12 Year Old Boy Begins Sex Change Treatment in the U.K.

[Jonathan Randall]

12 Year Old Boy Begins Sex Change Treatment in the U.K. (final surgery is illegal before age 18, though, so he's only getting hormones to arrest male puberty). This raises some serious ethical questions (which is why I put it specifically in the Study and not elsewhere like Horror Stories). Thoughts?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/01/28/wkim28.xml

 

[tellner]

Whisky? Tango? Foxtrot?

How did he convince his parents to go for that?

 

[Jade Tigress]

I just think it's much too young to begin that process. I think even age 18 is too young. There is too much going on developmentally beyond puberty. If the person still feels the same way once reaching a more mature level of adulthood (read 20's) then they can begin the sex change process with the level of mental maturity I think is needed for a life altering surgery. Just my .02.

 

[Flatlander]

From the article:

The costs of the procedure are being covered by health insurance, as the condition qualifies as an illness.

I don't know; transexualism an "illness" to be treated by sex change? This diagnosis is acceptable enough that the medical community feels the need to "treat" "diagnosed" children?

I don't know, but this doesn't seem right to me....

 

[Xue Sheng]

OK.... since I cannot yell out the profanities that are running through my head nor can I type them here on MT I will, in an attempt to be a kinder gentler Xue, steal a line from tellner

Whisky? Tango? Foxtrot?

And then just end with the boys parents appear to me to be HIGHLY IRRESPONSIBLE... he is 12 for crying out loud... what on earth does he know about any of what he is doing.

And I agree with Jade... 18 is too young to make such decisions.

I will now take several deep breaths calm down and stops typing.

 

[bydand]

I am simply appalled. The headlines says a 12 year old, but the text mentions Tim/Kim/Whatever is 14. Either way it is just WRONG!

I'm not going to say anything else because my thoughts will just get me in trouble if I put them nto words.

 

[jks9199]

I gotta agree.

Even beginning the sex change process on a 12 year old is nutty. Many, if not most, 12 year olds barely have an idea of who they are -- how are they supposed to have any idea who they "should be?"

I don't know who's more messed up... The parents? The mental health professionals involved? The medical doctors?

 

[shesulsa]

I just don't know how I feel about this. There are strong arguments on both sides of the coin here. Kim feels he's always been a girl, never wavering in that ... so is that a mental illness, or is that a sexual identity crisis? Gender is, apparently, shaped in the brain before the sexual organs are developed in the fetus and they are shaped independently of each other.

So ... if his brain is telling him he's a female, but his body is male ... what do we do?

The article states that the doctor says the procedures he's undergoing up until the surgery are all reversible should he have a sudden change of heart (or mind, heh) before the removal of genetalia. So ... hmm.

However, I strongly oppose girls who are 16 or 17 having breast reduction surgery or implant surgery.

I just don't know how I feel about this one folks. It's these kinds of dillemas I feel are almost unanswerable without following through with a possible solution and getting to the other side.

 

[donald]

Heart breaking, absolutely heart breaking.

1stJohn1:9

 

[Xue Sheng]

I just don't know how I feel about this. There are strong arguments on both sides of the coin here. Kim feels he's always been a girl, never wavering in that ... so is that a mental illness, or is that a sexual identity crisis? Gender is, apparently, shaped in the brain before the sexual organs are developed in the fetus and they are shaped independently of each other.

So ... if his brain is telling him he's a female, but his body is male ... what do we do?

The article states that the doctor says the procedures he's undergoing up until the surgery are all reversible should he have a sudden change of heart (or mind, heh) before the removal of genetalia. So ... hmm.

However, I strongly oppose girls who are 16 or 17 having breast reduction surgery or implant surgery.

I just don't know how I feel about this one folks. It's these kinds of dillemas I feel are almost unanswerable without following through with a possible solution and getting to the other side.

I strongly appose any cosmetic surgery on any child be that child male or female when they have not yet fully developed or finished growing.

Change a 12 year old from male to female when he is not yet done growing skeletally or that child’s musculature has not yet fully developed would only lead to more surgery later.

And talk about massive doses of medication to fight of puberty, I am sorry this is just wrong

Mental illness or not it is just not a good thing to do major unnecessary surgery on a child.

 

[matt.m]

I think it a heartbreaking story. However, I find it heartbreaking that a child to even think of such a thing. Not only that but are the parents high?

W.T.F. yep, that is where I am at. I wander if the parents minds are a.w.o.l.?

I agree with BYDAND, the word wrong is the shot heard around the world on this one folks.

 

[evenflow1121]

This is just sad that a 12 yr old is allowed by his own parents to be able to do this. At that age, I would gotten him a good shrink to figure out what his mental problems are. Not that I am against transexuals as people, but 12 yrs old come on, there is just way too much stuff going on in a child's developmental environment at 12 to allow him to take such a decision, even 18 seems a bit young for such a treatment.

 

[Drac]

Wasn't there a waiting period of about a year or two before performing the final surgery???

 

[tellner]

Next question:

How are they going to find an ethical doctor to oversee this much less a surgeon to do the nip-and-tuck? My father refused to do vasectomies on any man under 25 except one who already had a raft of children or the one with Huntington's. Why? Because it has to be treated as permanent and because a 20 year old just isn't ready to really get the implications.

 

[MA-Caver]

I'm gonna have to wait to calm down like Xue before posting my thoughts/comments on it...

 

[jks9199]

However, I strongly oppose girls who are 16 or 17 having breast reduction surgery or implant surgery.

I just don't know how I feel about this one folks. It's these kinds of dillemas I feel are almost unanswerable without following through with a possible solution and getting to the other side.

Off topic a bit... but I don't have a problem with a late=teen getting breast REDUCTION surgery when medically appropriate. Implants, however... No, unless there's a medical reason (like reconstruction).

This case, though -- I've got problems with transexualism as a disorder that's cured by surgery, anyway. My view is, therefore, admittedly biased. But I simply don't like messing with nature. Especially at an age where just about everyone is confused about who they are.

 

[CoryKS]

Well, I think this is a wonderful idea. Twelve-year-old boys usually have a very clear and well-defined idea of who they are and what they want. And it's an established fact that people don't really develop much beyond the age of thirteen, so there's little chance that he will change his mind or have a life-altering experience which will challenge anything he has ever known. Yes, non-reversable surgery is clearly the way to go.

.
.
.

:rofl:

 

[MA-Caver]

The article mistakenly says... removal of the penis... guess what boys and girls... it's not removed. I've had the ill opportunity to view a vhs video of one tape that is akin to the "faces of death" types. It showed a transsexual operation from man to woman. Basically (hold on to your tummies) the penis is split lengthwise down the middle with care taken not to sever or split the tube whence urine flows. Then it's literally turned in-side-out and put into where the scrotum normally hangs (the aforementioned sac is basically removed.
I had to get up and walk out of the room so to not see the rest. My friend who did sit through it all said the rest was a pretty gross procedure entailing plastic surgery techniques to replicate the inner and outer folds of the female genitalia. There is no clitoris unfortunately since all stimuli nerves are spread-out along the length of the penis instead of bunched up in a button/knob of the clitoris.
Said person is able to uriniate and have limited sexual intercourse with males of *ahem* small stature.

A 12 year old BOY does NOT have the facilities and maturity to suddenly decide that it was born the wrong sex. That 14 yr. old TIM is stil a boy irregardless of his sexual preference/feelings. You are born with what you are born with... live with it and act like it. You want same sex relations then fine...it's a free choice everyone can make. To change the otherwise healthy body around is mutilation any way you slice it... (pardon the pun).
I've had the occasion of knowing a Gay male who was of the "flaming" type of homosexuals... the ones whose actions/vocal connotations were very feminine... it bothered me so much that I had the following conversation with them.

Me: Hey! Do you have a penis? Yes or no?
Him: Y-yes.
Me: Then for the love of pete act like you still got a pair of balls to go with it!

 

[Kacey]

Not knowing more of the medical/psychiatric details of this case, I cannot - and therefore will not - speak to that aspect of it. Looking at what details were published, however, I note that one indication of Tim/Kim's transexual orientation is that s/he played with Barbies.... now, I didn't like Barbies, and was much more interested in playing with Legos, Lincoln logs, and toy cars - that did not, however, indicate that I was male instead of female, nor have I ever doubted that. Nor did William, in "William Wants a Doll", a song by Marlo Thomas, want a doll because of gender identity problems - he wanted to learn to be a daddy.

If going through puberty is such an ordeal because of Tim/Kim's transexual nature, well, darn... how much more traumatizing will major surgery be? Because I have no doubt that, if s/he ever experiences a change of heart, s/he isn't going to have the nerve to back out. I have no problem with the long hair or feminine clothes, nor the use of the name "Kim" - but I do have a problem with the hormone treatments, especially as even the doctors admit that they do not know what risks might be entailed in starting hormone therapy of this type on a child that young. There are other ways to avoid hair growth than hormone treatments - women use them all the time. And quite frankly, given the use of the penis to build a vagina (they are analogous structures in anatomically normal people, which is why it is possible to perform the surgery in the fashion described by MA-Caver), it would be in this child's best interest to allow his current equipment to grow larger in size. In addition, should the teen ever change his/her mind, the surgery could be cancelled, but not the bodily changes caused by the hormone treatments.

That this is considered an "illness" - and thus covered by insurance, when so many other ailments are not - is simply a mind-boggling addendum to the rest of the story.

 

[Jonathan Randall]

Ok, folks, I personally am against this - but I ddn't want to prejudice the discussions by either setting forth my viewpoints OR putting it in "Horror Stories". I think 12 is far too young to make this sort of decision, as is 18.