Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Who is Intersexed? new thoughts for the new year
Posted by the androgyne at 1:24 PM

http://intersexandthecity.blogspot.com/2009/12/who-is-intersexed-new-thoughts-for-new.html

Yesterday, I finished the book "Intersex, for Lack of a Better Word" by Thea Hillman. I found it very thought provoking. Hillman was born with a case of Congenital Adrenal Hypreplasia (CAH) so mild it was considered borderline. As such she had "normal" female genitals and did not undergo any surgeries as an infant. She repeatedly mentioned in the book that she often was unsure whether she really was intersexed, and sometimes felt she shouldn't use the label. This presents an interesting point. Intersex in really an umbrella term used to cover a wide variety of medical conditions that have very little in common except that they all result in a body that is biologically neither male or female. While the most visible intersexuals are those, like me, who were born with ambiguous genitals and had them surgically mutilated as an infant, but this does not mean that those with more hidden conditions are any less intersexed (there are many people out there who are intersexed and don't even know it).