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At age 50, Jeanette discovered the secret doctors had hidden from her for decades.
As reported by the BBC, doctors had removed the internal testes Jeanette did not know she had when she was 16.
The UK woman was born with complete androgen insensitivity (CAIS), a condition that affects sexual development before birth and during puberty.
At the time, Jeanette did not know about the hidden testes or even why doctors were operating.
“I’ve got an 8in [20cm] scar right across my stomach. I was feeling perfectly healthy and I can remember sitting up in up in bed, thinking, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’”
According to the International Society For Sexual Medicine, CAIS is a condition in which a child— although genetically male—develops female characteristics.
While Jeanette’s mother had explained that she would not be able to have a baby or develop like other women, she did not know the extent of her condition.
At age 28, she found sex with her husband too painful and she left him two years later.
Now 71-years-old, Jeanette explains that she only learnt of her condition when she noticed the term “testicular feminisation” on her medical records.
“I read my notes and that’s when it said I had the womb the size of a matchstick and two fully grown testes, and I cried my eyes out.”
CAIS affects between one in 20,000 and one in 60,000 people.
Watch Jeanette’s full story here.
This article originally appeared on Marie Claire.
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