The family of a woman born without a vagina has launched a crowdfunding campaign for surgery that would allow her to experience intimacy and live a more normal life.
Kaylee Moats, from Arizona, suffers from Mayer Rokitansky Küster Hauser syndrome (MRKH) — which means she has no cervix, uterus or vaginal opening.
Her boyfriend of four months, Robbie Limmer, says he doesn’t care about the lack of sex in their relationship.
Moats needs $15,000 for the surgery and the crowdfunding page set up by her sister, Amanda, has already raised $5,720 in two months.
“I met Robbie in my senior year of college when I was working at the front desk. He thought I was cute so he came up to me and we started talking,” she told the Daily Mail. “It took about a month for me to tell him that I have MRKH. He was confused at first but supportive and said that it doesn’t change how he sees me.
“He doesn’t really focus on the sexual side of our relationship because we can’t do anything since I don’t have a vaginal opening,” she said. “But I am looking forward to having a sexual relationship. I’m not sure if I want to wait until marriage, but I think having that option there is a lot more comforting.
“I’m a bit nervous to have sex for the first time after surgery because I’m not sure if something is going to go wrong down there or if it’s going to hurt,” she said.
Moats says her vagina looks exactly how it should — except that instead of a vaginal opening, there’s a little dimpled skin where the hole should be.
She says she ovulates like other women but it gets dissolved into her ovaries.
Moats says the crowdfunding is necessary because her health insurance won’t cover the surgery.
“The fact that insurance considers this a cosmetic or a gender surgery really upsets me,” she said. “I have all the correct chromosomes of a woman so it’s not a gender or cosmetic thing because it’s not what’s outside that is different. I can’t see inside what is wrong with me.”
Her sister has even offered to carry any children Moats might want in the future if she can’t have them herself.