Miriam Grossman: 'Lost In Transnation'

Did you know that transgender surgery on children began in the 1960s? And that its pioneer was a staff member of Johns Hopkins University who was later discovered to be a child abuser?

Background: Bruce Reimer was the elder of infant twin boys born in 1965. When Bruce was seven or eight months old, his parents Janet and Ron had him circumcised. The physician botched the procedure and the infant Bruce’s penis was literally burned off.

Bruce’s parents Janet and Ron then approached John Money, a professor of pediatrics and medical psychology at Johns Hopkins University, to inquire whether Money’s recently published theories on “gender roles” and “sexual orientation” — both new terms invented by Money — might provide some help for their injured son.

Money told them, in short, that the answer was to raise their injured son as a girl.

They proceeded to have Bruce castrated, administered feminizing hormones, and brought in for office visits to Money throughout childhood wherein “therapies” were given to Bruce that involved pornography and “sexual rehearsal play” with his twin brother.

At the age of 13, Bruce (who’d been called “Brenda” since infancy) was so distraught that his local psychotherapist insisted that his parents tell him the truth about himself.

As soon as Bruce learned the truth about himself, he insisted on living as a male, and even re-named himself “David” (as in David-against-Goliath).

Decades later as an adult, David publicly revealed what happened to him in childhood. Several books and articles were published about his testimony — a comprehensive list is available from the Intersex Society of North America: https://isna.org/faq/reimer/.

David’s story came to an end when he committed suicide at the age of 38.

No one knows these kinds of stories better than Miriam Grossman, M.D., a 40-year child psychiatrist who encounters gender dysphoria as the dominant complaint at her busy practice.

Full interview of child psychiatrist Miriam Grossman by Mary Holland: https://x.com/ChildrensHD/status/1826016367558144240