Does CAH fall under an intersex condition?

[ShaneS]

Hello,

When I was young, I felt like I had the wrong body. Didn't know how to describe it and one childhood experience taught me whatever I felt I should just keep it to myself! I had a lot of body hair young, hit puberty early, had greater muscle mass then bio/cis female, and really never had any feminine features/actions/mannerisms.

I figured out I was a transsexual (old school terminology) years ago, didn't do anything about it till recently. That is when the interesting news was given to me.

So I go into a endocranoligist for HRT. I tell her I've always felt male, never displayed any female traits, etc etc.. She orders blood work. Comes back with my cortisol not in normal range. She then ordered a cortisol stimulating test.  My diagnosis was CAH but I have no complications from it (from what I understand I got lucky there).

So I've seen a few topics that CAH falls under an intersex condition. I questioned my mother a lot asking if I had anything unusual downstairs that required any surgeries when I was young. She answered no but did admit she was given a supplement that was suppose to keep her from miscarriage (believe I'm a DES baby).

I really don't care. It won't change anything and as long as I'm medically healthy I'm happy (I was worried I would have to go on steroids if my cortisol test had come back with bad results). But interested in hearing from others if you have the same issues?

[Jamie D]

The Intersex Society of North America classifies "congenital adrenal hyperplasia" as an intersex condition.  They note:

Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH) is the most prevalent cause of intersex among people with XX chromosomes. About 1 in 10,000 to 18,000 children are born with congenital adrenal hyperplasia, but it does not cause intersex in those with XY chromosomes, so the prevalence of CAH-related intersex is about 1 in 20,000 to 1 in 36,000.

Among the many causes of intersex, only CAH represents a real medical emergency in the newborn period. Click here to read about the medical risks of CAH both at birth and later in life.

CAH occurs when there is a broken genetic "recipe" for making cortisone in the adrenal glands (the glands on top of the kidneys that make various hormones and add them to the blood stream). Because the recipe is broken, the adrenal glands, while trying to make cortisone, may make an unusually high level of other hormones that are "virilizing". That is, they can make XX embryos have larger than average clitorises, or even a clitoris that looks rather like a penis, or labia that look like a scrotum.