Raised in Baton Rouge, Lousiana, Jim was born in 1976 with XY chromosomes and had atypical genitals. So his parents, under the advice of a local doctor, decided to have surgery performed on the infant to create more female-looking organs, and then raised him as a girl without ever telling him the truth. It wasn't until he read about intersex people in a university feminism course that he realised who he really was.