We're All Insane - Detransitioning At 17 years-old

Episode Date: August 7, 2023

Sponsored by BetterHelp. Get 10% off your first month at betterhelp.com/insane Detransitioning, or gender detransition, is a multifaceted and deeply personal process whereby individuals who have previously undergone gender transition reevaluate their gender identity and decide to return to their original gender expression or assigned sex at birth. This journey is often marked by complex emotions, as detransitioners navigate feelings of self-discovery, identity reevaluation, and societal pressures. Physical aspects may come into play, such as ceasing hormone therapy or reversing surgical procedures. Detransitioners may seek understanding and support from healthcare professionals, therapists, and peer communities to cope with the challenges and uncertainties that arise during this transformative process. Open conversations about detransitioning are crucial to fostering understanding, empathy, and respect for each individual's unique path of self-exploration and identity development. If you have a unique story you'd like to share on the podcast, fill out this form: https://forms.gle/ZiHgdoK4PLRAddiB9 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey guys, it's me DeVora. I just dropped an all new bonus episode inside my new subscription channel, We're All Insane Plus. This week's bonus episode is called My Brain was slipping into my spine. Listen now by subscribing to We're All Insane Plus inside your Spotify or Apple Podcasts app or go to we're all insane.com. Hey guys, welcome back to the show. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp therapy online. If you want to live, a more empowered life, therapy can get you there. Visit betterhelp.com slash insane today to get 10% off your first month. BetterHelp is not a crisis line and better help is spelled better H-E-L-P. My name's Cassie. I'm 18. This is my experience with transitioning and detransitioning

as a minor. I guess I should tell me about my parents first. My dad is like a diagnosed narcissist and my mom has the same anxiety issues that I have and so basically a narcissist and an enabler got it and I've got two older brothers and a little sister and a whole lot of like mental issues run in the family my grandmother was bipolar and my brother my oldest brother and I inherited that it's caused a lot of turmoil yeah you can imagine um did you experience like your anxiety and stuff pretty young yeah um I think some of my earliest memories are being scared of strangers um my my my gender struggles started started

when I was like nine years old, probably. That's when I found out what being transgender was from online and started privately, like internally identifying that way. So did it kind of start as like a confusion and then you started doing your own research? Mm-hmm. Okay. I started developing like puberty very, very, young, I started developing, my chest started developing when I was probably about seven or eight

years old. And my first memory of that was standing in the shower with my hands like this, trying to push it back in, to stop it from growing. And it was always something I hated. I would layer sports bras on sports bras to try and flatten it. That whole, like, probably 10 to like 15 is a pretty blurry time of my life. I was groomed online when I was 10 years old and then abused by another intimate partner at 15 in sort of one right after the other. Yeah. And the summer between 8th and 9th grade, I had my mastectomy.

I had my chest removed. That's young. Yeah, when I was 14. Wow. Was that something like mentally that you knew that you wanted for a while that you were like preparing for? How did that come about with your parents and everything? I thought at the time that I had been wanting it for, for a first.

and thinking about it a lot. But now looking back, it was like a year before I got it that I decided I wanted it. Okay. It felt like I had been struggling for my whole life and that this was the only way to fix it. Well, that's basically what I was told by gender affirming therapists believe that. gender transition is the only solution solution to gender dysphoria and well I can look back now and see that it was a whole mess of other issues it was an eating disorder and my autism not liking change and a whole lot of stuff but at the time that that's

what I was diagnosed with and that's what they were telling me I had and that's they're telling me you have this this is the only way to fix it so what else was I going to do basically and I know that you said that when you first started kind of doing your own research you kept that to yourself right like pretty private when did you open up about that to anyone else the sixth grade okay I like changed my name and pronouns on Instagram and stuff and at school. And then when the 2016 election happened, my parents, I was really upset about the results. And my parents were concerned that I was so upset and asking me why, basically. And I told them that it was because I was trans and I was scared about the future.

So that was how you broke it to them. Mm-hmm. Okay. What was their response? They didn't really have one. I don't think they knew what that meant. Right. And everything that you knew and learned was probably from your own research, you said, right?

Okay. Did you feel like there was a lot online that helped you? Or you were still kind of like just as confused yourself, you think? Well, it gave me. an explanation that I sort of grasped onto. Right. But I don't think it was the right explanation.

I think I saw a lot of people experiencing similar issues to me went with the route they went with. I started therapy when I was 10 years old. And then because a family member died,

a grief therapy. And then again in the sixth grade after my parents discovered that I was cutting myself. The way that that ended up happening was not great. My mom saw the scars on my arm and had a whole big sit-down conversation with the whole family. A lot of things were said. My dad told me that I only ever think about myself and that my own feelings about it were the only thing I considered and that I was selfish because I was hurting myself. And I started going to therapy. And that therapist told me when I came out to her about being trans, she told me that, she told me that,

I should find God and that would heal me and I wouldn't feel that way anymore. And we stopped going to that therapist shortly after that. I was never raised religious, really. So I started testosterone about 10 days after my 14th birthday. And then I had in November. And then I had my mastectomy the next June. I honestly think I always knew it was a mistake. When I got the, so when you have that surgery, you're wrapped up in a lot of bandages, obviously. And the appointment after my surgery where they took the bandages off, I started crying. And my family and my therapist or my surgeon all thought it was like happy tears.

But I think it wasn't. I'm pretty sure I... Like regret? Yeah. Like I knew that I had hurt myself in the long run. I remember probably a month after the surgery, I learned what a breast reduction was. And that's when I knew that I had made the wrong decision.

Yeah. Because that's what I wanted, really. Just like smaller boobs. I'd always told people that if I had been born with like B cups I would have never have gotten right um I wouldn't have wanted it um but I had like triple these like I was it was inconvenient and I was 14 so I was like 130 pounds and 20 of them were boobs I kept identifying as trans until I was 17, so another three years after the surgery. And I think, well, throughout that time, I stopped identifying as like a man and started identifying more

like fluidly. And I think it was like a stepping stone for me. Um, obviously it's not that for everybody, but. Right. Did taking the testosterone was at, did that cause like a lot of differences in your body that you noticed and stuff like that? Yeah, but I don't really think I regret taking testosterone. Okay. I don't, I like my voice and I like, there aren't a lot of permanent physical changes with testosterone as much as there are with estrogen. Like my body fat redistributed to be a lot more like out of my hips and into my

like arms and chest area and that went back to normal um i i still have to shave my face but that's not a lot of a lot of women have to shave their faces i i don't think anyone could have stopped me from going on testosterone i was a bodybuilder at that point i was well i hung out with bodybuilders i was 14 but um i had access to a lot of illegal testosterone and i think if i hadn't been able to get it the legal means, I would have done it through other means. My top surgery consultation was 15 minutes long. And they're usually supposed to be like an hour. And I wasn't told basically anything about the actual consequences of the surgery.

I wasn't told about like the nerve pain and phantom itches and pains. I wasn't told that I would never be able to breastfeed or experience sensation in my chest again. And that's something I struggle with. Yeah. Is it just completely numb? I can feel pressure. Okay. But not like textile sensation.

But a lot of people are numb completely, especially people who have had, well, I had complications. with my nipple grafts. So they take your actual nipples and they cut them down and skin graft them onto different part of your chest. And mine rejected. They fell off, basically. And that, like, I could have gotten sepsis. I didn't, but my surgeon was completely unreachable after the surgery to my surgery to my

three-month follow-up, like, things easily could have gotten a lot worse than they are. Hi, Kitty. Go say hi. My nipples rejected, yes. And I couldn't get in contact with the surgeon at all. Like, he wasn't answering his phone. Like, we were given his personal phone number and the nurse's personal phone number to contact if there was an issue, like 24-7 was supposed to be what it is, because surgical complications

don't wait for business hours. Yeah. But couldn't reach them. There was also probably nothing that could have been done about that at the point that I noticed that something was wrong. But so they closed and I've just got like scars. So that was never something that you were able to fix? No.

there was a point when we were talking about getting tattoos done, but that never ended up happening. And well, now that I'm looking into breast reconstruction, that's probably, it's a whole other surgery, a nipple reconstruction. But that's also, there was a bill that was passed in Maryland that's getting gender affirming care, which is now broadened to include detransition-related care, covered by Maryland Medicaid.

And so all of that should be covered starting in January, which I'm excited about. They were free to get off back in the day. They were covered by my insurance, So I feel like they should be free to get put back. Yeah. But there's a lot of pain, you know? Mm-hmm.

Like I lost organs. The surgery they give to transgender, like transmasculine people, is different than the surgery they give to somebody who's getting it for breast cancer. It's they take all the skin so there's no um what they call it inframarmery fold. So it's completely flat and they're going to have to put a tissue expander in, which is a temporary implant that fills up with saline. They they put more saline in it over time, over a couple weeks. And then a second surgery to, take them out and put the implants in.

And then another surgery, which is fat grafting, they're going to take from my stomach to give it more of like a real feel. And then a fourth surgery, which is the nipple reconstruction and the tattoos. And then likely other surgeries down the road. And you have to get them replaced every 10 years. So I think I do transit. I still have gender dysphoria from both. like both being perceived femininely and masculinely.

I decided to detransition because I realized that none of the surgeries or the hormones were going to make me a cis man, which is what I wanted to be. I didn't want to be a lifelong medical patient. I didn't want to have to go in for blood work every three months for the rest of my life, which is what you have to do when you're on hormone replacement therapy. and I guess I've not really been able to escape that because I'm still going to have to be going in for surgeries at least every 10 years.

So for me, gender dysphoria, it's basically inescapable because I get it from both sides of the spectrum. I'm uncomfortable being called like feminine terms, and I'm uncomfortable being called masculine terms but those are the only

terms that people are familiar with like as a baseline it's like shame it's like feeling embarrassed is the closest like physical feeling I could compare it to

like falling in public is what it feels like and it's sort of when it's not being projected from outside when I'm not being referred to or whatever. It's internal. It's like, how does this person see me? How, even when I'm alone, it's like, oh, you look like a man right now or you look like a woman right now. And then I get that shame. And it leads me to like self-isolation

most of the time like this is the this is the first thing I've done in probably two months and I don't I don't really like pictures to be taken of me and I don't really like I really don't like to hear my voice

played back but I think that's kind of universal so before I transitioned I was really like a daddy's girl. Like my dad was the closest person to me probably. And when I transitioned, I really lost that. I went from being like the golden child, the favorite, to like a weird gender freak, basically overnight. And that was hard. And I haven't really been in regular contact with my dad. I'm Anna Garcia, host of True Crime News, the podcast.

Every week we bring you in-depth coverage on cases making headlines, as well as those that go under the radar. Tune in for murders that defy explanation, mystery seeking exploration, and shocking secrets that will leave you breathless. Each week, we honor the victims by going beyond the salacious in our search for justice. Crime never stops, and neither do we. Listen to True Crime News available now wherever you get your podcasts. Was he just not very supportive with everything? No. And he was a narcissist, like I said.

And really didn't like anyone to do anything he didn't like. We weren't allowed to watch movies he didn't like or listen to music. He didn't like. And he didn't like trans people. So transitioning was really a big no. I'm sort of having a realization right now that it might have been, because during the time when I started feeling that way and started privately referring to myself that way was my emo phase as you'd say like I was a rebellious a rebellious teen and it could have

it could have been some form of rebellion along with the real feelings that I was having but this past couple years really there's been a really big push by like conservatives to demonize trans people to um well you've seen like all the the health care bands and the bathroom bands and such and there are there's a group of probably about 10 detransitioners that they cycle through and one of these people that I'm former one of these people someone who used to do this that doesn't anymore I'm friends with

they get paid a lot of money to say the things that they do to call themselves mutilated and disgusting freaks and to allow conservatives to call them mutilated disgusting freaks that's been very successful

for them for the conservatives, for furthering that agenda. And so when people, we're a very small group, detransitioners. It's 1% of 1% of the population. So people, a lot of trans people don't have any experience with detransitioners outside of conservatives saying, oh, see, look, at these people, they regretted it so, so, you. Um, or for those people to go up and be like, there's, there's a, there's a, a woman,

I don't know if I should name names, but. You can just say a woman or yeah. There's, there's a woman who, um, had a pretty similar experience to me. She, she started testosterone. at about 13 and got her mastectomy also about 14 and is now one of a few people suing the insurance group Kaiser Permanente for covering this procedure and she she's very famous she got she got a standing ovation at a ron de santis rally in florida

and she was on the conservative political action conference and it's very vocal. She's testified in front of lawmakers in like 14 states and is making a lot of money from it. And this is this person is often the only detransitioner, the people that say detransitioner. the people that say detransitioners are transphobic have ever seen speak. That's what people think that detransitioners are transphobic. Yes.

That's interesting. Which to me doesn't really make sense because it's, I feel like it's more of like a physical. Like detransitioning, I feel like is more, I would think, is more of like a physical thing than it is anything else. Detransitioning, any, person of any gender can basically detransition.

Like there are trans people who stop taking hormones to preserve their fertility. Yeah. They're detransitioners. There are. And just because you choose to or not to do something doesn't mean you're like totally against something. Yeah. And I think too, something I wanted to add in was that I feel like, you know, at that young of an age to make, like that's a surgery is such a big decision. And it makes me wonder if there almost should be like an age limit where like it almost

forces you to kind of like wait it out just so you like mentally can think like is this a decision that I really want to make when I'm 18 or something like that just to give you that time. And I think too something else that wasn't on your side was information. Like while yes you were doing your own research, you were kind of neglected I feel like by the doctors. Like you said your consultation wasn't long. Like I feel like there should be more, I guess, information when it comes to, if you make this decision, here's what comes after that. Right.

And here's something to remember. And I mean, I think too, like as people, we always change our mind. Like there can be years that were dead set on something. And then 10 years down the road say, I don't feel the same way. And I think either way, that's fine too. But I feel like if there was more information and preparation and then even like, the post care and what things are like or what you can and cannot go back on or what's, you know, not going to be the same ever again. I feel like that should be so much more

there than it is. You know what I mean? Like it shouldn't just be an easy decision like, okay, you want to get your breasts removed? Sure. You know, because I feel like down the road, if you decide to change your mind, then you face, okay, well, now I might have to get four or five surgeries. And I feel like it's things like that that aren't discussed, which should be. And it's, even if I get those four or five surgeries, they removed organs that I'm never going to have back. I'm never going to be able to breastfeed my children. Okay. Kitty, come on.

I was 14 when I had my surgery, so I mean, this is kind of uncomfortable, but I'll never know what it feels like to be touched. Right. By a part. And that's sad. Yeah. And there are there so when I transitioned in 2018 they you had to have been identifying as trans for two years and been going to therapy for three years. Okay. And I had been.

But I hadn't been going to gender therapy for two years, which is three years, which is what you're saying. supposed to, which is what they mean when they say that. I found out that you need a letter for testosterone and top surgery. And I picked a therapist and I went in for one appointment and she wrote me the letter that I needed. and then I had probably a 30 minute like there's a packet that you have to go through that's like these are all the things that could happen your voice is going to drop you're going to get body hair you're going to your body fat's going to redistribute for testosterone

and I signed off on that and my parents signed it and then I Got it. Like it was it was two appointments. Right. And then my top surgeon was one appointment. And then are those, that's the only surgery you got was the top surgery? Mm-hmm. Okay. Did you ever consider anything else or?

Yes. Okay. I wanted bottom surgery at some point. I wanted it before I wanted top surgery. Like what do you think, I guess in your opinion, like what do you think changed for? you where you were at a point in your life that you really wanted like the bottom surgery first and then I know you didn't go through with that but that you wanted that and you um you decided to get your breast removed and then now you I don't want to say regret it and maybe you do but

I just feel like although it's a pain in the ass like where it is now I feel like sometimes we don't know unless we do things and it's always not the easiest things. and it can be complicated and a lot of things might follow that. But I almost feel like, how would you know if you never tried? You know, and if at one point you wanted that. But I guess, yeah, my question is, what do you think changed for you, like over the years of, like, wanting to go back on that?

And I, you know. Yeah. I think a big part of what led me to experiencing the gender dysphoria in the first place was beings actually abused. Okay. Okay. My breasts being sort of a focus of that. And that shame and that pain sort of read as gender dysphoria to my therapist.

And then when I was 16, I started going to a trauma-informed therapist. and started working through that. And I think once I started coming to terms with what happened to me, I realized that the consequences of the surgeries and the hormones were not what I wanted and not worth the things that happened that I did want. And like you said too, and correct me if I'm wrong, you said I think that even doing those surgeries and everything like that, it didn't help you feel any different, right? I. And I think too, like that's kind of what they like told you was a solution and would help you.

So I think going into something and then still feeling, I guess, confused or not like, you know, like what's, you know what I mean? Just not confident in your decision. I feel like can really be confusing even after that you're like, okay, well, I'm doing what they feel. suggested and then I still am just not where I want to be. And now a word from our sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Better Help Therapy online. For 10% off your first month, go to betterh-E-L-P.com slash insane. Start living a better life today. Life is a beautiful thing, but it is not always easy. We are faced with a lot of challenges through our lives, whether it's career challenges, relationships, friendships, friendships, family, literally anything.

you can imagine, life will probably throw it at you, and that's not a bad thing, but it's not always easy to get through things on our own. And this is why I think it is so important to reach out and talk to somebody, whether it's your friends, family members, or professional therapist. I've always struggled with anxiety and occasional panic attacks, and it can be really hard to conquer that on my own. It's been something that I've tried really hard to kind of sort through, figure out why I get them, mentally keep it to myself. and try to stop them, but it's really hard, if not impossible, to do on my own. And I have learned over the years that reaching out for help has been the best thing that I

could do because not only does it feel like I am being heard and understood, I can talk to somebody who's a professional that normalizes these emotions and things that I'm feeling and can offer different coping skills and even different breathing techniques, even if it seems simple that can really help me when I face these different panic attacks or anxiety circumstances that might happen to me. Therapy is something that can take a lot of time between setting up appointments, finding a therapist that suits you best. It can be a lot. It can be challenging and it's not a short and quick process, but this is why I love better help because it is entirely online, which means that it is convenient, it is flexible, and it is completely suited to your schedule. I personally have gone through

multiple different therapists in order to find one that suits me the best. And that is completely normal. It is challenging to find somebody who you can really feel like you can trust and open up to, but it's great because all you have to do if you want to try out BetterHelp is fill out a brief questionnaire and they match you with a licensed therapist and you are free to change therapists at any time until you find one that is perfect for you. Let therapy be your map with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash insane today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp help.com slash insane. Now back to the episode. There was this movement in the early 2010s on primarily Tumblr. It's embarrassing to talk about to a real person. The medical consensus for like a

century before then was that gender dysphoria was what made you transgender and transitioning was the only way to alleviate gender dysphoria and you should only transition if you have gender dysphoria and there was this movement primarily on Tumblr in the 2010s to say all of that's wrong that you don't have to have gender dysphoria to be trans that you can transition and not have gender dysphoria and that you can transition and or that you can trans, sorry. Be trans and not transition. Yeah. That you can be trans. So that's what I was just like going to say too. I feel like you can identify something and be trans but not necessarily want to go through all the surgeries and things like that. There's a lot of complications. Yeah. And those are big

decisions. Removing organs. Right. And there are people that want to be parents and want to to breastfeed and want to, there's a lot of reasons why someone would decide not to transition. Right. But sort of with this, these good things, the not needing to transition, not, there's also this idea that hormones are something you can play around with, that you can go on testosterone or estrogen and if you don't like it stop taking them. But testosterone, synthetic testosterone was designed to cause permanent changes to your body. And synthetic estrogen, I'm pretty sure, was designed as a alternative to breast augmentation for cis women because it makes your chest grow. And those things are

permanent without surgery to remove and they're not something you can play around with that it's it is something you need to be sure about these aren't

and there was this idea that like a cis person wouldn't want this a cis person wouldn't hate their breasts so if you do you are

are trans and transitioning is the only way to treat your discomfort. And so, like, I was being told from my social circles that this was the only way. I was being told from my therapist and doctors that this was the only way. Did you feel like you had, like, a pretty good support group even with friends or not really? Like, did you feel like you were kind of on your own with all the decision making? All of my friends were also trans. jealous of me, basically. So I couldn't go to them and be like, hey, I'm not really sure about this.

Right. And if I did, they probably would have told me, well, a cis person wouldn't want this. A cis person wouldn't want to remove their breasts. So you're trans and you're doing the right thing. And the point of having to get the letter and the therapy before you're allowed to do these things is so that you can be properly evaluated and to make sure this is the right thing for you.

And so giving it out in one appointment is irresponsible. It sort of negates the point of the letter to begin with. And my therapist was a gender-affirming therapist, so she didn't even question if I, was really trans or if this was really the right thing for me. I basically came in with these self-diagnosed feelings about myself and came in, I have gender dysphoria, I'm trans, I want this,

and I need a letter for that. And she just accepted all of that. Like she just took it all at face value. Because that sort of negates the point of getting evaluated to begin with. And there's a lot of work that needs to be. done with that system for sure. And I don't think banning it even for, even for people that were my age, is really the right call because there are so many people that get these surgeries at the age that I got them. And they're happy with it. And they're so much better for it. Yeah.

But it's something that can be so dangerous if there's not serious gatekeeping. Yeah. Like a longer process. Right. When you say that, people will get upset because it's like you're delaying this for people who need it. But we're delaying it for the people who don't need it that are going to get it if we don't delay it. Right. You know? Yeah. And it's not taking it away.

It's more so just prolonging it in the sense that people are getting the information that they need and being prepared for everything in every aspect. Exactly. Yeah. Trans kids deserve better than to be fast-tracked along this process and told that this is the only way. Because this isn't the only way. Talk therapy has been a proven good treatment for gender dysphoria. Their stance is that I was never really trans. I just, I was confused and made a mistake, like singularly on my own. And that's confusing to me. because I made that decision when I was nine years old. And I couldn't, none of this could have gone any farther if I had just made that decision in that mistake.

There were parents and doctors and therapists that were meant to be determining if this was the right thing for me, like it was their job to determine if this was the right thing for me, and they were wrong. And they get really, defensive about that, trans people online. There's a lot of money in the trans health care game, because a lot of it isn't covered by insurance. So you can get a lifelong patient who's going to be paying you at least $300 every month. And when you say that there are doctors that are greedy

and will use this irresponsibly and will fast-track people along this process to create lifelong patients for medical incentive or for financial incentive. It's even like people who claim to criticize the industry and claim to... People who claim to be like communists and who hate the for-profit medical industry will argue with me about this,

that there are doctors who transition kids for financial incentive. You know what I mean? And then did you say that now you still identify as trans or you don't? I don't really. Okay. I think I'm more of a woman than anything else. Okay. But you don't like hard core identify with one side of anything.

Right. Okay. I don't really. They want it to be that I was just a cis woman who made a mistake. And what does that mean exactly? A cis woman. Yeah. A cis woman is a biological female, someone who's born female who identifies as female.

Okay. And that's also like being trans is identifying with a gender that isn't what you were born as. Okay. So it's confusing to me that they would say I was never trans because I did identify as a different gender. And I have gender dysphoria, which is what other people would say makes you trans. So they completely dismiss my side of things, my perspective. And not everything is clear cut in this world. Like, yeah, there might be some people that know right off the bat.

And like you said, get these surgeries and make. that decision and they're happy with it. But then there also could be people that are confused or they make a decision and they're like, well, I don't really know if I want to stick with that. And that's fine too because not everything, we're not going to go through life with the same mindset. Yeah. Our whole life.

So. And when other people, when like, when a trans person says that their identity has shifted over time and changed as they've grown, nobody really has. an issue with that, but when I say that I was trans, that I, at that time, I do, I was a trans man, I believe. I, um, like, I was hospitalized because I attempted to cut my breasts off with a butcher's knife. And I was hospitalized many times after that for suicidality caused by my gender dysphoria. Yeah. I was trans.

But because of how I identify now and how I present now, I must just be confused. And I was just... And I think, too, like you said, which I think a lot of people might disagree with as well. Your circumstances as a child, I think too probably made you hate what came with being a woman. Yeah. You know, like having boobs and having that be something that, you know, men focus on. And having something negative happened to you, I can see how that could make you not want those things and not want to be a woman because it's scary. Like right when I was transitioning from girlhood into adulthood or to womanhood, I was told or I was shown that being a woman is to be objectified and to be in pain.

and I didn't really want that. When you transition into being a man, you lose that sort of like camaraderie with other women. Like women would pass the street or across the street when I would be walking towards them. And like just things that are seen as hard. harmless now that I do were seen as like, like I talk too much and I over-explained things. And at that point in time, it was condescending because I was talking down to people, I guess.

Also, transitioning, you get to see how men and in my point in time, eighth grade and ninth grade boys talk about women behind closed doors. And that was really scary. And I think that's probably why I realized I couldn't be a man. They treat the word rape as like an accomplishment, like winning a game. And I couldn't let them know that I was someone who, knew far too much about rape to ever think it was funny. And if I did, if they found out, I could be in real danger. When I realized that is when I think I realized I couldn't be a man.

And I think too, like at the end of the day, you're, you are who you are, like internally as far as like your personality goes, who you are as a person. You know, even if you are trans or you decide to change things about yourself. Like that doesn't make you like all of a sudden this macho man within. You know what I mean? Like you're just because you do that doesn't mean you're going to, you know, talk to men, you know, in the same way that they might be viewing and talking about women. Right.

So I think too that it makes sense that that was something that kind of was like a shock to you. Like, hold on. You know what I mean? So and it is sad because I think a lot of times that's just sky talk. And they think it's normal. But yeah, if women heard it, we would be disgusted. It's gross. Yeah.

So, yeah, I mean, that doesn't surprise me. And I think, too, that could be something that would, I feel like in a way, scare you out of that. It was, I think, the fear. Yeah. Even when I was rejecting the labels, women and female and such, I knew that when they were talking about women, they were talking about me. and that scared me I was too afraid to like I switched out of boys' choir after that

and I mean I've always hated public bathrooms but I stopped using them after that because well I looked and sounded like a man male and so I would have to hear that stuff in the men's bathroom and I would likely be attacked if I went into the women's bathroom. So I just, I developed like chronic UTI issues and testosterone also doesn't help that. One of the more common consequences of testosterone use is urinary tract issues.

And like I can't fully empty my bladder now because of the damage to those muscles. by my behavior and by the hormones. Right. So if there was any, I guess, advice that you could give to your younger self or maybe even other people when you were that age, what would it be? I guess looking back now, and I know it's hard to say, I feel like, because until every month, every day, every year of life, we learn new things and we feel differently, like I was saying.

Our mind is always changing. but I guess from your personal experience. I would tell myself that I was beautiful and that what happened to me doesn't define who I am going forward and doesn't have to define how I look at myself. I really hated my body, as most 14-year-old girls do. And I wish I could tell myself from back then that it was just how I dressed myself.

I was beautiful. And all these hormones and medications, I've been on a laundry list of medications like psychiatric, aren't going to make you feel better. The only thing that can make you feel better is healing. To other people, I would say heal from, because everyone has trauma. Everyone has different stuff they're going through. Heal, talk to a therapist before you make any permanent life-changing decisions. or before you have any organs removed.

And I was going to say too, I think, like you said, you know, loving yourself or who you are no matter what that means, you know, and I think besides gender, just knowing, being confident in like, okay, this is who I am, this is the things that I believe in, these are my morals and all that,

you know what I mean? All the important stuff that's deep down. Because at the end of the day, this is just a show. Right. And you can do whatever you want to it, I think, but getting to a place within that you really, really are confident in who you are as a human being and treating others right,

treating yourself right, loving yourself, and projecting that onto others. I think that's the most important thing. For sure. And I think that it's really sad that people are so judgmental and with all these terms of like, okay, well, now you're not trans anymore. You can't be trans or you are trans because you have this, this, this, and like, I just think that people can identify however the fuck they want. Free speech, free choice, whatever.

But the terminology and how angry people get is beyond me. Like, just let someone live. For sure. And I feel like, like I said, I know it's way bigger and way more complicated than this. But if at one point someone wants to be a woman and they want to be a man and they want to go back to it, like that's their life. You know what I mean? and the only person that really is dealing with that is that person.

And I just feel like I think that it comes from a place of like, I think a lot of times because there is so much hate in the world, I think that trans people and just people in general from all different types of groups, they tend to get defensive. And they almost feel like they have to form this close-knit group that we're all alike because all we have is each other and there is so much hate. And I get that. But I also think that someone like, you. for example, shouldn't be, I guess, I don't want to say bullied, but shouldn't be treated

differently because you didn't fit into the exact category or you didn't go through it the same way as somebody else did. Because like I said, everybody experiences things differently. It's not always a clear-cut decision in life with anything. So I think that's the thing that I guess upsets me the most about it is that people can be so like you're either this or you're this or that. You know, and just like let people live. And I think that it's so important that you came on here to discuss your experience

because while for other people it might have been a very easy decision, you know, it seems like for you, it was full of. Confucian isn't the word I'm looking for. But like. Hesitation. Yeah. And I don't think you had enough like information from the right people, like from those doctors. And I feel like even if you still decided to go down that road,

I feel like if you had more, I guess, support, but in the way that was like really informative, if that makes sense, I just feel like at least you could have looked back and be like, okay, well, they did tell me all these things. And I still made that decision. I feel like that's kind of where that kind of regret comes from is feeling like you were looking back and like, well, I didn't, I wasn't told this.

And it was a fast process. And I think for some people, like you said, that is fine. But then for people in your case, you might decide, I don't want this anymore. And that's okay too. And I think that's important. I think it's important for people to hear all different sides of it. Because there's definitely other people out there that even if they might not say it, they might feel like, well, what?

Even if it's not a regret, they might feel like, well, what if I didn't transition? Like, what if I would have stayed this way? So I feel like that's why it's important to discuss. For sure. That's all very important. Like I think what happened to me, was a medical malpractice. And I think it would have been medical malpractice

if it was done on like a 50-year-old real trans person. Like, it wasn't wrong because I was young and it wasn't wrong because I wasn't really trans or that I would regret it later. I think it was wrong because I wasn't properly informed.

of the decision I was making. I mean, you're removing body parts. There are obviously going to be consequences. Right. But I wasn't told what those consequences were going to be. And I should have been. And I think, too, like not having someone not guarantee that that is the solution. Mm-hmm.

Like changing physical things isn't going to change things internally and mentally for you. Yeah. There's this idea that you can be too far gone. that you you there are people who have been on hormones for like decades and have had all their reproductive organs removed and um feel like well I made my bed that this is there's no going back basically yeah there there are I mean it's just a fact that there are people identifying as trans right now that are going to detransition and there are people in like conservative states where they're banning this kind of healthcare that are going to be forced to

detransition. And I think it's so important to clarify that there's life after detransition and it can be beautiful. There are people that will understand what you're going through and there are people who love you. There's this idea that I would rather die than detransition. And detransition can be a temporary thing, like something like 60% of people who detransition retransition. It can be a safety thing. For me, transitioning was very much a safety thing. I didn't want to be attacked for being a woman anymore.

So I became a man. That will be what detransitioning will be for a lot of people, that you have to hide yourself until it's safe. to be who you really are. And I feel like too, it seems like on both ends, you didn't find that safety. Yeah. And I think that's what can make things so confusing and scary because we do live in a very evil world.

And I think that no matter what you are, you can face a lot of negative things and trauma. And I almost feel like, like I said before, because you were set up to believe that transitioning was going to fix your problems just to like kind of do that and then still not feel safe. Yeah. is where it gets even more confusing and more like, well, this was supposed to help me. And yeah, I feel like that makes a lot of sense with the safety aspect of things. I mean, no one's ever going to really truly be safe because it's an evil world, like you said. And being a man didn't protect me from being abused again.

I still got abused. Transitioning makes a lot of things harder. The bathroom stuff that I was talking about, and like just hate a lot of bullying and a lot of, there's just a lot of pain. People care too much. Yeah. And they have too many opinions that really don't matter.

Like at all. That's like something I'll never understand. Like ever. And I totally get that people can have their belief. Everybody has beliefs and mindsets and opinions, whatever. But like, there's so much more serious shit happening that, like, like people are so worried about what someone's identifying as rather than people that are being kidnapped or killed or raped or anything trafficked like why does it matter yeah what like what someone

is who and what is the point of bullying someone for that because you don't agree because you think it's weird like I don't get it like that's something that just like never made sense to me. Like, why do people care that much? Like, you think the person going into the bathroom is a man in a dress. Child marriage is legal in 29 states. Like, can we focus on the actual, the real issues? You know what I mean? Right, like, that's not putting someone in, like, danger.

Right. You know what I mean? Like, and it's someone, that's someone's choice. Yeah. And, like, if you're, I don't know, you're able to choose so many things in this world. You can choose to get, if you're a woman, you can choose to get breast implants. So what's the difference if you're a man and you want breast implants? Like, I don't know.

That's just how I just, why do you care? You know what I mean? That's just how I feel. But people, I think, want to feel like they're more powerful than they are and have more opinions. And, you know, I see a lot of negative comments and people just writing mean things. And I, mind blowing to me. You can't even, I can't even, like, explain it and wrap my head around it because, like, just feel like if you aren't like that you're never going to understand somebody who is but it's that

like I said it really is sad to me that I feel like it's very hard in this world to find support from everyone and anyone like it's like you have to find a specific group or like a doctor or a therapist like why can't just be anyone in your life that just is like maybe I don't exactly understand but like I'm here for you no matter what you decide to do like I support you we're all human the of the day, man, woman, whatever. Like, we're still, we should just treat each other as humans. For sure. It's not like that.

No. The world isn't that. No, it's not that easy. Everyone always wants to have someone below them on the social ladder. It makes them feel better. Yeah. Men want to be above women. Women want to be, like, there's so many cross-sections.

And I think potentially a reason why there's, so much vitriol for detransitioners among the trans community could be that. Like, well, at least I'm not the bottom tier. At least I'm not the bottom wrong of the latter, you know? I get that there's a lot of pain in the trans community surrounding like people who went through too much puberty to be able to ever really fully pass as the gender that they want to. and so when someone says we should make it harder to transition, that's where that pain comes from.

That's where that. And I understand that. But you would think that a group that has been so socially weaponized would understand that the way a different group is socially weaponized doesn't reflect the views of that group and especially not individuals within that group. but that hasn't been my experience they saw that detransitioner on TV and so that must be what detransitioners think and I think too not everyone like we're saying not everyone fits into a specific group yeah you know like everybody's different everybody has different mindsets and goes through different things so I just feel like and that's kind of why I stress like the importance of just having support from anyone and everyone because not not everyone is going to easily fit into one category of something. Yeah.

You can be trans and detransition. Yeah. And I guess some people would say that that's me. But you don't get to define somebody else. You can only define yourself. That's also something that kind of gets taken away from you when you de-transition is your ability to define your own identity. I've been told over and over that I was just a confused cis.

person and that I'm talking over trans people by sharing my lived life experiences. And I don't think someone's life can be bigoted or prejudiced. Like I could use my life experiences in bigoted or prejudiced ways, but what I experienced is what I experienced. Absolutely. And I think like I said, the more that different types of stories are shared, the more that there's always going to be somebody that's experiencing something similar. It might not be exactly the same, but somebody might be having maybe certain like thoughts or confusions. And I feel like, you know, having you come on here and explain your story is something that can confirm to someone else maybe. Like, I'm not alone.

Yeah. Or, wow, like I shouldn't feel bad for maybe one. wanting to go back on a decision I made. Because you shouldn't, I feel like with anything that you do, you should feel like you can change your mind. Yeah. No matter what it is. Because we can.

And you won't, I'm talking to the audience now, I guess. You can go back at any point and it won't reflect on who you are as a person. Like you will always be who you are. And it's not transphobic. to regret your medical decisions. People have bodily autonomy, and a natural consequence of that is that sometimes people will regret things

that they did with that autonomy. And that's not a good reason to take it away. I'm pretty sure the regret rate for abortion and chemotherapy and knee replacement surgery are all higher than the regret rate for transition. And that's not to say that people who regret it, their experiences aren't real or don't valid. Hi.

But we are the minority in this situation. Most people who get this kind of care are better for getting this kind of care. And you're not wrong for not being better for it, but other people aren't wrong for being better for it. No, overall, like I said, I think that, it's so important for different perspectives and experiences to be shared. And like I said, even if I always say this to my guess, but even if somebody doesn't have the exact experience as you, there's always at least one person out there that I feel

like can, it resonates with. Yeah. And they say, you know, even if it's a completely different circumstance. But I think that it takes a lot of courage and strength to open, say like I did this and now I don't want to go down that path anymore and I think that it's because we do live in a world that's full of judgment and it can be scary and I think the fact that you're willing to open up and be vulnerable and share that experience is so much about you and your strength as a person and I feel like the main thing from this episode and having you on that I take from

this is like like we were saying to not let anything define who you are as a person. Like love yourself as a person. And whatever decisions you want to make, make them, don't make them. Who cares? But, you know, any decision you make is okay and is fine. And I think, like I said, even if now, you know, you might regret things that you did or decisions that you made when you were younger, whether that was because of, you know,

circumstances or lack of education, you still made them. And, you know, I think that in a way it was meant to be because. now you can educate other people. Because I'm sure that there's still people that might make that decision and not have that education. And there might be kids that are doing their research and might stumble across this video and have, you know what I mean? Just have like a completely different perspective and a real life experience versus like

an article they might read. Right. Or like a yes or no on Google. So I feel like that's really important because hearing from somebody just like straight on in a very raw format can give somebody a completely different understanding of something. Yeah. And especially because it's not something that's really talked about at all. So, and I always say that's something that's so important is to shed light on topics that

aren't really discussed. For sure. Because it's just as important as the bigger ones. Trans people are such a small population and then detransition. Like I said, it's 1% of 1%. Yeah. And that doesn't make it any less of a real experience. Exactly. I agree. But thank you so much for coming on and for sharing your experience and your story. I appreciate it so much. You did incredible. Thank you. Of course. Of course. Great job. Thank you.