This looks like a kids’ book, but it’s really intended to help adults better understand the realities LGBTQ+ parents face. Created by Bubly Sparkling Water, the book’s proceeds (after production costs) all go directly to Family Equality to help them help LGBTQ families and families to be. With earnest but somewhat strained rhymes, the book explains that “everyone knows” the old saying that the “birds and the bees” are the path to parenthood, “but there’s another path to which you must be privy… it’s the lgbtq+ path to parenthood, and it’ll send you in a tizzy.” It takes us through the various ways LGBTQ people form families, noting the many obstacles, like information tailored to straight families, the need for lawyers, states that allow discrimination in adoption, the expense of surrogacy, gender norms, and more—but reassures readers that these are not the way things should or always will be. Finally, though, there are the joys of parenthood, making the journey worthwhile.
This isn’t a how-to guide (if you’re looking for that, try these), but rather an amusing poem in the style of a kids’ book to reassure LGBTQ parents that they’re not alone in the challenges they face—and perhaps to inform non-LGBTQ parents about them as well. With bright cartoon-like illustrations by Wednesday Holmes, a nonbinary lesbian artist (RuPaul; Pride 1 2 3), this would make a cute gift for any LGBTQ parents just beginning their journey to parenthood.
