XY

Chimera (XY♂️ female) living with gonadal dysgenesis DSD. Ask me anything! 💌

[chimera-boy]

Hello! I'm a new blog and just thought I'd introduce myself. For the sake of this blog, you can call me Chim (pronounced Kim). I'm a 28 year old person with a DSD (disorder of sexual development.) In particular, a sort of gonadal dysgenesis caused by chimerism. If you want to know more about what that means, just ask me! I don't discriminate politically, purely here to satiate curiousity surrounding a pretty rare phenomena and to log my experiences.

Say hi!

[chimera-boy]

You have a masculine, or feminine, or androgynous (ala "intersex") looking body. You cannot say you *are* a male, female, or intersex if you biologically are not. Transition doesn't change sex.

I constantly see trans people in particular claim their identity is 'just' intersex (this doesn't make sense, you can both have an intersex variation and clearly be a sex; especially when the majority say they have PCOS and are not mixed of anatomy or chromosomes) or attach it of their preferred gender. For example with transgender men, they say they are intersex males but they would be an intersex female, because they are a female (XX) with a variation. An intersex male would be someone with XY who is affected by unique sex development, regardless how they identify. E.g, a man with Klinefelter's identifies as a woman. They are now still an intersex male, who uses she/her. Words mean things.

[chimera-boy]

I think for my sanity I'm going to have to step away from the term intersex at all. It's clear that it's been ideologically co-opted.

I've seen posts imply having a DSD is separate of being intersex, that it's something you can identify into if you just Feel like you don't meet the convention of a male or female without having a DSD but whereas gender identity is the innate behaviour, intersex is the external, physical, bodily version of that. Thus every third woman with PCOS that gives her body hair insists they're intersex etc. Because to them it means "I don't look fully like the sex I am" as opposed to genuinely having mixed chromosomes and sex organs. That it's just surface level beauty standards they "fail" to meet that puts them "between." Or it's when an organ doesn't function like normal. Under this view, having cancer is intersex because it's not typical for men or women to have it. Erectile dysfunction. Amenorrhea or ovarian cysts. These things alone are not DSDs.

I don't think it's something we can argue with at this point, and I'm kind of tired of trying to defend the term (which the medical community considers outdated anyway). I definitely consider it more descriptive than prescriptive in many cases. Not everyone with a condition that causes an "intersex" appearance will be intersex. Just like people can have more "masculine" or "feminine" features. It doesn't mean anything about their sex, and is surface. They're not mixed with male and female from this.

Most are regular men and women, XX, XY, with slight clitoromegaly or extra body hair so on. The conditions alone do not create a DSD or warrant a DSD diagnosis which is why they are separate. Because human bodies can have variation.

I maintain that being an intersexed person is different in that the appearance of the genitals etc has to be caused directly by the amount of androgen exposure, mix of chromosomes or sex organs you have from birth.

My reality is not ideological. I don't "identify" as intersex. I am intersexed. Or I would be if that term still applied. It just doesn't suit anymore due to this shift. The larpers and fake statistics are too loud.

They have successfully changed what it even means anymore and have their own culture surrounding it that I want no part in or care to be associated with.

[chimera-boy]

.

[chimera-boy]

Just a heads up: DSD (disorders of sex development) also stands for differences of sex development or is sometimes referred to as VSDs (variations of sex development). It is not inherently a "pathologizing" term.

Even if it was, I think it's anti-disability to imply that being intersex isn't worthy of care if it's not "natural." So what if it isn't? If it is a disorder, a medical condition, a deformity. We still deserve basic rights and dignity regardless. These shouldn't be words that create aversion.

There's certain associated complications tied up with these conditions, however you call them, some life threatening to where ignoring the reality of how it could affect someone's life more like a disability is harmful and negligent campaigning.

[chimera-boy]

I saw a post just now from an interpretender (that's what I'll call 'em) saying something along the lines of "Nobody EVER needs to know about your agab! The gender you were assigned at birth doesn't matter AT ALL." and I'm like 🤦🤦🤦. They use 'assigned gender' as a synonym for your actual sex (opposite of what it means for actual intersex people, funny that) and say insane things like knowing what sex someone is is irrelevant and it's just. So. Stupid. Literally the one thing that's extremely important is for people with a DSD to know their actual sex and condition! It could literally be lifesaving!

(sorry for being MATI in your askbox man)

I agree. It was an extremely important development for me to know what my chromosomal makeup was. Having XY (as well as mosaicism) predisposes you to a few differences in what your body's genetically coded to do and certain conditions over others. It's nice to be aware of your sex and how that affects your body for health reasons.

I see these takes commonly from trans people who wish to abolish male and female. Interestingly, if they were never "assigned" what they are then they wouldn't have a basis for their identities. The definition of trans states it as identifying outside one's assigned sex (gender technically, but they conflate the two). So they would all be "cis" then?

How would they know what hormones they need to take to transition. How would transition, from one thing to the other, even be possible if those categories were meaningless and not observed. It'd just be recreational cosmetic procedures under this lens, which is closer to the actual truth of the matter.

They say this because they wish to avoid being analyzed through the associated dynamics of privilege or oppressions attached of their sex in society by obscuring it. That's their whole deal.

"It would benefit me, personally, if my sex wasn't real so you all need to pretend it's not."

[chimera-boy]

(Okay so feel free to ignore this to preface, and this will seem a little ramble-y at first, but I promise this isn't trolling or anything, just a genuine question/attempt at conversation)

I am personally of the belief that cosmetic surgery overall should be illegal, but in a nordic model sort of way, where the people who preform the surgery will be prosecuted but the people who receive the surgery don't face any consequences. The logic behind this is because I believe that freedom means you can do what you want to yourself, but it does not give anyone else the right to what they want to you. Aka, you're allowed to hurt yourself or even ask someone to hurt you, but they're not allowed to hurt you, and, well, cosmetic surgery is just making wounds for no medical benefits—aka, harm.

And because of this belief of mine, and knowing the rates of cosmetic surgery on intersex infants, one thing that crossed my mind was making mandatory blood tests on newborns that includes checking for intersex-based abnormalities a thing, and having a flag system in place so if an intersex condition is identified the infant needs to be checked over to ensure no cosmetic surgery has taken place and then require check ups every few years to continue to ensure no unnecessary surgeries have taken place. This kind of system would hopefully scare doctors and parents out of preforming/seeking out unnecessary surgeries, and would also help catch intersex conditions sooner if they only affect the internal systems

... However, as I am not intersex, so I'm not sure if this would be a good idea. Curious to hear your opinion on this if you're comfortable with that ^^

Well I can't predict all the logistics, but from what I read it sounds like it could be a decent system of checks and balances.

It would be /something/ which is more than what we currently have. The budding framework of some sort of structure around how the medical community is trained to interact with intersex births for our well-being and protection is a must. I think it might take some workshopping to achieve the most efficient methods, but such trial and error is required sooner than later to reach a point of overall improvement. There needs to be an interest and proactivity towards our situation so we are less mysterious and left to be confused about ourselves.

This is a good start.

It would also allow a more holistic view of how our identities are shaped overtime and what our bodies are doing with less gaps if doctors check with us on our conditions frequently which can then be used for further study on DSDs to create more understanding.

I would just add laparoscopy or ultrasounds (which can be used to uncover streak gonads or other configurations) as well as the blood tests for the hormonal situation and karotype.

[chimera-boy]

Favorite ice cream taste?

Cookies & cream! or 🍓 depending on my mood. :p

[chimera-boy]

I think Ommastar just got termed

Wonder what did it. I had to block a while back after he posted an insane lore dump essentially coming out as an agp through his substack (which interestingly was not in his blog description) considering himself a kind of advocate for 'safe' agps.

It started with mimicking the likeness exactly of a little girl he knew, then stealing his sister's clothes and equating shaving his legs with being a woman. He implied the way he masturbates is female (what?) yet maintains it's different somehow from the multiples of other stories like it while thinking of himself a lesbian. Between this, the endless, self-hating posts, layers of complexes and snobbery about bisexuals (which I am) that was enough for me. I don't believe the thinking and debates he embroiled himself in daily was very healthy for him.

All in all a pretty unstable individual with the same sort of all-consuming, turbo fetish obsession which leads him to breach boundaries like the rest then act as though a noble, tortured soul for it. In a word, this is obnoxious. He's just more in denial and not outright. But the bare minimum isn't a favour to anybody. I was tolerant in the beginning because I try to see the best in everybody. But it's clear the road he's on. And I don't support it. And I definitely don't want to feed it, which I think interaction does.

He could use the time to reflect, being that last I saw he was not backing down from surgical transition despite knowing the health risks and complications and that it won't make him female (so why?) bizarre to say the least. I don't think being propelled by mental illness is an excuse if you're aware of it.

I wouldn't say this was 'radically feminist' behaviour which he labeled it, but you guys be the judge. ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

[chimera-boy]

The entire tag is full of intersexist people claiming they're not intersexist because they have an interest in becoming intersex and hoping they have a hidden variation. Actually, it's still trash to exotify and actively "want" a condition that's given people health problems, identity issues, and medical trauma to "affirm" yourself.

[chimera-boy]

Before you send that intersex person that long ask of all your personal views on your own gender and questioning if you have a DSD consider: we didn't ask, and we don't care.

[chimera-boy]

Why do so many perisex people think it's appropriate to go up to a random intersex person, give out their life stories full of TMI information and then ask us to diagnose and affirm them on the spot by the way.

[chimera-boy]

Welcome to the intersex community! We got:

PCOS

PCOS

PCOS

NCAH

Um actually my variation isn't documented

Just a woman with body hair

Transmasc

Another transmasc

Another transmasc–

PCOS again

[chimera-boy]

DSD version of a meme I saw going around

[chimera-boy]

I love preemptively blocking obnoxious accounts.

[chimera-boy]

I feel like I didn't explain my previous ask well enough. It's more that I was wondering if you believe that nature is the reason for the major differences between the sexes and not societal conditioning or oppression? I don't think there are genes for "liking make-up" but I'm curious about your perspective on nature, like do you think women/men are naturally inclined to certain activities?

I basically think there are some trends in behaviour for the sexes that can be vaguely predicted by biological processes, genetics, and exposure to hormones e.g aggression and competition in males being linked directly to higher testosterone production which can predict boys inclination towards rough-housing, contact sport, or action-packed video games. Girls with higher androgen exposure to the brain in development, such as those with CAH, behave similarly and DSDs involving the activation of the sry gene, even partially, overwhelmingly predict the development of a male sense of self. Which are the statistical patterns gender is meant to describe. But not all boys will express this trait in the same way or may experience it diminishingly.

The effects of testosterone, in fact, are not static but mediated by cues of challenge in the environment with variability in how those cues are perceived and responded to. So your more docile, shy men also occur. There are just some commonly observed occurrences that can happen and are notable enough to mark a pattern, but with lots of diversity still happening outside the more typical pathways since personal and physical development is unique and life experiences, personality, environment, + "socialization" layers on top it. The greater presence of testosterone also predicts less agreeableness as a personality trait in both males and females, so biology clearly plays a role in how we are, even if it's not the full picture and there is still autonomy in how we handle and respond to our nature. We don't develop our personalities fully spontaneously.

The issue is when it's used like a blanket. There are multiple patterns in a single sexed quilt. It is more similar to how different eye colours have different incident rates but don't mean any one eye colour is more “normal” or less real compared to other eyes as multiple things can be common at once. 42% is technically more "common" than 32% but not much noticeable on the surface which is how conflicting generalizations exist. We know a dude with long emo hair is a type of guy and simulataneously acknowledge a more conventional looking man both as men since "other" expressions aren't actually that out of the ordinary and are patterns we also read into the sexes.

That is, any way someone's inclined to be is a "gender expression" of a male or female. A guy in a dress is a male gender expression because he's a man doing that and so on. Because gender is the physiological and social behavior of the sexes.

Contrary to popular belief, this is not the thing invented by John Money. What Money invented was the concept of "gender identity" whereby if someone is socialized strong enough or early enough, taught different etiquette, their entire nature could be overwritten and a new gender identity nurtured within them. That it's something inside you identify with because of how you act or look. That you can change someone's sex by exposing them to things the opposite sex engages in because these things are prescriptive. That gender is derived from clothes, hair, toys, and pronouns. We know this is false because it did not work with "Brenda" aka David Reimer who was given these things in an attempt to induce the associated identity.

It is therefore impossible for a man to have a "woman's" gender or way of being and vice versa since it's inherently tied to one's sex. It is an observation of the way the sexes are and how they interact, with some common archetypes being seen. "Gender roles" are merely descriptive of some of the most common archetypes, and some women or men engage in the cross associated behaviours of those archetypes which is how "non-conforming" individuals can exist. It does not mean they have the experience of what it means to be the opposite sex, they are only engaging in surface behaviours anyone can engage in.

This is where the toxicity happens; when people treat gender roles as prescriptive it leads to the idea that people can secretly be something else with a "gender" inside ala trans ideology. But as I've stated, gender is behaviour (behavior observed of what the sexes do) so someone is already their "true" selves by just existing the way they are. It's being. If they engage in unconventional roles, they are simply a woman/man who engages in unconventional roles. They did not transition past anything, it is them.

These "gendered" behaviors are neutral and don't mean anything inherently. The problem arises when people try to spread propagandic narratives about what these behaviours should mean e.g because some women are nurturing caregivers they need to give me a babies and be my slave. "Gender" as a tool, based in the interests and expectations of whoever wields it to try and control or make value judgements on others, is, of course made up and should be dismantled e.g women belong in the kitchen thus, any woman who isn't deserves ridicule and harassment.

Even if women are more "caring" it doesn't mean they need to care about what you want them to. She could "really care" about uplifting her community of radical feminists and not shaving her body hair rather than having tea parties or babies. Anyone can have an opinion on what gender is or should be. And they could lie or distort it for their own purposes and make false dichtomies and conclusions about what these behaviours mean.

But it exists outside that.

John Money's experiment with Reimer showed this. He was reared as a girl and still knew himself to be male, a man. His sex was already encoded with information about what he was which occurs on biological, neurological, and genetic level that socialization cannot fully erase. Babies are able to distinguish sex, which parent matches their sex and thereby their in-group by 9 months. And it's never, arbitrarily, the wrong in-group. Most people have a self concept that aligns with their sex because that self concept is shaped by them just existing within their own body. It does not require active identification.

When people "identify" as something other, that's able to occur because on the subconscious level they did not already comprehend themselves as the thing they're identifying with. Otherwise you'd already "feel" that you were it and that nothing was out of place.

This is the unfounded lunacy that Money unleashed and ideologues further built upon: gender identity pertains to everyone in the view of those who subscribe to it. They'll say "cis" people also have a gender identity they "feel" themselves to be, for example, it just happens to match typical associations with their sex. That's where it comes into contention with my view which is however the sexes behave, is a result of their biology, environment, unique temperament, and life experiences. Not due to an inner sense of anything. It's behaviour that doesn't require identifying with it. Which is why most people report not having an inner sense of gender.

I don't identify with my arm moving to pick up my cup to drink even though I indeed recognize it as my own arm. I'm just drinking. Doing. Living without thinking. "Identification" occurs only insofar as we're able to recognize ourselves in the mirror. Which is why most seemingly have an "identity" aligned to their body. Because all it takes is existing in our bodies. Knowing you're a man or woman by extension is the same. Feelings do not drive that.

Everyone will react to their biology and environment as an individual, even if they may be inclined towards some of the same things. There are small, but consistent findings of differences, and there is also massive overlap due to this, because it is not just the "brain" or behaviours or the hormones or any one thing that can accurately pinpoint sex alone. It is the full culmination of all these things working in tandem. It's the expectations attached to neutral attributes of sex that causes the problems.

And the people who want to erase sex don't help; but those who suggest behavior and self understanding can't be influenced and derived by biology are also unhelpful and leaves me in a predicament where I'm not believed and some deny me autonomy to say I'm a man since I was "socialized" female from birth.

So I can't agree with a purely socialized view of sex behaviors because it doesn't account for why John Money's experiment turned out the way it did and 2) I'm only the way that I am because I had male gene expression. Otherwise, my socialization paired with the fact I looked phenotyipically normal would have been enough to induce female self recognition. But it didn't, and doesn't in many DSD cases unless there is complete sensitivity to androgen exposure and inactive sry. Which supports nature as a large determinant of identity development over how someone is reared e.g those raised as girls with 5-ard which causes male typical virilization at puberty develop male identity in 90% of cases despite their bodies having an encoding issue with growing a phallus.

Moreover, humans are animals. Can we really say animals entirely lack instincts outside what they're “taught”? Who's teaching the gazelles in the savannah to be gazelles? Are they only prey animals because the cheetahs have podcasts claiming they're lesser? There is certainly an ubiquitous "oppressiveness" about the animal kingdom, cheetahs are faster and more dangerous than a gazelle regardless which creates an atmosphere of tension prey animals adapted survival mechanisms to, yes. The same is true of women and men.

But does it dominate all behavior and instinct. Does a cat only like milk because a predator instilled it? Does a dog like to lie in the sun or chase a ball because something bigger than it taught it to? It's a dangerous line to tow as it implies oppression is an evolutionary mechanism inherent to human development, and if oppression is what makes a woman then women wouldn't be women outside it which encourages seeking it out to affirm one's sense of self.

I refer by it as “sex encoding” to separate it of trans activism and regressive nonsense since the word gender is so fraught with discomfort and tied up with the idea of forced prescription. I don't think anyone is obligated to mold themselves to have the same instincts and behaviours just because it is a popular occurrence for a portion of the population to have them. There's multiple populations concurring beside the most typical outcomes.

It's an individualized and dynamic process across multiple domains (biological, social, psychological, etc) for everyone with some common tells in my view. As opposed to being a prescriptive thing you either meet or “fail” to become. And the relating to these subconscious commonalities, no matter how big or small, is what causes the feeling of solidarity with one's sex or, at the very least, recognition as that sex which creates the fundamental divide humans experience as dimorphism. Where you know that someone is different to you even if they "look" the same e.g same hobbies, way of dress, etc. Nature and nurture are both responsible for influencing how we are but have an open-ended effect on how someone turns out overall.

Which is why there's such diversity of men and women to begin with, yet we can still read them as men and women, as part of their sex, despite how wildly different to eachother they are. It's ongoing in stages from birth to maturity and solidifies through enough stable social reception that affirms one's self understanding in relation to the other. It can be confused, negatively impacted or obscured by social conditioning, abuse, trauma etc which is why some people feel they are "trans" because they lacked healthy mirrors to affirm they are the sex they understood themselves to be. Which is also why they sometimes stop after being exposed to a person like them of the same sex. Because they now understand they're indeed that sex.

Humans are social creatures who learn by engaging in the world and receiving feedback. I don't think it's something you can fully separate. And we'll exhaust ourselves trying. Nobody's "gender" is fully pre-assembled. But that doesn't mean it's fully malleable or changeable because there are other processes driving it.

In short:

[magnesia]

What in the fucking bio-essentialism. Did you test every girl for androgens levels? Did you? Is me being highly aggressive a result of some androgen exposure, or is it just a consequence of me not being allowed to express any emotions except anger - a social experience typical for males? Because I don't have high androgen levels

And as for agression being linked to testosterone - its linked to the HIERARCHY OF MALES

Can we stop with this crap already "estrogen makes you docile and stupid testosterone makes you angry and animalistic" and just recognise that all it does is physical/bodily and the behaviour differences between male/female is socialization

[chimera-boy]

Did you read my post where I said "vaguely predicts" and is an "open-ended," dynamic process where individual personality, temperament, environment, and life experiences play a role in shaping a person, that the effects of testosterone are not static, where we have self determination outside the influence of nature which is what creates diversity of the sexes, and finally that most differences are minute but consistent with large overlap. Or did you just leap to get angry.

Socialization does not account for everything or else Dr. Money's experiment on Reimer to make him a girl would have been successful, and unless you can explain to me why having sry activation and greater androgen exposure predicts male identity in DSD cases despite how we're raised.

Testosterone and Aggressive Behavior in Man - PMC https://share.google/88kpJR01ncgR1AsMb

Testosterone and the Amygdala’s Functional Connectivity in Women and Men - PMC https://share.google/XKJKWDXJkXedqyk1o

Personality and gender differences in global perspective - PubMed https://share.google/QRd9bwh8J0HlHrLYI

Paternalism in DSD Management: A Real and Present Threat - PMC https://share.google/gV3bCWP60GizCjGnW

Brain Sex Differences Related to Gender Identity Development: Genes or Hormones? - PMC https://share.google/dk4kvoz61qcpJYO7Q

The Genetics of Sex Differences in Brain and Behavior - PMC https://share.google/VSr1DXkrxTykmS3RM

Complementarity of Sex Differences in Brain and Behavior: From Laterality to Multi-Modal Neuroimaging - PMC https://share.google/drf6qp0KIFsZVLVWs

His and Hers: Sex Differences in the Brain - PMC https://share.google/ihCHWvdrXf0rH0jSm

Human gender development - PMC https://share.google/ubjVKA2c4VVXJavZR

Gender identity and sex-of-rearing in children with disorders of sexual differentiation - PubMed https://share.google/8EgVCiug8NWac1gvY

Phenotype, genotype and gender identity in a large cohort of patients from India with 5α-reductase 2 deficiency - PubMed https://share.google/gVg3C8fIdn3VAsfdk

[chimera-boy]

Part of the issue with the ""intersex community"" is that when people say "I found out" about their supposed variations they mean "my delusions led me to believe without evidence–"