A woman who de-transitioned last year claims hundreds of transgender youths are now looking for help to return to their original sex.
Evans said young people who have recently undergone sex reassignment surgery are now approaching her for help as they don’t know what to do.
The 28-year-old said she is launching a charity called The Detransition Advocacy Network for those who feel the same way as her.
Just in the area where Evans lives, Newcastle, 30 people have reached out, she said, adding that those who reach out to her are typically in their 20s, “mostly same-sex attracted” and often autistic.
“I’m in communication with 19 and 20-year-olds who have had full gender reassignment surgery who wish they hadn’t, and their dysphoria hasn’t been relieved, they don’t feel better for it,” Evans said. “They don’t know what their options are now.”
She described the moment she met a young girl with a beard after giving a public talk, who told her she had also detransitioned, but felt like a “traitor” and “felt shunned by the LGBT community.”
That’s when Evans decided to take action and set up a charity, which is having its first meeting in Manchester towards the end of October, reported Sky News.
A 21-year-old woman, whose name was changed by the outlet as she did not want to be identified, reached out to Evans with her concerns.
Ruby began to take testosterone after identifying as a male at 13, and she gradually experienced several physical changes, such as a deeper voice, changes in her body, as well as developing facial hair.
Ruby previously wanted to undergo surgery to remove her breasts this summer, however, she changed her mind in May after she started to have doubts. She decided to detransition to identify as female, stopped her medication and cancelled the procedure, she said.
The woman told Sky News the medication didn’t help her gender dysphoria, and instead of having surgery, she wanted to work on changing how she felt about herself.
“I’ve seen similarities in the way I experience gender dysphoria, in the way I experience other body image issues,” she told the news outlet, adding that she also had an eating disorder.
Ruby explained that she had therapy sessions when she went to gender identity services, but she didn’t feel as though staff made a connection between her gender dysphoria and her eating disorder.
“For everyone who has gender dysphoria, whether they are trans or not, I want there to be more options for us because I think there is a system of saying, ‘Okay here’s your hormones, here’s your surgery, off you go.’ I don’t think that’s helpful for anyone,” the 21-year-old said.
According to Sky News, patients as young as three or four-years-old have gone to the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust for its gender identity services for children under the age of 18.
A spokesperson for the trust said in a statement: “Decisions about physical interventions made in our care are arrived at after a thorough exploration process. While some of our patients may decide not to pursue physical treatment or drop out of treatment, the experience of regret described here is rarely seen.”
Researchers found a surge in the number of operations may have been linked to an increase in patients whose procedures were covered by insurance plans such as Medicare or Medicaid, according to the study published in the journal JAMA Surgery.
