CW: surgery talk
Hi all,
Like a lot of trans/nonbinary folks, I've been aware of the
existence of intersex people for some time. I've even known a few, but we didn't talk in any detail about intersex issues, so I'm not sure how to broach the topic respectfully. Being trans, I'm quite familiar with uninformed cis people coming into our spaces and asking ignorant and presumptuous questions, and I'm trying not to do the same thing here (non-intersex person coming into an intersex space...), but I don't know what I don't know, so... can I beg a little patience? This is my first foray into posting in intersex space, so if I've already offended somehow, I'd like to know about it so I can avoid it in the future.
I'm transitioning AMAB to (hopefully) androgynous nonbinary, and recently I've been going through the process of getting cleared for GCS by my insurance. Thing is, I'm in what seems to be a fairly small minority of NB androgynes that want, well,
congruence between their identity and their genitalia. Specifically in my case, I've been looking into the possibility of GCS creating a vagina while keeping the penis. Info on this more or less consists of a bunch of unverifiable anecdotes, and nothing solid, so it's been a slow and frustrating process. Recently, my therapist suggested reaching out to the intersex community under the assumption that since you folks are pretty aware of so-called "corrective" surgeries for making ambiguous genitalia (only a small fraction of intersex folks have this, I know) match typical male/female genitalia, you would be the most likely group to know about the kind of surgery I'm seeking, and/or who does (or has done) it.
First off, if anyone has such information, or knows someone who does, it would be very welcome.
Secondly, how do I make sure I'm asking intersex people respectfully? I was concerned that some intersex people would react poorly to this line of inquiry, e.g. thinking it was fetishizing intersex people for example, or some other issue I'm not aware of. Would it be better to post in the open like I'm doing now, or ask others if it's alright to PM them some questions instead?
Next, how do you deal with surgeons'/doctors' reluctance to deal with this sort of thing? I know other NB people in my position have approached GCS surgeons with this question in the past, and been turned down flat, generally on the basis that it's "unnatural", or that the existing tissue(s) are healthy and should not be operated on. This feels pretty backwards considering that people used to say the same things about binary GCS surgeries, and those procedures are now widely accepted as being medically necessary in many cases.
Lastly, a very minor point, but one that I've been wondering about: I've been using "non-intersex" in this post instead of "dyadic", at least to refer to myself. "Dyadic" seems to imply that non-intersex people are pretty strongly binary, either male or female. As a nonbinary person, this troubles me, and it's uncomfortable to be referred to that way. How well-accepted are alternate terms like "perisex"? Are there any issues with using these alternate terms?
Thanks all, and preemptive apologies if I've managed to offend despite my efforts.
