Sophie Ottoway

[FabulousFryingpan]

Maybe this was posted before, but can bear reposting regardless. Gender changed just after birth, a salutary reminder. And what a lovely person.

I was just about to post this myself having stumbled across the YT video.
Indeed, what a wonderful human being.
How on earth did her parents live with this lie for so long. It would have eaten me alive.

It's a great example of what you can make parents do if you hammer into their heads "you must tell this set of lies to your child because otherwise there'll be terrible harm".

Agree that Sophie seems like an amazing and very forgiving person.

I watched this yesterday and there was a point in the video where she said something like she had her own views on why it was the Dr wanted to what they did to her.

I would have liked to have known more about that although completely appreciate why Sophie couldn't be seen to be speculating.

I guess I wondered if the surgeon's motivation could have been a John Money kind of experiment because that's the only reason I could see for keeping Sophie's real sex from her.

Oh I've just clicked the link and realsied it's a longer clip than the one I saw yesterday and that Sophie does mention John Money. Will watch it now, thanks op.

You can tell a lot about a person's character by how they react in adversity.

I can understand the decision to operate to remove the penis, although I don't think that was strictly medically necessary. Was penile reconstruction possible 30 years ago? It was wrong to remove the testicles as well, IMO. (No medical knowledge, but Sophie said the problem was with her penis and bowel.) The orchiectomy was more to do with passing as a girl. But not telling Sophie, instructing her poor parents to keep such a huge secret from their child, was so cruel to the parents and Sophie. Especially when she got to puberty. Really no excuse to keep up the lie then - series of lies, I should say.
It sounded similar to the dead child/trans child manipulation - imperfect boy/perfect girl.

Men suffering from erectile dysfunction can be happy and have a good sex life with a bit of help, surely? Plus not all women are massively into PiV sex all the time. I'm a bit bothered by the implicit reasoning that if the boy/man doesn't have a penis that works well or can penetrate a woman, he might as well be a girl/woman. Anyone else read the doctor's rationale like that?

She should have been given the choice. For her own peace of mind, she has forgiven the doctor and her parents, and seems to be in a good place. All the best to her.

"I'm a bit bothered by the implicit reasoning that if the boy/man doesn't have a penis that works well or can penetrate a woman, he might as well be a girl/woman. Anyone else read the doctor's rationale like that?"

Absolutely. And I can absolutely understand how Sophie has found peace by using the lens of body as a shell or an avatar for the soul. Because Sophie had all agency removed from her with regards to her body, and as she explains herself surgeons have forced her into the 'wrong body' (her words) and she has managed to find peace with that without modifying her body.