Sex Change Regret website

[arbon]

6. There are far more people who regret NOT transitioning than those who regret transitioning, probably by a factor of 1000
7. There are far more people who commit suicide rather than those who regret transition, probably by a factor of 1000

Thats the part that scares me more then people regretting transition - people getting stuck and unable to move forward, people killing themselves. Because I was in that spot and it was messed up. Seeing people who were successful in transition helped a lot gave me some hope that I could to.

[Marleena]

Arbon I'm feeling in that stuck place right now and getting depressed again. We're losing our home of twenty years and moving into a townhouse complex this week,*sigh*. Right now my priority is keeping a roof over my head. I too am far more concerned about people struggling to transition and all of the obstacles in their path.

The regretter in the OP made his own mess and should not be blaming the community or gatekeepers for his own mistakes. He should not be making it difficult for others and even profiting from it. He had choices and messed up with only himself to blame.

[whowhatwhen]

I dunno, lots of talk about regret and maybe only one or two people in this thread personally knows someone who regrets transition.
Otherwise it sounds like RLE works as intended and those who don't need to go any further stop where they are comfortable.

Beyond that it's just arguing stuff back and forth.

[Frances]

Regret does not always lead to detransition. I have seen quite a lot of regret over the years on this forum. Some have detransitioned, some are plugging along for now. I also have a few Facebook acquaintances who detransitioned after years of RLE. It happens, but threads, posts and profiles get erased, along with memories.

[LeaP]

You know what's hilarious about this forum? There isn't a single person here that ...

There's a simple reason for that, and that is there are very few with regrets, period.

Those who are CDs aren't likely to be here in the transsexual forum in sackcloth and ashes. If they are vocal about it at all, they are more likely to be positioning themselves as anti-SRS activists, hoping to save all the poor trannies from their delusions and sway the medical profession back to its proper ethics.

Why you would find anything related to this funny, truly funny, ironic, or otherwise, is completely beyond me.

[Frances]

FtM dissappear and rarely face the scorn and ridicule reserved for trans women. Not all of them get bottom surgery as it's not required in most jurisdictions for a legal sex change. Their transition is visibly easier and the changes are not reversible for the most part. Going back is not a real option and there is no social pressure to do so. After all, they picked the socialy respected and powerful gender.

Do you know any FtMs, whowhatwhen?

[whowhatwhen]

Sorry, I deleted the post because I didn't want to go down that road.
Yeah, I've met a few trans guys IRL and they were just like any other guy I've met.

I just thought it was interesting that we have all these "real trans" discussions here and it's only about MtFs.

[Kathryn Martin]

Given the fact that this is an open forum and anyone can post maybe it is because trans guys don't find us all that interesting?

[Starling]

Kathryn, perhaps after what they have gone through they just can't imagine why anyone would want to choose to live as a female. Despite knowing that the sword cuts both ways, I have trouble appreciating FTM for the same reason.

Lallie

...Misty used the word – hollow – that expresses it very well. This has nothing (or should have nothing) to do with aspirations. There are many ways of expressing this narrow, restricted way of living within yourself. One is the cliché about being trapped in a man's body. Another is imprisonment. Another is hollowness. Yet another a false persona or shell. All of them describe a fundamental, culturally reinforced inability to live openly in the real world. It gradually kills the spirit to the point where, when you die inside, you either give up or choose to literally stop living.

I'm conversant with all those feelings, LeaP, believe me. I guess I was not so much discussing goals and aspirations, but defending the honesty of our relations with other people. The human being we laid before them was not a sham, but a brave survivor of a great hurt. When I write it, it seems grandiose, but after all, we bear a burden that few others do, or would ever want to.

Lallie

[Kate T]

LeaP and Frances: Regarding post transition suicide rates etc. The swedish study Foxglove gave a link to had some information on this including survival graphs. It may have some of the info you want. It was one of the Pubmed links and is open text (i.e. the entire paper, not just an abstract is available free of charge). The same study Frances reported significantly higher incidence of crime rates as well as suicides in FTM vs controls. Hardly the characteristics of a group that easily transitions. The broad generalities of your statement I think are a smidgen belittling of the struggles that our friends in the FTM community also face though I don't think that was your intention. Maybe FTM are just better at dealing with discrimination than us MTF because they have been fighting discrimination their whole lives

[Frances]

Adina, I don't remember mentioning suicide or studies. Are you responding to the right person?

[Kaitlyn Michele]

I think Frances you used the term "visibly easier"... I took that to mean its easier to look like a man. It's easier to pass, blend, be accepted ...whatever you want to call it..
+++++

So after all this, here is my question...

If you are considering transition, is fear of regret something that is holding you back??

Transition is very difficult in many ways, and people around you often pressure you to show them the goods and they quietly disbelieve you and wait for you to fail...a good appearance and integration is often far away at the start.. you will be clocked.....is this something holding you back??

Can outside pressures cause you to feel regret, and more importantly will this "regret" cause you make compromises, doubt yourself as a woman (its very different to doubt yourself as a woman than doubt your transition)?

If you are very concerned with these fears, you could consider waiting it out.

To me the biggest fear you should have is not transitioning well. Starting too early, not being emotionally stable and prepared for the slog, not being really honest with SO's about what you are really doing (to me this is mistake #1..trying to manipulate the info to get the SO on board) or not being prepared for the reality the SO faces when you are truly living as a female...also not properly planning to achieve realistic goals around your job, your appearance, your social life..etc...

If you start this process with fear of failure being a big part of your life, you have a bigger chance to fail.. you have a good chance to make compromises that speak to your fear instead of your goal... what a shame for any woman that tries to live her best life and fails because she focused on ways to fail

I will answer for myself... I certainly feared these things... but my desperation trumped them...fear and doubt relating to regret and loss were eliminated by fear of dying as a man..and that was that.. once I started I had literally zero doubt

Unfortunately if you parse all this out, there is a conclusion you can infer that the only way to eliminate doubt is to make the leap...that's how it worked out for me..
one fear over another.... some are more confident in their inner dialogue...that's a great place to be prior to transition...this issue won't touch them... if you are reading this far however, that's probably not you!!!

the best response I can give to that is that this is why its so important to do the hard work and allow yourself to admit you are female...that why you need a therapist that gets it... perhaps, like me, you just have to wait until the desperation kicks in.

and this is why its so important to plan out and execute your plan as best you can... that's because IF you are a woman, the way transition fails has nothing to do with "fear of regret" and everything to do with events and circumstances around your transition

In other words, get the idea of fear of regret out of your head...its WORTHLESS to you...its fear of fear..

think of the nuts and bolts... the specifics of what you need to do and how to do it..
fear of regret is fear of the boogeyman... the up and down, boots on the ground, mundane day to day reality of transition is what you need to consider.

[Starling]

...get the idea of fear of regret out of your head...its WORTHLESS to you...its fear of fear..

Wow. Just wow.

Lallie

[Kathryn Martin]

Kaitelyn,

truer words could not have been said. When I transitioned I had reached a point where I had made peace with myself and that opened the door to transition. No qualms about who I was, all fear gone, couldn't have given a hoot about what people would think and incredibly focused on doing what needed to be done. No waiting around, no longer any questions or doubts. From that point to social and professional transition was pure execution and it took all of nine months. One year later surgery, I have not looked back.

[Jonianne]

Melissa, I liked what you said about not encouraging someone in transition, but being supportive. Kaitlyn, "getting the fear of regret out of your head" is important too. I will always have regrets about whatever I do when it hurts someone else. A good quote about that Iv'e heard is, "yes, there have been regrets, but NO doubts".

What seems interesting to me, in a TS support group I go to, there are a lot of those who are gender varient, especially young people and have no interest in SRS. In a way I think that is good, because people are being more comfortable with not feeling under pressure with either gatekeeping or being pushed to SRS. People that feel somewhat feminine or are searching are feeling more and more comfortable to go only as far as they really are inside. I think this attitude is helpful in limiting the number of those who may make a serious mistake in having SRS. They have an option of not going that far if it is not for them. What do you think?

Refering to the OP, I have had indrect dealings with another religious detransitioner, Jerry Leach, who really made my blood boil.

[Pink Person]

Some transitions are harder than others. The transition from work to play always seems easier than the opposite one for example. Perhaps your transition through salad to sweets at mealtime is a rough ride. Bear with it soldier!

I suppose it's possible to regret stepping out the door as much as walking across the desert but in most cases the trips would be very different and affect you differently.

Feminine people (hello audience) who have to walk across a desert to abide and become comfortable with their gender status might develop some regrets in the process. Feminine people who only have to take small steps outside of their normal shelters to find peace with themselves tend to suffer fewer pains.

Caution is a virtue. If your transition from one version of you to another version involves a desert march then try searching for yourself closer to home first to avoid getting burned in the process.

In other words, if the new you doesn't hit close to home with the old you then you should stop and ask for directions.

[gonegirl]

Pink Person - Your metaphors are eloquent, however, I don't understand what you are saying. Could you please explain your meaning, preferably in reference to your own experience transitioning?

[kerrianna]

So why do a dozen or so bitches on this board get all 'gate keepy' when a new girl starts yammering about transition? Because we care. Because we know what's coming. We have no way of knowing what's in your heart so when we say "think twice" we're just trying to stem the tide of blind support that we know exists in the greater trans community. I will support any person that transitions, but at the same time I will discourage anyone that is "thinking" about it. My feeling is if a bitchy tranny on an internet forum can sway you or confuse you than you are simply NOT ready to transition. If you think I'm a bitch, than you need to know that LIFE is a real bitch when you are coming out. Especially at work.

Transition regret is a real thing and the people that regret it are the same people who didn't really know what they were in for when they pulled the pin.

I think it's patronizing and unnecessary to discourage people.
People come on here and process, prod, explore, try to find answers and probe their feelings. When they put it out there they are thinking about this or that, someone else telling them what to do isn't necessarily going to be helpful. So then what is your motivation?

You don't know their whole lives, their own truths. Heck many of us have a hard time finding out what is true to us. It's a PERSONAL journey and process. To dissuade someone is controlling and futile IMO.

Now, to share your experience, to answer someone who asks SPECIFICALLY for advice, and to remind people that this is not to be taken lightly... that can be useful.

If that's what you are referring to as discourage then my apologies. But if you are suggesting that you want to "fix" someone, save them from themselves, then I just find that incredibly hard to justify. We don't own experience.

Telling someone who is in turmoil that they are wrong or mistaken is not all that helpful. It creates defensiveness and shuts people down. TALKING about things, openly and WITHOUT judgment, helps people.

So what is your motivation really? Why do you think you know better than someone else, when you aren't even them? Like I said, it's one thing to share experience and thoughts, it's another to make a judgment about another person and then treat them based on that judgment, and it's patronizing to cloak it under the guise of "for your own good."

It's stuff like that that raises the "gatekeeper" terminology. I just find it so unhelpful and misguided.

And I want to say this further about regret. I have NO experience of it. Not in myself or any of the many many trans people I know who have transitioned, many of them, trans women and men both, have had full medical changes.

I think maybe regret happens with people who are likely to just make poor decisions for themselves no matter what the issue is. That's why one thing I am very vocal about to people considering any kind of HUGE and challenging life change like this is to get into counseling and stick with it and BE HONEST with yourself and the people supporting you.

And get someone who you can work with. Hopefully someone with gender identity experience but if not with the ability to properly assess and handle difficult life issues.

Many of us carry multiple issues with us. Some of mine came from family stuff. Some of it came directly from being mis gendered at birth. By the time I was needing to truly and finally deal with all this stuff it was wrapped up in a big ol' ball of confusion.

Maybe that's why I tend to have a lot of compassion and patience for questioning people here. I know what multiple issues and a complicated life can do to clarity of being. I know it is a journey to get to a place where you begin to understand, accept and work on your own self.

My therapist, who is one of the pre-eminent gender ID therapists in Canada, told me well after a very successful and happy transition that when she first met me she considered me a poor candidate for transition. Unlike some people, because she is a trained professional, she allowed me to explore and work with her as we tried TOGETHER to figure out what was up with me, and what it was I truly needed to be ok.

It was a very messy, organic process. I encourage anyone to get their hands messy doing this, with consideration that when you unravel life hurts and secrets and weird stuff, you will upset your apple cart and those of the people around you. So work with THEM too. Go as slow as you need.

I recall my therapist telling me one day when I told her I just wasn't a person who can do like a 5 year plan or something to transition, it's just not how I work or am, that she found that kind of methodical planning a bit unnerving herself. But it is how some people are and work.

I just think it's important to respect our different ways of being. If needing all your ducks lined up in a row works for you great. Just don't expect everyone else to do it that way. If being wild and organic and rolling with the flow works for you great. Just understand that some people need more structure. Whatever works for each one of us.

If people have regrets I suspect they have regrets because they never truly were honest with themselves or weren't willing to tackle the other baggage they may be carrying.

In my case I had to untangle a bunch of related but separate threads - addictions, low self esteem, fears and worries, childhood abuse, PTSD, lack of life skills. It would have been easy for my therapist to dismiss my gender identity concerns as being another way of running - heck I even had to consider that myself.

But I processed like crazy. I journalled. I talked to people. I researched. I listened. I imagined but then had to learn not to let imagination lead me astray.

At the end of the day, I suspect that regret is rare and is mainly being used to oppress us by the religious right and other transphobes.

I think it is unfortunate if we use it as a stick to oppress others who are just trying to sort things out. I know this forum is wild. It's a CD forum with many allures for people. But this forum has also helped some of us figure stuff out and I really believe if you could line up all the people who were helped and found their way to their authentic selves, however that ends up being expressed, versus the people who were misled and got bad advice and hurt themselves... I think that again, the regret side is very very small.

At the end of the day all of us need to be responsible for our own lives. If someone goes online and reads about how living in a grizzly cave will turn them into a grizzly and is sure they want to be a grizzly and goes and tries it.... well they have more problems than wanting to be a grizzly.

Sharing experience, sharing knowledge, answering questions, I think these are all great, DONE GRACEFULLY and with compassion.

The reason I stay away from this forum is because too many people seem to be wanting to be territorial.

Just... be gentle, loving and kind, folks. We all have enough misunderstanding and oppression from the greater world.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Lots of Pollyanna in what you are trying to say.. I understand your point of view, but I don't fully buy in ... I'm totally with Melissa...


We have a veil of anonymity and deceit here...its like a cop showing up at a brawl... if only they knew the "truth" going in the situation it would be so much easier!!!!
This makes it a harder place than anybody would like, but it is what it is.

People that give advice to try to avoid transition are not being territorial... they are not "using it as a stick to oppress others " what on earth does that even mean?? who is being oppressed..

I think giving somebody a kick in the a$$ is often the most compassionate thing you can do for a person..

Frankly the least graceful and compassionate people here are the ones that demand our experience, demand our advice and then punish us for giving it..


Trust me , I get it... put some sugar coating on everything and it will be a little better...but its still medicine that has to go down, and pretending its not doesn't help anybody.

[dreamer_2.0]

Thanks for your comments, Kerrianna. They were nice to read and I appreciate your less hostile approach.

[LeaP]

Frankly the least graceful and compassionate people here are the ones that demand our experience, demand our advice and then punish us for giving it...

A nice summary.

So, who is hostile - the person that tells you how to transit the minefield, or the one who tells you that all paths are good and encourages you to experiment?

[kerrianna]

Ok Kaitlyn, you bring your energy to the table and I'll bring mine. I'm quite happy being "Pollyanna". It's not a place that I arrived at by merely clicking my red shoes together. I'm just not a kick your ass kind of girl, maybe because I've had mine kicked way too much in my life and am personally aware of how unhelpful it was, even how damaging. It didn't work with me. When someone would "kick my ass" I would just find my way around them if I was set on my ways and that would drive me underground and that's where it becomes truly more dangerous. I'd rather encourage people to stay in the light and find the patience and compassion to help them that way. Maybe the other way works better for some people? I dunno. I just know it doesn't work for me, and I suspect it doesn't work for lots of people, so I thought I'd add my own energy to the mix for balance.
I do understand what you are saying too, and a lack of grace from people accessing your own experience is wrong and dismissing. I know some of the misdirection that happens here. I think maybe it's not that we differ so much in how we think about these things, but in the way we approach it.

[DebbieL]

Therapists and doctors try really hard to screen those who want to transition. There may be a few cross-dressers who slip through the screen because they have memorized the right answers, and there are some "do-it-yourself-ers" who self-medicate and slide under the radar because they have already gone too far to go back. However, therapists try to make sure that we can actually live a happy and comfortable life in our chosen gender before approving the hormones and procedures for transition.

There are brief moments in anyone's life where we think "I'm I crazy" or "is this real?". There are times when things don't go well that we can start to freak out a bit.

Most of us, especially those of us who are type 6, KNOW that this is the ONLY option.

The "regrets" website probably doesn't list the statistics of those who are transgendered and attempt suicide? Of the RESPONDENTS, over half have tried multiple times. Imagine how many have actually succeeded in killing themselves who couldn't respond. Some estimate that the suicide rate among non-transition transgender MtFs could be as high as 25%, meaning that around 75% of us have tried suicide at least once. Not just thought about it, or planned it, but actually attempted.

The same survey shows that about 95% of those who DO transition are happier, healthier, more successful, more productive, and more satisfied with their lives.

Sure, we need to look at the 5% who were not successful and try to understand why they regret it.
Are there factors that should be incorporated into the screening process that we haven't considered?
Are there issues that need to be addressed during the therapy phase that we haven't considered yet?
Maybe one of the issues is that some transsexuals still have strong religious beliefs and struggle with not being accepted as their chosen gender by the Fundamentalist Christian community.

[LeaP]

... I'm quite happy being "Pollyanna". ...

Rather than furthering my contribution to the never-ending conversation about "bitches getting all gate keepey"*, despite my inclination to tackle theoretical topics with limited practical forum value, I'll simply ask a question:

Kerianna, do you have any specific advice for the OP?



* (Team challenge goal: A new phrase every time the topic comes up in a new thread. You go, girls!)

[kerrianna]

Rather than furthering my contribution to the never-ending conversation about "bitches getting all gate keepey"*, despite my inclination to tackle theoretical topics with limited practical forum value, I'll simply ask a question:

Kerianna, do you have any specific advice for the OP?



* (Team challenge goal: A new phrase every time the topic comes up in a new thread. You go, girls!)

In regards to this thread, the OP never asked for advice. I haven't got the time nor energy to read all her responses on this thread, but I have read most of them now I think, and I'm still not seeing her ask for advice. She initially asked us what we thought of the regret concept and that site.

From what I can tell from her posts I'd say she's intelligent, thoughtful, and reasonable and as long as she has support and guidance, especially professional and medical guidance if she choses that path, then I think she's going to be fine. But that's said not really knowing her or her reality, just from a sense I get from what she has said here.

As for the concept of "trying HRT" that is exactly what I did and it worked for me. It is true my route is not conventionally traveled as far as I can tell in the community. I did do things kind of in a different way, but different is part of my landscape and acceptance of my own way of dealing and being was a huge part of me making the changes I needed to make.

I was stuck on doing this the "right way". Maybe that's what sticks in my craw a bit when I see people lecturing others on the process. Yeah, there is a lot to be learned from doing things the way others have or recommend. For instance, not finishing electrolysis before transition makes it harder now. But I live with it. It was a personal decision to weigh given my own feelings and my own sense of place in the world. Had I been in my 20's and looking forward to a life of loving ahead of me, that would have been more important.

But that was a personal decision made at the time, weighing everything else. To tell me that I was wrong or made an error or should have or any other blaming shaming tool is not helpful nor useful to me. I'm the one who lives with the stigma of facial hair issues as female. It's entirely my choice and I was well aware of how awkward it would make me feel at times.

As opposed to, say, GRS. That WAS important to me, but again, at one time I THOUGHT it wasn't. Mainly because I didn't see myself being ABLE to do it. It just seemed out of reach and I was scared. Once I confronted fear, once I looked at the other issues colouring my feelings about it and acknowledged their impact I could look clearly at what I REALLY needed and it was actually a very simple and direct decision, and one that I have NO regrets. In fact, I wonder how I ever managed the other way. It's such a foreign concept to me now and I'm amazed how quickly those old feelings went away.

Now, having said that, this is MY experience I am sharing here. I think most people need to remember that, and perhaps that is what "realists" are trying to say in their own way. Just because A was happy following a path, doesn't mean B will. You have to make up your OWN mind and take everything with a grain of salt and process it into your own reality.

I think the OP shows she is capable of doing that.

The language she uses can raise red flags for us, because we articulate and understand this maybe differently? But two things about that, based on my own experience.

One is that this is a journey and we change as we journey. We adapt and we learn and we leave what doesn't work, embrace what does.

I would disown many of my old posts here. Red flags all over I am sure. Yet here I am, absolutely sure that what I did for myself was necessary and proper.

And then there's the concept of a greater sense of being. We tend to focus intensely on gender because it has been such a huge source of dissonance in our lives. We tend to have absorbed both cultural teachings about gender and our own physical experiences in the bodies we have.

While there is a lot to be said for focusing on such, and I don't regret that I did so for a period of time in moving forward, we are beings beyond gender. And sometimes when we encounter people who are including other aspects of self into their transition it seems confusing to us and not clear. Again it comes off as a red flag because we may not understand how someone could move so laterally through a transition landscape when to us we had to move forward.

I guess what I am saying is, not everyone is going to follow the program but it doesn't mean they are wrong or will have regrets.

To go back to "trying HRT"... well it would be patronizing I think to suggest dreamer doesn't understand the physical risks and consequences of HRT, and that her professionals wouldn't understand that in helping her. When I first tried it, it was using the anti-androgen as a T blocker first to see whether that made me freak out (which some of my cd friends said it did when they tried it) or if it brought me peace. It brought me peace and after awhile on it I realized I needed to step forward try E. I started at a really low dose and that made me feel even better.

So in a way HRT, administered properly and with supervision and guidance, can help people discover if that is a right path for them. It is used as a diagnositic tool under the right situation - it was with me and it worked.

I really think in the end we have to trust the professionals that work with people. So my advice will always be, get yourself proper care. Be honest. Deal with ALL your issues and don't be in a hurry to get it all done and don't feel you need to do things just the right way. And do listen to those who have traveled these roads. Take the best and what will work for you.

Travel with eyes, ears and minds wide open.