This is a bittersweet pain every parent knows. To see our children grow up healthy and tall and strong is both the fulfillment of a heartfelt desire and a heart-ripping loss. It’s charming, of course, to see how upset the little girl to learn that her cute little brother with his cute little smiles is not going to stay exactly the way he is, the way she loves him. But I find myself wondering how much of the misinformation that is passed on from mother to son and from sister to brother concerning intersexual relations stems, at least in part, from this natural desire for things to remain as they are.