As someone who has actually more or less detransitioned, I really wish the news and politicians would just shut the hell up about gender.
Just let people make the choice they feel is in their best interest, and allow medical research to enable doctors to support people in making choices that are likely to lead to better long-term health outcomes.
If people would stop using my existence to politicize and demonize folks they don’t understand, I wouldn’t feel like I was “betraying trans folks” by making the choices that are right for me with respect to presentation and HRT.
This shit is exhausting. Just let people live their lives, and let doctors do their best to help them do so in a way that’s likely to be positive long term.
I wouldn’t feel like I was “betraying trans folks”
I know you know this, but I just wanted to affirm that your journey is your own and you’ve not betrayed anyone
Thank you very much, I appreciate that a lot
I hope you have a lovely day friend
I have never heard of someone detransitioning. Perhaps because of what you say. So given this chance: could you tell me/us a bit about that?
I transitioned to presenting more femininely when I was around 16, from where I was at the time I felt it was the right choice, and my family supported me, so I started Hrt. That was comfortable and felt right for me for a long time, but I found I progressively drifted back to identifying more masculinely, presenting very tomboy-ish towards the end of my time identifying more femininely. I went by Cristen and used she/her exclusively for about 7 years before I realized I wasn’t comfortable anymore and started making changes
Because I was so used to being on the femme side of the spectrum and am generally very change averse, I waited until things got really uncomfortable gender-wise before I started making meaningful changes to my presentation, and still have a hard time with sometimes presenting too femme too often because everything cute is feminine, and if I don’t pay attention to honoring how I feel with respect to gender, I get super anxious and uncomfortable with anything more feminine. Each time that’s happened I’ve had a harder time enjoying feminine things after and it’s pushed my gender identity more masculine, which has been an unpleasant and frustrating experience.
Not long ago I felt that cutting my waist length hair short was more than enough to feel right gender wise, and that I might be happier back at my previous dose of estrogen. That was an awful mistake that although I’ve now corrected, has left me figuring out where I’m at with gender identity all over again, with descriptors or labels that used to feel affirming now prompting mild anxiety at times and feeling much more ambiguous.
These days I go by Cris and use he/him with friends, though I haven’t asked my parents to change over. I’m kinda anxious they’ll feel like they made the wrong choice in supporting my decision to transition, as it wasnt trivial for them to understand and accept, although not as hard as for many parents. If someone asks I usually just say I have a complicated relationship with gender. I’m still on HRT, but half my previous dose of estrogen, though I may make futher changes to my dosages, we’ll see
I followed the path that felt right for me, and somewhere along the way it stopped feeling right for me, and stopped being comfortable. At this point I just try to pay attention to how I feel and try not to overthink it, as that’s really never accomplished much other than making me more anxious about it 😅
Wow wow wow, thanks for the insight. I hope you find your way, even if the path changes direction.
I think everyone has “issues” with feeling that some clothes/haircut/behavior/… is not fitting to them. In these things you can be sure that everyone is like that. Of course: Some more, some less.
