Do I Still Regret My Transition?

The other day, I gave a quick summary of why I had a recent surgery to a newish friend: I used to be trans, it was bad, it was a mistake, got my boobs cut off, then got reconstruction.

My friend, a thoughtful lady, asked me: “Do you still regret it?”
Hmm. Good question.

I know some people have a philosophy like: no regrets. Regrets don’t make sense. Every mistake took you to where you are.

And I get that. But in another sense - aren’t some things just going to be regretted forever? Are some things too painful to totally shrug off? Would you really say “no regrets” if you like, got in a car accident driving drunk and had to live the rest of your life as a felon on a mini moped?

Yeah, I guess. But sometimes the suffering and loss is so great that the additional self knowledge - “oh turns out I actually really prefer having breasts rather than a scarred numb flat chest” - comes as very cold comfort when it arrives when it’s too late to do anything about it. In the words of the problematic bard Amanda Palmer, “it doesn’t matter if you want it back, you’ve given it away!” (“This is so true about surgery,” I said to my husband, while showing him the song, who replied cryptically, “That’s true about everything.”).

Do I still regret it? Sure I do! Listen, I regret a lot of things. I regret not majoring in computer science in 2016, I could have bought a duplex in Chicago and be riding out the AI boom as a middle manager by now. I regret the time my roommate tried to open up a conversation about her eating disorder getting triggered when she returned to her parents house, and instead of being the listening ear she cleared needed, I froze up and got anxious and excused myself. I regret accidentally cutting my infant son’s finger with nail clippers. I regret not grinding harder to survive the layoffs at my dream tech job when I was pregnant. Rather than insisting with psychotic PollyAnna-ish-ness that No Regrets, I feel that I must simply hold these lessons and try to do better next time. But maybe this is just semantics. Maybe when people say “no regrets”, people really just mean “learn the lesson and don’t dwell on it.” And to that, I say, sure.

The other thing about regret is that it’s easier to handle when your life is going okay, and all-consuming when it’s the only thing to chew on in a life you are unhappy with. So rather than picking at the scab of your discontent and drawing new blood, we should try our best to find better things to think about and work towards. Be happy, even, if you can.

And I am the happiest I’ve ever been. Breast reconstruction helped, so far - it’s nice to look normal-ish again instead of being constantly reminded. Not a “just like new” situation, of course, but what’s one more scar on top of my existing scar when I get to feel and look soothingly normal-adjascent? But the really helpful thing is everything else in my life. Husband, kids, home, routine, friends, good food, enough sleep, enough money. Chances to do better, every day, and have it matter. That makes the regret so much easier to bear. And, of course, a lot of time has passed. You get used to a lot.

Did I learn some valuable lessons? Yeah! I learned I’m not immune to social contagions. I learned that health is very precious and should not be taken for granted. I learned some mistakes are permanent - yeah, duh. But does anyone else kind of remember being a newish adult and not really, truly, in your bones, understanding the gravity and permanency and crushing weight of capital-C Consequences ? Remember Ms. Palmer’s brutal exhortation - It doesn’t matter if you want it back. So yeah, I try to learn those lessons. Maybe the most valuable one is that I can, eventually, with great effort, come back from rock bottom. Now, I’m hoping not to have to do it again, but you know - good to know.

Whatever. Regrets are part of life. So yeah, I still regret it. But even if I lost a pound of flesh, most of me is still alive and kicking, so you know, what can I do but mostly move on and occasionally write a pensive little blog post about?