Baby hiatus

It's been a while since we posted here. Mostly, the issue has been that we're currently on baby hiatus. It's funny--here we are, with virtually everything that is external set for being able to start the next step of this baby journey, and we've stopped.

People who love us, and even who know at least some of what's going on in our lives right now, keep letting us know that they are eager and excited for us to have a baby. It's not so much pressure as gentle encouragement. Even though they know the issues, they think we're ready to get going. We're not so sure.

The main issue is our health. Whimsy has been coping with what is probably a hereditary case of degenerative disc disease. The quick way of describing this is her back causes debilitating pain to her entire body. I have fibromyalgia, and have recently realized that not only do both of my older sisters also have it, and my niece, but also probably my mother has it. So I admit to many moments of wondering: Is it really responsible to bring a child into this world when the odds are that one or the other of us will be passing on some kind of painful disorder? (We don't even need to go into the things like depression, weight issues, bad teeth, asthma, alcoholism, and so forth that our families deal with, and which might well be genetic also.)

On top of that, I've been dealing with a whole mess of mental health issues of my own. On the positive side, since my issues are pretty definitely derived from having survived childhood abuse, I know we're not going to be passing them along to any kids we have. But on the negative side...

I've really had to face the fact that children, just being children, can be quite triggering for me. And also the fact that I'm not entirely in control of my responses. More than that, I've been confronting the fact that I have dissociative identity disorder (aka multiple personalities).

I think neither Whimsy nor I is sure about how this impacts our decisions about parenting. And it's scary, because there just don't seem to be any role models out there to show us that you can be a good parent and also multiple.

A lot of the hiatus is that we want to be the best parents we possibly can. Part of me says that there is no way to prepare for every contingency, and eventually, you just have to make that leap of faith. But other parts are concerned that we're jumping off without thinking about the consequences.

And we see so many people who seem to have become parents without thinking about doing the best job they can. Our neighbors shriek at their children almost constantly. They don't seem to pay attention to them. They do seem to hit them. There are so many bad parents out there, and we don't want to go into parenting unless we can do at least a pretty good job.

In a lot of ways, I'm wistful, and tempted to just say, "Heck with it, who cares, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead, how much can go wrong?" But other parts of me are terrified of the changes. In the end, we're waiting for now. And I keep hoping that the wait isn't going to go on too long.

New York Supreme Court Says Gay Parents Have More Stable Relationships

Also Supports Incest, Polygamy, Arranged Marriages, and Forced Procreation

The New York Supreme Court argued yesterday that, as marriage is solely to provide stability to couples raising children, neither marriage nor the 316 benefits associated with marriage need to be extended to homosexual couples. Why? Because, as homosexuals cannot get pregnant by "accident or impulse," but only via adoption, artificial insemination, or "other technological marvels," they are more likely to be stable than those heterosexuals, who can get pregnant on a whim. So, essentially, they're saying that only people who get pregnant without thinking about it or planning for it should be allowed to get married. No one who is infertile, who is choosing not to have children, or who is responsible about their method of birth control should be allowed to be married either, because they don't need any incentives to stay together or to think about what they're doing.

The NY Supreme Court added that marriage law should allow only aspects of marriage that "was an accepted truth for almost everyone who ever lived, in any society in which marriage existed...." Advocates of polygamy, forced marriages, arranged marriage, and incest rejoiced at this decision, because it supports their contention that, due to the longstanding historical preference for these forms of marriage, and because it has only been in recent decades that marriage has been a matter of free choice between two equals, they should be able to practice their preferred forms of matrimony.



Feh. I would have written something intelligent or pointed or thought out, but why bother? As W. says, they're all a bunch of, um, edited version is "lackwits." But I'm glad to see that the main reason I'm not allowed to legally marry her is that our relationship in general, and our future as parents in specific, has been deemed by our state's Supreme Court to be more inherently stable than heterosexual partnerships. I should also note that the Supreme Court has apparently also determined that, if you have children, you should no longer be allowed to get a divorce, for whatever reasons. And that people have the right to divorce their partners on grounds of infertility. But I wonder: are they going to be okay with men getting their wives' maidservants pregnant if they would rather not divorce their wife, but still need an heir? And how about if the wife persists in having girls, when the men want someone to carry on their name?

Hello out there in mommy blog land!

Anybody interested in another chat time?

OR NYC wannabemoms and moms get together for coffee?

School's out and I'm socially deprived. I just wanna talk babies!

-Whimsy

J and W

J and W
Originally uploaded by quiteabroad.

My rainbow contribution is our wedding. I'd like to keep most of the pictures private so please go to flickr to see the rest!

Biological Clocks

Or, "Why Having Two Women in the Relationship Complicates Matters"

We spent this past weekend at my 10 year college reunion, and I swear, it felt like at least half of the members of my class had either had a baby in the past year, or were currently pregnant. Naturally, this intensified my baby lust. I looked at all of those tiny babies, and pregnant classmates and tried to remind myself that my time is coming soon. (PKD seems to be giving out very good signs. Cross fingers!)

So, on the way home, W. brought up the topic of spacing between children. Originally, she'd been advocating for a five-year gap, because she and her sister are five years apart, and that worked well for her. I had suggested a closer gap because my family was spaced a little closer together, except for between my older sister and me (6 1/2 years) and the closer-aged siblings seemed to bond more. Plus, if each of us goes, we've got these (fertility-wise) rapidly aging bodies to consider.

W. spent much of the ride home trying to convince me that it would be a good idea for us to get pregnant really close together. No more of this five-year gap for her. I think, if she had her way and we both got pregnant on the first try, she'd be happy to have, oh, a 6-month gap between kids.

I finally realized something (we were driving home from outside of Philadelphia, and I realized this going over the Goethals Bridge into Staten Island--this is a measure of how slow I am on the uptake!). W. was looking at all of those pregnant women and babies, too. She is also the same age as these women. She was feeling the exact same tug inside her, that urgent, supremely physical desire to have a baby INSIDE OF HER, nursing at her breasts, being directly and immediately from her body.

Much of the time, I forget that physical side of things, and the desire for a baby is about the baby, and about beginning the next phase of our family life. But then, at moments like this weekend, I realize how intensely physical my desire for a baby is. I don't just want to have a baby, I want to have a baby, go through the physical changes, carry that little being inside of me. And W. gets the same impulse because, oh yeah, she's also a woman.

So we've been wondering. There are lots of good reasons for all kinds of spacing between babies. From what I've seen, most people seem to think that what they chose or experienced is the best. (Well, except that my mother doesn't advocate having quite so many children as she did, nor as quickly as she had the last five.) Given ideal fertility situations, and no other complications, what would you say is the best spacing between children?

War of the Sexes

Tonight, the kids next door devised a new game. I'm not quite sure what it is, but it seemed to involve dividing by gender and trying to out-shout each other.

So I cleared the table to the sounds of kids shouting "Who needs girls?!" and "Who needs stinky boys?!"

I think the girls were winning, or at least were managing to be louder.

Decidedly NOT kosher

I'm sitting here, waiting for the potatoes to cook so that I can transform them into smashed potatoes. We're having 3/4 of a dinner from my childhood: pork chops, smashed potatoes, and broccoli (when I was a kid, the meal also included fried apples, but W. is not fond of cooked fruit, and I'm mildly allergic to apples lately, so I decided to skip that part).

Sometimes, I do things that are just plain wrong, if one considers combinations of things that really should *not* go together to be wrong. This was one of those evenings.

Anyhow, I was glancing at our "pantry" (aka, open wire shelving along the kitchen wall), looking for something to coat the pork chops with. What should catch my eye but the cannister of matzo meal left over from Passover. Now, this is not what we used to bread pork chops when I was growing up, but it seemed handy--a bit like bread crumbs, and not likely to be used for many other purposes. And so I dumped some into the plastic bag, and the pork chops are cooking as I speak.

I think I notice these things more because the rules of Judaism are completely out of my formative experience. I mean, Southern Baptists have a lot of rules, sure, but they're vague and unstated. Plus, you can eat pretty much anything you like (especially if you like "salads" that consist of things like lime jello, pineapple, cottage cheese, and mayonnaise. Don't knock it until you've tried it, I say.) And as an adult, my religion has been paganism, which explicitly limits its rules to "do as you will, harming none." So a religion that prefers you not to eat pork or shellfish still seems a bit awkward. And when you get into the permutations that come up as people practice more relaxed versions... well, for a backslid Baptist girl like me, things get a little strange.

I Think They're Saying Lesbians Smell Funny

I'm reading the New York Times science section, and came across this article, titled Link Is Cited Between Smell and Sexuality. It basically says that straight men and lesbians process pheromone-related smells in similar ways, as do gay men and straight women.

The thing is, though, that while gay men process smells in pretty much the same way as straight women, lesbians don't respond to the smells exactly the way that straight men do. They conclude that "This observation could favor the view that male and female homosexuality are different."

Yeah, I could have told you that without doing the fancy study or anything.

But hey, they did mention lesbians, right there in the article, just as if we existed!

Birds Do It

Yesterday, while W. and I were having lunch on our porch, I noticed two pigeons engaging in that thing birds and bees are supposed to be so good at doing. I pointed them out to W., and told her the story of how I discovered that pigeons engage in foreplay. I had been in a park, and noticed two pigeons who appeared to be french kissing. When they moved on to having sex, I knew I had made a delightful natural history-type discovery.

Several hours later, when we were having dinner, I noticed our copy of Don't Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late, by Mo Willems, on our dining table, and burst out laughing. W. asked what I was laughing about, and I explained the juxtaposition in my brain.

We decided it's time for a grown-up parody of these delightful books (or else, for a parody that would be very useful in sex ed classes!)--

Don't Let the Pigeon Get It On.

If you're unfamiliar with the "Don't Let the Pigeon..." books, the concept is simple. At the beginning of the book, you're asked to keep the pigeon from doing something (we've also got Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus). The rest of the book consists of the pigeon trying to convince you to let it do whatever it's not supposed to do, and the unwritten text requires the listener to tell the pigeon "No!" Simple, and with the drawings, remarkably funny.

We figured there are plenty of stock lines that people use to try to get into one's pants, and we could combine those with copies of pages from the original books (because, in the context of "gettin' it on," phrases like "What's five minutes in the grand scheme of things?" "Your mom would let me!" and "I'll give you five bucks!" become really funny).

Handily enough, Hyperion has a link to instructions for drawing the pigeon on the webpage for Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, so even with my limited drawing skills, I might be able to pull off making my very own illustrations.

Stay tuned for further updates.

J. needs...

Stolen from Dykes on the Ark... Basically, you put your name into Google, followed by the word "needs," and then you see what it comes up with.

Here are my favorites (I used my real name on google, which makes it all the more amusing to me):

"J. needs our positive thoughts and prayers." Boy, do I!

"Now J. needs to learn to let go." Many people have told me this.

"J. needs an adoptive family who will love her unconditionally." J. adds that it wouldn't hurt if they were wealthy. (This one actually showed up several times on the first search page. Hmmm. I must especially need this!)

But... "First there's a call from the adoption agency where J. needs to prove that she is not gay in order to adopt her baby." Well, hmmm. Something about my name and adoption today....

And here's someone who must have done the same game:

"J. needs to learn to let go. J. needs an ass whoopin'. J. needs a bad boy not a saint. J. needs another mocha."

Google seems to know me very well. I do need another mocha. So I guess I need to go buy some milk, and if I'm going to buy milk, I could go buy some ice cream. J. needs a cure for PMS...