There and back again: A Desistors Tale

My name is Sinead, and I am a desistor. I was in the trans community for three years from age 11 until 14. I started to leave the community in August 2021 but it has taken until recently to fully recover and feel happy and relaxed again. This testimony is to describe how I got into the trans community and how I got out of it and how it has affected me and others as far as I know.

I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was nine years old. I was diagnosed with Autism in January 2022, but it was obvious to my parents that I was autistic long before this. This neurodivergence makes it hard for me to understand my emotions and it affects the way I perceive my surroundings and people. I had trouble making friends and was bullied so I had low self-esteem and was eager to be liked. When I was 11 years old, I made two new friends. One of them had a porn addiction and talked all the time about dirty things that I did not understand. She started to touch me inappropriately even though I told her to stop but she just pretended it was a joke and said that it was normal. She showed me horrifying images on the internet that frightened me. I started to hate my body and because of my neuro-divergency I was already uncomfortable. As an autistic person I always feel a bit disconnected from the world anyway. Now I felt disconnected from my body, and it felt like a disgusting flesh prison and I could punish or do anything I wanted to it because it wasn’t really me.

Around this time my other friend, who is a lesbian had a much greater interest in social media than me, became interested in the trans community and even started identifying as non-binary. She would mention it in conversations like it was just completely normal and was shocked that I did not know about it. When I heard these definitions of gender identities, I felt it really resonated with how I felt about my body. I went on Youtube and found trans influencers like JammieDodger and Noah Fince. Before long, I would not go a day without watching them. I felt like they really understood me. Not long after I started identifying as non-binary.

The influencers divided the world into trans or cis. They talked constantly about how everyone in the cis world hated trans people and wanted to kill them or beat them up. There were stories about trans people being murdered and attacked but also stories about being mis-gendered or dead named, which was presented as horrific violence. Cis people were presented as transphobic and if you were a trans ally you would always identify yourself as pan sexual, bi-sexual, asexual etc. If you were in the LGBTQIA +++ community that was a sign that you were a trans ally. I was taught to be terrified of anyone outside of this trans bubble. I was taught to never look up anything that was transphobic because this would have meant doubting my true authentic self. For example, I believed that J.K. Rowling was a horrific transphobe and wanted me dead.

We were taught to never trust parents even if they affirmed our identities and used our pronouns and “true” names. We needed our parents in order to get chest binders and hormones so the influencers would tell us what to say and do in order to get what we wanted but, otherwise, they encouraged us to isolate ourselves and not to communicate with our parents as it might be unsafe and could put us in danger. Because our parents were Cis, they were dangerous and a threat. I lied to my parents all the time as my perception of them was morphed into thinking that they were abusive. I felt that I was in danger and I needed to run away but these obsessive thoughts were actually created by listening to the influencers every day and were not my own thoughts.

As time went on my identities kept changing but they were all progressing in the direction of becoming a fully trans-identified. By the time I was 13-years-old I had identified as agender, bi-gender, gender fluid, pan gender, omni gender and there were even more, but I have forgotten them all. Finally, I became a demi-boy and soon after a trans-man which is the destination of all girls if they are in the community long enough. I gradually became more and more miserable, and my body dysphoria worsened. My trans friend was now fully trans-identified like me and had got me into discord servers where I would spend hours talking to strangers in teenage trans chatrooms. They were all miserable even though becoming their true authentic selves was supposed to bring euphoria.

I can’t really remember how it was with my family at this time as I paid them no attention and I hated and distrusted them, and I believed that they were abusive. By the time I was 13 and 1/2, I started to self-harm by cutting my arm. Sometimes it was because I would get a flashback of my abusive friend and sometimes it was because I felt like I was losing my mind and had no control over my emotions. I had three emotions at this time - scared, angry, or sad. I felt like I was living in a nightmarish dream world where everything was distorted, and nothing made sense but I couldn’t figure out why. This is when I finally came out to my Mum as trans.

She did not take me seriously and didn’t know what I was talking about. She refused to buy me a binder and said that I was just confused, and I needed to get a diagnosis of autism. I believed that everything the influencers told me was true. She was clearly lying as she obviously knew about the trans community. To me, she was a transphobic bigot. Because of the self-harm I had got a few sessions with CAMHs. I was already seeing them to get Ritalin for my ADHD but these sessions were to discuss my anxiety.

Although I believed I was trans, a psychologist affirming this was extremely important to me and proved that I was really trans and that I was right. Because I am autistic, I really depend on professionals to confirm what I feel is right. My plan for these meeting was to get the professionals to convince my parents that I was trans. I was surprised how easy it was. I told the psychologist I was trans and she asked me my name and pronouns without hesitation. Before I told her I was trans, I told her that I felt like I was going insane, and she replied that that was completely normal and it was just a bit of anxiety. She never asked me why I thought I was a boy but believed everything I said, and she told my parents to use my new name and pronouns. She agreed with me that my Mum was aggressive and, even though we didn’t call her a transphobe, it was implied. It was implied that my Mum was old fashioned and strict and was making me miserable.

After this meeting my family still refused to use he/him pronouns but did agree to a new name. I kept changing my name and made my family use each one or I would get very upset and try to convince them that they were being disrespectful to my true self. My names changed from James to Elliot to Noah to Jesse and finally ended with Zac. The trans community talked about suicide all the time. They said that trans kids tried to kill themselves because of all the transphobia in the outside world. The only way to prevent suicide was to transition as fast as possible. I was afraid of dying and was desperate to avoid suicide. This wasn’t just social transitioning. You had to stop puberty and get puberty blockers. And then you had to get your hands on Testosterone. They told me how to buy hormones online or in real life. I heard that you could buy them at Pride parades. I had a friend who was a trans ally who identified as pan sexual and she was going to get me a binder.

By this time I had no ability to think critically and use my brain which meant I couldn’t study or learn in school. My relationship with my family was seriously damaged because I had turned into an angry, selfish, unstable stranger. I cut my hair short, wore three tight sports bras because my mother wouldn’t buy me a binder, slouched constantly and had constant back pain. I distorted my memories to fit the new trans narrative of thinking I was a boy since childhood. I believed my own lies and could not communicate with people outside the trans bubble.

I was encouraged to spread the word and persuade other people that they were trans, to realize their “true authentic selves”. It was like a cult where there is a need to prove that trans is real by making as many people trans as possible. I would spend hours learning all the language used in the trans community and policing other people online if they said anything deemed transphobic. In real life my friend group were all really into the trans community too and I was very careful to never mis-gender anyone or say anything that would trigger them. I used they/them pronouns for anyone I didn’t know that well just in case. There was constant drama and bullying of anyone who broke the rules.

In July 2021 I went back to CAMHs for a meeting to talk about getting a diagnosis for Autism. My Mum and Dad went as well. My world was completely unreal by this stage, and it was like drifting through a waking nightmare. I didn’t feel in control of my own actions or even thoughts and it was only the persistent commands from the trans community that made me do anything. I spent most of my time in my room online and even avoided friends. I was completely miserable and on top of that, I couldn’t stop thinking about the sexual assaults when I was eleven and even the trans train couldn’t drown it out anymore. I decided to tell someone in CAMHs what had happened. At the meeting I went off with one of the psychologists and I told her about what had happened when I was eleven. I spent most the time talking about my parents. I didn’t know exactly why I was so miserable, so I blamed them, in particular my mother. I said that she was controlling and that she hated me because I was trans. She wouldn’t buy me a binder or use my pronouns and wouldn’t believe me. I found it easy to criticise my parents, but I found it almost impossible to talk about the sexual abuse. I managed to choke out a couple of words but that was enough.

When I went back into the meeting room my Mum and Dad and two other psychologists were all there and they were told that I had been sexually assaulted when I was eleven and a meeting was set up the following week to tell them more. Then the talk switched to trans again and my parents were criticised for not affirming me. We all talked about me coming out in school, which I said was what I wanted. The part of my brain that was controlled by the trans community was delighted that my parents had been told to agree with me. But deep inside I was screaming “no”.

We had the meeting about the sexual abuse the following week and again the psychologist spent as much time giving out to my parents in front of me for not affirming as she did in talking about the sexual abuse. At the time I didn’t question it but now I am wondering why the psychologist did not question me on whether the trauma of the abuse could have made me become disgusted with my body. I think now that a part of my trans journey was an attempt to destroy Sinead and turn her into a different person. Someone who had not been abused.

I heard that CAMHs sent some letters to my parents going on about my trans identity and that they changed my name and pronouns on their system. My Mum went mad when she got the letters and had a fight with CAMHs and sent some letters back and then did a load of research on trans theory. She almost immediately asked everyone to stop using my trans name and also not to start using the new pronouns which they had been about to start doing. She also found me a therapist who she said was more suitable than CAMHs. I was so depressed, I didn’t even have the energy to fight back. I felt that it was out of my hands, and I couldn’t control anything anymore.

In the last few weeks before school started again my Mum talked to me a lot about the sexual abuse. Something similar had happened to her when she was young and so she understood how I felt. We talked a lot about the trans community as well. She had bought a book and looked up stuff on the internet and she asked me to watch a you tube video called “Transkids: It’s time to talk” with Stella O’Malley. I was reluctant to watch something so transphobic as I had been trained to avoid anything like that. But I was a small bit curious too. I watched the video and saw all these young people like me who thought that they were trans. From where I was sitting, I thought that they were all mistaken and then I thought about myself and what if I was wrong about myself too? Even though I still believed that I was trans, I was not 100% sure anymore. My Mum then told me about what transitioning actually meant with the hormones and surgeries and showed me more videos of people who had got them done. It was clear that you cannot actually change sex, and this was something completely new to me. Maybe it is because I am autistic, but I had believed that you could actually change sex. And then there were the side effects of puberty blockers, testosterone and surgeries which the trans community never talked about.

I went back to school in a confused state of mind. I didn’t think I was trans anymore but sometimes I would wonder if I had made a mistake and I was. Facing reality without the crutch of the trans community was a huge shock. My parents had blocked all access to Youtube, TikTok, Discord and a ton of other sites so I now had nothing to do with the online trans community. But my friends still thought that I was Zac and that I still believed everything about trans theory. One of my friends in particular was treating me like her special project and pushing me to transition as fast as possible. She was the one who wanted to buy me a binder as she had lots of money. She was going to buy hair dye for me to dye my hair pink. But worse than that, she wouldn’t stop talking about suicide and how depressed she was. I became very upset and anxious and as I was seeing the new therapist that my Mum had found, I told her that my friend was going to kill herself. I had started self-harming again with the stress of the double life I was leading and also trying to adjust to the fact that the trans community had told me so many lies. I was discovering new lies every day and each time I would remember JamieDodger telling me these lies and how I had completely believed him/her. For example, I was shocked to discover that trans people are not being killed every day and that cis people don’t hate them and want them dead. I had been terrified for no good reason.

The self-harming became really bad and I cut my arm over and over with the blade from a sharpener. My friend had made me so worried, and I could not calm down and I could not stop thinking about suicide. I felt that unless I was checked into a mental hospital, I would have to kill myself to make it stop. I told my therapist how bad I was feeling, and my Mum brought me to the GP and then to the local Childrens’ Hospital. We spent five days and three nights there. I saw at least three psychiatrists, including the chief child psychiatrist, who my Mum said was very good at his job. Most of the days when we were in hospital, we had nothing to do so we went for long walks around the hospital chatting about everything. There wasn’t any exact thing wrong with me so I couldn’t explain why I was feeling so bad but now I think that the jolt from being pulled out of the warped reality of the trans community back into the real world was the main reason. And also I think because I had pushed away the trauma from the sexual assaults by becoming trans and now I was processing it all. I had terrible nightmares every night that made me afraid to go to sleep. I was having panic attacks in school regularly and most days I had to go home early as I found it so stressful to be in the same class as my abuser. I did not do much learning in school this term either and I felt that I was hanging on by a thread.

I was discharged from the Children’s Hospital and an appointment was made to go back to CAMHs which my Mum was very unhappy about. We went back the next week and my Dad came with us. We met a consultant psychiatrist who seemed very angry with me. In the waiting room my parents told him that I wasn’t Zac anymore, but Sinead. He wanted to see me on my own and I told him all about the sexual abuse, the bullying when I was little, the friend who was pressuring me to transition and talking about suicide all the time and my problems coping because of my autism and ADHD. He wasn’t interested in any of that but kept calling me Zac. I felt that he was trying to trick me into admitting that I was still trans. I told my Mum this on the way to the car and she was very cross. She wrote a letter asking for a transfer to a different CAMHs unit and I moved to a new CAMHs in January 2022. My Mum got a few appointments with a government agency that deals with sexual abuse cases for children. They gave my Mom to help me with the PTSD. She also made an appointment with a special autism clinic to get a diagnosis for autism and to get an educational psychological assessment for school. This happened in January 2022. In the assessment they asked all about gender again and waited until my Mum was out of the room to ask me. It’s like you cannot get away from gender anymore and I don’t even believe that there is such a thing as gender identity anymore. It all seems so silly.

My Mum talked to the school about getting the abuser moved from my class but in the end the school said that instead they would move me so I was transferred to a different class and it was much better. The new CAMHs I attend put me on a different Ritalin which works much better, and they see me regularly for check-ups. They don’t talk about gender but talk about autism, ADHD and mental health but I never see them on my own and my Mum insists on being at every meeting.

I didn’t get over my dysphoria so easily. I had my last short haircut in December 2021 and I am now trying desperately to grow it again. I feel very upset about cutting my hair which I miss terribly. I look at photos of my lovely hair and feel sad and count the months until it will be long again. Around March 2022 I really felt the dysphoria start to lift and I started to stand up straight again. Everyone commented on how much I had grown but really, I was just standing up straight. My back stopped hurting constantly and I threw away all my tiny sports bras. Recently I threw away all my trans clothes and I have bought normal clothes. I went on holidays in June and wore a swimsuit with no problems, something that I was unwilling to do for years. I even wear dresses.

I am still a bit weirded out by mirrors because the trans charities all give advice like covering mirrors when you are trans so as not to get triggered by seeing yourself as you really are. So, I had got used to covering all my mirrors like a vampire and now I have to adjust. I think that trans ideology creates dysphoria and not the other way around. Trans ideology put the idea of dysphoria in my head and encouraged me to pick at it constantly until I could not bear my body and wanted to disassociate from it.

It is nearly a full year since I first discovered that trans theory was a big lie. I am slowly losing all my friends because they sense that I don’t believe in trans ideology anymore. I am making new friends who have no interest in trans. I am slowly getting my brain to work again as being indoctrinated makes it difficult to think critically. My Mum is helping me to study but I have a lot of catching up to do to make up for being unable to concentrate for three years. Because I have a diagnosis of autism, I get support from the government now so, at the moment, I have a tutor who comes every day for July Provision. My Mum plans on paying her to help me when I go back to school. In some ways I feel much older than my friends. I feel like I have been through some experiences that they do not understand. In other ways I feel much younger as I missed out on so much when I was stuck in trans land. It’s like I entered a horror world when I was 11 and came out again when I was 14 so I had to learn what teenagers are like from scratch, like what they wear and watch and talk about.

I hope this account helps you to understand what it is like to get sucked into the trans world. This is my experience, but I don’t think that I am any different from all the kids on Discord that I met. We were all on the same path and I am lucky that I was pulled off that path before I did something terrible to my body. You might think that I got away with no damage, but I did suffer for three years. I missed out on a lot of school. I delayed dealing with the sexual abuse and my real problems like autism and ADHD. I missed out on having fun and being happy. I made my family suffer. But the worst thing is that I put so much work into distorting my memories of when I was a kid that now I can’t really remember what I was really like. Even looking photos of me as a kid does not make me remember.

I hope that this letter helps other kids. Maybe if people understood what the trans community is actually like they would not encourage kids to become trans like the professionals in CAMHs, my old GP or even the psychologist in the autism clinic.