The Tragedy of David Reimer

By: Aubrey Ana Searle

This is the tragedy of David Reimer. The year of 1965 in Winnipeg Canada, David and

his identical twin Brian were born to Janet and Ronald Reimer. When they were eight months

old, Janet took her twins in for a routine circumcision and Bruce’s penis was burned off by a

malfunction of equipment. After the accident the surgeons let Janet know that his penis could not

be salvaged, she was devastated. Circumcision was not performed on Brian after what had

happened to Bruce. Janet was wondering what she could do with Bruce as he would have to

grow up without a penis. One day, Janet was watching television and wrote a man named Dr.

John Money of her predicament after seeing him present one of his cases on a transgender

woman. She thought that maybe he could help her solve the problem of baby Bruce.

Dr. Money in the 1960’s was one of the lead scientists and psychologists regarding

gender reassignment and transgender studies. He graduated from Harvard with a PhD in

psychology and worked at Johns Hopkins one of the nation’s premiere research hospitals. Dr.

Money jumped on the chance to test out a transgender theory he coined called “Gender

Neutrality”. Dr. Money wanted to test to see if nature or nurture would win out when it came to

raise a child as feminine or masculine. The controls for this experiment were ideal as they could

monitor the progress of the experiment as both boys were identical twins, only one had a penis,

and the other did not. They would reinforce male gender stereotypes with Brian, and female

gender stereotypes with Bruce.

The Reimers took Bruce to have his testicles surgically removed and created a

rudimentary vulva for him. Janet renamed Bruce to Brenda and were told explicitly to never

reveal to Bruce that he was born a boy as it would ruin any and all progress. So, began the

journey to see whether they could turn a little boy into a little girl. The Reimers were successful
in fooling Brenda into thinking she was a girl from the ages of two to six, yet she still was

tomboyish. Dr. Money even wrote a book declaring the success of his treatments and therapy. It

wasn’t until Brenda started puberty that things went awry.

Brenda began feeling like something was wrong with her, she was teased and bullied at

school for looking so masculine. She didn’t feel comfortable with Dr. Moneys treatments, and

his persistence with her having another sex surgery. She became depressed threatening to kill

herself, her parents finally told her that she was born a boy at the age of thirteen. Brenda stopped

seeing Dr. Money, and started her transition back into being a boy at the age of thirteen. Brenda

changed her name to David. David would have to cope with how much autonomy was taken out

of his hands, and the experimental treatments that were performed on him and his brother for the

rest of his short life.

Thesis:

David made it known to his parents that he didn’t feel comfortable in his own body. He

didn’t want to continue with seeing Dr. Money because he was not comfortable with his

explicitly sexual based treatments and his persistence that David should have a sex surgery

performed to construct a vagina for him. In this paper I will show that the lack of autonomy and

experimental treatments during David’s childhood caused him to be depressed as an adult, and

ultimately led him to take his own life.

Medical Indications:

During David’s childhood, his penis was completely burned off by an electrical

malfunction in equipment. The surgeon wanted to use a new method using electricity to cauterize

the penis, and ended up burning off the penis instead. They kept David on a catheter for seven
months while deciding what route they were going to take medically. Ronald and Janet consulted

with many different physicians even looking at phallic reconstruction, but one plastic surgeon

told the Reimers that “Such a penis would not, of course, resemble a normal organ in color,

texture or erectile capability, It would serve as a conduit for urine, but that is all." (The True

Story of John/Joan). The parents and doctors made the decision to surgically remove his testicles,

and construct a rudimentary vulva for him. The removal of David’s testicles would make it so

that there would be a lack of testosterone, making David’s features more feminine.

David and his brother Brian would begin an annual psychiatric treatment, where Dr.

Money would reinforce that David was indeed a female. The treatment reinforced gender roles

even going as far as yelling at both David and Brian to take off their clothes and making them

point out the obvious differences in sexuality as Brian had a penis, and David did not. This

treatment made the children believe they were going to be physically harmed if they did not

listen to Dr. Moneys instructions.

In an interview with BBC, David himself described the treatment as perverted, and that

he wouldn’t subject his own children to such treatment. In a separate interview with Rolling

Stones David professed that “It's torture. What they did to you in the body is sometimes not near

as bad as what they did to you in the mind -- with the psychological warfare in your head”. (The

True Story of John/Joan). When David became an adult, he took it into his own hands to go

through a painful sex surgery, having doctors create for him a penis because he wanted to have a

heterosexual relationship, and to have a family.

Patient Preferences:
 David was never given a choice about what health care route he wanted to pursue when

he was a child. His parents made the decision for him to be circumcised. The practice of

circumcision for males is mainly practiced in North America, the Middle East, and some African

countries, with the rest of the world leaving their boys genitals intact. David was also never able

to give consent when they decided to surgically remove his testicles, and construct a vulva.

These are two life altering surgical procedures that David was not able to consent to

because he was too little to have a say otherwise, and because circumcision is practiced generally

in Canada. As a child David’s parents were the ones who made the medical decisions for him.

They believed that it would be traumatic for him if he knew that his penis was burned off. As an

adult David was finally able to choose a treatment for himself and chose to have a sex surgery

where they reconstructed a penis for him. He was never able to have children of his own due to

castration, though he did father children, his wife was inseminated by other means.

Quality of Life:

David’s quality of life was poor, he had a strained relationship with his twin brother after

it was disclosed to the twins that David was a boy. David was a very lonely child as his school

mates would make fun of and bully him day in and day out for looking so masculine. David

became extremely depressed and threatened to commit suicide at the age of thirteen because he

didn’t want to continue therapy with Dr. Money.

As an adult David and his brother Brian would discover that Dr. Money would continue

to claim that his treatments were a success, this deeply disturbed both brothers, David in

response to Dr. Moneys declaration of success, in his interview with BBC said that he “was

appalled, disgusted, and angry when I heard about it, because it was nothing further than the
truth”. (Dr. Money and the Boy with No Penis). David convinced his brother to go public with

the controversial methods Dr. Money had treated them with. Brian who experienced everything

with David succumbed to mental illness and developed schizophrenia. Brian eventual took his

own life at the age of Thirty-six. The death of Brian was a catalyst for David; with the

accumulation of everything that had happened to him in the past, and a series of unfortune events

such as being unemployed, and problems with his marriage David’s mental health deteriorated

rapidly. Two years after Brian, David killed himself by shooting himself in the head with a

shotgun at the age of thirty-eight.

Contextual Features:

What happened with David Reimer could have been avoided if his parents had been more

informed, and allowed their son to grow up and have a decision on what healthcare path they

could have pursued. When watching documentaries and reading interviews with David’s parents

it’s clear to see that they were hanging on every word and decision that the doctors made for

them, even if the treatments were highly experimental. The Reimers should have been more

informed of the risks of circumcision, especially when using a new treatment using electricity to

cauterize the penis when circumcising, which resulted in the main injury that started this all.

They should have been informed fully about the psychiatric treatment, and what methods Dr.

Money was using to achieve his agenda.

Alternative Options:

Even with the parents being fully informed, David should have been given a chance to

grow up and choose his own gender identity. Modern physicians have taken up wariness of the

parents’ choice over the child when such drastic surgeries are being considered. Dr. Hazel Glenn
Beh, and Dr. Milton Diamond are two such doctors they contend “that consent to sex assignment

and genital normalizing surgery in particular exceeds parental authority because it unnecessarily

forecloses the child’s right to an open future”. (David Reimers Legacy: Limiting Parental

Discretion) No one gave David the right to choose, and this led him to have an extremely

distressing childhood, and an even more perturbed adulthood.

Conclusion:

In conclusion, David Reimer from birth to puberty was never given a chance to make any

decisions for himself. He was subjected to highly experimental treatments that were the basis and

groundwork for the gender reassignment, and gender identity that we have today. He was only

allowed to feel comfortable and happy after his treatment with Dr. John Money had ended.

Maybe if such extreme measures weren’t taken in treating David he’d still be with us today. The

case of the Reimer twins should be a call to action to make sure that the mental, and physical

health of children who are intersex, or have had horrible accidents are not subject to unethical

experimental treatments in modern medicine.

Bibliography:

Colapinto, J. (1997, December 11). The True Story of John/Joan. Rolling Stone, (775).

Glenn Beh, H., & Diamond, M. (2005). David Reimer's Legacy: Limiting Parental Discretion. Cardozo
Journal of Law & Gender, 12, 5-30. Retrieved December 4, 2017.

O'Connell, S. (Writer). (2011, April 7). Dr. Money and the Boy with No Penis [Video file]. Retrieved
December 4, 2017, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUTcwqR4Q4Y&t=22s