The Pros And Cons Of Intersex Surgery

There are many healthy children who are born daily. Unfortunately, there are also some children who are born with disorders, such as Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH) or Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (AIS). CAH is a disorder when a child has the inability to produce cortisol and aldosterone, overproduction of testosterone, and possibly end up having both genitals (male and female). AIS is when a person develops female physical traits, but instead of developing a uterus they develop testes. A common result to a situation where the newborn is born with both genitalia is to perform a surgical procedure to make a child fall into the category of a male or female, which is what our society is considered “normal.” To “normalize” this situation, the infants undergo surgery. Although this procedure is very common, I do not think having the intersex surgery at birth is a logical decision for these conditions because it could affect the child physically and mentally
The intersex surgery is not just one surgery procedure, it contains constant maintenance, which causes the child to have multiple surgery procedures throughout their life. According to Ms. Karkazis, someone who interviewed parents, doctors, and people who had the surgery when they were infants, “…they were unhappy with the results and complained of lack of sensation or pain, of the need for repeated surgeries and of the fact that they had thick scarring and the genitals never looked 'normal'” (Navarro, 2004). What parents do not really think about are the future problems that’s intersex surgery may cause in during the kid’s adolescence. They try to “normalize” their genitals to either look like a male or female but it will not look like that even with surgery due to the fact the process of surgery leaves