Thread by @reclaimingtrans

Back when I was still detrans, I watched the Miseducation of Cameron Post with another detrans TERF, which is a movie about a teenage lesbian in the US who's sent to a Christian ex-gay camp. Part of what they do at the camp is look for "root causes" of being gay, try to find...

..."what's behind" their feelings, what kind of trauma or other experiences supposedly caused their "same-sex attraction disorder". The gay kids have to fill out a worksheet with an iceberg on it, the tip of the iceberg is their gayness, the part underneath the water...

...is supposed to be their real underlying problem. Their gayness is supposed to be a "symptom" of this larger problem, unresolved trauma or whatever. So after we watch this movie, the other detrans TERF tells me, "This is like how I talk to people about their gender dysphoria...

... I ask them to look for what's behind the feelings,I tell them to look for what those feelings are a symptom of, to find the root trauma, etc. How am I different from those people in the movie?" She was asking me to find a way to deny that we were doing the same thing.

And I don't remember what I said but I came up with some bullshit answer about why what she did was different from what the ex-gay people in the movie were doing. She was asking me to help hide what she was doing from herself and I did my best to do so, while at the same time...

...knowing on some level that I was rationalizing and denying. I even said something like, I felt like I could understand what those ex-gay people were doing. At that point I'd already been researching conversion practices and knew that what I was doing to myself was...

...the same but I was still deep in the detrans rad fem community and didn't see how I could leave and was trying to make the best of it. I came up with some bullshit answer to hide reality from both of us, so we could keep living in the fantasy we'd created around ourselves,...

... that I felt trapped in but didn't know how to leave. But we were doing the same thing those ex-gay people were doing, only looking for "root causes" for gender dysphoria instead of "same-sex attraction disorder" & based in transphobic feminism instead of conservative...

...Christianity. Hell, I watched that movie because I wanted to see how much my experience was the same. Read the book it was based on for the same reason. I'd been reading about conversion therapy and ex-gay groups because by then I knew what I was doing was similar and I was...

...trying to understand what I'd gotten myself into. But I wasn't ready to leave because that would mean completely uprooting my current life, cutting a lot of people off and starting over and I wasn't ready to do that. I wasn't ready to even think all of that out consciously.

I was preparing for my eventual escape not fully realizing that was what I was doing. So I lived in this in-between place, figuring out that I was a trans person who converted to a transphobic ideology and was engaging in conversion practices while still pretending everything...

...was fine, still trying to make it work. Hell, I put in even more effort to make shit work as I was figuring out that I was basically an ex-trans person. On some level I knew I was lying to that other detrans woman, that I'd seen myself in the characters in that movie, I just..

...wasn't ready to leave yet. And I was afraid to tell her or other detrans women the truth. I kept most of my doubts, disillusionment and research into conversion practices secret. Partially because when I did open up about that it didn't go well. And I knew it was coming...

...apart for me, the whole world I'd built around myself. I wasn't ready for it to all come down. I still can't quite believe that conversation even happened, like why would you ever need to prove to yourself that what you're doing isn't conversion therapy if that isn't what...

...you're doing? She was doing the same thing those ex-gay people were doing! On some level she recognized that. Looking for the "root causes" of being gay or being trans in trauma or early childhood experiences or whatever so you stop being trans or gay is conversion therapy!

I'm just grateful to all the people who've helped raise awareness of what conversion practices are actually like, who've put their stories out there or created fictional portrayals, because it helped me figure out what I was going through and get to the point where I could leave.

I tell my story and talk about my experiences because I know just doing that can help people figure out if they're trapped in a similar situation, even if it takes them a long to to actually leave. Believing in your own thoughts and feelings can take time when you've been...

...taught not to trust them, to constantly dissect them to find the "unresolved trauma" or "internalized oppression" that's supposedly hiding behind the them. When you're taught how to reframe them to fit the ideology you've absorbed because you think it'll make your life better.

You end up losing the ability to trust your own mind and you're encouraged to see your thoughts and feelings as the tip of the iceberg that you need to ignore, so you can dive deeper into the waters below to find their "real meaning", nevermind that you're actually drowning.

In the end, I finally listened to myself and got away. But it took years and I still had trouble trusting my perceptions for years afterwards. I'm still healing from all I lived through. But I made it through, I made it out. And I know other people who've gotten out too.

Some people from my old community call me "crazy", some have even accused me of making things up. If that's what they have tell themselves, if they have to deny my experiences to keep going, then it's not really about me. It's about where they are. My experiences are still real.

Maybe someday they'll be able to accept that I'm just doing my best to describe a fucked up time in my life, maybe not. I just want people to find what they need. I want people to have an easier time than I did getting out. I believe in people's ability to free themselves.

I believe if given enough information and encouragement to trust one's self-knowledge, that people can see for themselves if they're engaging in conversion practices. No one else can pierce through that denial, the person has to be ready to go there and free themselves.

I tell my story so other people have an easier time trusting their feelings that something is wrong, that they can believe themselves instead of what others tell them is going on inside of them. That if they feel like they're killing a part of themselves off, they can stop.

I want people to know that if detransitioning hurts, they can stop. If it doesn't seem like it's working, they're not doing anything wrong and they don't have to try harder. They can just stop, they can leave. It might be hard but it's better than lying to yourself for years.