detransition log

if you want to get in touch with me about any of this, i am available on butchmutt (at) protonmail (dot) com

--- 28/04/2026 ---

so there's not really much out there in terms of what can be expected from hormonal detranstion, so i thought i'd put together something that might be helpful. this entry is being written about 14 months after i stopped taking T, so some of this is being remembered or reconstructed from reddit posts. hope it helps!

i basically stopped cold turkey in February 2025, but my dose was not particularly high. i was doing about 20-30mg per week injected, and my final injection was about 50mg designed to cover me for a two week holiday abroad, because i didn't want to start my period all of a sudden overseas. within the first few weeks, my skin got softer and the smell of my body changed. within the first six months the hair on my head changed texture back to being curlier again, though this might have happened as soon as after 2 or 3 months. another thing that happened in the first 6 months was that my nipples got slightly more nipple-like? they'd always been pretty flat after top surgery, and one of them isn't really a nipple at all as much as it is a pigmented area of skin. i don't know if them perking up a bit was due to the change in my hormones, or just more time after surgery (I was 3 years post-op at this point in time).

i think i got my first period/bleeding within a couple of weeks. i had been on desogestrel birth control for several years. i started to get bleeding around every 1-2 weeks with no real pattern. this was accompanied by some bad cramps, and also nausea. i had almost no issues with periods on T, they stopped quickly and didn't resume. prior to T i had a fucking nightmare with them, and only high-estrogen birth control would solve the problem. however, going on T caused my migraines to get worse and because i had one with visual effects once, the GP will no longer prescribe me the combined pill. i took a private blood tests and discovered my estrogen levels were 92 pmol/L, which is technically a healthy prefollicular phase estrogen level, but probably not good for my body to walking around on all the time! also the estrogen ranges for cis women are so broad that i highly doubt their veracity, given how badly underresearched much of women's health is. however my GP didn't seem to care about this

after 3 months of it not settling, they switched me from desogestrel to noresthisterone, which did not really make any difference. after several more months, i switched to the injectable contraceptive sayanapress, and in addition started to DIY estrogen, taking 1mg orally every day. this is roughly equivalent to the dose of estradiol present in contraceptive pills that use it (Zoely contains 1.5mg, Qlaira contains between 1-3 depending on the phase of pill. other pills available in the UK use ethinylestradiol, not biodentical). after about 3 months of this, my trough levels came back at around 200 pmol/L - much better! i was concerned that taking E longterm might fuck with my body's ability to make it on its own, so now being about 10 months out from stopping T, i decided to stop the E and see what happened

my periods haven't come back at all, however i got a blood test the other week and my E levels are sitting just over 100 pmol/L. my T levels have been around 0.4-0.6 ie. as expected. it's possible that being on T has impacted my ability to produce estrogen somewhat, and that may return slowly or it may never return. when i got my baselines, i had E levels of 400, but i also wasn't on any birth control at the time. it's possible that progestogen-only birth control just locks me down to around 100. i fear this may not be good for my health as i am struggling with a lot of ME/CFS symptomns since about a year ago, but there's been stress in my life that could also explain that.

since coming off T, the only thing i miss is my ability to lubricate. i no longer bleed so easily during sex as my vaginal lining is not atrophy-ing, however when i was on T i would make copious amounts of slime that was an excellent lubricant for sex. i make far less now, and the consistency just isn't up to spending an hour or more bottoming, which is something i very much like to do. i also have become a lot more prone to yeast infections, which is i suspect partly due to my lack of adequate lubrication accruing me some damage, though i never got them from all the internal bleeding during sex when i was on T (which never hurt, so i generally didn't notice until after). on the flipside, i seem to be a lot less prone to UTIs than i was while on T.

my current plan is to speak to the doctor about vaginal estrogen. honestly, all things being ideal, taking a very small dose of T and some extra estrogen may be what i want long term, but there is so little research or community anecdotal resource to tell me what the health implications of doing this would be, beyond the generally low processing cost of exogenous hormones. if you know anything about this, please get in touch with me. another option is to come off my birth control, which i'm considering. my acne has been pretty bad in the last few months, which is usually a sign my hormones are a bit unbalanced. however, i do actually use it as birth control and while it's likely that my partner who has the biggest risk of this is shooting blanks, i can't guarantee that she is and it would be hard for us to find out.

i do think my chronic illness has gotten a bit worse since i came off T, however again it's hard to tell because last year was honestly hell and i might just be getting the consequences of that. i've been taking electrolytes in the morning and trying to improve my baseline fitness, however i definitely am more tired and get more joint and muscle/soft tissue pain. i also have IBS now, though that's been developing slowly over the last few years since i had COVID for the second and third times and has just gotten a lot worse in the last year, again that could be life stress rather than hormones, it's hard to say.

in the last few months (so, about a year after stopping T), my pubic hair has suddenly gotten less soft and a lot more wiry. this might be because i'm low on E. my body hair has in general receded back to pre-T levels, though there's still a lot more on my asscheeks and thighs than before (i have always been quite hairy).

think that's all i have to say for now. i'll keep updating as my medications and body changes, and as i potentially learn more about if i can just take both at once. i want my slime back!