Parents decide to bring up "genderless" child

"David Reimer (August 22, 1965 – May 4, 2004) was a Canadian man who was born as a healthy male, but was sexually reassigned and raised as female after his penis was accidentally destroyed during circumcision.[1] Psychologist John Money oversaw the case and reported the reassignment as successful, and as evidence that gender identity is primarily learned. Academic sexologist Milton Diamond later reported that Reimer never identified as female, and that he began living as male at age 15. Reimer later went public with his story to discourage similar medical practices. Eventually he committed suicide, due to suffering years of severe depression, financial instability and a dissolving marriage."

Reimer's account, written with John Colapinto two decades later, described how - contrary to Money's reports - when living as Brenda, Reimer did not identify as a girl. He was ostracized and bullied by peers, and neither frilly dresses (which he was forced to wear during frigid Calgary winters) nor female hormones made him feel female. By the age of 13, Reimer was experiencing suicidal depression, and told his parents he would commit suicide if they made him see John Money again. In 1980, Reimer's parents told him the truth about his gender reassignment, following advice from Reimer's endocrinologist and psychiatrist. At 14, Reimer decided to assume a male gender identity, calling himself David. By 1997, Reimer had undergone treatment to reverse the reassignment, including testosterone injections, a double mastectomy, and two phalloplasty operations. He also married Jane Fontaine and became a stepfather to her three children.

His case came to international attention in 1997 when he told his story to Milton Diamond, an academic sexologist who persuaded Reimer to allow him to report the outcome in order to dissuade physicians from treating other infants similarly. Soon after, Reimer went public with his story and John Colapinto published a widely disseminated and influential account in Rolling Stone magazine in December 1997.[4] They went on to elaborate the story in a book, As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl.[3]

The Intersex Society of North America, which opposes involuntary sex reassignment, treats the story of David Peter Reimer as a cautionary tale about why the genitals of unconsenting minors should not be needlessly modified.[6]

TheZohan wrote: »

Right I don't have kids so I can't speak with authority here and I'm probably going to get crucified for the analogy...but I have a wee mutt and he always peed like a female dog if he was inside (using his puppy pad,an asborbant pad on a tray) and when he was outside he did the same, honkered down and away he went. Then one day I brought him for a walk and he raised his little leg and peed against a bush, I was proud as punch and he didn't need any mentoring to know how pee like a male dog, it came naturally eventually....and before anyone starts yes I'm well aware babies aren't dogs!

Links234 wrote: »

The child's identity will develop on it's own though, that sense of self, of whether we are male or female, is something we are born with. My identity developed in spite of my upbringing, so I don't think that the parents of this child are impeding anything. I'd bet the kid will turn out perfectly fine tbh.