Regarding the topic of detransition, it's so good to see robust empirical research like the DARE study. Moving past purely rhetorical discusisons toward data-driven insights is fundamental for responsible discourse. Your commitment to scientific rigour and clarity is truly appreciated, Kinnon. This work is so important.
Unfortunately the decision to detransition is not necessarily informative about the correctness of the more important decision to transition in the first place. Detransition does not take you back to where you would have been.
Is there any research on people who regret they didn't transition sooner? Going through a whole puberty without intervention creates irreversible changes in your body. You can't completely undo or reverse the puberty you had when you transition later. If you transition in, say, your forties rather than twenties, that's even more irreversible changes you've been through.
I don't know how common it is. Just going by trans people I personally know, this "I will regret forever that I didn't transition sooner" thing seems pretty common, but obviously that's purely anecdotal. Would be interesting to see research on it.
Often, people talk as if waiting as long as possible to transition means erring on the side of caution, UNLESS the person will become seriously depressed or perhaps even suicidal from gender dysphoria. People talk as if "irreversible bodily changes" only happens during a medical transition, but it totally happens during natural puberty and natural gendered ageing too.
Thank you for these excellent points! You're right, but I am not aware of any formal studies that look specifically into the question of prevalence of wishing one had transitioned at a younger age. (If others are aware of such a study I would also love to know about it.)
But it does come up commonly in trans discourse on social media in recent years. Just spitballing, my sense is that this emerged more as a reverse/counter discourse following the increase in visibility of regretful detransitoners who regretted treatment as youth (I do not recall observing trans adults in the late 2000s - early 2010s speaking on this type of regret/desire, but we also didn't have young public regretters back then like we see today). In some of these cases of wishing one transitioned earlier, it can be more of a "what if" type of situation, because these folks didn't realize a transgender identity until well into adulthood, so it can be somewhat of a moot point (although the feelings are felt acutely).
There is one longitudinal follow-up study conducted by a Dutch team (Smith et al. 2001) that did compare the outcomes of trans youth referred for pediatric trans medicine with gender dysphoric/nonconforming youth who were rejected for treatment. Among the group not treated (mostly due to complex MH and sexual trauma), it appeared that most did not end up transitioning as adults and generally agreed, in hindsight as adults, with the decision not to start as adolescents. I know of no other studies like it.
There are a few experiences of regret relating to realizing transness and seeking transition treatment, including the one you mention:
1) those who wished they realized their identity at younger ages and transitioned younger;
2) those who did realize they were trans at younger ages but could not access treatment due to barriers/life circumstances;
3) those who did access treatment and later regret it;
4) those who discontinued treatment/detransitioned, but regret stopping treatment or the temporary detransition period.
On point 4, I examined this question among a non-probability sample of TGD youth and young adults, finding about 37% of those who reported stopping treatment said they regretted treatment discontinuation (but this is not representative data) (MacKinnon et al., 2024).
(There are also many satisfied with the timing of starting transition, and content they didn't start any younger.)
Refs:
Smith et al. 2001. Adolescents with gender identity disorder who were accepted or rejected for sex reassignment surgery: a prospective follow-up study. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11314574/
MacKinnon et al., 2024. Discontinuation of Gender-Affirming Medical Treatments: Prevalence and Associated Features in a Nonprobabilistic Sample of Transgender and Gender-Diverse Adolescents and Young Adults in Canada and the United States https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(24)00251-9/fulltext
1 and 2 can sometimes be pretty blended, too. Like someone cautiously voices some thoughts about their gender identity at a young age, is met by INTENSE push-back, anger and shaming, then try to repress it as best they can for years to come.
This happened to an acquaintance who's now middle-aged (and transitioned like ten years ago). And I know, one single data point. Still, my guess would be that there are many more cases, at least in my generation and older, and/or people who grow up in conservative environments.
Anyway, there's a media discussion now where regretting that you transitioned so late is explicitly juxtaposed against detransitioning, and that might be pretty new. But people did talk about irreversible changes in puberty and gendered ageing, and how the "results" you get from medical transition depend a lot on your age, long before that.
If anyone would like a pdf copy of the article, please email me:
kinnonmk @ yorku.ca
Thanks for this very thoughtful and grounded discussion of a complex phenomenon. The references / links are very much appreciated.
Regarding the topic of detransition, it's so good to see robust empirical research like the DARE study. Moving past purely rhetorical discusisons toward data-driven insights is fundamental for responsible discourse. Your commitment to scientific rigour and clarity is truly appreciated, Kinnon. This work is so important.
Wonderful to see truth-seeking in academe.
Unfortunately the decision to detransition is not necessarily informative about the correctness of the more important decision to transition in the first place. Detransition does not take you back to where you would have been.
Is there any research on people who regret they didn't transition sooner? Going through a whole puberty without intervention creates irreversible changes in your body. You can't completely undo or reverse the puberty you had when you transition later. If you transition in, say, your forties rather than twenties, that's even more irreversible changes you've been through.
I don't know how common it is. Just going by trans people I personally know, this "I will regret forever that I didn't transition sooner" thing seems pretty common, but obviously that's purely anecdotal. Would be interesting to see research on it.
Often, people talk as if waiting as long as possible to transition means erring on the side of caution, UNLESS the person will become seriously depressed or perhaps even suicidal from gender dysphoria. People talk as if "irreversible bodily changes" only happens during a medical transition, but it totally happens during natural puberty and natural gendered ageing too.
Thank you for these excellent points! You're right, but I am not aware of any formal studies that look specifically into the question of prevalence of wishing one had transitioned at a younger age. (If others are aware of such a study I would also love to know about it.)
But it does come up commonly in trans discourse on social media in recent years. Just spitballing, my sense is that this emerged more as a reverse/counter discourse following the increase in visibility of regretful detransitoners who regretted treatment as youth (I do not recall observing trans adults in the late 2000s - early 2010s speaking on this type of regret/desire, but we also didn't have young public regretters back then like we see today). In some of these cases of wishing one transitioned earlier, it can be more of a "what if" type of situation, because these folks didn't realize a transgender identity until well into adulthood, so it can be somewhat of a moot point (although the feelings are felt acutely).
There is one longitudinal follow-up study conducted by a Dutch team (Smith et al. 2001) that did compare the outcomes of trans youth referred for pediatric trans medicine with gender dysphoric/nonconforming youth who were rejected for treatment. Among the group not treated (mostly due to complex MH and sexual trauma), it appeared that most did not end up transitioning as adults and generally agreed, in hindsight as adults, with the decision not to start as adolescents. I know of no other studies like it.
There are a few experiences of regret relating to realizing transness and seeking transition treatment, including the one you mention:
1) those who wished they realized their identity at younger ages and transitioned younger;
2) those who did realize they were trans at younger ages but could not access treatment due to barriers/life circumstances;
3) those who did access treatment and later regret it;
4) those who discontinued treatment/detransitioned, but regret stopping treatment or the temporary detransition period.
On point 4, I examined this question among a non-probability sample of TGD youth and young adults, finding about 37% of those who reported stopping treatment said they regretted treatment discontinuation (but this is not representative data) (MacKinnon et al., 2024).
(There are also many satisfied with the timing of starting transition, and content they didn't start any younger.)
Refs:
Smith et al. 2001. Adolescents with gender identity disorder who were accepted or rejected for sex reassignment surgery: a prospective follow-up study. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11314574/
MacKinnon et al., 2024. Discontinuation of Gender-Affirming Medical Treatments: Prevalence and Associated Features in a Nonprobabilistic Sample of Transgender and Gender-Diverse Adolescents and Young Adults in Canada and the United States https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(24)00251-9/fulltext
Thanks!
1 and 2 can sometimes be pretty blended, too. Like someone cautiously voices some thoughts about their gender identity at a young age, is met by INTENSE push-back, anger and shaming, then try to repress it as best they can for years to come.
This happened to an acquaintance who's now middle-aged (and transitioned like ten years ago). And I know, one single data point. Still, my guess would be that there are many more cases, at least in my generation and older, and/or people who grow up in conservative environments.
Anyway, there's a media discussion now where regretting that you transitioned so late is explicitly juxtaposed against detransitioning, and that might be pretty new. But people did talk about irreversible changes in puberty and gendered ageing, and how the "results" you get from medical transition depend a lot on your age, long before that.
You can never get back to where you would have been if you never transitioned. It’s a one-way street.