Is detransitioning rare?

Question

This CNN article states that "Conservative lawmakers’ defense of gender-affirming care bans often cite detransitioning as evidence of possible harm if patients come to regret their medical transition. But LGBTQ advocates argue that detransition is rare and is not always rooted in regret. A person may choose to stop undergoing treatment because they lack family support or access to adequate care, among other reasons." 

Is detransitioning among trans youth rare as they become older?

Answer 1

According to the National Library of Medicine (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9516050/#CIT0001) Irwig references the research done by the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism (https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/107/9/e3937/6572526) on TGD within the US Military System. Within the article it is stated that, “4-year gender-affirming hormone continuation rate was 70.2% with 81% for the transfeminine group and 64% for the transmasculine group. Using a Cox regression model, increased discontinuation rates were independently associated with transmasculine gender identity (hazard ratio 2.4) and starting hormones ≥ age 18 (hazard ratio 1.69”. Meaning that 30% discontinued hormanal therapy for reasons not including, “discontinued hormonal therapy for more than 90 days, the short period of 90 days, and the inability to capture prescriptions filled outside of the military healthcare system”.  Based off of this information provided, I would say that detransitioning among trans youth isn’t necessarily rare. However, that does not mean that the individual is regretful of their medical transition. 

Comments

Thank you for the informative comment! After looking at the sources myself I believe I agree with you. Both those sources seemed to agree that detransitioning is not what the majority of transgender folks do, but it isn't necessarily rare. However I did find many articles that disagree, providing different statistics of 92% continuing rather than the 70.2% you'd found. Perhaps looking for more sources is necessary here.

One of the sources I found that disagreed: https://www.gendergp.com/detransition-facts/

Answer 2

This claim is subjectively true. The Report of the 2015 Transgender Survey found that only 8% of 28,000 trans people. Out of that 8 percent, 62 percent detransitioned due to economic or environmental reasons rather than social reasons.

https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS-Full-Report-Dec17.pdf

Answer 3

This NIH study says "The most common reasons cited were pressure from a parent (36%), transitioning was too hard (33%), too much harassment or discrimination (31%), and trouble getting a job (29%)."

This SEGM article also says accurate rates of detransition [and regrets] is unknown due to "inadequate follow-ups", "high rates of loss of follow up", "Imprecision of the measurement of detransition and regret", and "Reliance on biased samples or samples with poor generalizability".

Although the above are not specific to trans youth, however these articles 1 2 say that 97% of trans youth do not regret transitioning.

Overall, rates of regretting transition are highly exaggerated.