Is this Intersex condition realistic & sensitive?

[cavitycollector]

Hello. I am writing a comic, and in the comic there is a man who is meant to be intersex. I have done as much research as I could find into different Intersex experiences and though I’ve seen none that are identical to his, based on what I’ve read think it is possible? I think I probably have an okay enough grasp of the actual science behind it, but in terms of his personal experiences I’m not sure.

He is a man in his late 20s. He currently has notable breasts, a deep voice, a lot of body hair, and is very heavyweight. For his backstory so far I have written: He was born in the 1990’s with male appearing genitalia, and was assigned male at birth due to this. He was raised as a boy, but during childhood he began to experience negative symptoms such as fatigue, weightloss, muscle weakness, and early development of body hair and odor (precocious adrenarche). He was seen by a doctor who determined he was actually female, and his parents not knowing what direction to go with hormone therapy let him choose. He chooses estrogen for a female puberty because he has always behaved femininely and been bullied for this, so he believes this might be the answer. (He also starts other treatments for the other symptoms of congenital adrenal hyperplasia) Once he begins this therapy and transition develops breasts, he realizes he doesn’t want to continue with female hormones and asks to be socialized as male again and to start male hormone treatments instead.

Throughout this, his parents would be trying to do what is right while completely out of their element, and there would be some conflict about the difficulty of resocializing as female and then male again. they would not really understand and slightly resent losing their son, and then again not understand and be both frustrated by the switch and also relieved to have their son back. In adulthood his parents do not acknowledge his technical female sex, they just desire normalcy.

My main concern is the parents, doctors, and character himself choosing a female puberty at first. I have no idea if that is realistic, especially for the 90s. Most of the experiences I’ve read even when the child is ”biologically the opposite sex”, they continue being raised as their AGAB with or without their consent. I know this experience would be unusual in that way, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t be possible. I feel some parents may justify it because it is technically their “true sex” and therefore bioessentialism states they must be raised as their “true sex”. These parents would have been willing to go either way and believe whatever their son seemed to lean towards due to their complete ignorance on the subject.

If you believe this is unrealistic, what other ways could I come about having an intersex character with these adult physical traits, who identifies as male, and is fully accepted as such by his family, who have been shown to NOT be accepting of transgender people, just him due to it being a “real medical problem”.

Comments

[cavitycollector]

With the doctor saying “Actually female” what I mean is not that he would up and say “Oh well you have XX therefore I will call you she now!” I just mean “He is biologically considered female, so thats why these issues have arisen.”, which is completely medically accurate and says nothing about how the doctor actually perceives the kid. My character would be presenting with gender dysphoria symptoms, because he does feel ostracized from masculinity and wants to be allowed to present femininely. (As an adult he wears mostly womens clothing and does makeup, etc. because thats how he feels most comfortable.) i’d call him genderqueer but, he doesn’t identify that way so I wont.

However, despite what I just said. After further research to fact-check your reply, I did find more information that clarified some things that had become fuzzy between researching the different forms of CAH and I see yeah my proposition is not good.

I already researched Klinefelter's and originally when I created him that WAS the disorder I had in the back of my mind, but comically the issue with that is that Klinefelter’s doesn’t seem to result in breasts as obvious as my character has, same goes for him being heavyweight not being enough. (I’m not talking cartoon crazy big bazonkers, they're just realistic for a woman of his size.)

I am still considering the possibility of changing the backstory up to fit closer to one of the CAH subtypes, or finding another way to fit estrogen therapy in there to result in larger breasts. His backstory is very malleable in that regard, the only necessary elements are

1. He develops the previously listed secondary sexual characteristics.


2. He goes through this process in a way that would not necessarily upset transphobic parents.


3. Preferably he remains identifying as a femme cis man. But that ones a little flexible.

Finally, on the political sensitivity note; I am quite aware of this issue. This plot is in no way central to the story, this character has a sister who is protagonist and whose gender and sex is the only one explored in the comic. It may not even come up once in the entire story. It’s simply that in writing and understanding this character, these details are important to me. I am not content to leave this gaping hole in my world with a lack of reasoning for why he looks the way he does and why he has the relationship with his family that he does. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[melannen]

Gynecomastia can give men breast development well into average female range! If you combine that with volume from fat and or muscle they could certainly be more than enough for your purposes. (They won't necessarily look like cartoon boobs but real cis women's usually don't either.)

If he actively likes looking femme he could also certainly have gotten them on purpose through either self-administered hormones or somewhat illicit implants, and then lied and told his parents it was the medical condition. There's a long history of people of all gender identities, including cis male, doing that for various reasons. He'd need connections in queer communities probably to know how but he could also be keeping all of that very secret.

The specific narrative of getting prescribed feminizing hormones during puberty and then changing his mind is not only really, really unlikely but it's right out of modern transphobes' most paranoid fantasies. If you're in a place where you need to ask for a sensitivity read on that you should probably stay very far away from it.

I'd also add if he's not a main character and the precise configuration of his body and its history isn't a plot point you might not actually need all the medical details up front - it sounds like a lot of this is about presenting a contrast with the main character's story? You really only need to know what the MC knows (which may not be a lot - parents are often very secretive about intersex kids.)