This isn’t internalized transphobia. This is just what it feels like to run up against the impossible promises you were made when you transitioned: namely, the promise that you would become, that transition would be linear and that there would be a finish line.
The reality is something else.
Dysphoria migrates from one body part to the next. Cut off your breasts and your eyes drift to your hips. Grow a beard and worry that your small hands will give you away. There’s no point at which transition passes from performance to simply being. You never stop editing your backstory and suppressing your real experiences that have shaped who you are. You never stop pretending.
And for people like the original poster, it turns out that’s just not good enough:
The last two times I got high, I felt like I was seeing myself, and transgender people, from a very new perspective. Specifically, someone who is transphobic. I think I may have experienced temporary depersonalization, because for a brief moment, I forgot who I was and even more scary, I forgot why I had even transitioned. I felt like an alien and a freak. All my friends are cis and they say they accept me, but I don't know how they actually see me in my head. All I could think is "they see me as a freak. Neither fully male or female. Why did I do this to myself? Why did I change my body? Why couldn't I just have been cis? I want to be cis. I want to be normal. I don't want to be a woman, but I don't want to be... this, whatever this is"...
This doesn't feel like the real me, because ever since I learned what transgender people when I was 8 or so, I immediately understood even back then how gender is more more your body, but also a social role. Basically my belief has always been "if it sounds like a duck, acts like a duck, walks like a duck, looks like a duck, says it's a duck, it's a fucking duck." but I also feel like i am beginning to become disillusioned by the transgender movement. And I don't know where this came from. Maybe because I don't feel that testosterone has fully solved my dysphoria, because it certainly hasn't…
And at my job, I currently work in a mostly male environment, and only a few people there know I'm trans. Everybody else assumes I'm like any other guy. But I can't get over the feeling that I'm just lying to them. That I'm tricking them…
And to be honest, I don't know if I "feel like a man". I definitely have always had feelings of "I should have been male, male feels like it would fit me better", but I still have a hard time thinking to myself, "I am a man", it just doesn't feel true, and I thought if I took testosterone for a long time and became accepted by other guys, that it would finally start to kick in for me that I'm really a guy, but I just don't feel it…
I don't want to detransition, to be honest, I really don't want to be a woman. Maybe being a butch woman is fine, but it still isn't what I really want, it would just feel more like a compromise. But at the same time... I don't want to be trans. It's exhausting. I have to worry if I'm going to be accepted in every space i go in. And I could go stealth, but I would still feel like I'm lying that I'm cis, that I'm hiding a big part of myself. I have to pretend that I don't understand what having a period is like or that I know how much it hurts to be kicked in the balls, all of these things that every man goes through. I feel like I can get close, but there are probably subtle social cues that I'm not picking up on in all male spaces and probably never will because I wasn't socialized as a boy. Not that I had a normal "girlhood" either, because I was a tomboy with no friends. Maybe thats why I ended up like this. I don't know…
I keep wondering if I could have just learned how to be okay with this parts [sic] of me, if I could have learned how to manage dysphoria, because at this point, that is starting to seem like the better option than transitioning. Because as much as I want to be a man, and be seen as a man, make love as a man... I just don't know if I can ever fully buy it…
I mean, I knew from the start that transitioning would not be a magic cure for all my problems. I knew it could never make me biologically male. I thought I could come to terms with the latter, but I can't, because I still subconsciously hold the belief that a man = biologically male and I don't know how to get over it. Everytime I look in the mirror, I wonder how the hell I pass to most people. I see all my feminine features, my short size, I feel the empty space between my legs…
I desperately want to see transgender people as they gender they are, but it seems like I can really only do it if they pass fully. It isn't fair to them and it isn't fair to me. But I don't know what to do. I don't know how to leave that outdated belief behind. And it's probably why I'm having this gender crisis…
I don't know if that makes any sense but as I've said before, I don't wish to hurt anyone with what I've said, even though I know it still will. But I don't want to think this way anymore. I feel like I still need "convincing". Sometimes I read detrans stories and it scares me because now I wonder if I really did just transition to escape misogyny…
So, what’s the response on r/actual_detrans?
r/actual_detrans is an interesting community, set up as an “alternitive [sic] to [the oft-vilified] r/detrans that provides support to detransitioners, reidentifiers, retransitioners and questioners in an environment free from gender critical ideology and rhetoric.” Posters and commenters tend to cleave to the beliefs that underlie transgender identity, even if they question whether those beliefs apply to their own situations. But there’s more breathing room here than you typically find in online trans communities and heterodox thinkers appear from time to time.
Zeroing in on this particular post, commenters urge the author to conquer their “internalized transphobia” and move toward “acceptance,” but it’s a funny kind of acceptance: Accept that the body you have is a man’s body. Recognize that “biology varies so much.” And if that sounds “really… something. Like, disconnected from reality?” then just remember everything society does is disconnected from reality, “it’s all just shared memes that went collectively viral.”
Here’s the full comment:
“Yeah I can understand that alienation.
By acceptance I mean, if that is the way you want to go, that you don't actually have a woman's body. I know you used the word female, but it is a pretty pointless distinction for the acceptance route. If you are a trans guy, you have a man's body. Even if you don't see it now, it is recognising that biology varies so much. There are cis people who look androgynous or like the opposite gender. There are intersex people that look like any part of the gender spectrum and it has nothing to do with their chromosomes or sex organs. And, importantly, there are trans people that pass and trans people that don't, and they are all beautiful. I know that sounds really... something. Like, disconnected from reality? But so is everything society does, it's all just shared memes that went collectively viral, like what body shape is attractive or what traits are positive or negative (physical or psychological etc). They all vary based on time and culture. The ideal weight of a woman for example is all over the place historically as an example. Recognising that cisnormativity is just a meme that has wormed it's way into our brains was a gamechanger for me. There is nothing objectively better about having some flesh bits matched with other flesh bits, or some traits combined with other traits. There isn't even a scale to measure "better". People with non-normative bodies are perfect as they are and if they change they are still perfect. That's acceptance IMO. Once a person can accept that, then it is much easier to resist the external forces. Not trying to sell you on it or anything, just trying to explain the position.”
The original poster persists in expressing forbidden thoughts: “I know and understand that biological sex isn't black and white, sometimes cis women are born with a y chromosome and male organs and sometimes cis men are born without a y chromosome but unless you can show me a cisgender man born with breasts, a vagina, and a full female reproductive system, with no male reproductive organs whatsoever…”
But the interlocutor keeps tunneling, blasting away any solid ground either could hope to stand on: “Re: your question about cisgender men... I'm not sure what you mean by cisgender here?”
Another commenter takes the original poster to task for “internalized transphobia” and attempts to undercut the OP’s sense of capacity to make independent judgments:
“I think you know this isn't on. You need to be able to handle the fact that some people are androgynous, and to respect other people's authority on themselves. That youre not able to demonstrates a possible lack of self trust or acceptance within yourself. I would definitely investigate this… Once you've taken stock of that, then you can work on your gender stuff. But it would be helpful to be brutally honest with yourself and make sure you're not having these attitudes because you're insecure about where you are in life generally.”
This is how “internalized transphobia” operates in the trans community. If something doesn't feel right, if you’ve got doubts about your trans identity or whether transition is right for you, who are you to judge? Isn't that just your internalized transphobia talking? Confess to your misgivings and you’re only exposing your own personal inadequacies, your attachments to old and problematic points of view. Aren't you hurting not just yourself but other trans people when you ask the wrong questions and say the wrong things and think the wrong thoughts? Don’t you have a responsibility to silence that pesky inner voice once and for all, for your own good and the good of the community?
You’re trans. Accept it: “It would be easier to be a woman rather than be trans but it’s the cards we have. I think you gotta do deep rethinking to get out of this loop for what you want and I gotta too. What’s worth more to you”
Two commenters who are actively transitioning relate:
“Even though I know my friends accept me, I still feel as though I'm lying and they're lying to me, just going along with me so they don't hurt my sensitive feelings. Especially when I'm with guys sometimes, like I'm obviously very different from, so why am I with them, calling myself and letting them say I'm a guy?” [Think more about this.]
And…
“Wow I feel the exact same way you do. Internalized transphobia is such a huge problem I have. I even have the same problem with not being able to view non passing trans ppl as their gender, but weirdly enough I only have that problem with trans men so I think it's really just a reflection of the internalized transphobic view I have of myself. I've tried detransitioning because of it. Twice. And it's just felt so wrong that I couldn't take it so now I'm resigned to my fate as a trans person lol.”
Lay off the weed, not the testosterone: “therapy in general will also help you sort thru these feelings, but this really sound like weed-induced issues and internalized transphobia.”
I was about to hit send when I refreshed the Reddit page one more time and this fascinating comment loaded:
Wow, yeah I feel very similar. I'm at the point where I've stopped identifying as a man because I felt, despite a long history of being a tomboy/male-ish identifying kid, that sense even 7 years on T that I actually don't really feel like a man. Part because my body is female. Part because, like you said, there's so much male socialization I missed and goes over my head I probably don't even recognize all the subtle cues. Plus after so many years passing as a man, I finally allowed myself to admit the aspects of myself that felt solidly in the woman camp. I miss relating to woman and being part of the social fabric they weave.
A big part of my rethinking of transition/trans identification was doing drugs too, psychedelics in my case.
I also hate to admit, because it's embarrassing and makes me feel like people were just treating me like a basket case, but I feel like my community probably saw me as freaky, abnormal and largely humored my gender identity.
In addition, the more I thought about it, I started to feel like transition wasn't affirming my true self, in so much as rejecting myself as a female. Rejecting myself as a failed, abnormal woman in some sense. For me, transition has felt ironically very small minded in trying to put myself in a different gender box because deep down I thought women couldn't act a certain way or do certain things or love other women. I wouldn't admit that consciously before, but I think this drove my transition quite a bit. Sort of like internalized homophobia/GNC-phobia. I feel like I participate in self-elected conversion therapy to make me "straight" (male appearance with attraction mostly to females).
Thing is, transition was life changing for me. But now I see it as life changing not because I was becoming my True Self as a man, but because it worked like a very powerful placebo in letting me view myself in a different, more positive light. It gave me a purpose and concrete goals to work towards too which is so nice to have as an aimless adult. Truth is, I associated myself with many negative qualities. And by extension, I viewed womanhood with all these negative qualities. It was easier to de-identify with myself and instead identify as something else because my self image was so fucked.
I'm trying to get off T, but I'm not honestly sure I'll stick with physical detransition forever. I also don't view going off hormones and even going by female pronouns and name as inherently changing my identity in any way, because I still feel basically the same. That gender is part inherent and part performance/learned. It just seems like, if gender is kind of made up, why not just slip into the gender my body is usually associated with and make things smoother? Why would looking like a female make the way I internally feel any more or less valid? All I can say is that after this many years on T, I'm at the conclusion that I'm running away from myself by continuing this hormonal experiment.
I also have this rising paranoid-sounding idea that transition was encouraged in my case because the thing is I have genetic physical deformities (in other words visible disability, though I'm not technically disabled) and had pretty bad mental illness, depression/anxiety, but how do I put it... I excelled in certain areas that put me ahead of women with regularly formed bodies. I have this paranoia because when I look at all my trans friends and acquaintances I know in real life, so many have physical health issues or mental illness and it's just a bit odd that we were all so heavily affirmed and encouraged to pursue transition, a set of procedures and hormones that tend to sterilize us. I never really saw myself or these friends of mine encouraged to try anything else. I also noticed some of the more highly attractive gay and bi people who mentioned considering their gender identity and they don't seem to have been affirmed/encouraged in that same way.
What strikes me about these posts and the ones I've read on detrans Reddit is how alone these young people are. They're posting these significant existential questions to anonymous people online. They trust people they've never actually met, despite an intellectual understanding that the online world is a fake. They have no faith in the adults around them — likely been told to reject them. There are no longer "experts" or objective truths. They seem so utterly lost, just piecing together a reality that can get them through whatever awakening is stirring. You have to wonder how long it'll be before the vast majority come crashing down.
If we ever needed any further proof that trans ideology is indeed a cult, then all the evidence we require is included in the posts exchanged by these individuals. In other words..."you can't leave"....