong.

I started taking estrogen. At first, it felt like I was finally doing something to address the pain. My skin got softer and I started to look more feminine, which was what I thought I wanted. But pretty quickly, things started to go wrong. My mental health got worse, not better. I started having bad anxiety, and I even began having physical health problems like constant diarrhea, nerve pain, and trouble with my vision. I felt like I was falling apart, but I was in deep denial. I blamed everything else—transphobia, society—instead of the hormones I was putting in my body.

I tried to live as a woman, but it never felt like I thought it would. The people who "supported" me felt fake. It wasn't the natural support women give each other; it felt like they were just humoring me, or even worse, that they were secretly enjoying my struggle. The only people who truly loved me, like my parents, never supported my transition. They were waiting for me to come to my senses and learn to respect myself.

A big turning point for me was a moment during yoga. I was thinking about death and aging, and I had this stark realization that no matter what I did to my body, I would die in the body I was born with. It was an absolute truth that made all my efforts to change it seem completely futile. I saw that my "dysphoria" was just a symptom of much bigger problems—low self-esteem, anger, and a deep feeling of being unsafe in the world. Transitioning was just a glorified bandaid, and a very expensive, painful one at that.

I realized a lot of my desire to transition was fueled by anger. I was angry at society, at gender roles, and at my own family. I think I wanted to upset people and reject the role I was given. I also struggled with comparing myself to others online, seeing women and feeling like they had it better, which fueled my envy and dissatisfaction. I now believe our generation has a lot of anger between genders, and being trans can be a way to express that.

Stopping hormones was one of the hardest things I've ever done. It felt like quitting a drug, and in a way, I think I was addicted to the idea of becoming someone else. The withdrawal was rough, both physically and mentally. But slowly, after I stopped, I started to feel my real personality, my original moods, and my joy coming back. It was like waking up from a fog. My physical health began to improve too.

I don't believe being transgender is a real, inherent thing anymore. I think it's an idea that exists in people's imaginations, and it causes a lot of pain. It damages your health, your fertility, your social life, and your sense of self. The body you create with hormones and surgeries feels incomplete, like a lab-made version. It doesn't have the same life force as a natural body.

I don't regret my journey because it brought me to this understanding, but I deeply regret the damage I did to my body and the pain I caused myself and my family. I have to live with the fact that I might be infertile now and that I put my health at serious risk. My thoughts on gender now are simple: we need to learn to love and accept the bodies we were born with. That’s the only path to real happiness. Gender dysphoria is something to be understood and overcome, not something to be affirmed with permanent medical changes.

Age Event
20 First started seriously considering that I might be transgender after reading online.
21 Began taking estrogen (HRT).
21 Started experiencing serious mental and physical health declines (anxiety, diarrhea, nerve pain).
22 Had a major realization during yoga that transition was a "glorified bandaid" and began the process of stopping HRT.
22 Stopped all hormone therapy and began detransitioning.
23 (Present) Continuing to heal physically and mentally from the effects of transition.

Top Comments by /u/opniaoinstavel:

24 comments • Posting since December 10, 2023
Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains how HRT side effects changed their personality and negatively impacted their brain, comparing it to pharmaceutical drugs.
48 pointsDec 25, 2023
View on Reddit

Tbh, HRT side effects are similar to those of drugs, have you ever experienced personality changes after using pharmaceutical drugs? HRT can have similar effects and it changes personality, lol, but no one tell you this in trans subs.

Cross-sex HRT affects the brain negatively, even contraceptive birth pills affects the brain negatively, I feel like stopping HRT is making me more intelligent, giving me life back.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) comments on the severe weight loss and unhealthy habits they experienced while on testosterone, including nicotine use, heavy marijuana smoking, and stimulants that suppressed their appetite.
26 pointsDec 19, 2023
View on Reddit

Not to mention how unhealthily skinny I was.. but i also was actively using nicotine and smoking a ton of weed the whole time I was on testosterone. That made eating really hard despite the fact I smoked weed. I’d get full real fast and start to feel sick if I tried to eat more. Had a stimulant phase while on it too, so that explains why I weighed absolutely nothing. My lack of body fat in pictures from that timeframe (October 2022) creeps me out honestly.

All signals that this is bad for your body.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains his decision to quit HRT and online trans spaces, describing how accepting his gender dysphoria while stopping transition has improved his mental and physical health.
25 pointsDec 12, 2023
View on Reddit

But currently I respect having gender dysphoria.

I have it myself.

Desiring to be a woman is okay, I will keep my female stuff that is not HRT, they comfort me, but I know it is an impossible dream, I'm better keeping a fiendly attitude toward gender dysphoria itself, I'm better not trying to deny the fact I always wished I was feminine and womanly as a cis woman, but HRT and transitioning do fuc up a person's life, I'm better without those.

IDK, I feel so unsafe being alive, it has manifested in absurd ways such as actually being violent, trying to kill myself, isolating myself, doing risk stuff, pissing in bottles... keep transitioning even thought I realized how it was messing up my situation even more... I was in denial. But I feel so much better without HRT, physically, mentally, it is not even transphobia, lmao, I started feeling bad yesterday after taking E again, I tried blaming transphobia and developing a loving mind toward all this transition stuff, well, it failed, I woke up with diarrhea and feeling like shit, I was feeling good without those, so good, but my mind always feel this constant state of unsafety... And I needed more, I needed answers, changes, but HRT is shit, 😣, I am glad I feel traumatized about the whole trans stuff, this wil keep my safe from that at least ❤

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains why he believes transitioning is an incomplete solution and encourages a young man to consider he may outgrow his discomfort with his body.
17 pointsDec 18, 2023
View on Reddit

It is so common that biological males be feminine during childhood, but grow up to be masculine. I'm pretty sure you are just like many other young men around the world, you had a hard time adapting to those masculinizing changes, adapting to your adult life, but that is still possible.

If you choose to transition now and embrace all the damage and pain that comes with it, stuff that is usually well hidden in trans spaces, you still won't know whetter if you have choosed to not transition, if you would have outgrown your discomfort with your body.

And the body a trans person is incomplete, it feels like being made in a lab, there is less light, less life in it, infertility. It is a zombie body compared to the body of a non-trans person and people will notice it.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains the damage caused by transitioning, calling it a "scam" that harms health, finances, and social life, and discusses the despair and difficulty of quitting testosterone cold turkey.
13 pointsDec 29, 2023
View on Reddit

Not only is that transgender thing a scam, but It damages our sexual organs, sexuality, social life, financial life, health and It throws trans people in despair.

It is normal you have a hard time quitting T, I believe you have to undergo something similar to andropause... I am suffering from going cold turkey, but overall I feel better, it is just that the regret turn into desperation some days😔.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains that cross-sex hormones, not the hormones themselves, worsen mental illness, citing personal experience with estrogen's negative effects and testosterone's positive ones.
9 pointsDec 19, 2023
View on Reddit

I don't think it is the testosterone, but the fact that for you it is a cross-sex hormone.

I personally experienced worsening of mental health due to Estrogen, I'm male and T gel actually make me feel like healing.

We need limits when it comes to gender, because in the reality, our body is an essential thing, and giving cross-sex hormones to people, in reality, is a perversio , a practice that harms lived.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains how bullying from more masculine males is a common experience for less masculine boys, highlighting the absurdity of adults comparing themselves to and feeling superior to children.
9 pointsDec 18, 2023
View on Reddit

Experiencing bullying as a male, due to males that are more masculine than us, is a common experience.

There are infantile adults that compare themselves with male kids and feel so superior and inflated for being more masculine, they manage to treat you like shit, for not being a man, well, we were just kids, lol, it is ridiculous but it is super common.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) comments that transness is a human construct existing only in imagination and specific social spaces, not in material reality.
8 pointsDec 28, 2023
View on Reddit

They might feel, but they are not, it is painful to watch, but they're just overthinking.

Transness is made up by humans, yes,it exists, but only in the imagination of people, only in trans spaces, only in trans's allies heads, those who are more tuned with a solid, material reality, refuse to aknowledge transness.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains why he believes transitioning is a self-destructive fantasy driven by a lack of self-respect, arguing that true respect comes from embracing one's inherent male strength.
6 pointsDec 17, 2023
View on Reddit

I am not found of your text, you don't sound like you respect yourself as a man.

We men have a strenght deep down that we can't trade for a woman's unique powers, you need to respect it, only then you will be respected by both women and men.

People actively supporting your trans identity are only messing with you, no one sees you as a real female.

I have used HRT, my skin got soft, I got feminine, etc, and the only people that respectfully respect me affirming myself as a female, only did so in the name that I had enough balls to call myself a female, lol, it was never like, the natural support that women give to each other, it was never like, the interest that straight men had for women, all affirmation they gave me was directed at the small ammount of self-respect I had for my own masculinity, for being ballsy enough to say I'm a woman.

No one who loved me supported my transition. My father, my mother, the people that liked me IRL, they all awaited the momment I would learn to respect myself. I had a bad friend online that would use my pronouns and share degrading trans stuff, but that was it, even that person that used to identify as a trans person would come to his senses once in a while and suggest that I should detransition, this transition stuff is harmful, it is a degrading fantasy of self-harm, you take joy in betraying your fellow humans.

Give up affirming yourself as a woman, you're only a joke and a fool to your friends and ppl. For real, that was my experience, I noticed that the only people that "respected" my pronouns, were my enemies and they felt pleasure in seeing how much of a joke I was.

It is all evil, this trans stuff, no one is gonna respect you until you learn to respect your true strenghts and traits and that is deep down in your being, won't change. You can only attack it through HRT and surgeries, but you can't change to female.

You are deffective in your mindset, but as you see, I view you as a man. You won't ever achieve success as a woman, you can't only do that as a man. You are strong, capable.

The world is not cruel to men, it is a lie, we have so much strenght, the world is flattering to men. You are supposed to hug your stinking male friends after they give you a punch, because you are beautifully male, don't be a bitch, or if you do, at least be aware that you are doing that because you have issues.

Reddit user opniaoinstavel (detrans male) explains that the problem isn't living as male, but a "deranged" belief in transness and a failure to change.
6 pointsDec 28, 2023
View on Reddit

Why do you say it's always been a problem?

This is not true.

The problem was never living as male, the problem was our deranged way of seeing things, our belief in transness, our failure to change and live happy lives.

Rough true, but I choose to accept the fact I'm an pure idiot that believed in transness over continuing caving my grave in this shithole