i once detransitioned. i did it against my will. Well, i was more or less bullied into agreeing to it. It was in the fall of 1989. That previous spring, while at the University of Texas, my egg cracked, and i came out to my parents. My grades were terrible, and my life was really falling apart from depression.

So i moved back in with my parents and transferred to the University of Houston. Over the summer, now that i was out to my parents and they weren’t kicking me out, i started being open about who i was. i started buying some women’s clothing and adding it to my daily wear. i started wearing eyeliner and sometimes a bit of other makeup everywhere i went. In short, i turned into what today would be called a femboy.

Then came the first day of classes at U of H that August. One of the classes was Russian, and to start with, the professor taught us all how to introduce ourselves to each other in Russian and then had us each talk to someone next to us. As she’s going around the room, the professor comes to the boy sitting next to me, points at me, and in Russian says “Ask her what her name is.” OK, so i was dressed a wee bit femme that day. Maybe more than usual. i mean, it was the first day of class so i wanted to look nice, right?

So i get a deer in the headlights look for a second and then this voice in my brain screams out “OMG DO IT DO IT DO IT THIS IS YOUR CHANCE!!!” So i turn to the boy and say “My name is Eve”. That was the first few letters of my then middle name and i had instantly thought that would make it defensible as a nickname if anyone ever called me on it.

So after that, i became Eve at school. Every day i’d get up early in the morning, have a bite to eat, throw on some disposable boy mode clothes, and put my real clothes and makeup and purse in a large canvas tote bag. My parents just assumed it was school books or something. Once i got to school, i’d park in the back of the lot, change clothes, and then spend the rest of the day on campus as myself.

It was really nice! i was finally getting to be me for the the first time. People there only knew me as a girl and no one ever questioned me. i was just living a normal life for a 20 year old girl in college. It was bliss!

But it didn’t suddenly make my life better overall. i was suffering from major depression, and probably it was unrecognized bipolar disorder, but that diagnosis didn’t come until ten years later. Despite the fact that i was making friends as a girl and living pretty much all of my life away from my parents house as a girl, i was still struggling to get through each day.

Often enough, i’d skip classes and just sit somewhere on campus half napping or ruminating over how bad i felt. Frequently, the place i’d sit was in the lounge of the women’s restroom – the campus building were older and were from a time when lounges were still common. Naturally, this did not help my grades. i was also ignoring homework, again because of the depression more than anything. There was probably some executive dysfunction thrown in to boot.

I was in therapy at the time – intensive therapy multiple times a week, even. i was started on anti-depressants, Tofranil and Mellaril at that time. They did not work. The depression just kept getting worse and i kept getting less able to take care of my daily needs. By November, everything collapsed. i stopped going to class at all. i’d just change clothes, and find some place on campus to nap or sit in despair until it was time to go home.

At some point my parents found out that i’d been living as Eve outside the house and they confronted me. My mother was furious! She and my dad really tore into me over this and that was when i finally realized that they intended my therapy sessions to be something that was supposed to “cure” me of being trans, not help me learn to accept it. They yelled at me and threatened to stop paying for therapy and bullied me until i finally said i’d stop being Eve and try to be a boy again.

At first i just went back to femboy mode, but in January of 1990 my depression got so bad that i literally walked out of my job at Taco Bell in tears and what little remained of my life collapsed. That just made my dad yell at me even more because to him it meant i was being irresponsible, and weak, and unmanly, and i needed to get a job or he’d kick me out of the house. At that point they broke me entirely, and i pretty much gave up any thought of wanting to be a girl. The bullying from my parents had beaten into my brain the idea that i was supposed to be a boy, and that became my new programming. i packed up all my clothes and makeup in a box and put them away so i could focus on being a Real Man and set aside the “insanity” of being trans.

And that’s how i once started to transition, and was forced into detransitioning.

And i’ve never resolved my feelings over it.