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Confessions of the Other Mother: Nonbiological Lesbian Moms Tell All!

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Many thanks to all of you who have already shared your information and stories! If you haven’t yet participated and would like to, just fill out the form below. Again, the results spreadsheet is here, so you can go look through the entire list of responses. ASHLING: It's been difficult at times because I think people in our town weren't exposed to gay families before. Overall we've been accepted by our community, but every now and then there's a little reminder that people don't know how to deal with gay families. The week before Father's Day this year, Giana's class made cards, and because her school wasn't sure what to do with her, they got her to make a card for her little brother instead. She's young and didn't understand why she was asked to make a card for her brother while all the other children made cards for their dads. The school knows that Natalie and I are together – they just didn't know how to deal with the dad issue. NATALIE: We've heard of lesbian mums who have told their child that if they feel uncomfortable telling the truth, they can lie and say that their other mummy is just a friend or an aunt, but Laura and I hope that Sanne and Quinten won't feel like they have to do that.

You have the choice between a known sperm donor ‒ a friend or family member ‒ or an anonymous sperm donor, who you would find through a sperm bank. Our donor is a close friend, and we refer to him and his wife as Uncle [his first name] and Aunt [her first name].NATALIE: We planned and researched our options thoroughly beforehand, and of course we had to decide what method we wanted to take. It was about finding the process that we felt most comfortable with. We'd initially considered a friend based in the US, who was happy to help us, but we felt it could over-complicate matters. We decided to go for an anonymous donor instead. LARA: A tremendous amount of trust, love and respect has built up between us and the donors. Aside from the fact they helped create them, it's great for the children to have male input, along with their grandfathers, uncles and friends. It's important to have that male energy around them so that there's a balance. We started out with Mama and Mommy, but never really committed and both just referred to ourselves as Mama (as in, ‘your mama’) until it lost all meaning. Then for a while it was Stephamommy (Stephanie + Mommy) and Other Mommy (who is technically the bio-parent. Stephamommy thought that one was hilarious) until we convinced our daughter to start using Mommily (Mama + Emily).

Equally important: our second generation of children, whom I birthed, call their “half siblings” (biological children of my partner from a prior heterosexual marriage) their “ sisters.” We met four different families living in the UK, to talk about both the benefits and the challenges of raising children with two mums. In each case, it was noticeable that both mothers were equally involved in all aspects of their children's lives; and that they consider open communication with their children to be crucial. They shared with us their style of parenting, how they explain the difference of their situation to their children – and whether attitudes towards gay families have really changed. ASHLING PHILLIPS AND NATALIE DREW NATALIE: For us, our focus is to be honest about our sexuality and open to any questions we're asked by our children as they get older. We probably emphasise how special they are and how special our family is a lot more than straight families. Sanne is only three and a half, but she's already being asked questions at nursery about where her daddy is and why she's drawing two mums – we just make sure she feels secure enough in our family to answer.

Choosing Sasa had to do with finding a nonbinary parent name that was simple and felt right. As Mama’s given name begins with M and mine begins with S, I explored Sasa as an option. Finding it to be a name in the same family as Sasha or Alexander, and carrying meanings such as “protector,” I felt it was a good fit. LARA: The desire to be as involved as possible in our children's lives is part of the reason Ruth is a governor at the school. We want to be right in there and know what's happening. Having a close-knit community has been pivotal for us – both at the school, in our local neighbourhood, and with our friends and family. I am generally the working parent; my wife works part time. Kids have gone through a phase during which they call whatever mom is home “ mommy” and whatever mom is at work “ mama.” Our son chose to call me mommo at about 18 months old. Before that we were both mama. I called him baby-o and buddy-o, so I think that’s why I became mom-o. Our daughter just called us what my son already did.

DAKSHA: I always wanted a child. We asked friends to ask their friends if they'd be a donor, and when one said yes it turned out we knew him already. It was important to us that he was Asian, as we figured Lia would have enough to contend with without having to deal with issues about her nationality, too. We inseminated at home and it took us almost a year to get pregnant. It was difficult and stressful, but we got there in the end. We see Lia's biological father every couple of months. Bibai was what I called myself as a toddler and my family still uses it for me sometimes, so it’s pretty easy to get them to remember to call me that in front of my kid.

Being a lesbian mom

Our daughter shared a crib with another baby for nine months in the children home they lived in. She lives with her two moms three hours away. The girls call themselves “ sisters.” (They’re both only children.)

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