Detransitioning

It means in the trans-community going back to live in the gender of your birth. It doesn't happen often, but it does happen. In the news last was about a person who detransitioned over in England.

'I was born a boy, became a girl, and now I want to be a boy again': Britain's youngest sex swap patient to reverse her sex change treatment
Dailymail
By Katy Winter
PUBLISHED: 29 October 2012 | UPDATED: 30 October 2012

________ [I deleted her name because it is not important for what I am writing about and a minor.] made headlines last year when she became Britain’s youngest sex change patient aged 17, after years of begging her family and the NHS to turn her in to a girl.

But now, having lived as a women for less than a year the 18-year has decided to change back in to a man after suffering huge mental anguish as a woman.

She has cancelled the full sex change operation that was scheduled for January and ceased the female hormone therapy that has seen her develop breasts saying that she has found the changes overwhelming and that they have made her deeply unhappy.

The article goes on to say how the transition and the hormones affected her. But I think what was telling was the comment that made about how her transition estranged her from her family,

‘The night I tried to slash my wrists I’d downed a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and just thought about how alone I am, and how my decision has alienated my family and how I will have to become a boy again to resolve it.’

One of the things that results in a positive outcome is a support system, especially the family and to me it sounds like she had resistance from her family. For children it has been shown time and time again, that a loving family can actually make the difference between life and death.

In another article in the Daily Mail about trans-girl who successfully transitioned they write…

Evidence suggests that four in five pre-pubertal children diagnosed with GID do not go on to experience the condition in adulthood. Of those who fulfil the criteria for GID at puberty, one in five becomes happy in the gender they were born. To add to the confusion, many children originally identified with GID turn out to be homosexual instead. It would seem there is a problematic grey area in differentiating so early between sexuality and gender identity. However, Dr Carmichael believes there is a strong case for treating these children.

So if eighty percent of the children do not go on to transition, why do you allow them to transition? The answer is simple, to allow them to find out for themselves what is their true gender. If you force them to live a role that may or may not be their true gender you create internal stress that can lead to suicide or other emotional problems.

Ms. Kaplan, LCSW writes in her blog, Transgender Mental Health about detransitioning and says this about external pressure,

The person encountered too many problems with transition (i.e. dissatisfaction with their post-transition life).  These problems could include lack of family support, loss of partner, problems with transition in the workplace, disappointment with the outcome of surgery and problems “passing” as the new gender.  Additionally, transitioning is hard.  There are many hoops to jump through and one enters into a group of discriminated against people.  This can be exceedingly disconcerting for some.

As she says, “transitioning is hard” it is probably the hardest thing that they do in their life time and if you don’t pass that good, you face constant microaggressions from strangers in their comments and behavior. For school children it can be in the form of bullying or shunning (no one wants to be their friend, they never get picked for sports teams, etc.). It can come from fellow employees who always use the wrong pronoun. It can be something as simple as getting asked all the time for you ID when you use your credit card.

In 2009 a sports writer committed suicide, a year earlier he detransitioned after having transitioned in 2007. No reason was ever state as to why she did go back to being identified as male, but I can imagine that one of the reasons was the pressure that she felt from society because she was a transsexual. Being such a public figure in a male dominate field, I feel, must have played a part in her de-transitioning.

I know someone who detransitioned she couldn’t find a job that paid enough to support her and her wife. So he detransitioned to live with his wife’s parents who were deeply religious. Many of my friends said, “Oh he must not have been transsexual because he’s living as a man” and I said this has nothing to do with being trans or not, but it has to do with love.


We must remember that one of the purposes of living as our true gender is not only to find out whether we are trans or not, but also whether we can deal with the pressures of transitioning and for those who detransition that does not necessarily mean they are not trans.