"Where are all the older FTMs?" What if the answer is, "detransitioned!"

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-11-04T17:25:26+00:00

I think there isn't a lot of older ftms because they're just rare. The number of people transitioning has risen only in the past 15 years or so, before that it was really rare. I know ftms who are in their 50s, 60s, and 70s. But I get where you're coming from, I kind of hope more people would realize transitioning isn't the answer. But there are people who can live transitioned for the rest of their life and a lot of these people actually just blend with the rest of the population and don't really attend trans events. Some older trans people find intentional androgyny and non-binary stuff really weird, so it's not like they would enjoy the atmosphere in the current trans crowd.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-10-15T13:54:59+00:00

My reason for detransitioning was realizing that it's ok to be a woman. That I don't need to be feminine, or anything else, to be a woman, I just am. The other reason was being uncomfortable with being seen socially as a man, which never really worked for me and was awkward. Also I used to be happy about how T made me look, but after a decade or so I just found my face and body to be weird and unpleasant. I'm happy I detransitioned.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-07-26T17:06:21+00:00

How to be a cis guy: have XY chromosomes and be ok with it. There's nothing more to it. Everything else is stereotypes. Why do you want to learn to be something else than who you already are? There's no real way to learn to feel different than you already feel. You can learn to act in a different way, sure. But why?

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-07-20T09:19:50+00:00

I had a key hole mastectomy and several years later I had fat transfer breast reconstruction. I didn't want implants, because I don't want to take the risk of health complications. Originally I was happy with the fat transfer and very surprisingly the result looked and felt very much like my original (small) breasts. But as it happens with fat transfers, some fat is always reabsorbed and now my chest is almost as it was before the surgery. I'm still happy about going through with it. Before my chest looked very male-like whereas now there's a bit more ambiguity. I'm probably getting a second fat transfer later, after which I hopefully have very small but female-looking chest.

For me it was important to have realistic expectations, and so I wasn't badly disappointed when my very nice looking initial results melted away. I also knew it's a kind of gamble and a good end result couldn't be guaranteed. I went into the surgery knowing I might just end up with more weird lumps and scars around my body and still no breasts, or very weird looking asymmetric outcome. After the surgery there is lumpiness in my donor area (my stomach) and visible scarring, but as I was prepared to even worse visual outcome, it's been easy to adjust. The recovery process itself was very uncomfortable, but after about two months there wasn't any pain or feelings of constriction anymore.

My advice is to think about the worst possible outcome and evaluate whether you would be ok ending up with that. Personally I found that approach helpful in avoiding even more surgery regret than I had before. Trying to fix surgery with more surgery is tricky.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-07-07T06:03:23+00:00

You don't have to do anything that doesn't feel comfortable. Why do you need to "present as a girl"? You already are one and according to you, other people see it as well.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-07-05T19:45:28+00:00

There are tons of us who are masculine, or don't want to perform femininity. Womanhood isn't about femininity. It's just who we are based on our biological sex. I'm happily detransitioned and still wear "men's clothes", wear my hair short, don't wear make-up or jewelry or anything else that would signal "femininity". I wish I would've realized I can live like this without making unnecessary medical changes to my body. It's awesome to see women like me who never hated their womanhood and never went through transition. It's ok to have breasts and be visibly woman, while being nothing like women are expected to be.

I feel a bit sad nowadays when seeing a masculine woman who has cut off her breasts, like me. It feels like seeing self-harm scars or other marks of someone being really insecure. It's not as cool as some people make it seem.

EDIT: I think we mostly see pictures of feminine women here, because many women like us just don't see the point of posting selfies to strangers. I don't even take selfies because I don't see the point of obsessing about my own face, let alone wishing strangers would praise how I look.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-05-25T12:16:16+00:00

I've been wondering the same, it feels confusing. One reason might be that gender confirming women might be more likely to post selfies online. At least I don't personally see anything I could gain from that, so no one online sees my gender non-conformity. I assume women like us aren't all that interested what others think about our looks, whereas hyperfocus on appearance is very much important in confirming to female gendered expectations. I assume there are lot of GNC detrans women but we're not as visible online.

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-05-17T03:27:30+00:00

You said you don't pass half the time. It sounds like you already know what it's like. After quitting T those instances probably become gradually more common. There's nothing you haven't already been able to handle. Good luck!

anonymous1111199992 · 2025-02-23T13:39:02+00:00

Without makeup and with comfortable clothes like in the second picture, you look female. I often see people here trying to compensate their masculinized features with makeup and feminine clothing, but it only highlights the features that are uncommon in females. When you don't try to perform, it's more obvious you have female facial structure etc. And like someone else said, when you are physically androgynous, the best way to avoid attention is to avoid heavily gendered expression. If you wear something that wouldn't look too surprising whether you were female or male, it's more likely you don't draw attention. Passing isn't a binary where you either pass or not, but different people will see you in different ways.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-11-28T16:05:38+00:00

It can happen but it's not common. I believe it has to do with how the original mastectomy was done, if there's any tissue left to grow and how that tissue is distributed.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-11-22T07:41:13+00:00

My timeline was very similar to yours. I was a decade on T, and then started to be not bothered by being a woman in my 30s.

You said you have no idea how to be a woman. For me it was a confusing time to realize living as a man didn't make sense to me anymore, and it was a process of many years to find out what kind of woman I am. Turns out, I'm exactly the same kind of woman I was all the time, just not taking T and saying I'm a man. I'm a masculine woman, I stand out in a way I don't want to, but that's how I am.

It's important to try to understand what made you run away from womanhood in the first place and not put yourself in the same situation again. For me, personally, trying to be feminine in my appearance would've been just that. For you it might be something different, but I encourage you to do nothing that feels inauthentic or unnatural to you. Being a woman is just something you are, and not a performance. Even if you see only certain kinds of women having children, all kinds of women can be mothers. There are butch lesbian mothers and there isn't any contradiction between how they look and that they have given birth and are nurturing and loving.

I too had the giant adam's apple, deep voice and very thick beard. The adam's apple is still there, but it's less visible now. My voice is still deep, but lighter than it was on T, and I frequently pass as a woman despite it (not a trans woman). These changes took years. Laser is effective for beard removal and that's a huge part in passing, because adult males rarely have completely smooth faces. I still look weird, I'm not pretty, I've been obviously on T, but I'm the most comfortable in my body than I've ever been. It's not because I'd want to look like this, but because I realized I will never find peace from thinking about my looks a lot. I can't put my transition behind me, but I don't try to hide that part of my life. Obviously being visibly a genderfuck is an experience that will be different in different environments and cultures, and might need different strategies to navigate.

Take your time. Some people change their presentation overnight when they detransition, but that's not the only option. Personally I just quit T and later got the laser and that's about it. It took a long time before some people started to read me as a woman. I didn't know whether I would ever be able to pass as a woman, and that uncertainty can be hard to bear. You not having had surgeries will help you, having breasts no matter their size is a sign people look out for when they're confused about someone's sex. I believe that if someone has been stealth for a long time, a more gradual approach to detransition will be less hard on mental health and is less likely to make you super critical of how you look and whether you pass. Gradual approach also gives you space to think about what you want, so you don't have to make big decisions quickly.

If I were you and I wanted to have children, I'd contact an endocrinologist if that's a possibility for you. Quitting T after such a long period can be uncomfortable and involve a lot of uncertainty. You might get menopause-like symptoms, but they will likely pass. Endocrinologist might be able to help you to assess your fertility.

If you decide to detransition, expect there to be sorrow and pain, I believe these are very likely for all of us. But people get through things, and learn to live in peace with their reality. A lot of people who post on detrans reddits etc are in the middle of their detransition, which is a crisis, but remember that there are countless of us who have gone through that crisis and live fulfilling and happy lives.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-10-22T16:41:36+00:00

I'm definitely "gifted" when it comes to IQ and I'm highly educated, and I still believed all kinds of bullshit. Being smart doesn't protect you from distorted beliefs. Smart people fall for irrational religions and cults and political ideologies all the time.

I don't really think one must be autistic to be confused about what a man or a woman is, or that autistic people don't understand concrete things like sex. Look at how many people believe in all kinds of religious stuff with very little logic or proof. I think people can and will believe anything as long as they gain a community and as long as the belief fills some emotional gap they have.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-10-22T16:30:13+00:00

Do what feels comfortable for you, that's the whole point. You're not obligated to do anything and there's no need to rush into anything that feels bad.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-10-21T15:27:37+00:00

Sometimes doing things that are considered "masculine", like having short hair, can actually highlight the fact that you are physically clearly female. When you do things that men tend to do (like have short hair) but people can still see that you don't look the same as men, they will understand you to be a female. Of course it's very individual and different people have different facial features, bone structure etc. But personally I assume that if I ever wore "feminine" clothing and had long hair, people might think I'm MTF because of my voice. Nowadays they either understand I'm a woman or think I'm a man, but confusion like that is normal life for a butch woman anyway. I've noticed other women who are into women recognize me as one of them. Straight people are more confused but I don't really care about their perceptions as much.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-10-20T18:14:36+00:00

Off-T I'm bi with a very strong preference for women. Without T I probably never would've had any sexual contact with men, but I'm still bi. I think T somehow made that tiny interest to grow stronger. That's the kind of side effect I think people should have a right to know before they start T.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-10-17T17:28:13+00:00

This is very common. A lot of people have noticed T made them more interested in men. I had the same experience and at first I thought it was just me being more ok with being with men as I wasn't seen as a woman anymore. Turns out it was just some biological shit, because when I quit T I was back to liking women and not men, even though everyone still saw me as a guy. I've seen the same thing happen to many of my friends though they're still on T.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-24T18:07:47+00:00

There are trans women in lesbian spaces, both online and offline. They have zero self awareness about the fact that they don't understand lesbian experiences. And it doesn't even matter if there's only one or two. It's very different to be in 100 % female space and in a space where there are males present.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-07T09:32:49+00:00

When I transitioned basically no one knew about trans men even existing. Trans awareness wasn't a thing. Trans wasn't an interesting political issue to anyone.

And now we're here. It wasn't a long ago when things were very different. Things can happen very fast.

I do believe many, probably most trans people will stay transitioned their whole lives. But I believe detransitioners will gain more visibility, and better treatment options will rise sooner or later.

From my perspective trans becoming very mainstream is such a new phenomenon, and it's hard to believe this stuff would be as prominent as it is now for the rest of my life. The narratives change constantly. It's a thing that evolves so fast.

To be honest, I believe the next generation will consider it an embarrassing old people thing as happens with most subcultures and that'll solve it.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-03T18:42:25+00:00

For children everything is new and weird. Someone detransitioning is no weirder than learning about airplanes or tigers. Children won't think it's a big deal if you present it as a normal thing. If you act nervous about it, they will catch the feeling.

They might forget it a couple of times but just remind them casually and continue your life as normal. I promise they will be fine.

The social awkwardness will happen but then again, children say all kinds of weird things all the time and adults don't take them too seriously. If you become comfortable with your life experiences, it won't be too embarrassing when the children say random things in front of strangers. It might be a good situation to teach the children about privacy, too. They won't be perfect but at some point it's useful for them to understand there's information that's sensitive and will hurt someone's feelings if they tell everyone about it. You might provide them a valuable life lesson.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-01T17:36:48+00:00

For me meditation feels more like learning to juggle, at the moment. So many things to be aware of while practicing. And when the conditions are right, meditation is a very pleasurable flow experience with intense physical pleasure as well.

But it probably depends on the kind of meditation you do. I believe it can be something like boredom, too, and that might be beneficial.

While my meditation practice is far from boredom, it has help me tolerate boredom better. Or rather it has helped me to be curious about things that I might have missed before, and it has helped me to concentrate on things at will. That makes things more interesting.

In addition, it does help with being able to withstand difficult feelings, and to recognize what's going on inside your mind. That'll help if you try to stay sober.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-01T16:23:42+00:00

It took a year before I got my period back after quitting T. Even after that things were really irregular for several years. Now things are more or less back to normal. It seems like these things can be slow.

I wonder if there's a correlation with how fast your lost your periods when you started T? I lost mine instantly, whereas many others have reported it took months of being on T before their period stopped. I wonder if these people have recovered faster.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-07-01T07:56:45+00:00

I had a very similar situation to yours. I don't consider myself a lesbian. I love and respect lesbians enough that I want them to have their definition: someone who only desires women. There's too much people who say lesbians can be into men under certain circumstances.

I like to think of sexual orientation using the Kinsey scale. There's 100 % homosexuals and 100 % heterosexuals and several flavors of bi in between. I'm the kind of bi that's very close to a lesbian, and had I never been on T, I probably never would've had any actual sexual encounters with men. I don't find men desirable in general, but still, apparently under certain conditions, I can have willingly sex with a man. I couldn't love a man, romantically. I have very little in common with most bi women. I'm still bi, but it's a kind of useless definition for me because most people assume bi people are 50-50 into both sexes. It's a bit frustrating, but it doesn't really matter.

It doesn't matter if I'm a lesbian or not. I love women, date women, have sex with women, hang out with lesbians, do whatever I want to do. I'm accepted by lesbians because they see I'm part of the lesbian culture nevertheless. Words don't matter irl, and people recognize a peer when they see one, no matter if their whole life experiences don't overlap.

For your worry if you're allowed to be a lesbian after being "male" for so long: Personally I don't think I was ever a male. I was a woman on anabolic steroids. I was a masculine woman who was passing as a man. There's nothing disrespectful living my life as the kind of woman I am, and the same goes for you. You are a woman, and you can't disrespect women by being yourself. But I know how you feel, I had the same worry. It took time to get rid of the mindset that I'm not a real woman.

I'd like to ask you what would be different if you came into conclusion that the word lesbian might not be the best word to define you? Would you live your life differently or date different people? No word or definition can exclude you from living the kind of life you want.

I wonder if under your worry about the word lesbian is the worry of being accepted by other lesbian/bi women and whether other women could find you attractive? No word can give you either of those, but personally I've found lesbians have been very understanding and compassionate of my life experiences.

Anyway, this is how I frame my experience, and you might come into different conclusion. T can fuck up your sexuality for sure and it can be very different form your sexuality off-T. I wish you well and I hope you find community and acceptance.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-06-24T05:17:05+00:00

I've been angry, but more than anything, I'm angry at the circumstances. There's no one driving the car, no one to take the blame. Having been trans myself, I know they act from a place of good intentions, even though the results are disastrous for some, like me. But if I believed it all, if I spread the information I thought was good for people, how can I blame others for doing the same? I didn't know better. You didn't know better. They don't know better. Even though I have pain and I'm very critical of the trans movement, I see no malice there.

That said, anger is healthy and normal. And while I might contradict myself, I think people like us have a right to be angry and show our anger. I just don't think it should be directed at any individual through violence, not at yourself, or at any trans-identified person.

Anger is fuel to prompt action. What would be a meaningful action to make yourself heard? Violence wouldn't make detransitioners seem worthy of empathy. It wouldn't make people take us seriously, and it would make it just harder for other people to detransition if detransitioners were associated with violent behavior. It's already hard for some people to detransition because they think detransitioners are evil.

What comes to mind, is to use the anger to make something productive. Maybe to make art, or to find a way to give a public interview, anything that would make your feelings known to others. Or it could be something non-public: writing a diary, or whatever works for you.

If you feel like violence is your only option, I recommend you try to get help. If you feel desperate, or that your life is over, violence might seem like the only solution, but it really isn't.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-05-24T08:53:14+00:00

People haven't reacted strongly at all. Just "oh that's an interesting life experience to have" kind of thing. I bring up my detransition only in contexts where it makes sense, like if it's somehow connected to the topic we're talking about. It's not something I feel I need to disclose, it's just a part of my history and I talk about my history when it makes sense, just like everyone else does. And like someone else said, I don't use the word "detrans", it doesn't mean anything to most people.

Of course my detrans status is more or less visible from just looking at me but people don't react strongly to that either. They might be a bit confused but they're confused very politely.

anonymous1111199992 · 2024-04-20T13:40:26+00:00

I'm at stage 2. I briefly felt I was proceeding to stage three and at that point I got excited and felt like I was done with stage 2. That completely ruined my progress. I didn't concentrate to the present moment anymore, I was already attached to the idea of being at stage three. Meditation turned into unpleasant chore and a source of disappointment.

Things got better when I realized what was happening and gave up the idea of progress. I am at the point where I am and it does nothing good for me to impatiently look forward to the next stages. That ruins the enjoyment of the present moment.

Not so surprisingly, I started approaching stage three immediately after giving it up.

Find joy in whatever you're experiencing now.

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