The Case of David Rheimer

Of all the attempts that were made to try to disprove the idea of a biological basis for gender identity one case in particular stands out. In 1972 Dr John Money, a psychologist, started to publish research papers in scientific journals about a child called Brenda who had been born a perfectly normal boy but who was being brought up successfully as a girl. The papers were to become hugely influential.The boy had been left with severe anatomical problems after a routine operation had gone horribly wrong. Because the child was still less than a year old Dr Money persuaded the parents that the wisest course of action was immediate plastic surgery to enable him to be brought up as a girl (in 1967 plastic surgery to reconstruct anything resembling a functional male organ of reproduction was impossible). Although Dr Money assured the young and desperate parents that the outcome was bound to be positive, in truth it was merely an experiment conducted in the hope that it would prove once and for all his conviction that at birth a person's gender identity is undifferentiated.

In the published papers Money portrayed the transformation as an unqualified success. The child, he said, had responded perfectly to his parents, who had consistently treated him as a girl and had kept the anatomical alteration completely secret. According to Money the child at the age of 6 had typically feminine character traits and interests: "She was observed to have a clear preference for dresses and frilly blouses over pants and T-shirts. She took pride in her long hair and loved being her daddy's little sweetheart."

The real story was not made public until 1997 when one of the less senior psychiatrists who had been treating the girl finally found the courage to speak out. The ensuing reports included quotations from relatives and friends. The child's twin brother (who knew nothing of the truth at the time) said: "To me she was my kid sister, but she just never acted the part. She'd get a skipping rope for a gift and the only thing we'd use that for was to tie people up or whip people with it. She was always playing with my toys: toy dump trucks, cars and stuff. The sewing machine she got just sat there. And when she was 6 she said that her ambition was to be a garbage man. I thought it was kinda bizarre - my sister a garbage man!" One of her female classmates also recalled the way she reacted sometimes when she was teased at school (as she often was): "What always impressed me about Brenda was that when the boys called her 'Cavewoman' or 'Gorilla' or something like that she might grab one of them by his shirt and punch him. I always wished I could do that."

Despite the concerted efforts of her parents, the psychologists and the doctors the child was never happy with the idea that he was a girl. After obstinately refusing hormone therapy at the age of 14 ("They told me it would fix things so that I could wear a bra - but I didn't wanna wear a bra!" he later recalled) his parents finally told him the truth. Looking back in 1998 he said: "I was so relieved. Suddenly it all made sense, and I finally knew that I wasn't some sort of freak." Shortly afterwards he willingly underwent the medical treatment necessary for his final metamorphosis back from being a girl to a boy, and the person previously known as Brenda settled into a new and more contented life as David.

When David was in his mid-twenties he met and married a woman who had three children from three unsuccessful relationships. She was bowled over by how caring and considerate he was. To one of the few journalists David agreed to speak to he described how proud he was in his role as husband, father and sole breadwinner in the family - a family that he never believed he would be lucky enough to have. "From what I've been taught by my father what makes you a man is: You treat your wife well. You put a roof over your family's head. You're a good father. Things like that add up much more to being a man than just sex. I guess John Money would consider my children's biological fathers to be real men. But they didn't stick around to raise the children. I did. That, to me, is a man."