{"id":8956,"date":"2017-12-05T15:36:26","date_gmt":"2017-12-05T09:51:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pahichan.com\/?p=8956"},"modified":"2017-12-05T15:36:26","modified_gmt":"2017-12-05T09:51:26","slug":"this-young-man-wants-you-to-know-what-its-like-being-intersex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/this-young-man-wants-you-to-know-what-its-like-being-intersex\/","title":{"rendered":"This Young Man Wants You To Know What It’s Like Being Intersex"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Kathmandu (Pahichan) December 5 – Doctors knew there was something different about Anick shortly after he was born. His penis was unusual \u2013 much smaller than most boys’, and with an opening along the side. They explained what they could to his parents, but they didn\u2019t know what it would mean, or what the future held.<\/p>\n

They also could not foresee what shame would do to him, or how much he would have to fight when he couldn’t bear the silence any more.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never thought that one day I\u2019d be doing something like this,\u201d says Anick, sitting in the BuzzFeed News office, \u201cactually talking about what was originally the biggest secret of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is here because he needs people to understand what it is to be intersex. Very few others in Britain have ever spoken publicly about it. He hopes that finally people will begin to discuss a basic fact of life: that a lot of people\u2019s bodies are not entirely male or female. \u201cI don\u2019t want more children growing up the way I did \u2013 hiding it,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The ramifications of Anick\u2019s story are wider and more fundamental than first appears. They begin to unpick long-held assumptions about sex and gender, and raise troubling questions for the medical profession. Is it really biology that governs whether a baby (or indeed an adult) is deemed male or female, or is it society? Who decides where the line is? And should doctors ever intervene?<\/p>\n

In October, the Care Quality Commission \u2013 the independent healthcare regulator \u2013 demanded answers from Britain\u2019s most celebrated children\u2019s hospital, Great Ormond Street, after a\u00a0BBC investigation<\/a>\u00a0accused the hospital of \u201cnot meeting care standards for intersex children\u201d. There was, according to the broadcaster, no psychological help for intersex patients, a lack of discussion with the children before life-changing procedures were performed, and a lack of information for parents to be able to give informed consent to operations.<\/p>\n

The findings tally with Anick\u2019s experiences. But before discussing the wider picture for intersex children, he begins to describe what happened to him as he was growing up. Memories surface in rapid succession, detail after detail, like a flipbook of Polaroids. His delivery is matter-of-fact, almost unemotional, but as layers of experiences unfold \u2013isolation, surgeries, secrecy \u2013 it seems this is the only way he can do it.<\/p>\n

A vast scar covers his left forearm. Fleeting gestures belie his nerves: fidgeting with his clothes, combing fingers through his hair, smiling often. He asks that we don\u2019t use his surname.<\/p>\n

He says he is lucky, that it could have been so much worse. But the consequences of what he has endured reverberate far beyond the marks on his body. It is this that has led him to speak out and explain for the first time who he is.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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