before and now....opinion poll

[peaceandparty]

Dr Rick's comment
While I was surfing the internet, I found Dr. Rick's statement which made me soooo upset by saying "ambiguous genitalia are "a serious disease", without hesitation, and "management of ambiguous genitala in the newborn"...and he like to performe "the potential and limits of reconstructive surgery"?
However, I believe the corrective surgeries more likely caused various mental illnesses.

( Definition)
disease
a condition of a person, animal, or plant in which its body or structure is harmed because an organ or part is unable to work as it usually does; an illness.


By Dr. Rick:
"Ambiguous genitilia are a manifestation of a serious disease, not an oppurtunity to delay life-altering distinctions and treatment. The disease sometimes occurs in conjunction with serious and potentially life-threatening anatomic anomalies of the digestive and/or urogenital tract that can't wait until puberty to be corrected. Gender assignment cannot be practically put-off for a dozen or so years without profound and harmful implications for the patient and his/her family under most circumstances. Human beings are she's and he's, not it's.

Karyotyping (chromosomal analysis), the anatomic condition of the baby, biochemical and imaging studies, and the etiology of the genital malformations can lead to a precise and unambiguous diagnosis. Management of ambiguous genitalia in the newborn, when done properly, utilizes an entire multidisciplinary team along with the family in every step of the diagnostic procedures, the choice of sex assignment, and the treatment strategy; a delay in gender assignment and definitive treatment is now rarely warranted.

As a general rule, female pseudohermaphrodites (genotypic females) are usually declared to be female sex at birth. In cases of male pseudohermaphroditism (genotypic males), the decision can sometimes be more complex. In all cases, the potential and limits of reconstructive surgery and the pubertal "programmed" response of the genitalia to endogenous and exogenous hormones must be considered.

What's not entirely clear from the other posts on this thread is how assigning gender to a child with a birth-defect should be any more of a moral dilemma than assigning gender to a healthy baby, or how a delayed repair of deformed genitalia is somehow more ethically appropriate than a delayed repair of a cleft palate, an undescended testicle, or an imperforate vagina."
http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...2&page=2&pp=25

this is what a member said
i just came across it alli-gah-to!

i would like us to discuss how we feel about this article!

personally i know i am out of my league until someoen can explain the scientific terminology

one of the curses given to me in life was that i was given a genetic"abnormality"
again---another bad use of words from scarey doctors!
because i always hated science and had no interest
but i am interested in correct usage or creative usage of words
so i would love it if we could discuss this old post
and try and find out what type of language we would like used in conjunction with explaining our own going intersexed conditions and lifestyles

hope this makes sense
its sunday...i am a bit brain dead!!lol

[Dianne]

This "Dr. Rick" appears to be a follower of the deceased Dr. John Money (unfortunately).

There is a modicum of truth to what he says about unusual genitalia sometimes being an indication of possible other anatomical problems, REAL problems that could effect a child's health, but from everything I have read it is only in very rare cases. More commonly, but still relatively rare, even among those with some form of anatomical variation, things requiring early medical treatment are usually related to the lower urinary tract. Various (non-invasive) tests can ensure that there are no related endocrine problems that would effect the child's health and development.

This "Dr. Rick" is obviously from "the old school" that thinks "gender" and "sexual identity" are taught (nurture) rather than inherent (nature) and as much as stated that doctors need to not only assign a gender but make irreversible changes to the child's genitalia in assigning a SEX. With the historical accuracy of such assignments, one is better off flipping a coin! To THINK that doctors can tell at a few months of age how the child will identify is absolute HOREPUCKY!!!!!!!!!!!!! We already have an inkling of how many lives have been badly damaged or totally destroyed by doctors and their "God complex". A person's gender (and the most appropriate sex to go with that gender) is NOT determined by any "test" yet available to medical science! The only true test that will determine if that child is a boy or a girl is TIME. For God's sake, let us do everything we can to give that child TIME!

As many of us know, even if the doctors guess right, there is every likelihood that the child is still going to grow up to know he/she was tampered with and was/is Intersexed. At least by not screwing around with the child's anatomy, the child has a better chance of having appropriate surgery later in life to have normal or near normal sexual function. Infant surgery, when it is the wrong type, makes later surgery much less successful.

May God grant these arrogant medical practitioners a grain of human decency and understanding before they destroy even more lives!!!!

(Who me? Passionate? You bet your bippy! :pissed-2: )

[Kailana]

Ok i'd love to say tons about this Dr. Rick.
but i think the above title says everything, and yes you can borrow it when i am done.


Dr's like him are the ones making life for us the hell it is.

[JOS]

I don't get it.... why is being in-between such a bad psycological deal.... it's obviously the way we were meant to be and no amout of butchery will alter that fact.... duh!

Binary thinking is so narrow minded... it's a bit like the idiots who based evloutionary theories on male humans and completely forgot that the majority sex was female... they may have been important too... who knows maybe variety is crutial to our existance????

I'm guessing this doctor is from the shallow end of the gene pool where biased researchers feel right at home. Incompetence? or just plain lazy? Still if they tell the parents they must keep it secret for their childs mental well-being, maybe no-one will ever notice they're all basing their surgical "trigger happy" ideas on their personal feelings rather than actual scientific surveys.

4FS how will they know the psycological effects if there is no control group that hasn't been mutilated??

[Dianne]

I don't get it.... why is being in-between such a bad psycological deal.... it's obviously the way we were meant to be and no amout of butchery will alter that fact.... duh!

Well, again, not all of us are the same. Physically they almost turned me into a passable male (except for size) but psychologically I was at the opposite end of the spectrum and fit easily into the binary and have alway enjoyed it.

[JOS]

Yeah, ok I see your point (or at least I think I do), we've all had different experiences.
I guess I was just wondering on what evidence doctors are basing their views that a babies sex must be chosen for them as early as possible or else terrible psychological consequences will ensue... did you see

http://www.channel4.com/health/microsites/H/health/magazine/sex/health_intersex.html

One parent was raising her two AIS children as intersex rather than trying to enforce a choice of one or the other..... but as you said each of us is different and I shouldn't have been so flippent

[Kailana]

thanks for the link. I do really wish that, the medical community would acknowledge the need for information. I am still having a hard time getting medical records. I keep reading that, untill recently, the information was withheld. My experiences is that the information is still being withheld, it is vary rare for one of us to obtain medical records that havent been massively edited. Or more like me, I keep being told, the hospitals dont carry records that far back. I know they do, eventually, records show up, but its taken years to get them, and as i have said repeatedly, so very little information is actually left intact, which just furthers my frustration.

Now as for being both, or whats wrong with being both, Absolutely nothing. The thing that gets me, is living in a world where parents and doctors wont acknowledge or even accept someone as being both. They see me as a man, well maybe a transitioning male-female, or whatever. Just seem to refuse to acknowledge my unusual anatomy, scars, scans, hormones, lab work, my well everything. Its kinda crappy that i have to travel every 3 months to Seattle just to get some descent care. At least my Endo acknowledges me as female, it might be nice to hear the words "yes you are in fact intersexed". That hasn't happened though, at least not within the medical community in Walla Walla Washington, USA. Now as for being both, grandparents, I got to love mine, both are very accepting and acknowledge me as both male/female. If they could only get there son(my dad), and daughter(my mom) to accept me my family life would actually be pretty good. As it is, parents seem to just be ashamed of me, maybe a little ashamed of what they have allowed, who knows now, they dont talk to me anymore.

And again i will say there is nothing wrong with being both, as long as we are allowed to be both, express both. I see myself as a woman, so it's a little difficult to accept for me, being assigned male. Yet i know i am anatomically both, genetically with a twist both, hormonally both. I think i Just Identify as a Woman, this suits me better. This is who i really am. This is what i want the world to see.

last thought, I really do wish people would stop calling me "Sir", especially when i am wearing a skirt, dress or whatever. I think that annoys me most.

Just thoughts off the top of my head.

[JOS]

It's weird to remember that now, but I can remember loads of occasions now where shop keepers (usually old ladies ... or at least I assumed they were lol..) called me sir and then looked confused.

It was always quite upsetting at the time because I have been raised as a girl and was never told about intersex etc. I always put it down to being tall but now I wonder if I do look quite androgenous... or is it oestrogenous?

but it hasn't happened since I have been more aware of IS... wonder why?

I'm sorry to hear your parents aren't too accepting of you, I know I've often mixed up my parents feelings of guilt with what I though was shame due to me. It's hard to keep going back for more rejection isn't it!

[Kailana]

oh yes its very easy to expect our parents to love and accept us for the way we were made, came into this world, only to find out, that they are the worst ones, they are much like the doctors who say its for our best interest, they are the ones who seem to betray us the most. It is not easy feeling rejected by the ones who are suppose to love you most. I actually think its the surgeons fault, i blame them most for how my parents treat me. I really see how a parent with an intersexed child is gonna react and wish the best life for there child, and do/allows dr's to fix things so there child looks normal. What i still don't get, is that all of the evidence has shown and repeatedly shown that the methods used on us, failed miserably, and made our acceptance even more difficult. Not just with society, but with our families most. Not having the supportive parents, my life became much more difficult after I found out, then before. The openness of dr's during my military carreer was a difficult thing in its self. Coming home to the states i expected much the same treatment, instead, i am nothing to them, and get treated as such. It is rare when i feel a dr. actually cares, and its even rarer when i feel that they are listening to me.

[peaceandparty]

i cant imagine myself in a war situation.......i would shoot anything that moves!

in the military.....i would be considered even weaker than the women there!

not having supportive or open parents has been something i ahve read from many peoples stories and i have met many people who have been sort of controlled by their parents most of their lives---nightmare-is all i can say to that!
not a reality i am familiar with
in my life from my family
but i understand

doctors,specialists and "professionals" over the last century nearly at least,have made our matters worse
we need to get in direct paying contact with "professionals"
because all of us together are more professional at dealing with the crisis that comes out from the way in which our leaders in professional healthcare deal with us and our emotions and bodies!
the payment should be better for us though
instead of leaving their palaces of research(research labs) and places of "practice"(doctors offices)out of pocket.....we could be leaving with cash in hand for excellent swopping of advice for cash.......it would be worth it for those rich doctors!