‘My Name Was Baby’: How this Midwestern author came to write an intersex memoir

An array of pride flags celebrate the LGBTQ+ community. Author Chris Arnone has used his personal experiences as the basis for an intersex memoir released this month. (Susan J. Demas/Michigan Advance)

On Jan. 20, 2025, Donald Trump took back the White House. On that same day, he signed executive order 14168, the natural progression of the GOP’s ongoing assault on transgender people. This order sought to define gender and sex as strictly binary: male and female.

And yet, I was not born into this strict binary. My genitals were ambiguous at birth. For three days, my parents called me Baby, while they awaited the results of chromosome testing. I am one of the roughly 1.7% of the population born intersex. That is, somewhere between the male-female binary of biological sex.

As this executive order was signed, I knew I couldn’t remain silent any longer. I couldn’t sit on the sidelines and casually be erased. Because buried in the bowels of this order was the attempt to do just that: erase intersex people.

I read Alicia Roth Weigel’s “Inverse Cowgirl” back in 2023. It was the first time that I’d thought that my intersex story could be worth telling, that it might be worthy of a book. But I was in the midst of writing other things, so the idea slid to the back of my mind, joining the unending queue of book ideas, where it lingered for two years.

Executive order 14168 launched it to the front of the line.

I sent an email to my agent, Stephanie Hansen. She thought it was a great idea and encouraged me to write the book and build my online presence. I was overdue to do both, so I got to work. I created a newsletter, spending at least half of my writing talking about intersex issues. I became more active on social media, where I began sharing my intersex story.

A couple of weeks later, Hansen received an email. The University Press of Kansas was creating a new imprint for trade nonfiction called Plainspoken Books.

What were they looking for? “Trade books written by engaging and authentic Midwesterners.”

I’d barely put a few pages together for this new writing adventure, when this new imprint seemed to fall out of the sky.

Within weeks, we were having coffee with Alec Loganbill from Plainspoken Books. We discussed the project with great excitement, and he became such an advocate and friend. Soon after, we were under contract. I was writing to a deadline, reading every other intersex memoir I could put my hands on and continuing to produce online content promoting intersex education and advocacy.

Now, it’s Pride Month 2026. Less than a year and a half after meeting Loganbill for the first time, “My Name Was Baby: An Intersex Memoir” is about to be released. Weigel has written a beautiful foreword for the book, bringing me full circle on this journey.

I often say that this entire journey has felt like kismet. But it’s more than that. Every inch of ground that LGBTQIA+ people have gained regarding our rights and freedoms has come with hard work and sacrifice. While the confluence of my decision to write this memoir and Plainspoken coming into existence is kismet, the writing, editing, and production of “My Name Was Baby” has been a lot of hard work.

From Loganbill’s insightful feedback to the marketing and publicity support from Laura Pilcher and Andrea Laws, from sales to production and beyond, I’ve seen how much care and effort has gone into this book. It’s been a labor of love and sacrifice.

It’s the most important work of my life. It’s my story. My truth. I couldn’t be prouder. Fitting as I add my own brick to the fight during Pride Month.

Chris Arnone mostly writes science fiction and fantasy, though he’s known to dabble in poetry, playwriting, and literary fiction. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.