Well... I believe I might be at the cusp of it, so pardon my rambling, if this gets rambly, as I recently started considering detransitioning. Very recently. I'm not entirely sure if I will yet or not, cause well I've been living as a man for the past 9 years, so it's not something I can easily toss aside and I'm still working on understanding my own feelings, but I do feel more and more like a woman, that I might want to go back to living as one and I'm re-connecting more to whatever remains of my birth sex features. But then as to what I may or may not want to try to medically revert in terms of transitional changes, I really don't know yet.
My reasons for considering detransition do not impede on any scientific evidence of that transitioning is generally a good thing for trans people; they are personal, and I seem to be one of few who actually, genuinely thought I was trans but turns out I wasn't.
I was an adult when I came out as trans and pursued transition, but very barely, at age 19, and also very traumatised and with a split personality since childhood, that I chose to hide from the gender therapists. I discovered being trans very soon after having been raped and then gone through an abusive relationship. I started taking T via black market at age 21, and got it legally prescribed by endo at age 24. I'm 29 now. In total I've been on T for almost 6 years and had top surgery 4 years ago. So, quite a lot of permanent changes by now, but I can still pass well as a woman. I was planning on getting SRS, had been approved by a surgeon and got on a waiting list for it, but then changed my mind in all good time. For that I'm very glad.
In general that did always feel right and good to be transitioning and passing more and more as a man, but there was always something nagging at me about it, and a lot that didn't make a lot of sense or was off. But I didn't dare to look into if I could have been wrong about being trans cause the more time that passed on T the harder it would be to go back, and the more scared I got of that possibility. I simply didn't want to know.
But then I had a switch with my alter, for the first time in many years as that generally happens very rarely, just a few days ago, and she took something with her up from the depths of me when we switched: reverse dysphoria. Or I don't know if that's a term or if I just invented it, but what I mean is that I basically got dysphoric over looking like a man, and virtually panicked over my reflection. After that I knew I had to find out more so went digging in my mind. And found out that most likely all of my original dysphoria was just body dysmorphia from the traumatic sexual assault I had been through in my childhood and teens, which had of course caused the personality split. That so conveniently targeted my chest and genitals, and gave me a subtly sexistic view on men and women, in favour of men, which made me think I was trans. Upon realising, it clicked in me. That deep wanting to embrace my femaleness that I had been pushing away subconsciously due to the trauma that made me hate my body.
I'm not diagnosed with DID due to not having spoken up about my issues to any therapists yet, but because I barely have any amnesia I've been very aware. And with that I'm guessing I could likely have DDNOS/OSDD which is kind of a variant of DID.
Realising all of that yesterday, I'm still in shock, but trying to just... idk, playfully explore things and try not to worry too much of what might be ahead. But of course I couldn't help but finding my way to this part of this forum. So far I've shaved a lot, been experimenting with clothes and makeup cause luckily I saved a lot of that stuff from my past and acquired some new on the way, looked into a new female name, and having the only friend of mine who knows this yet use female pronouns and terms for me to help me test it out. So far it feels good and comforting, but I also have moments of total confusion. I know that deep inside I fear the future though.
So in short, my reason is sex characteristics focused dysmorphia brought on by trauma, that I mistook for gender dysphoria. So I guess I'm really just a traumatised woman who thought she was a man for 9 years. And I should have known but I didn't. But I suspected it more than I wanted to admit. I don't blame anyone, except possibly myself for lying to therapists about my trauma and its aftermaths. But then I also did what I thought I had to do at that time. It has nothing to do with other people actually being trans and needing to transition, and living happily ever after with that. You do you, kinda. But I'm sure I'll always support trans people and their journeys, regardless. So I'll probably stick around here for a while longer, in some corner or another, giving my friendly feedback on stuff I know.
Yeah, I will definitely talk to my therapist about this stuff and start looking into some trauma therapy, when she's back from her vacation. Don't know if I should contact the gender clinic too maybe. And no, I haven't changed my profile pic or other info here yet, or on any other social media. I need to test my waters mostly in secrecy at this very early point, before I make any definite decisions. It's pretty big, after all.
Oh and yeah, it's likely that my trauma issues felt very similar to gender dysphoria due to the nature of them, but it's not the same thing. I may have temporarily treated the symptoms of some of my trauma by transitioning, but the root of it is still festering at the core, causing more and other problems. On that point it's very different from actual gender dysphoria. I don't think they should be treated the same. I read through a bit of what was said already in this thread, on the first page at least, and couldn't help but notice there was some focus on trauma and sexual abuse. I'm not an expert but I've read up a lot and lived through a lot, and I don't think transsexualism and abuse are really all that connected and I think that they should be treated as separate issues. Also for those who deal with both. Now I need to sleep and see if I can muster going swimming in "guy mode" tomorrow. I really should look into getting a women's swim suit of some kind... I don't wanna slack on my exercise.
