Walt Heyer
Walt Heyer is an American author and speaker. According to his own website, he underwent gender-reassignment surgery at the age of 42 and lived as a woman for eight years before detransitioning. He attributes this change of direction to his Christian faith and the support of a church community.
What can be found
The site provides an overview of his speaking engagements, articles, and books and offers the opportunity to book him as a speaker. Heyer has written several books, testified before legislative bodies, and is a senior fellow at the Family Research Council. His second website, Sex Change Regret, focuses on people who regret transitioning.
Why it is included on this list
Heyer is one of the best-known and longest-active voices on detransition in the United States. His work is religiously motivated and controversial: the Family Research Council is a conservative Christian lobbying organization, and critics point out that his personal story does not necessarily apply to others. See also critical perspectives.
Life story
Heyer was born in Los Angeles on October 25, 1940. According to his own account, his grandmother dressed him in girls' clothing as a child, and he was abused by an uncle. As a woman, he lived under the name Laura Jensen. In 1991, he returned to living as a man. He calls the diagnosis of gender dysphoria he received at the time an incorrect diagnosis. Before becoming an author, he worked as an assistant manager at Honda.
Books and speaking engagements
His books include Trading My Sorrows from 2006, Perfected by Love from 2009, Paper Genders from 2011, A Transgender's Faith from 2015, and Trans Life Survivors from 2018. He co-authored Embracing God's Design with Jennifer Bauwens. Some titles have been translated, including into Czech, Italian, and Japanese. Heyer writes for The Federalist and other conservative media outlets. His site lists appearances on, among others, Fox News, Focus on the Family, and Daystar TV. He identifies protecting children from gender-affirming care as the goal of his lectures. His second site has its own profile on this list: Sex Change Regret.
Criticism
The media watchdog Media Matters for America describes Heyer as a source of extremely transphobic commentary. Several letters to the editor disputing the factual accuracy followed an opinion piece he wrote for USA Today in 2019. In June 2020, YouTube removed a recording of a Heritage Foundation panel in which he participated for violating its hate-speech policies.
How to use and weigh this source
Heyer tells one life story and draws general conclusions from it. The story shows that regret and misdiagnosis occur. How often this happens is a question for research; see the international detransition statistics.