Stop downplaying the damage of late transitioning

It annoys me how much our community refuses to acknowledge that transitioning later in life is bad for people, and that trans people ought to transition as early as possible. Anytime someone vents about being ruined because they started after age 20, 25, 30, etc, they get 100s of people fingerwagging and saying "skill issue" and repeating the line that "you can transition at any age." Bullshit. The time to start transition was years ago, but we cope with starting now because it'll only get worse the longer we wait.

I understand that it's not healthy to believe in oneself as "ruined" by not starting earlier, but the soft language used by the trans community is making it easier for cis people to justify delays for our transitions. If we can transition at any age, why not ban minors? Why not wait till 25? Why not go through bureaucratic hurdles, years of therapy, exhaust every other option, make 100% sure that it's actually gender dysphoria and not autism or depression or just a phase or being gay or any number of other things?

I wasted my early 20s being scared of medical transition, wanting to "make sure" I was actually dysphoric, being miserable and depressed while my other friends got to transition. My parents never would've let me transition as a teen anyway, but my 20s were entirely in my hands - I could've started sooner, had this fucking community not been so goddamn soft in its rhetoric and amplified fearmongering from cis people about the "horrors" of transitioning. Had I known then what I know now, I wouldn't be this bitter husk of a person who started late, and who's going to look like this third gender freak even after the full effects of HRT take hold. I wish I could just be a beautiful woman and I hope the trans community grows a fucking spinal column and loudly advocates for early transition so that no one else has to suffer like I am.