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A baby born as a hermaphrodite

Comments (84)

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Posted 11/14/2012
I went to school with a kid born this way. His parents chose to raise him as a boy and had the surgery done for that. When we made it to high school his voice still hadn't gotten any deeper. It's actually more high pitched than a lot of girls I know. He eventually stopped cutting his hair, started carrying a purse, and wearing girl clothes. After high school he went to have a surgery done so that he could become a girl. He also started taking hormones and grew boobs. "He" now introduces himself has a she and goes by a girl name.
I guess I would probably wait just because of his/her story.
Posted 11/14/2012
That's a tough call...I'd have to know whether the baby had ovaries, uterus, in addition to testicles. If no internal organs, I'd choose male...if there are internal organs with testies I may just leave it be. If as a teen & adult, the child favors one gender over another and both parts are intact I would feel better about leaving the child intact.

Again tough call.

~~~ Christine ~~~

Lovingly practical wife & Gold ( . Y . ) mommy of 2 girls who are pure awesomeness!

Rihana (26 Dec 02)Rhiya (15 Nov 12)

Posted 11/14/2012
As far as raising them, clothes, pants and t-shirts or dresses. My DD wears all of it and I dont see why my hermaphridite kid couldnt.

As far as people asking, my lo is 1 and people assume she is a boy sometimes and others a girl, I'd let people assume until the babe decided which one they liked to be called and I would let them know it didnt matter to me which one they wanted to be at home, because to me they are both. I'd get in the habit of calling their name instead of refering to the babe as he or she. Give them a name like Sam. Sam likes this, Sam just learned how to walk, Sam is so quick! I like it when Sam babbles to me etc etc.

School, none of their business or if there are medical issues I would explain to the staff the medical issues.

I wouldnt be confused or embarrassed because that is my baby and they are great the way they are. Plus I've already given this considerable thought since when a poll was going on whether or not I was having a boy or girl hermaphrodite was an answer given. I thought about it way back when.

Most of that is barring any medical issues that force surgeries like not being able to pee. Even then I would request that that alone gets "fixed" but dont choose their gender just because you're "down there" already.

Hermaphrodites are way more common than people think. www.isna.org/faq/frequency

1 in less than 2000 for some types. Thats a lot of intersexed people. I think we should start accepting in it instead of hiding it. Then there wouldnt be a "problem" when it happens, because as much as it does occur it is as normal as having one or the other.

Some of ya'll suggesting doing surgery about it may have been or could be intersexed yourselves and not know it.

Anyhow i rant so Im going back to sleep
Posted 11/14/2012
I would do no surgery for anything non life threatening. I would raise the child as the gender that they looked most similar to. If they started acting more like the other gender we would revisit the issue.


Posted 11/14/2012

no idea what i would do, but middlesex was a great book. 


"close your eyes. fall in love. stay there." (rumi)

a welsh boy + an american girl = baby lion 11 june 2012


Posted 11/14/2012

Having many awesome transgender friends, I can say with 100% certainty that gender is not solely biological, so even the results of a DNA test wouldn't lead me to do unneccessary and possibly irreversible surgery on my infant. 

I would wait and let my child decide for themselves. 

As for the person who asked about clothes, aren't most kids clothes gender neutral anyway? How often do people ask you the gender of your baby or toddler?  I don't think it's a big deal to wait.


If God exists, she's pro-choice


Posted 11/14/2012

Omg, that would be sooo hard. Because you don't really know if the child is going to grow up male or female. I saw an episode on a talk show that a baby was born a hermaphrodite and they choose to make the baby a BOY, but later on in life, he didn't feel like a boy, he felt more like a girl. So that is a VERY hard decision to make right off the bat. I would honestly probably wait until the child was older so I could see if they were leaning more towards a boy or girl.

Posted 11/14/2012

Of course there's also the important point that it's not about just waiting until your child chooses a gender.

Some (many?) intersex people don't want to ever choose. They will never have surgery to be one or the othr if given the choice. They want to remain how they were born and that's their right too.


Posted 11/14/2012

I'd wait and let them decide... what if I chose the wrong one for them and they hated me for it! Ah!!! That would freak me out... I'd let them make the choice for sure!!


Nicki, 35, SAHM


Posted 11/14/2012

I'd let them decide. Gender neutral isn't a big deal anymore.


Geeky Guy + Nerdy Girl = Super Hero 

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