Caitlin Ryan

I don’t need to tell most readers that LGBT youth are at a higher risk than their non-LGBT peers for attempting suicide. Until today, however, no “Best Practices” have been identified or designated to help reduce vulnerability and risk among LGBT children, youth, or adults. That has now changed.

The national Best Practices Registry for Suicide Prevention, coordinated by the Suicide Prevention Resource Center and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention has designated a multi-lingual, multi-cultural series of family education booklets from the Family Acceptance Project (FAP) at San Francisco State University as the first “Best Practice” resources for suicide prevention for LGBT youth and young adults.

The booklets—”Supportive Families, Healthy Children: Helping Families Support their LGBT Children”— were developed after extensive research and direct feedback from families, LGBT youth, and service providers. They offer non-judgmental, research-based guidance, using personal stories, “to help ethnically and religiously diverse families understand how specific reactions to their children’s LGBT identity both contribute to and protect against risk for suicide and related health problems,” according to a press release. They are available in specific cultural versions in English, Spanish, and Chinese.

Dr. Ryan and her team were the first to put research findings behind what may seem obvious to many of us: LGBT youth whose families are accepting of their LGBT identities are more likely to become happy, healthy adults, and less likely to have depression, suicide risk, substance abuse, and similar problems.

Ryan explains, “Our research shows that common rejecting behaviors such as trying to prevent LGBT youth from learning about their identity, not allowing them to have gay friends or not letting them participate in an LGBT youth group are related to a nine-times greater likelihood of attempted suicide.”

Ryan has also shown the lingering effects of childhood bullying and the positive effects of gay-straight alliance clubs.

The FAP is as much about intervention, education and policy as it is about research, however. Greater Boston PFLAG President Stan Griffith, whose chapters have used FAP’s approach and materials since 2007, calls the new booklets “an indispensable part of every individual or group conversation with parents and caregivers and with professionals who provide counseling, health and other services to children, youth and families.”

“Supportive Families, Healthy Children” is available for download on the FAP Web site. Printed copies are also available, and lower literacy and faith-based versions are in development. FAP provides on-site training on using all of their resources and tools. Contact fap@sfsu.edu for more information.

Fran and Anna Simon, the moms in the video, live in Colorado and have been helping lead the fight to enact the state’s civil union bill. You can read more about them in this Denver Post article. Unfortunately, the bill was killed in committee last night, despite testimony from the Simons and others.

As Fran told me, though, “We will continue to fight.  It’s not a matter of if we will achieve equality for our families, just a matter of when.”

Zach Wahls (Photo credit: In the Life Media)

I’m very excited to invite you to an online forum for LGBT parents and their children this Wednesday, May 16th, at 2:30pm ET, hosted by In the Life Media. They’ve asked me to join Zach Wahls, whose speech about marriage equality went viral on YouTube; Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida (and mom of the adorable baby smiling at Michelle Obama); and Dr. Abbie Goldberg, assistant professor of psychology at Clark University and author of Lesbian and Gay Parents and Their Children. It should be a great discussion!

Please join us and share your comments and questions!

To participate, visit the forum page on the In the Life Web site, where you can also set up an e-mail reminder in advance so you don’t forget.

In the Life has also created the new Web short video “My Two Moms,” featuring Zach discussing his experience as a child of two moms, how he’s adjusting to life in the spotlight, and his new book by the same name. View the whole thing below. (For more on Zach’s book, see my review; please note I did the review before I was asked to do the chat, and I don’t know Zach personally.)

In the Life Media produces the two-time Emmy-nominated series, In the Life, the first—and  the only—LGBT newsmagazine on public television.

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Photo credit: Jebulon

Happy Mothers’ Day or Mother’s Day to all of the moms out there! We may come to motherhood in different ways, and approach it in different manners, but we are all united by a love of our children.

Here are a few additional posts from round and about that speak to the spirit of the holiday:

• Jaime Jenett, whose post was my Post of the Week last week, has has a piece at The Frisky in which she shares her perspective about being a lesbian mom on Mother’s Day. Also waffles.
• David Sarasohn of The Oregonian writes about lesbian moms and “the many ways of motherhood.” And waffles.
• My own Mother’s Day column from last year, “Waffles and Roller Coasters,” still reflects my thoughts on the holiday.
• Moving on from waffle-themed posts, Darby Hickey at HuffPo writes of her own mom, being a transgender mom and a godmother, “mommas defined by their nurturing rather than a title on a birth certificate,” and “the mother in all of us.”
• HuffPo Gay Voices asked its readers and bloggers to submit photos and anecdotes about their moms. (My favorite is number five, by lesbian mom Lisa Lay, who came out three years ago after 27 years of marriage and five children. She writes not only of her mom, but of a woman who was a mother figure to her and her partner and knew, as her own parents did not, of her lesbian identity.)
• On a more political note, Kenji Yoshino of the New York Times writes, “For Obama, It’s About the Children.” I love the piece because it speaks to themes I’ve written about myself: President Obama’s use of same-sex parents and our kids to show why he now supports marriage equality, and the reclaiming of the “best interests of the children” argument from the right wing, as a recent ad in North Carolina did.
• On a non-LGBT-specific note, the International Museum of Women has launched “Mama’s Work,” an online gallery “about how women around the world juggle work and family life.” (Via Bunchland.)
• And finally, don’t forget that halfway between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, on June 1, is the 7th Annual Blogging for LGBT Families Day! Post at your blog and submit the link here to participate.

• J.C. Penney is featuring lesbian moms Wendi and Maggie and their daughters, along with Wendi’s mother, in their May catalog. Double kudos to the store for doing this despite coming under fire from right-wing group “One Million Moms” after selecting Ellen DeGeneres to be their spokesperson.
• Lisa Weiner-Mahfuz has an awesome essay, “All the ways that we are queer mamas of color,” at Strong Families’ equally awesome “Mama’s Day Our Way“ blog series. Make sure also to check out their diverse, inclusive, and socially just Mama’s Day e-cards.
• A bevy of celebrities have joined GLAAD in asking the Boy Scouts to adopt more inclusive policies, and to reinstate Jennifer Tyrrell, whom the Scouts ejected as den leader of her son’s den because she is a lesbian. You, too, can join GLAAD in sending a message to the Boy Scouts for Mother’s Day.
• A Colorado court said lesbian mom Wendy Alfredsen must be given access to the daughter she had raised for several years with her ex, Lena Alfredson. Each mom had adopted one of two biological sisters (state law did not allow them to adopt jointly) before they broke up. Lena then took her legal daughter and went to Norway, whereupon Wendy filed a suit using a new state law that allows non-biological parents to file paternity suits. LGBT family lawyer Nancy Polikoff says that although the use of “paternity” in reference to a woman is novel, the decision was actually expected, given previous applications of the law in cases involving opposite-sex parents.
• While I usually focus on lesbian moms, I thought this story of a straight, evangelical mom’s journey to acceptance of her lesbian daughter, as told in her new book Above All Things, was worth a Mothers’ Day mention.

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What I’ve come to realize is that for loving, same-sex couples, the denial of marriage equality means that, in their eyes and the eyes of their children, they are still considered less than full citizens.

Even at my own dinner table, when I look at Sasha and Malia, who have friends whose parents are same-sex couples, I know it wouldn’t dawn on them that their friends’ parents should be treated differently.

So I decided it was time to affirm my personal belief that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry.

The president may have come to embrace marriage equality, but it seems like his daughters were there before him. That in itself speaks to the power of family. We learn as much from our kids as they do from us. Maybe even more.

President Barack Obama

BREAKING NEWS: President Barack Obama, in an interview with ABC News this afternoon, announced, “I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.”

You can view the video of his interview via ABC News.

Took him a while, but he got there.

This is, I imagine, small consolation to equality minded folks in North Carolina, who are still mourning yesterday’s vote to ban recognition of any same-sex relationship under the state constitution. Nevertheless, it is significant progress. Good to see a leader being a leader on this issue. (And I’ll note that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, long an ardent supporter of many rights for LGBT people, has yet to state she is in favor of full marriage equality. Let’s hope that changes soon.)

I cannot do justice to his legacy; perhaps no one who did not know him personally can. NPR’s Fresh Air, however, has an excellent piece about his life, along with links to several interviews he did with the superlative Terry Gross. I found the latest interview, “This Pig Wants to Party,” particularly touching. In it, Sendak explains that his partner of 50 years, Eugene Glynn, was ill and dying while Sendak wrote his last book, Bumble-Ardy.  Sendak wrote it, he said, in order to help himself live after Eugene’s death.

All Things Considered’s Lauren Silverman looks more closely at his work in “Sendak’s Legacy: Helping Kids ‘Survive Childhood.’”

I hope the Wild Things are having a rumpus in his honor.

I’m sure every LGBT news source (and most mainstream ones) will have further analysis in the hours to come. North Carolinian Pam Spaulding of Pam’s House Blend, has offered her initial thoughts, and that’s a good place to start.

The only good news from North Carolina tonight is that Rep. Marcus Brandon, the state’s only openly gay state legislator, has won reelection.

My sympathies to Protect All NC Families and the many others who worked to try and defeat the amendment.

This is the “long” part of that moral arc, I’m afraid. But bend towards justice it will. Just not tonight.

(Originally published in my Mombian newspaper column.)

I have a love-hate relationship with the term “LGBT parenting.” On the one hand, I often say I write a column about LGBT parenting, insofar as I write for and about LGBT people who are parents. On the other, I believe that we LGBT folks change diapers, sing lullabies, help with homework, and drive to soccer practice like any other parent. There’s no “LGBT” way (or even, separately, lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender ways) of doing those things—which makes me doubt whether there is such a thing as “LGBT parenting.” Is there?

Many LGBT activists avoid use of the term “gay marriage” for the same reason. Marriage is marriage: it’s about love and commitment, regardless of gender. Similarly, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) advises against using the phrase “gay adoption.” Gay people (and all LGBT people, for that matter), adopt children in the same way as anyone else, and for much the same reason—because we want to raise a child. One doesn’t “gay adopt” (or even “gayly adopt,” although I’ll grant you “gaily adopt”).

And if there were such a thing as “gay adoption,” why stop there? One could also argue for the existence of a “lesbian diaper change,” a “transgender nighttime feeding,” or a “bisexual walk in the park.”

So does that mean there is no such thing as “LGBT parenting,” no distinguishing characteristic that defines it?

Certainly, our parenting may include a healthy dollop of our particular take on LGBT culture—but LGBT culture is itself a multi-dimensional affair.

We create our families differently from non-LGBT parents, and that sets us apart, some might argue. Even after the children arrive, we have donors, surrogates, or birth parents in our lives, whether actively or in the background. But non-LGBT people may create their families through assisted reproduction, surrogacy, or adoption, too. And let’s not forget the many LGBT people who have biological children from previous, opposite-sex relationships, or the transgender people who have biological children with a partner.

The law applies differently to LGBT parents, to be sure. We often have to cobble together legal protections for our families, if we are even lucky enough to live in a jurisdiction that allows them. Does that affect how we parent? Perhaps, insofar as nonbiological or non-legal parents may feel less authorized or included, and that may affect their relationships with their children—but not all of them feel that way. Many consider themselves equal in all but the eyes of the law.

Legal struggles and social stigma may also toughen us, enabling us to better prepare our children to face adversity—but we certainly don’t have an exclusive on that one, as many families of color, families with differently abled members, and immigrant families, among others, could affirm.

What does academic research tell us about “LGBT parenting”? In Abbie Goldberg’s Lesbian and Gay Parents and Their Children: Research on the Family Life Cycle (2009), she synthesized decades of studies by herself and others to conclude that lesbian- and gay-parent families “are not, by virtue of their family structure, essentially different from heterosexual-parent families.”

Goldberg also, however, cited one study that found that lesbian nonbiological mothers were more involved with their children, compared to heterosexual fathers; another found that gay fathers were “more sensitive and responsive to the perceived needs of their children” compared to their heterosexual peers. Still more studies have found that children of lesbian and gay parents may grow up with “more expansive and flexible notions of gender,” and be more accepting of differences in others.

She cautioned me in an e-mail, however, that “many of the characteristics that make (some) same-sex parents ‘special’ . . . also occur in some heterosexual parents,” and that we should not conclude lesbian and gay parents are “better.”

Goldberg also noted that more work needs to be done on the impact of class, race, and geography, among other factors. Most studies of LGBT families have focused only on white, middle-class ones. And little has been done on bisexual or transgender parents. Our image of what LGBT parenting is remains incomplete at best.

Where does that leave us?

LGBT families cut across racial, ethnic, religious, geographic, and socioeconomic boundaries, and our parenting styles reflect the mix of our disparate identities. In that, we are no different than non-LGBT parents.

Still, I can’t help but feel that there is still something that distinguishes LGBT parenting. It lies, I believe, in us as a community and in our shared, though diverse, history as LGBT parents. The generations of LGBT parents who have gone before us have paved the way legally, socially, and emotionally. No other community shares that same exact history, that same pattern of interwoven stories.

“LGBT parenting” is not a particular parenting style or method. Instead, it is the collective history in which we partake because of one aspect of our identities. We create it as we live, and as we add our stories to the pattern.