Bibi's Story

[Received Oct 2002]

If you are going to print this story than please use the name BIBI.

Where shall I begin?

My earliest memory of AIS was the annual visits to the hospital for dr to check me. The time I realized the full extent of my disorder was when I was going abroad with my granma and I asked my mum if I should take sanitry towels (pads) and she told me that I would never need them. I ignored it but it was then the past started making sense to me. I remember the days my dad used to tell me about not having children was a good thing because you can't have a career etc. and I said, when I was about 8 or 9, that I would never get married.

The weired thing is that I am a Muslim with this disorder. And my whole religion emphaziz marriage, what am I going to do when marriage proposals come, what do I say. Of course I want to get married one day, and have a big family (through adoption) but would a muslim man understand me, will he want to adopt.

Anyway, the first time that I was told by a dr was the most awful experience I will ever go through. I remember sitting in the room with my mum, a junior dr and some nurse. I was lik the clown in the circus. I was then told I didn't have a vagina, uterus and ovaries. I was 14 and th[r]ough Bio class completely understood the consqeunces, i.e. not having children. I went home and tried to take all of this in and being a religious person have found some solles in my god. God creates barren whomsoever he wishes, and I beleive it is for a reason.

I have not told anyone, but my best friend knows I can't have children but not the full extent of AIS. My other friends know that I am 18 and havn't started my periods, and I always reply I have booked an appointment with the dr and they say it's hormonal problems Thy make fun of me but again they don't understand my full disorder.

About two years ago I had an appointment with a female dr because I told the male one that I didn't feel comfortable with him, he was a bit angry saying that he has done checks on several people like me, but I was still not comfortable. The female dr told [asked] me if I understood the problem and I said I did, not wanting further discussion about it. She checked my vagina, and said it was very short and I would need an operation to extent it. What made me feel better was that she said my genitalia had very good appearance of female gentalia. She then talked with my dad and I was told to leave the room, and have never heard from anyone again. I think my dad said we have to wait a few years before anything can go ahead.

I still don't know the full extent of my disorder as my family are very traditional and don't talk about it much. My sister knows though reading through my diary and when we fight she calles me jealous because she's normal and I am not, and I can truely say that I am not [jealous] and I am very happy she is ''normal''.

I am still plucking the courage to go and get my medical records off my dr and make an appointment to have my vagina extended, without the permission of my parents. The reason for this is that they think I will never get married, because the whole purpose of getting married is to have children. I disagree, I am not normal (who is) and I feel that I will get married one day and have a sexual relationship.

Even though [I] make my parents to sound overly traditional, I know that my parents have never treated me different from other siblings. They may over-love me. I just hope it doesn't have an affect on my sister's children.

I am still learning about my disorder, and I know I am a human, regardeless of gender.

I am currently doing Social Sciences at a good university and hope to adopt one day even though I am a Muslim. I would like to know if there are other Muslim with AIS.

On 12 Sept 2009 Samar emailed us from France with the following comments:

Having been made aware of your website through the article published in the Independent today, I scrolled through various personal stories only to find one which caught my eye. In Bibi's story, it is alleged that the Islamic faith foster ideas such as 'marriage is for procreation only' and that 'adoption is not favoured'.

Contrary to this contention, Islam is perhaps the only monotheistic religion which encourages enjoyment of sexual relations within the bounds of matrimony and gives women full rights to retention of wealth, maiden name and divorce. This is much unlike the orthodox Jewish and Christian strands of faith. Furthermore, adoption is widely encouraged with only the stipulation that the adoptee must retain his or her birthname.

Confusing patriarchal, tribal values with Islamic ones is inexcuseable in an age where ignorance should be extinct.

Please seek to retain the credibility of your otherwise honourable initiative by correcting this information. You are advocates of tolerance, so please do not foster ideas that breed intolerance.