Review: "Inverse Cowgirl" by Alicia Roth Weigel

 

Inverse Cowgirl by Alicia Roth Weigel
Published September 2023 via HarperOne
★★★

It's a season for memoirs about growing up intersex: I read Nobody Needs to Know by Pidgeon Pagonis (mentioned in Inverse Cowgirl, because the intersex advocacy world is small) earlier this year, and with Weigel adding her voice to the mix, I hope this heralds an era in which intersex people feel that they can talk more freely about their experiences.

This is likely one where how much you enjoy the book will depend largely on how well you connect with the authorial voice. Words that come to mind: punchy, chatty, rapid-fire, manifesto, y'all. (Tattoos.) Weigel comes in swinging and never really stops—she's quick to call out structures (and individuals within those structures) doing, and perpetuating, damage to her community, and as quick to call out her own privileges and shortcomings and learning experiences. Formally, this is a memoir in essays (with a common theme of the experiences that led Weigel to her tattoos), but I'd posit that a lot of context would be lost if you tried to read any of the essays solo.

Two things that I really would have liked from this book: first, Weigel focuses heavily on her advocacy and political work, especially later in the book, and as a reader that's something that I've never been very interested in. No criticism of the work itself, obviously, just that it tends to read to me as "and then I did this thing and then I met that amazing person" (perhaps reflective of the exhausting nature of campaigns and advocacy work). I would have been interested to see her talk more about things like HRT—a necessity when your reproductive organs have been removed, but a necessity with consequences, such as loss of bone density and spending your life on medication that insurance might well not pay for. I'd have loved to read more about knowing she had a "condition" but not knowing the word "intersex" until she was in her twenties(!!), and knowing that (minor spoiler, but small point in the book) she had other family members who were intersex. In the latter case, I doubt she could have gone far while maintaining privacy, and I respect that, but my gosh that would be a fascinating line of inquiry.

The second thing I really would have loved is a direct exploration of the intersections between sex and gender, and what it means to Weigel to be intersex and also to firmly apply the label of "woman". Weigel touches on this a little, but it sounds like she (luckily) never had to question her gender identity, which might have been interesting to discuss. This might be an area in which I'd like to see more science—I really don't have a sense of how often assigned gender (or assigned sex!) feels true to someone whose body, as Pagonis puts it in Nobody Needs to Know, "chose intersex" rather than "boy" or "girl". And perhaps the science simply isn't there—Weigel notes, after all, that there's a dearth of knowledge on how intersex bodies develop in the absence of, e.g., nonconsensual childhood surgeries, but as far as I can tell there's just a dearth of knowledge on the personal experiences of intersex people in general, because it's a topic that's so long been taboo. (Ooh, can someone please curate a book of essays by intersex folks with varying experiences and from varying generations and locations?)

Overall, an interesting look at an experience that isn't talked about enough, and hopefully one of many voices sharing stories about this in the next years.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.