As Nature Made Him

In 1967, after a twin baby boy suffered a botched circumcision, his family agreed to a radical treatment that would alter his gender. The case would become one of the most famous in modern medicine?and a total failure. As Nature Made Him tells the extraordinary story of David Reimer, who, when finally informed of his medical history, made the decision to live as a male. A macabre tale of medical arrogance, it is first and foremost a human drama of one man's?and one family's?amazing survival in the face of terrible odds.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERWe should aspire to Colapinto's stellar journalist example: listening carefully to the circumstances of those who are different rather than demanding that they conform to our own. Washington PostThetrue story about the "e;twins case"e; and a riveting exploration of medical arrogance, misguided science, societal confusion, gender differences, and one man's ultimate triumphIn 1967, after a twin baby boy suffered a botched circumcision, his family agreed to a radical treatment that would alter his gender. The case would become one of the most famous in modern medicineand a total failure. The boy's uninjured brother, raised as a boy, provided to the experiment the perfect matched control.As Nature Made Him tells the extraordinary story of David Reimer, who, when finally informed of his medical history, made the decision to live as a male.Writing with uncommon intelligence, insight, and compassion, John Colapinto sets the historical and medical context for the case, exposing the thirty-year-long scientific feud between Dr. John Money and his fellow sex researcher, Dr. Milton Diamonda rivalry over the nature/nurture debate whose very bitterness finally brought the truth to light.A macabre tale of medical arrogance, it is first and foremost a human drama of one man'sand one family'samazing survival in the face of terrible odds.

In 1967, after a twin baby boy suffered a botched circumcision, his family agreed to a radical treatment that would alter his gender. The case would become one of the most famous in modern medicineand a total failure. As Nature Made Him tells the extraordinary story of David Reimer, who, when finally informed of his medical history, made the decision to live as a male. A macabre tale of medical arrogance, it is first and foremost a human drama of one mansand one familysamazing survival in the face of terrible odds.