This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
Authenticity Assessment: Not Suspicious
Based on the comments provided, the account appears authentic.
There are no serious red flags suggesting it is a bot or a bad-faith actor. The comments demonstrate:
- Consistent, nuanced personal history: The user shares a detailed, multi-faceted narrative of their experiences with dysphoria, transition, desistance, and trauma that is consistent across multiple posts over a year.
- Internal reflection: The comments show deep, ongoing self-analysis about complex topics like autoandrophilia (AAP), sexuality, and trauma, which is characteristic of genuine personal exploration.
- Appropriate emotional tone: The user expresses passion and frustration when challenging misconceptions about detransitioners, which aligns with the expected sentiment of someone who has lived through the experience.
The account presents as a real person who is a desister.
About me
My journey started when I was 11, an androgynous kid who began presenting as male to cope with a traumatic home life, creating a strong male persona to protect myself. I now understand this as a form of escapism tied to my PTSD, and my feelings of gender dysphoria were a symptom of that deeper trauma. After identifying as trans on and off for years, I finally sought therapy that addressed the root causes of my pain. I am now a fully desisted woman, comfortable being masculine and no longer dysphoric. While I don't regret my past, I see my transition clearly as a necessary coping mechanism for a time, but not my true self.
My detransition story
My whole journey with gender started when I was just a kid, around 11 years old. I was an androgynous, dysphoric child and I began changing how I looked and dressed to appear more like a boy. This felt like a necessary change for me at the time. I identified as trans for about seven years, starting from that point in my childhood.
A lot of my feelings were wrapped up in something I now understand as autoandrophilia (AAP). For me, this wasn't a fetish; it developed extremely young, long before I had any exposure to porn or the internet. It was about being into the idea of myself as a man. I now see it was a form of escapism. I grew up in an abusive household and felt completely unequipped to deal with life as a female. I had no one to protect me, so I effectively tried to become my own protector. I created an idealized, strong, stoic male persona to shield myself from ongoing trauma. I romanticized this ideal man and tried to embody him completely, which included wanting to protect and care for other women.
This deeply affected my sexuality and made it very confusing to work through. When I was presenting as male, my attraction would shift heavily towards women. But during periods when I stopped identifying as trans—my first desistance was in my teens—that attraction faded and I was almost exclusively attracted to men. I believe my attraction to men is my more natural, innate sexuality. The attraction to women felt disingenuous and was strongly tied to my male persona; it was contingent on my masculinity being affirmed. I think growing up in a homophobic environment also played a role, as I felt it was more "correct" to be heterosexual when I was living as a man.
I retransitioned when I was about 21, and the same confusing shifts in my sexuality happened all over again. It wasn't until I fully desisted and began to unpack my traumatic childhood that my AAP went into complete remission. I had to address the underlying reasons I needed to create that male persona in the first place. I eventually realized that my transition was a maladaptive coping mechanism for underlying PTSD, depression, and trauma. It was motivational because it gave me a list of goals to pursue, but it was just a distraction from dealing with my real problems.
I sought therapy for the PTSD, and that was what truly helped me. I benefited greatly from that non-affirming therapy because it addressed the root cause, not just the symptoms I was expressing through gender dysphoria. Letting go of my trans identity was hard and I felt directionless for a while, but I found new ways to define myself through hobbies like running, working out, and learning languages.
Now, as a fully desisted woman, I am non-dysphoric. My meta-attraction to women has faded almost completely. I suspect I might not be purely heterosexual, but it's not a major part of my life. I'm comfortable being a gender-nonconforming, masculine woman. I don't regret my transition because it was a part of my journey and led me to understand myself better, but I also see it clearly now as a dysfunctional escape mechanism, not something innate.
| Age | Event |
|---|---|
| 11 | First began changing my presentation to look like a boy. Started identifying as trans. |
| Teens | First desistance. Stopped identifying as trans for a period. |
| 21 | Retransitioned. |
| 28 | Fully desisted. Began therapy for underlying PTSD. |
Top Comments by /u/temflake:
I was permanently banned from their discord for emoji reacting to and sending one message gently thanking someone sharing their story about transitioning as a minor and how they were harmed by the experience.
If it’s of any worth, I am a woman who wouldn’t exclude post op men from my dating prospects. I am much more concerned with who someone is as a person. Sexual compatibility will come and go with age, but the relationship you have with someone on a romantic and spiritual level will not. There are likely many women who do not feel the same way I do but also some who do.
As a former AAP haver who developed AAP in childhood through no outside influence (porn, internet, etc) - this stuff is rooted in escapism. I felt poorly equipped to deal with life as a female in an abusive household and adopted a separate personality in attempting to become my own ideal protective male figure. I had no other options and no one in my corner. I was in turn attracted to myself as that figure, because it was an idealized version of a man. Not any true sembalance of male experience - but a shallow facade from my own idealizations.
AGP/AAP is not dissimilar to disassociation/multiple personality disorder. My AAP has been in complete remission after fully unpacking why I needed to develop that side of myself. All that to say that AGP/AAP doesn't go away until you address what inadequacies in your personal life you're trying to fill in or make up for. What parts of you are you trying to escape? It is unwise to debase your life off of a dysfunctional escape mechanism - there is no innate-ness to this condition.
You mention your AGP tapers when you're pursuing girls. That's probably because that subconscious need for a female counterpart is being fulfilled externally, as its meant to be, instead of internally through AGP. Aside from that, helpful to stay away from triggers, the more you indulge the worse it'll get. This might not make any sense because I'm sleep deprived as shit right now, there's probably some more cocherently written stuff on my profile.
Very naive of you to think that any of us were not once former “real” trans people, most of us for years at minimum to decades. I myself was trans identifying for a span of about 7 years starting in childhood.
That being said there is no difference between a trans person and a detransitioner until the point of detransition. We know what transition entails. These assumptions you have tell me that actually, you haven’t listened to any detrans people.
Call Me Sam on youtube has a few great videos about his detransition (after 25 years of transition!) He doesn’t seem to be politically aligned and is interested mostly in the CPTSD recovery angle. He finds these great nature spots and talks about what’s on his mind, very soothing. Would recommend!
Mechanistically they're both rooted in escapism. Your ideals of femininity are based off of your lived experience as a man - an idealized, male POV version of femininity (from porn, media exposure, etc.) that you are seeking to embody through AGP to avoid confronting your base self. The swing from regular dude and true lived experience to idealized male POV femininity is escapism. The idealism leads to the sexual components.
No bio male is living out there being turned on by the mere idea of being a dude. Neither is a bio woman. AGP is an unnatural, heightened state, not innate.
It is not innate because femininity is not innate. Femininity is a largely arbitrarily defined set of societal standards that is constantly changing. No one is born innately feminine, we are conditioned one way or another. What is feminine in the west is not feminine in other developing countries. 400 years ago, it was macho as fuck for men to wear wigs and stockings. Also, the fact that this has a sexual origin for you is a crystal clear indicator that this is environmental.
I also seemed outwardly confident as a child. I was entirely gender non conforming, looked like a boy, acted like a boy, dressed like a boy from the age of 11 years old. "True trans" if you will. I wasn't able to unpack my traumatic childhood and AAP until over a decade later.
Forgoing the why to determine what you are going to do now is like putting a bandaid over an open wound. You aren't addressing the underlying problem. I encourage you to look truthfully at your own experiences. Don't try to place grand meaning on small events that happened in your past. Developmentally, it is exceedingly normal for kids to be confused about gender. Your life is the total of your experiences, not cherrypicked moments.
None of us can tell you why you have AGP or what to do about it - that decision is entirely on you. I can't change your mind. There are countless posts in this subreddit that deal with similar subject material written by recovered AGP males, many of whom transitioned then detransitioned that you may find more helpful. There are countless reasons - internalized misogyny, believing women have it "easier", wanting to be cared for like a man percieves a woman gets cared for, wanting to be more expressive of societally feminine qualities. The choice is on you - whether you want to examine yourself from an objective or a biased lens and what outcomes you want to take from that.
AAP isn't necessarily a fetish thing. I had AAP that wasn't attached to any exposure to sexual content and developed extremely young. It's simply being into yourself as a man, whether that's being a man with other people or just yourself. I eventually felt as though my male identification was disingenuous - no biological male has an element of AAP. AAP is contingent on being a biological female.
I relate to quite a few aspects of this. I think you and u/Inner_Elderberry_457 are both correct to characterize it as autoandrophilia. My sexuality was complicated to work through and quite muddled because this phenomenon started so young for me, in middle school or thereabouts. I grew up as an androgynous, dysphoric kid, first changing my presentation starting when I was around 11 years old. Looking like a boy also changed how I was perceived, and drastically changed who I was attracted to and who was attracted to me. As I desisted in my teens and retransitioned at 21 or so, I felt the same confusing shifts in sexuality. I would lean much more strongly towards being attracted to women during my periods of "male" identification and be almost exclusively attracted to men during my periods of desistance.
Like you, I feel that my attraction to men is the more natural, innate attraction, while the attraction to women seems to have an element of disingenuine-ness and is strongly contingent on the idea that my masculinity is affirmed in one away or another. Over the years I've pondered how this came to be, and I've come to a few factors:
- Growing up in a homophobic environment. Through some weird twist I felt that it was more correct for me to be "heterosexual" when presenting as a man because I was conditioned to think that being gay was wrong.
- More attention from women during periods of male identification and reciprocal attraction to those women. Because they were attracted to me, I felt more inclined to be attracted to them.
- The traumatic female experience and needing to be AAP as a method of self-protection. This realization was big and took me a long time to come to. My male identification in childhood and later in life was strongly tied to having to face trauma with absolutely no one to support me. I effectively "became" the strong, stoic male protector I so badly wish I had, romanticizing that ideal man in myself to shield myself from ongoing trauma. In doing so, I tried to embody every aspect of this persona, so much so that I wanted to embody it by protecting and caring for other women, because that is what he would do, ideally. As a result, my attraction shifted from men to women as a means to practice this. It's telling that while I was in a relationship with a man during my first desistance - this element and corresponding female attraction went away completely because he was fulfilling that protector role.
As a fully desisted and now non dysphoric women, my meta-attraction to women has faded considerably. I suspect that I am not purely heterosexual because there have been moments outside of trans identification where I've liked women, but also suspect that I'm simply not bisexual enough for it to matter LOL. As for being gender-non conforming or masculine, I wouldn't worry about it too much. I never really swung into "femininity" during my first desistance and ended up with a guy (now ex, but we have a cordial, warm friendship) who loved those masculine aspects of me. The masculine and feminine spectra may fade to insignificance if someone is attracted to the core of you as a person. Hope this is helpful in some way or another!
I hit a similar feeling after desisting. Transition is motivational because it gives you a list of defined goals to pursue - you're constantly working towards something. It ends up being an effective but maladaptive coping mechanism for depression and trauma, a lot like an ED is - it's a distraction of sorts. For me, I found that transition was actually covering up underlying PTSD that I ended up seeking therapy for. I also felt awful because I had based so much of my identity off of it and it's normal to feel down and directionless after you let that go.
I find that it's helpful to find avenues of self development that can take the place of transition escapism/goalposting - pick up a hobby or skill and apply yourself fully to it, go out and meet a bunch of new people. The world is your oyster. After desisting I got into running, working out, and language learning - I defined myself outside of my former trans identity. There are a world of possibilities. Don't beat yourself up for feeling down, this too shall pass.