Changing your mind

Having doubts can be a normal part of how we affirm our gender, whether its others’ or our own doubts, and it’s good to talk about that. It’s also really important for us to tackle the big topic of de-transition, and what this can mean, how we can do it safely and with care for ourselves. Whatever path you take, you deserve to feel supported and affirmed.

Any kind of gender affirmation can feel like making a big life change. As with any big shift, it’s okay to have doubts or fears about what will happen. Doubts don’t mean you’re any more or less committed or that what you’re feeling is any less real.

It’s also okay to feel frustrated if the other people in your life doubt you or second guess your decisions. Going through a process of figuring things out offers an opportunity for our alllies to trust and support us, not question our sense of self.

Trans and gender diverse people often have the threat of ‘changing our mind,’ or regretting decisions, used to hold back affirmative process, whether medical, legal, or social, and that’s not fair. People change their mind, or shift their thinking about things all the time, it’s a normal human thing to do. There is always a risk that any decision we make might cause regret, and there’s also every chance it wont.

It can sadly be a common experience for trans people to doubted by others, whether about specific aspects of our identity and life, or for pretty much everything. Doubt from other people can be painful, it can make us feel less sure of ourselves, or like others know something we don’t know about ourselves.

If people are expressing doubt towards you, some ways to work through it could include:

• Reaffirming to yourself that what you’re feeling, and who are are, is real

• Talking to/meeting up with other trans people, and reminding yourself that there are other people just like you out there

• Keeping a journal or note of thoughts that you can look back on

• Point the people who are doubting you towards resources, information, and support - such as our allies section

• Connect in with mental health support, you aren’t alone

It can also help to remind yourself that no matter what anyone else says, or claims to know, no one else can know you better than you know yourself.

Being trans isn’t a bad thing, or anything to ashamed of, and no one has the right to make you feel that way because of it.

Being doubted by others can be difficult, but it’s also external, and can be tuned out or walked away from.

Doubt that forms inside of us can be far more difficult to outrun (or out-think), and most trans people have felt it at some point, even those who are really, really sure. When we’re contemplating big things, no matter what they are, doubt can make an already difficult time a whole lot more time-consuming or frustrating.

It can be useful to keep in mind that doubt by itself doesn’t mean anything, though. Doubt is a totally normal human emotion, especially when you’re thinking about or going through change, and it doesn’t mean you’re making the wrong decision.

When you’re feeling like this, here are some things to do to help work through the feeling:

• Making a list of pros and cons

  • This might include all the reasons to go through with gender affirmation and all the reasons to not do it, or all the pros and cons for starting now vs waiting a year, or figuring out who you want to tell and why.

  • Even if your cons list ends up being longer, it doesn’t mean that the pros are less valid, you get to figure out how you want to weigh up each option.

  • It can also be a lot like flipping a coin for something - it’s when the coin is in the air, and you find yourself hoping it lands a certain way, that you might figure out what you actually want.

• Imagining your ideal self in ten years time, then asking yourself how to get to that point

  • This doesn’t even have to do with gender, it might be about your relationships, your career, where and with who you live, and how you want to be seen by others. That said, it might be about your gender too, if you see yourself as very different to how you see yourself now, that could be an indication that there’s something to start working on

• If you’re asking ‘Am I trans enough’, head here to try and answer that question

• It can feel scary to be thinking about gender affirmation when you still have doubts, or are unsure about certain aspects of it, but it’s also totally okay to be in that position.

The expectation that all trans and gender diverse people will have an absolute sense of self, or a direct and clear desire for how we want affirmation to look, forgets that gender is a complex, messy and beautiful place to begin with.

There is not one single path that every trans person must take, and this idea in and of itself can lead to doubts. The way you meet your most authentic self is your path to take, there is no right or wrong way to exist as trans.

It’s also okay to want some things and not be sure about other things, and to mould this experience to your wants and needs. For example, some people feel a strong need to change their name, but others aren’t worried about it in the slightest; some really want to use hormonal therapy, but are also sad that some parts of their body could change.

You get to be in control of how this looks for you.

According to some elements of the media, ‘de-transitioning’ is apparently all the rage. If you were to believe the tabloid press, everyone and their dog is de-transitioning, which is often positioned as undoing all the gender affirmative processes that a person has engaged in.

However, the very concept of de-transitioning paints gender affirmation as one linear process, that you can undo or move away from, like flicking a switch back to its original position. TransHub uses the term ‘affirmation,’ rather than transition, because for many people it’s not linear, and can exist in multiple different ways. When using this framing, we don’t de-affirm, we can just affirm who we are in the new or different ways we want or need to. It’s not a case of reversing what’s already happened, but taking a new and different path.

That said, the way de-transitioning is spoken about is often blown out of proportion to scare trans people, our families and affirming clinicians. Recent studies have found that not a single participant expressed regret about medical gender affirmation1. Another study found that less than 2% of trans people had major regrets regarding the changes they had undergone, which may seem high, until you compare it to 65%, the number of cis people who experienced regrets about the plastic surgery they’d undertaken2.

When we actually talk to people who have at some point in their life ‘de-transitioned’, the factors involved in that decision are never as simple as realising how they affirmed their gender at the time was a mistake. In fact it often occurs because of a range of other social or societal factors that make being an out trans person difficult or harmful.

An older study found that the risk factors for regret often involved a “lack of support from the patient’s family, poor social support, late-life transitions, severe psychopathology, unfavorable physical appearance, and poor surgical result3.”

It’s important to be clear that making different choices is not a bad thing to do. There are reasons that people might want to change what kind of affirmation processes they’re engaging in, who they’ve told, how out or not out they are, and a range of other factors, including what might look like from the outside as a ‘step backwards’. There is no one right path of affirmation, and there are a range of reasons why someone might want to change the way they’re interacting with their gendered self, presentation and well being.

‘De-transitioning’ isn’t the dirty word it’s made out to be. As long as you’re making your own decisions, and not being forced to do anything, that’s still a form of affirmation and you should feel supported and celebrated along the way.

If you are seeking support, accessing a mental health professional is always a good idea.