Honest reflections. Tender truths. A safe place for same-sex parents and donor-conceived families.
“When it comes to generating writing material, teenagers are gold. Their world is a narcissistic, anarchic, paranoid hell of anxieties and stresses about how they look; how popular they are or aren’t; and how fast or slowly, big or small their private parts are growing […] Lifts and pocket money aside, teenagers crave privacy – … Continue reading So Many Baskets
Now here is a contentious one for you... I write this entry with as much care and sensitivity as I can muster, having already experienced a taste of the polarising and colourful reactions to this ‘land mine’ of a discussion. I stumbled into this issue for the first time about fourteen years ago, completely by … Continue reading Donor ‘Siblings’
It was one of the best, but also one of the worst years of my life in 2003 when Master Z made his way into our world. I was 36 weeks and 4 days pregnant and had suffered lower back pain all day. Thinking I needed to lie down, I went into the bedroom to … Continue reading Earlymark
Parenting is a drug. The highs are amazing, euphoric even. The lows: the worst come down ever. Nothing makes you confront your own feelings of inadequacy and fractures your sense of self-worth like a teenager with a bee in his (or her) bonnet. That same being you held to your breast and nurtured, that you … Continue reading Drug of Choice
Our excitement at being pregnant for the first time in 2002 was short-lived. Tragically, our first pregnancy ended in miscarriage at 8 weeks. It was three days after the Bali bombing in 2002 that we lost our first little one. We were actually supposed to be in Bali with my ‘in-laws’, T’s parents, at the time, … Continue reading Rocky Road
Conceiving our first child was by no means a simple task. My polycystic ovaries meant it was always going to be an uphill battle. Not that I knew this at the time. The long and short of it was I was going to struggle to fall pregnant without specialist help, whether I was gay or … Continue reading An Uphill Battle
Not everyone who wants to be a mother wants to carry a baby. For some women, that urge to physically grow another human never arrives; however the desire to be a mother does. The ‘maternal instinct’ comes in many forms, and is different for everyone. It is a spectrum – with those like me, who … Continue reading Modern Family
We received an invitation for Master Z ‘and his family’ to have afternoon tea with the local member on Wednesday afternoon to celebrate his receiving a ‘Local Sporting Champion’ grant. He’s had a great year with his sport, playing hockey at National level plus State level for both club and school hockey. Initially, I felt … Continue reading Ready or Not, Here Come the Teen Years.
Book Week poses far more of a stress in our household than Father’s Day ever has. Hard to believe but it’s true. For us, the day itself is spent celebrating with extended family. Grandparents and uncles are celebrated with either a family breakfast, or lunch. Basically it is just like other families, but on a … Continue reading Father’s Day
I was in London the day I learned I was expecting my first boy fifteen years ago. I was doing data entry at a dingy small scale factory style establishment near Croydon, walking distance from a hospital. Work was optional for me at this time, as my partner had been offered a contract working for … Continue reading About a Boy
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