Supporting Families: Lessons Learned from Parents’ Narrative Experiences

Support and guidance for parents of a newborn with newly diagnosed differences in sex differentiation (otherwise known as ambiguous genitalia or intersex) is important soon after birth. Often, parents do not immediately share this medical condition with many people in their family and social circle. The medical and psychological team can be helpful at the bedside by welcoming parents’ beloved baby, normalizing this biological condition (1.7 percent of the population), providing the medical information that is known, supporting them through whatever emotions they may feel, and connecting them to peer support so they can talk openly with others who have kids with differences of development.