Pull up a chair and check out some of these great recent stories about LGBTQ families, including ones on donor kin, becoming a parent at an older age, and sharing household responsibilities!
- Laura Davis writes at LitHub about being “Out of the Closet and Out of Time: On Being an Old(ish) Mother.” It’s a must-read piece, in my opinion, as she writes about the societal and medical barriers for queer people trying to become parents and observes, “As a mother in my forties, this is the thing I have had to struggle with most—my grief over how this all took so much time.”
- Melissa Hart writes at PrideSource, “I’m a White Cisgendered Straight Woman. ‘Pose’ Gave Me My History.” When she was 9 years old, in 1979, her mother came out and lost custody of her. “The resulting sorrow and stigma shoved us both so deep into the closet” that they didn’t take advantage of the support LGBTQ organizations could provide, or involve themselves in LGBTQ advocacy. Yet “‘Pose’ has showed me where I belonged in that era, and where I belong now as the daughter of a lesbian, the sister of a gay man, the mother of a queer Black biracial teen. It’s shown me, too, how profoundly ignorant I was of the world around me as a young person and how that ignorance stemmed from fear and sorrow and trauma and isolation.” It’s a great piece—and for more of her story, read her memoir Gringa: A Contradictory Girlhood.
- The Atlantic’s Julie Beck speaks with two couples—Jenny and Marisa (parents to Atlas and Blaise), and Lora and Michelle (parents to Finnley and Tegan)—who used the same sperm donor and reached out to each other so their kids could connect, and eventually became friends themselves, expanding their notion of family. (For an even wider view of the experiences of donor siblings and their parents, check out the book Random Families: Genetic Strangers, Sperm Donor Siblings, and the Creation of New Kin.)
- LGBTQ Nation has launched a video series on LGBTQ families as part of its “Authentic Voices of Pride” partnership with Chevrolet. Among those profiled are Stacey Stevenson, CEO of Family Equality, whom I interviewed here; Trystan Reese, author of How We Do Family: From Adoption to Trans Pregnancy, What We Learned about Love and LGBTQ Parenthood; and Bart Heynen, author of the gorgeous photo essay book Dads.
- PinkNews profiles Richard Scarlett and his husband Dario, from London, who started their family through surrogacy and will be taking part in the Growing Families London seminar on October 2, on IVF, surrogacy, and egg donation.
- Linda Fruits writes at ScaryMommy about “How I Told My Husband I’m A Lesbian” and the lessons both she and he hope they will convey to their children about their journey.
- Christina Caron at the New York Times explores “How Same-Sex Parents Share the Mental Load,” which sounds more definitive than it is, since every couple is different. Still, it’s useful to have the reminder that while same-sex couples tend to divide tasks more equally than different-sex ones, there are a lot of factors at play, including career differences and the backgrounds and expectations of each person. As for all couples, communication is key.
