Real People

A Secret Life

My name is Steven Hammond. I was born with a genital sexual birth defect. Because it was undetected at birth by both the doctor and my parents, I was raised the wrong sex. Alot of things in this life are hard to understand, but I think I have endured one of the most difficult things I can imagine to endure.

Children are born every day with different types of congenital birth defects. Some are born with no arms and no legs, some are born blind or deaf, or mentally retarded. It is hard to understand why these things happen, but in my case there were two things that happened. The first was being born with a sexual birth defect, which I now accept as just that. The second was being raised the wrong sex and having to change my whole life.

Only the God of this universe knows what I have had to endure both mentally and physically. He is the one who created me to be who I am, and he alone can understand my circumstances.

I'm sure that all the other people who have lived with birth defects must feel the same way. I hope that my story will enlighten people about sexual birth defects. Sexual birth defects are in a category of their own and are not to be confused with homosexuality, transsexualism, cross-dressing, or any situation where a physically normal person makes it their own choice to be different.

Steve Hammond is an ordinary guy. I drive a Jeep Cherokee pickup. I built the house where me and my wife, Sara Jane, live. I get up every day and go to my job at a warehouse in Berea, Kentucky. I wants to adopt a child and provide stability for my family. Like most of us, I dream of getting a little extra out of life. An ordinary guy. But I have an extraordinary story to tell.

Surprise

In 1981, Linda Jean Hammond (I was known as "Linda Jean"), 25, stepped into the Richmond office of Dr. William P. Grise a few minutes after he had opened. "It was the first time I'd revealed myself to a doctor. I'd been to a doctor for an ear ache and an infected hand but had never had a complete physical. I was very embarrassed and scared. I knew my secret was going to be revealed, a secret I'd held in all my life. "I figured he would know without asking me so many questions. That first time, I had a hard time talking." Grise remembers single-word answers to nearly every question, chipping away at Linda's wall of protection. Then came the examination.

Born Different

Linda Jean Hammond was born with a birth defect June 2, 1956, in Mary Rutan Hospital in Bellefontaine, Ohio. Dr. John B. Traul is listed as the physician. He has since died. If he or his nurses noticed anything unusual about the infant Hammond, they didn't press hard to do something about it. Linda went home untreated.

Six weeks later, my mother, Christine, and father, Floyd, moved our family of five children to Jackson County, Ky. Floyd's sister noticed "Linda used the bathroom funny" when she diapered the baby. She wanted to take Linda to a doctor. She told my father, but he wasn't around much. There wasn't money for the essentials then, much less medical help. A few years later, my parents divorced. My mother tried to raise the family the best she could, but there was barely enough to eat.

There are memories of the poverty: "We woke up sometimes bleeding - me on the toes and my sister from the head - where rats bit us. We lived in houses with dirt floors. In the winter, it was always cold, so Mamma put us all in one bed together and covered us with a feather mattress so we could keep warm." I cried alot during those first years. My mother often thought something was wrong but couldn't pinpoint it and never said anything about it to me. I took comfort from my younger brother. Me and my younger brother Michael were the closest. I always wanted to play with his toys more that mine. He always had the guns. I always got the dolls.

The Tomboy

Photos of Linda at the time (this one at age 10) show a cute, cheerful child, a little girl with chestnut hair cut in a pageboy. But all was not right. School was boring. There were school chums at Sand Gap Elementary School, but mostly Linda wanted to stay home alone, play softball or shoot basketball. Linda seemed a bit of a tomboy, but it only provoked a little teasing. By seventh and eighth grade, Linda became a cheerleader. "I wanted to be a part of the boy's basketball team, but I couldn't play. That was the only way I could be part of the team."

When I was 10, my mother married John R. Johnson. Life got much better. "He loved us alot. I have a biological real dad, but to me he is my real dad because I didn't know my other dad. He (Johnson) ran a filling station and taught all of us, but I guess I was the one most interested in electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, and mechanics. Mostly, he taught us alot of common sense."