Obgyns

[Giner]

I have had this nagging question for sometime now. Does anyone know if our OBGYN's are telling soon to be parents about intersexed children and what the occurences of intersexed children may be? I have talked to my cousin about this and she was never told about the possiblity of her children being intersexed. You would think that soon to be parents would be told this since 1/1000 babies can have some type of congenital anomaly. Thankfully, my sister was aware of this and had talked to her doctor before my niece was born. She was not born with a congenital anomaly. I Think that the doctors should be discussing this with soon to be parents. They may be telling soon to be parents about this in certain areas of the US, but I do not know. If you have any answers for me or think that OBGYNs should be telling people about this, please let me know. I think that this is where we need to start our education of people and I think that we would not have so much of a problem with secrecy, feeling ashamed, and genital mutalations that are associated with intersexed children.

Thanks for your time.
Giner

[Wohali]

I seriously doubt there is even a handful of doctors that tell parents beforehand that there is such a thing as intersex, unless a test came back suggesting the fetus was IS. I mean that would be like telling a parent oh your child might have freckles, or might be blind, or deaf, have a club foot, or be born with a tail, etc. If drs told the parents this at the beginning of pregnancy all the possibilities would scare them... so doubtful they tell parents ahead of time what "might" happen.

My ob/gyn says she has delivered so many babies that she insists there are 5 genders. However I don't think she tells every patient this... just the ones of us that are IS.

[Giner]

Angela,
Thanks for your response. My wish would be that doctors would tell the soon to be parents. I may have been spared GM if my parents had been informed.

[Sunshine1]

Hi !

I'm not sure about telling of the parents before hand, I guess everyone would hope for a "normal" baby or family members that would be more forth coming with medical information about the family tree. I was given up for adoption because of those families genetic birth defect of CAH. The adoption papers stated that she couldn't emotionally handle it and her parents were all for the adoption. I wasn't a secret, they wanted me gone.

I do know that CONGENITAL ADRENAL HYPERPLASIA is one of the many birth defects that a baby is scanned for along with many other types of birth defects. There is a list of states that do this but some don't as of yet. The scan helps boys with CAH or girls with CAH that don't have the ambiguous genitals which is a tip off right from the start of life. Really the scan is for babies with CAH that don't fall under the medical definition of INTERSEX, it's kinda like the VENN diagram from high school math class. Some of us fall into it and some of don't. When I was born the doctors at first thought I was a boy, then thought I was a hermaphrodite, then they realized that I was just a girl under that external virlization and I was just a girl with CAH and because of the excessive virilization a pseudo- hermaphrodite. I like the word pseudo- hermaphrodite unlike many people with natural genitals vs. "normal" genitals. I don't like the word anomalies, the word natural is much better.


To change to subject but not that much lol There was a cow that was born with extra legs. There was nothing medically wrong with the cow but surgeons removed the extra legs and I quote," so the cow would be more aesthetically pleasing" Do you think the cow or the other cows really cared ? or maybe people need to be more tolerant and good luck with that.

Aimee

[Giner]

It has never entered my mind that someone would think about giving someone up for adoption because of CAH. I am taken aback by this revelation of yours. I know that I can set here and say that I wish that I would be told this if I was having a baby. I know that I am on the opposite side of the coin and have seen how it has affected me.

[Betsy]

Hola Giner,

Welcome to Bodies! I try to get a quick welcome out to all our new members but was a bit busy this weekend, and you dived right in! I like that :D

I so agree that it would be nice if parents-to-be at least heard of intersex before that baby was theirs. Considering that they usually know of other things that can go wrong (I hate to use that word, but can't think of an alternative), it would seem only fair. Think about...most expectant parents know about downs syndrome, and cystic fibrosis, yet those occur at a lower incidence than intersex births. However, many doctors don't include information about those conditions either; I guess denial seems fitting in waiting rooms for expectant parents.

With that said, one of the projects that Bodies has been working on will hopefully overcome that. We are currently working on materials that will be supplied to ob-gyns, clinics, and other points of encounter with expectant parents. Right now, the project is still in the planning/design phase, and once we get our mock-ups done, we will be looking for funding to to produce them. The next step comes getting them out there, and getting those charged with caring for expectant parents to use them. It's a long term project, but one I believe will ultimately be successful.

Our goals with it are simple--if parents have at least heard of intersex and maybe learned a little about it, they will be less likely to react to it by running to a surgeon, thinking it can be fixed with a scalpel.

Warmly,

Betsy

[Giner]

I was hoping that you would have some insight on this subject matter. I am glad to hear that someone is working on this. I would love to see how this progresses. If some of the mock ups get done, please let me see them. I would like to have some type of input on the project. Not sure what I could do but would like to help. If I can be of any assistance let me know.
Thank you for sharing.
I am so glad that I have been made aware of this website. I was told by another CAH female that I met through an adult personal site. We have just started to e-mail one another to share our experiences. We both had thought we were the only ones that had CAH for a very long period of our lives. Boy were we wrong.
Her brother and my brother also have CAH. But we still did not know about other people.
Glad to be a part of this website.
Later,
Giner:cool:

[Betsy]

Interesting:

Her brother and my brother also have CAH. But we still did not know about other people.
I have a brother with CAH also. Is your brother aware of what happens to CAH girls? My brother was shocked when I told him.

[Giner]

Betsy,
My brother would not talk about it or listen to me for many years. He did not want me to tell him about me. But he knows as of three weeks ago. He watched the program Is it a Boy or a Girl. His fiancee' had him watch it with her. I have not gotten a chance to talk to him yet. But I will now.
Well got to go.

Giner

[Janet]

I think, given the odds of having an intersex child, doctors have decided to ignore the condition unless it happens. Since the protocol of care creates the need for shame and secrecy, they're just getting a head start.

I have been blessed with two bright and healthy children. I conceived without fertility issues, but was treated as a high risk pregnancy. Being pregnant made me realize how important it was for me to get good care. It was a revelation really, that I cared enough about my own body to find good doctors.

Each pregnancy ended in long labor and cesarian births. But now with a lot of hindsight and much more knowledge, I wonder how anyone with a vaginaplasty would dialate enough to allow a baby to pass through. I know, for myslef, it just wasn't possible and I never "progressed enough".

Realizing now that I'm not the only one in the world with a body like mine, I'm wondering if it is a trend among us. If so, it's a trend that will go unnoticed and unreported because the incidence among CAH mothers would hardly be connected.

If you've had any experience with pregnancy, please post!

[Giner]

Hello,
I had my brother watch the video Is It a Boy or a Girl this weekend with me and his fiancee. He did not want to watch it. But he did watch it. He did not have a comment. His fiancee though was outraged. She wanted to strangle the doctor that was on the program. I hope that it has at least given my brother some type of understanding that he did not have before.
I just wanted to update you on my brother.

Later,
Giner