Confessions of the Other Mother Part 1

Confessions of the other mother : non-biological lesbian moms tell all.

Harlyn Aizley.

Introduction.

Just moments after I gave birth to our daughter, my partner, Faith, scooped up the baby, cooed into her squishy newborn face, and said, ah.e.l.lo there. Iam your mommy.a I wanted to kill her. Faith, that is.

Granted I was doped up on hormones, painkillers, and fatigue. Granted I had been up all night struggling to learn how to place my cracked and excruciating nipples into our childas rosebud of a mouth so that I might oae'er up every ounce of nourishment and energy I had left in me. Granted I had not had an Advil, a gla.s.s of wine, or sushi in a very long time. Still.

Who was Faith to call herself Mommy?

I wanted to be Mommy, the only mommy. Yes, we both had planned for the birth of our child; yes, we both had been present and accounted for at her conception; yes, we both were women. But hadnat I earned it?

And so we were oae', into the beautifula"though often unexpectedly complexa"terrain of two-mommy parenting. To extend the metaphor, we soon learned that this new land that was our home, while frequented by many, remained virtually uncharted. Where were the guidebooks? Where were the stories from other settlers? As a new biological mother, I had at my disposal mommiesa groups, lactation consultants, my obstetrician, and my own mother, all of whom wished to share advice, support, and stories of their own similar initiation into parenthood. But where was Faithas experience? Where were the anecdotes from women who, like Faith, had opted to postpone or forgo their own birthing experience to a.s.sist their female partner in hers? Where were the tales of life at home raising another womanas child, a child who is also your own, but ix in a wholly diae'erent way? Faith needed them. I needed them. And one day our daughter would need them, too.

A search for literature on the subject revealed a sad wealth of horrid and fearsome custody tales, news, and scientific reports about the battles between women over their children, made all the more painful and divisive as they had the added pressure of creating precedence for custody cases yet to come. There were stories about states that forbid adoption by same-s.e.x parents, and harrowing tales of a biological motheras relatives exercising their a.s.sumed blood rights over those of a nonbiological mother. While valid and critical to our understanding of the social and political impact of same-s.e.x parenting, these stories provided little in the way of support and/or relief. They emphasized the need for adequate legal safeguardsa"wills and powers of attorney, second-parent same-s.e.x adoption when possiblea"but shed no light on the everyday experiences of the nonbiological mother. Legalities aside, lacking were what we needed most: tales from the front lines of nonbiological motherhood, optimistic, funny stories of otherwise happy and contented lesbian moms struggling to make sense of their family structures at the playground, at PTA meetings, in car pools listening to three-year-olds discuss what it means to have two moms, or when slamming headlong into unantic.i.p.ated maternal longingsa"their own as well as those of their biomom partner. (As far as this bio mom was concerned, the reluctance to share the t.i.tle mommy was just the tip of my biological iceberg).

The narratives in this anthology are stories from these settlers. They are anecdotes about what it means to be a macho butch politico more accustomed to pa.s.sing as a man than as a mother, or a woman grieving her own infertility while supporting a partner who has easily become pregnant for the second time. They are honest, candid confessions of jealousy experienced while watching a partner breastfeed, and exasperation at having to come out publicly a dozen times a week in response to the question, aWhoas the daddy?a These are the stories from childbirth cla.s.s, from the nursery in the middle of the night and the tot lot first thing in the morning. They are humorous and poignant, exquisitely personal and deeply reflective.

Confessions of the Other Mother is not a guidebook, because as any of the women featured here will tell you, there are no universal rules for two-mommy parentinga"or any parenting, for that matter. Itas more like a campfire around which a nonbiological lesbian mom can listen to tales told by a bunch of gals making the same journey as she. Itas a place where that same exhausted mom might at last slap her knee and exclaim, aI know exactly what you mean!a The essays that make up the first part of the book, aBirth, Babies, and Beyond,a explore the experience of nonbiological motherhood from conception to raising children. Almost every author addresses the issue universal to lesbian couples desirous of biological children: Which one of us will get pregnant? But from there they diverge, with some women using the brief telling of a moment in their lives as parents or parents-to-be to convey the emotional significance of their role: watching a partner breastfeed, battling insensitive bureaucracy in the maternity ward. Others consider the place in society their mothering has created with longer pieces that capture both the personal and political sides of nonbiological mothering. Still others challenge the presumptions of language, suggesting that all female parents need not be mothers, and that words like non-biological and non-birthmother are negatives that do no justice to the very positive fact of a womanas parenting.

Because lesbians have at their disposal varieties of parenting that far exceed those available to couples sporting opposite genders, I have included two shorter sections. aMucking with the Stuae'a gives voice to women who have straddled both sides of the mothering fence. In it we hear from two biological moms whose partners chose to become pregnant, as well as from two nonbiological mothers who later birthed a child. In aArriving When the Show Has Started,a a lesbian astepmoma shares her story of picking up the parenting pieces upon uniting with a recently divorced woman and her two sons.

Some of the essays are funny. Some are sad. Some are both. All are riveting enough to keep you up at night pondering the meaning of motherhood, parenthood, and the nuclear family. This is a campfire, after all. Hold tight to your marshmallow.

During share time at a group for new (biological) mommies, I confessed my dirty little secret about wanting to be the only mom in the house, wanting to delegate to Faith some new word that does not yet exist to represent her role as parent. Thinking myself h.o.m.ophobic, an embarra.s.sment to gay parents everywhere, I was shocked when the only other lesbian mom in the group nodded her head.

aMe too,a she said guiltily.

As both Faith and I are Jewish (albeit of the nonpracticing variety) a well-meaning heteros.e.xual mommy suggested Faith refer to herself as ima, the Hebrew word for mother. This seemed to me like a great idea. Maybe we would even join a temple to lend it context.

aYou be Ima,a was Faithas response.

aBut Iam her mother, her American mother.a aSo am I.a That it took me some time to grasp that Faith was as much our daughteras mother as she was a red-blooded, blue-state American, I blame nowa"thanks to my contributorsa"on the limitations of language rather than my own lack of comprehension. With no name for her role, Faith had only her heart to guide her as she carved a place in the world for herself and our family. Sheepishly, I shoved over and made room.

Ultimately, our daughter decided for us. She refers to us as Mommy Faith and Mommy Harlie. Sometimes, to save breath, when either one of us will do, she shouts from across the house, aMommies!a This collection is dedicated to Faith, and to nonbiological lesbian moms everywhere who grapple not only with the usual trials and tribulations of parenthood, but also with the sometimes arduous and revolutionary task of creating their own role as mother/parent in their homes as well as in the outside, Cheerios- and Elmo-filled, world. Itas for the women who would remind us that, just because they are women with children, they are not necessarily amomsa or amommies.a Itas for those who until now have had to look toward fathers in an eae'ort to locate themselves in the vast open waters of parenting. These are your stories. May they provide support and laughter, strength and kinship, and may they serve to educate the rest of us as to the historical enormity and cultural significance of mothering. Have at it, girls!

Harlyn Aizley.

Boston, Ma.s.sachusetts.

Confessions of the Other Mother.

part 1.

Birth, Babies, and Beyond.

Watching.

Amie Klempnauer Miller.

It has been three weeks and two days since my partner, Jane, and I stood in our bright pink bathroom, gaping as the second line on the pregnancy-test stick turned indisputably blue. After ten years of talking about it, a year and a half of trying to get pregnant myself, and a squirt of thawed donor sperm for Jane, we are apparently going to have a baby.

Nearly every day since then, Jane has crawled home from her job as an administrator at the University of Minnesota and gone immediately to sleep, lying like a fallen soldier on the battlefield. She hauls herself up to wolf back a plate or two of food, then shu~es back to her pillows. She lies unmoving on the bed or the couch, our two cats sprawled blissfully on top of her. In these early days of gestation, she is all hormone, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s swelling, her energy sapped by a creature still smaller than a sesame seed.

Meanwhile, my inner guy is coming out of the closet. I feel urgently, irrationally protective of Jane. I want to stand guard over her, to protect her from drafts, from worry, from bacteria-laden soft cheese, from cat litter, from free-floating germs. I want to tell her what to do and what not to do. While she sleeps, I go outside and mow the lawn. I pull weeds in the garden. I turn the compost. I climb an aluminum ladder and clean the gutters. I sweat. I stink. I feel positively virile.

Is this the role of the nonbiological lesbian moma"to be a faux dad? Am I becoming a DH, the adear husbandaa"or designated hitter, for all I knowa"that all of the straight women write about on the Internet discussion boards I visit? I donat feel like I need to mimic the paternal role, yet it seems to be finding and claiming me. I am a little worried that I am somehow fueling the stereotypes of right-wing complementarians who argue that every woman needs a man, every man a woman, and ev ery child one of each in order to have proper balance in the universe. Maybe major change inherently promotes traditionalism, a grasping for the models most familiar, if not necessarily the most fitting. Or maybe the experience of the unpregnant partner, whatever the gender, follows a predictable pattern, and itas just that most of the unpregnant partners in the world are men.

We used to think that I would be the one to get pregnant. Month after month, I went to a clinic in a suburb south of Minneapolis, where the very friendly nurses inseminated me with the sperm of first one donor and then another. I took progesterone, to better the chances that a newly fertilized egg would successfully implant in my uterus. I had a variety of blood tests, to make sure that my follicle-stimulating hormone and my prolactin and my thyroid-stimulating hormone levels were all normal. I had ultrasounds, to make sure that I ovulated. I had a hysterosalpingogram, to determine that my fallopian tubes were unclogged. I refused to take Clomid or to have Jane give me hormone shots, because we had both decided well in advance that we did not want to start down what looked to us like the seductive path of just-one-more-try fertility treatments. That, and we were half convinced that wead end up with a litter of six babies. After twenty or so inseminations, I stopped.

We didnat know at the time what our next step would be. Jane was not yet convinced that she wanted to be pregnant. We briefly explored adoption. We went to work. We came home. We had dinner. We talked. We spent a year this way. Finally, Jane decided that she was ready. We went back to the same clinic, where one of the same nurses did the insemination, but this time Jane lay on the table and I sat in the chair. I expected that we would need to give it five or six tries. Jane got pregnant the very first time.

Now, in those moments when Jane is not sleeping, we go to the bookstore. We are both believers in the idea that reading bestows control. The trick is finding the right books. In the pregnancy and parenting section of the store, Jane settles down on a chair. There is a mound of books by her side, all explaining to expectant mothers in more or less exhaustive detail what is about to happen to their bodies, what they need to worry about, how to worry less, how to exercise, why they shouldnat exercise too much, and on and on.

Meanwhile, I find myself drawn to books for new fathers. Compared with the absolute onslaught of books for pregnant women, who apparently have nothing to do but read, there are surprisingly few volumes directed at men. Based on what I find, dads still seem to be remarkably marginal to the whole process of reproduction. The general pregnancy books mention men in an almost oae'hand waya"as in, itas good to have Dad involved or, Dad can help with parenting by giving Baby a bottle. Many of the books actually targeted at men emphasize manliness: book jackets designed to look like menas clothing, Guysa Guides to the mysteries of pregnancy. They are gestational positioning systems, promising to help men navigate the wilderness of pregnancy.

None of these books expect men to be naturally good at much of anything relating to parenthood except, maybe, teaching the kid to throw a ball. They a.s.sume anxiety and a certain cluelessness on the part of new fathers, which may be why I find them consoling. Books for guys provide the most basic information, while books for Mom are far more sophisticated. While Dad learns how to keep from dropping the baby, Mom learns the various hypotheses about what causes colic, the dangers of strep B, and how to do yoga with an infant.

Finally, I buy a book for stay-at-home dads. I like the topics it covers: balancing childcare and work, defining responsibilities for housework, developing shared family goals. Now that we know Jane is pregnant, we are actively discussing the prospect that I quit my job and take care of the baby. After spending so much time and energy deciding to have a child, neither one of us wants to hand our baby over to a stranger, no matter how much more they might know than we do. Many of the questions faced by stay-at-home dads are also mine. Should I quit my job or work part-time? How will I feel about not earning money? Will it aae'ect my self-esteem? How about my virility? How will I feel about being the princ.i.p.al caregiver of our child, but not the (biological) mom? How will Jane feel about going back to work and leaving our baby with me?

Thinking of myself as a dad, maybe a stay-at-home dad, feels a little safer to me than thinking of myself as a mom, especially when Iam not the one who is pregnant. I distrust maternal instinct, particularly my own. Among the dads, I feel less anxious about becoming a parent. I at least know how to operate the washing machine; in contrast to these guys, I am positively prepared.

The truth of the matter is that I feel more at home among the dads because I have never thought of myself as a particularly good woman. I have never regretted being female, nor am I even remotely butch; Iam just not very good at girl stuae'. At my favorite coae'ee shop, a young guy who works behind the counter frequently wears a T-shirt that says you make me feel like a natural woman. Every time I see him, I feel rea.s.sured. If he feels like a natural woman, then there might be hope for me.

When I was a teenager, the things that girls were supposed to care about never really registered in my life. Like boys, for instance. I tried several times to have a boyfriend. A couple of them turned out to be gay. On the rare occasions that I was asked out on a date, I became painfully introverted and verbally inept, trying to guess what my lines were when I didnat even know what play we were in. My most successful relationship was with the boyfriend who lived in New Jersey. I lived in Ohio.

Growing up, it never occurred to me, mercifully, that perhaps I was unsuccessful with boys because I was meant to look at girls. At the time, I would have been utterly unequipped to deal with the notion. I suppose the warning signs should have been obvious. Other girls developed crushes on Burt Reynolds, while I had a thing for Kristy McNichol; other girls loved the Bee Gees, while my favorite band was Queen.

What does it mean to be a natural woman? While I was trying to get pregnant, I went to a birthday party to which one of the guests brought her three-week-old daughter. When Baby entered the room, heads spun faster than Linda Blairas. Women cl.u.s.tered around the still-puckery little girla"whose sandy blonde hair fell onto her forehead, whose tiny, dime-size eyes were closed in sleep. Within seconds, a line formed to hold her.

Most of the people at the party were lesbians who had no children of their own, although some were in the process of trying to get pregnant. As each person held the baby, someone else would invariably comment, in a tone of coy innuendo, aYou look really natural, there.a Eventually the baby was pa.s.sed to me. I sat in an armchair, believing as I do that it is always best to sit down when holding an infant, in the same way that itas best to wear gloves and a hat when facing a hazardous situation such as a dead bird on the porch. I tried not to move and barely breathed, convinced that she might suae'er sudden infant death syndrome while lying in my arms. Eventually, as was bound to happen, someone looked at me and said, aYouare looking really natural.a Wink, wink. So does Astroturf, I thought. I certainly didnat feel natural. I felt fraught with danger. I was aware that at any moment, Pookieas head could fall oae'. She could become fatally overheated in her fleece receiving blanket. She could smother in her onesie.

I feel like a distant cousin to the natural woman, and maybe would have felt even more unnatural as a pregnant woman. But still, I wanted to know what it would feel like to grow a baby. I wanted to know how it would feel to nurse. I wanted to know if I could give birth.

Now that Jane is pregnant, I acknowledge that I donat know what Iam doing, but not that I donat know whatas best for her. I have granted myself the solemn responsibility of being Janeas protector, although some tiny part of me admits that she has not asked me to do this. I am bossy by temperament, an inclination that is growing in direct proportion to Janeas rising HCG level. I shoot directions at her like telegrams. Do this. Stop. Do that. Stop. I want her to follow my directions because I am sure it will be good for both her and the baby. I could lighten up, I think. But I donat.

aGo take a nap,a I tell Jane, for the fourth or fifth time today.

aI donat want to,a she says.

aYou seem tired.a aIam fine.a aIt would be good for you.a aIam fine.a aOkay. Whatever. Itas just that you wonat have as much time to sleep during the week. And I know how tired you were last week.a Jane glares at me. Her lips are pursed and tight. aYou canat be so pushy about what I do or donat do, and what I eat or donat eat, and when I sleep or donat sleep.a She goes on. aThis is absolutely our baby, but itas my pregnancy.a She is lying on the sofa, covered with cats and sections of last Sundayas New York Times. I stand by the side of the coae'ee table as she talks, but inside, Iam running. I hate her anger, even more so when I suspect sheas right. I dodge.

aIam sorry,a I say. aI didnat know I had upset you.a This is bulls.h.i.t. I know Jane well enough to know exactly when I am pushing her too hard. But I continued anyway for reasons that I do not fully understand. My eyes are stinging.

Donat cry, I think. Donat get angry. Donat look hurt. I tell myself that she has every right to say what she has said, every right to feel the way she does. I even partly believe this. I also know that repeating it to myself will throw a wet tarp on my own smoldering feelings. I come from a family that rarely has a good idea about how to deal with anger, especially among other family members. Weave tried lots of approaches, from rage to denial to Valium. As for myself, I generally stick with pa.s.sive aggression followed by retreat. Jane thinks weare all nuts.

Itas not until the next morning, when I wake up exhausted and depressed, that I realize there might be something bigger going on. I find it impossible to focus on anything. I sit at my computer and obsessively browse the sections for dads on BabyCenter.com. I donat know what exactly I am looking for, but I know that the sections for new moms do not apply to me. I am not pregnant. My b.r.e.a.s.t.s donat hurt. I donat throw up before breakfast. At the same time, as much as I might empathize with the men, the fact remains that I am fundamentally an outsider in the dads section. I donat know where I belong. I am in limbo between being a mom and not being a mom and being a dad and not being a dad.

The phone rings. It is Janeas mother. She asks how the mom-to-be is doing. I say, sheas doing greata"pretty tired, but not too nauseous. aAnd how is the mom-to-beas, uh, helper?a she asks. I know that she doesnat know what to say, what language to use for her lesbian daughter-in-law. I know this, but I feel as though I have just been shut out of the Mommy Room.

aFine,a I say slowly.

Whatas my role here as the non-birthmother? And what is my role as a non-birthmother who tried to be a birthmother? Jane has asked me how I feel about not getting pregnant myself. A few other friends have also asked. Until now, I felt fine, but I have made a lifelong habit of the delayed emotional reaction.

When we visited the clinic for Janeas first pregnant-woman exam, the nursea"who had inseminated me several timesa"turned to me and asked: aAre you jealous?a I almost fell oae' my chair. Her question felt suddenly and intensely personal, an unexpected shift in focus from the details of Janeas body to the details of my psyche.

aUh, no,a I said. In that moment, I didnat feel jealous or angry or betrayed or any of the things that I could have been feeling about the fact that Jane is the one housing our zygote. But then again, maybe just a little.

aI would have liked to nurse,a I said a moment later.

She explained to me that there are ways. I should call the La Leche League and talk to a lactation consultant. aYou can just tell them that youare adopting, if you donat want to tell them your whole gig,a she added. aSome women can stimulate milk flow. And thereas also this tube that you can wear that goes right along your breast so the baby can have formula while sucking at your breast. You should try it.a Maybe. But then, maybe not. I feel overwhelmed just thinking about it, as though it throws me ever deeper into a liminal s.p.a.ce. I could be a semi-mom, non-dad who nurses. Gays and lesbians often say that we spend much of our lives making our own road maps. This feels to me a little too much like making the road.

I donat know how other lesbian, nonbiological mothers-to-be, who tried to get pregnant and could not, might experience their partneras pregnancy. For that matter, I donat really know other lesbian, nonbiological, presumably infertile, mothers-to-be. I donat even bother looking for books on the subject.

Itas my general impression that I should be in pain. I know that many women, straight and otherwise, go through a great deal of grieving when they try to get pregnant and canat. I have heard about other lesbian nonbirthmoms who feel resentful toward their pregnant partners, or bitter about the pregnancy. I donat think I feel that way. Mostly, I am sad. I feel left behind in unmarked territory. I am expecting a baby, but I am not pregnant. I will be a mother, but I wonat have given birth. I will adopt our child, legally, but my experience has little or nothing in common with most adoptive parents. There is really no category, no name for what I will be. I am defined by what I am not: a nonbiological parent, the nonbirthmother.

I sit at the computer, my stomach clenched. Tears roll down my face and splatter the keyboard. I donat know what I am. I certainly had my own set of doubts about whether I would make a good parent, but unlike the guys I read about (most of them, anyway), I wanted to get pregnant. I am not mourning the loss of my pregnancy; I am mourning the absence of it. Now that we are settling into the rhythms of Janeas doctor visits and morning sickness and rising hormone levels, I am missing what never was.

As Jane moves from herself to herself pregnant, I am increasingly an outsider. This is not because Jane is actively trying to exclude me, nor is it because I donat want to be involved. The reality is that she is undergoing something intensely and profoundly visceral and I am watching. When Jane first realized she was pregnant, we began to refer to our little zygote as athe speck.a aYouare the speck jar,a I teased her, adding, aand Iam the spectator.a It struck me as funny at the time, but it just seems sad now. To some extent, the spectator is exactly what I am. I am involved, supportive, bossy, coaching, protective, but utterly outside.

Jane is becoming someone diae'erent from who she has always been. I am still myself, but wandering in new terrain. I feel a little ferocious about wanting to be part of this pregnancy, as though I am lashing myself to her leg in order to know what is going on, in order to feel some of what she feels. I donat want to let her go on without me. I donat want to be left behind.

I have my first baby dream. In it, Jane is pregnant, and so am I, and we are somehow carrying the same baby. Mine is a carbon copy of hers. We decide that I should have an abortion, so I go to the clinic, which is in a Target Superstore. I ask a clerk where the clinic is. She has no idea, but she directs me to a bank of escalators. I ride up and down, up and down, looking for it.

A few weeks later, we spend a Sat.u.r.day with our friends, Karen and very pregnant Carla, as well as their two-year-old daughter, Alice. We drive out to a lake west of Minneapolis, where Karen grew up. Karenas parents were on vacation and had asked Karen to be sure to pick green beans from the garden that sprawls across the backyard while they were away, lest any go to waste. Karen had confessed to me that they hadnat yet been out to the garden, but her parents were coming home in a few days and she didnat want there to be any rotten green beans hanging from the stalks. So we meet them at the house, Karen picks beans, and then we sit by the lake in plastic chairs, our feet in the water, while Alice splashes.

Alice didnat feel like wearing a swimsuit; because she is two her wish was granted and she is dressed only in a life preserver. She shows us how she can dog-paddle through the water and how she can blow bubbles. She shows us her sand pail and shovel and the little plastic chair that is just her size. She points out the weeds that grow in the lake. She demonstrates how to make birthday cake out of piles of wet sand and then leads us in singing aHappy Birthdaya to each person there. Twice. She fills her mouth with lake water and spouts it out. aAre you a fish?a Jane asks her. aNo,a she giggles. aIam Alice!a I find the day enormously consoling and Jane finds it equally unnerving. Jane is focused on Carla, who is due to deliver in about ten days. Carla is amazingly mobile, but still nine months pregnant, which appears to be something like carrying a television strapped to your torso everywhere you go. After a while, Carla goes into the house and changes into a bathing suit so that she can get in the water with Alice. In her suit, she is all stomach, her arms and legs sticking out from the sphere of her belly, like the round figures that children draw. Jane flinches when she sees her.

Meanwhile, I watch Karen. She is aMamaa to Carlaas aMom.a In some ways, she fills a sort of wifely role, arranging her work so that she can be at home part-time with Alice. In other ways, she is something of a dad, playing tickle monster with Alice on the living room floor. In yet other ways, she is just Mama, letting Alice pick out a jelly bean whenever she uses the big-girl toilet, watching over her in the water, making a snack.

Alice climbs on Karen as if she were a tree and on Carla, insofar as it is possible to climb on someone in her ninth month of pregnancy. She plays one oae' the other, to the extent that that is possible for a two-yearold who has a toddleras willfulness but hasnat yet figured out how to tell anything but the truth. She giggles into both of their faces and insists that Mom read her a book and then that Mama come say good night to Teddy Bear. And then that Mom bring her a gla.s.s of water and then that Mama kiss her one more time.

Watching them, I donat know if Karen is more mom than dad or vice versa. To Alice she is Mama, and thatas all that really matters. I can do this, I think, and in some respects, I prefer it to the stricter rules of the heteros.e.xual world. As obtuse and obscure as my role seems to me, I prefer it to what is all too often a straitjacket. I am glad not to have to worry about whether my spouse feels his virility threatened by providing childcare. I am glad not to have to feel like I am the de facto nurturer. I am glad not to have to carry the baggage of Motherhood all by myself, watching as my spouse hauls the yolk of Fatherhood all by himself. I like the idea that Jane and I can step back and forth over gender lines.

I think I can live in this new country, even if there arenat very many maps.

Trouble with Pink.

C. J. Ward.

Okay, okay, I admit it. I am allergic to pink. It isnat an aversion, it is an outright allergy. I see the color pink, my eyes water, my breathing changes, the room spins, and I am suddenly very weak in the knees. I have always hated pink. I see cutesy outfits made especially for little girls and I want to throw up, violently.

But guess what? We are having a little girl. Yep, it has been confirmed and reconfirmed by a sonogram. However, I think I knew a couple of months ago. How, you ask? It was simple. I walked into a store and started noticing the cute little pink outfits, made especially for little girls. At that precise moment I think I knew deep down, but sometimes denial is a great thing.

We should be having a boy. I know more about boys. I am more comfortable with the rough-and-tumble of little boys. I can drive a toy dump truck, for goodnessa sake. I like dirt, mud, and worms for fishing. I donat know anything about Barbie, except that her feet are always in a weird position and sometime during the last couple of years she broke up with Ken. She must not have wanted to go out on dates in high heels anymore. A girl should be able to wear flat shoes when she wants.

My heart beats excessively fast when I think about dresses. I can remember exactly three times in my life when I wore a dressa"my high school graduation, my college graduation, and infancy (I have a baby picture, in which I am in of all things a pink frilly dress). What will I do if that is all our daughter ever wants to wear? Do dresses come with application instructions for butches?

We have had names chosen for over a year. The name we reserved for a girl, Abigail, came from a dream I had before Melissa became pregnant.

In the dream, I am changing a baby girlas diaper. Melissa comes home from work while I am doing this. Suddenly, this five-month-old baby girl jumps up and starts running through the house, bare bottomed, yelling, aFly, fly, fly.a Her little baby arms are out at her sides like an airplane and she is running, jumping, and climbing all over the place. I am yelling, aAbigail, stop!a My wonderful, loving wife is yelling at me: aWhy didnat you tell me you taught her how to walk and talk?a I am trying to explain that I didnat, she has just done it for the first time.

I told Melissa about the dream and over time she fell in love with the name Abigail. I was never really set on using it, but now it fits. Our current dilemma is the spelling of its short form. I spell it aAbbiea and Melissa spells it aAbby.a I am sure Melissa will wina"when Abigail is old enough, she will tell me she is an Abby with a y, not an ie. Even in the uterus, our daughter has a mind of her own. After Melissa started being able to feel Abigail kick, I would put my hand on her stomach and Abigail would kick as hard as she could. If I gently tapped Melissaas stomach with the tips of my fingers, Abigail would answer the taps with the same number of kicks. I was thrilled, but Melissa was a bit freaked out. I expressed my joy to all our friends, and now Abigail refuses to kick my hand under any circ.u.mstances.

Already I am very possessive of this little baby named Abigail. I have the right to feel this way, because she is as much my baby as she is my partneras. I am not talking about the legal aspects. I know how much this baby is my own, thanks to a higher authority, one answering to the name of Reed. Reed is a five-year-old little girl who, along with her mother, sister, and baby brother recently stayed with us overnight during a road trip they were taking.

Before they arrived, I tried to think of ways to entertain them and to make them feel welcomed. This entailed creating little paper plates with animals printed on them and special pancakes shaped like shamrocks. I dug out leftover Halloween costumes and two colored travel pillows for them to play with and take home. All of these were great successes. My C. J. WARD 15.

only failures involved not having vanilla pudding and my inability to discuss the clothes and shoes on Melissaas antique dolls.

During their stay I was holding Ian, Reedas baby brother, when I asked Reed if she would trade me the pillows for Ian.

Reed became very animated and said, aNo, you already have a baby.a I laughed and said I didnat, that there was no baby present in the house, except for Ian.

Reed simply stated, aYes you do, it is in her belly,a and pointed to Melissa.

It struck me at that moment that if the world could just sit and listen to the wisdom of this five-year-old, who held no prejudices or preconceived notions about what makes a family, we could truly embrace the freedoms and liberties we so often speak of but seldom really practice.

My being Abigailas parent or her being my child was as natural to Reed as her having a daddy and mommy. How would I ever be able to argue with that logic? Why canat the rest of the world see it the same way?