This story is from the comments listed below, summarised by AI.
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 comments demonstrate:
- Personal, emotional experiences with detransition, loss, and health.
- Consistent, nuanced viewpoints on complex topics like identity and regret.
- Empathetic, person-first language when offering support to others.
- A detailed, analytical argument about research methodologies, which is consistent with a passionate, personally-invested individual.
About me
I'm a woman who started identifying as trans as a teenager because I hated my developing body and was struggling with anxiety. I took testosterone and had surgery, influenced by online communities and a friend group that pressured me to have a unique identity. I lost all those friends when I detransitioned, but it was a relief to stop pretending. I now believe my discomfort was from body dysmorphia and a need to belong, not from being born the wrong sex. I have regrets about the permanent changes, and I'm learning that self-acceptance, not changing my body, was the real answer.
My detransition story
My whole journey with gender feels like it happened in a kind of fog, and I'm only just now starting to see things clearly. It all started when I was a teenager, feeling incredibly uncomfortable with my body during puberty. I'm female, and I developed a real hatred for my breasts. I didn't have the words for it then, but looking back, I was also struggling with pretty serious anxiety and low self-esteem. I found a lot of comfort and escape online, and that's where I was first introduced to the concept of being non-binary and then transgender.
I started identifying as non-binary, and then later as a trans man. It felt like a solution to all my discomfort. I had a group of friends who were all exploring similar identities, and it felt like we were all in it together. I think I was heavily influenced by them and by what I was reading online. To be "cis" in those circles was seen as boring and almost wrong. There was a lot of pressure to have a unique, non-conforming identity. I started taking testosterone, and I even got top surgery to remove my breasts.
For a while, it felt right. I felt like I was finally fixing the problem. But the relief didn't last. I started to have health issues, and deep down, I began to question everything. The real turning point was when I decided to be honest with myself and reidentify as a woman. That's when I lost almost all of those friends. It was really painful, but it was also a huge relief. I realized I had been walking on eggshells around them, constantly worried about saying the wrong thing about gender. A lot of my health problems actually lessened after I left that friend group, which makes me think they were being made worse by the constant stress of that environment.
It was around those people that I felt the most ashamed of calling myself a woman. They made it seem like a bad thing. The irony is that when I detransitioned, those same friends were completely unsupportive. It showed me that they cared more about my identity label than they did about my actual well-being and happiness.
Now, I see things very differently. I think my initial discomfort was a mix of body dysmorphia, the normal awkwardness of puberty, and a desperate need to belong somewhere. I don't think transitioning was the right answer for me. I have regrets about the surgeries and the hormones, especially because of the permanent changes they caused. I think the whole idea of a "true self" that you have to discover is misleading. No matter what I did to my body, it was always me. The real work was in learning to accept myself, not in changing myself to fit an idea.
I've come to believe that gender as a concept is something we should be able to question without fear. It's sad to me how politicized everything has become, and how hard it is to have honest conversations or get good information. We need better studies that actually listen to people like me, so others can make truly informed choices.
Here is a timeline of my journey based on what I remember:
| My Age | Event |
|---|---|
| 14-15 | Started feeling intense discomfort with my body during puberty, hated my breasts. |
| 16 | Found online communities and friends who introduced me to non-binary and trans identities. Started identifying as non-binary. |
| 17 | Socially transitioned to living as a trans man. |
| 18 | Started taking testosterone. |
| 21 | Had top surgery. |
| 23 | Began seriously questioning my transition and the concept of gender. |
| 24 | Stopped testosterone and reidentified as a woman (detransitioned). Lost my friend group as a result. |
Top Comments by /u/weeb2000:
coming from someone who did lose a lot of friends over this: yes it sucks, but i no longer have to walk on eggshells around them all the time (because to some people, gender is literally their entire lives). the relief is incredible. i was having a lot of health issues before this all happened— many of them lessened once it did, i suspect because they were being exacerbated due to stress.
i also found that it was around these people i felt most ashamed of calling myself a woman, because to be “cis” was uncool, lame, hateful, etc.
it’s a tough thing to go through but in the end, something has to give.
edit: also your friends are being unsupportive about your detransition? tf? it’s YOUR choice and clearly you weren’t happy. seems like they care more about your identity than your well-being, imo.
something similar happened to me recently, actually. i lost a whole group of friends because reidentifying as a woman led me to questioning gender as a concept, and that was apparently not allowed.
what’s really ironic is only days before this began i had talked with one of them (who holds a masters degree) about living in an age of anti-intellectualism…
the 1% figure comes from one or two metaanalyses that pool figures from a number of studies on post-surgical regret.
issues with these metaanalyses include:
study date; many of these only involve the “old” cohort of gender-affirming care patients, in which the typical patient is male-to-female, male-attracted, and has a lifelong history of gender dysphoria, rather than the “new” cohort which skews much younger, more female, less same-sex attracted, and with more rapid onset. these are very different patient populations
studies only contained data from patients who actually followed up after retaining contact with their treatment providers, something detransitioners seem less likely to do
studies only surveyed post-surgical patients, whcih are not representative of the whole transgender demographic, especially the new cohort
there is an inconsistent time frame of follow-up surveys across studies, ranging from less than one year to nine years in this metaanalysis
“regret” is itself often poorly defined in these postsurgical follow ups, and doesn’t necessarily correlate 1:1 with detransition; there are detransitioners who do not regret transition, and vice versa
overall, there is a lack of any good information on the rate of transition regret or detransition and the demographics of detransitioners. what studies exist are either out of date, poorly formulated, or not actually representative of the population at hand.
i know exactly what you mean and totally feel what you’re going through. as tough as it may be, i would advise talking to your girlfriend. keeping secrets from each other is going to lead to resentment. something is going to happen eventually with this whether you keep your concerns secret or not, and it may be better to be open with her now when there is no tension between you two.
sometimes it feels crazy to live in this world, i understand. but what other choice do we have? i know it sounds bleak at first, but there’s a certain comfort in recognizing that no matter how insane the world might get, we’re still in control of ourselves first and foremost, and that we can still choose to live our lives however we want.
i truly feel for you but please know that you’re not alone and neither is your partner. dysphoria is a real beast regardless of where it comes from, and plenty of folk here understand how difficult it is to start questioning the nature of gender while being totally immersed in a world obsessed with it. i wish you and your girlfriend the best of luck going forward.
i feel like the thing you said about hoping to get pregnant to have a “reason” says everything. i would definitely recommend you take a break from t (with the guidance of an endocrinologist) to see how you feel.
no matter what you do, though, remember you’re still you. i think all the worry in trans circles about one’s “true self” and such is missing the point that no matter what you do to your body, it’s still yours, it’s still you.
it is very sad how politicized the pursuit of this information has become. i completely understand why, from multiple perspectives, but i wish people could put aside their egos long enough to recognize that having more quality information is never a bad thing