People who opt to change their gender and then choose to reverse the process often face mistrust and a lack of support. RT.com spoke to two detransitioners who shared their story of the painful journey back from being trans.
Transitioning from one sex to another is a radical process. It’s commonly misunderstood, and most ordinary people are confused about how to even refer to the individuals involved. But there’s an entire group of people who are even more widely misunderstood: detransitioners. They committed to living as the opposite sex, only to change their mind and revert to their original gender.
Few detransitioners are comfortable speaking publicly, but two agreed to share their journey with RT.com.
Oliver from Minnesota in the US was born female. She said: “Growing up I was called a tomboy. I didn’t feel I related to the other girls, all my friends were boys or outcast girls that didn’t fit in. I’d mostly be by myself. I remember getting a pair of boy’s shoes and being elated. I held on to them until they fell apart. I wanted to wear boys’ clothes, but that was too much for my parents as they’re fundamentalist Evangelical Christians.”
Calvin Lunt, from Liverpool in the UK, was born male. He recalled, “When I was being this flamboyant little child dancing around the living room I was called a f****t and queer at the age of five. I know it sounds weird, but I had to become a woman to become a man.”
While both had very different experiences, it’s clear their journeys began as children. For Oliver – who changed her name as an adult – it became progressively harder to understand her body.
Puberty was traumatic, and she recalled, “My mum bought me training bras, but I was like, ‘what are these even for?’ There is nothing there. I felt like my body was being leased. I asked, ‘Why doesn’t my dad have to shave his body? Why is my body hair disgusting?’ I was like a little feminist kid.
“Being a girl was reinforced to be this very specific closed-off box and I never identified with that. So that why it was easy to say: ‘I must not be that’. I was told for so long that being gay was a sin, and ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’. I didn’t understand what ‘trans’ was in high school. When I got into college, I looked up trans and there was this feeling… should I be looking into this? But it was almost with dread.”
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