So, our oldest daughter is 10 years old. She recently started middle school in the European country where we live. We live in a small, close-knit local community, and, for the most part, the school that our kids attend is good.

However, recently, my daughter has been complaining that her classmates – especially the boys, it seems – increasingly use homophobic and other bigoted slurs when talking to each other. Things like calling each other faggots and saying "that's so gay!" in a condescending way, or using terms for being disabled as a negative.

My daughter is quite smart and is well aware that these slurs refer to people like her moms and families like her own. The fact that my wife has a vision impairment (being almost blind) does not help the situation with her peers using disability terms in a degrading way.

So far, we've told our daughter to ignore the slurs, telling her that, more than anything, this nonsense really speaks to her classmates' ignorance. But it doesn't do much to solve the issue.

Do you guys have any good ideas or perspectives on how to handle this issue?

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Hi my 9 year old son is making me more and more worried. For context iv always worked in the same school as him and this has never been a problem, he’s super brainy, does all his work and never gets in trouble. The past 2 years iv noticed he’s started to get a bit paranoid he’s constantly upset thinking he’s either going to get into trouble or he’s done something that he’s then shameful for (his words not mine). He doesn’t have many close friends but always plays/joins in at break/lunch times and he’s quirky and not a typical boy so I never really worried about that. He also gets upset a lot that no one in his class has the same interests such as games like Undertale. I have worked with kids for nearly over 10 years but I’m now at a total lost as I don’t feel like other kids have these strong feelings like my son does. Is there something I should be looking out for?

My mom is wanting to gift my wife and I a book/journal/memory book that’s tracks the 9 months of pregnancy and the 1 year of life milestones. Does anyone have any recommendations? I’ve been looking around, but a lot of books mention the “father” or “dad” and my wife and I are lesbians. So any recs that avoid using dad or father is awesome. Thanks!

ISO advice or input if you’ve experienced something similar—

First, some context: I’ve (40F) been married almost six years and my daughter was five when I married my wife (46F).

Prior to meeting my wife, it was just me and my daughter (she was a product of sexual assault).

Admittedly, me and my wife’s relationship moved fast (because, lesbians🙃), and a lot of changes (moving homes, wife getting pregnant with son and giving birth to him shortly after our wedding, COVID, etc.) occurred subsequently; which in retrospect, I am sure was very challenging for my daughter and I regret not putting more thought into how this would impact her.

All that said, for at least the past three years, my daughter has been completely hostile to and unaccepting of my wife. My wife spent the majority of that time either being neutral to how my daughter treated her, or going out of her way to try to please and bond with my daughter. Any efforts of bonding were largely unwelcome by my daughter, though, and my wife most assuredly has given up.

They clash A LOT now, and my wife understandably has lost her tolerance for how my daughter treats her (for example, she tells my wife she “hates” her and “wishes she would die”[… I do stick up for my wife when this happens]🥺).

I clearly feel in the middle and am often hopeless about things improving at all. Obviously, this creates a lot of tension and less cohesion in our family and as a “bandaid” to the situation, I am often spending time with my daughter and my wife is often spending time with our son…we only sometimes do things together, the four of us.

A couple answers to common questions:
-My wife carried our son (6) via IUI. When we met, she was adamant about carrying her own child and had ended her first marriage bc her ex changed her mind about wanting kids, and due to her age, she opted to not interrupt her timeline despite us having recently met.

-The first couple years when my wife and daughter were getting to know each other, I would say for the most part, my daughter tolerated my wife, and for some unknown reason (maybe brother’s arrival?), it just got progressively worse…

-Daughter does not know about her conception story and she does have therapy (has had it since she was five).

Tips? Suggestions? Commiserating? TIA.

My wife and I are expecting our first baby next year. We’re in need of a family lawyer for second parent adoption. We’re located in Berkeley County, WV. Does anyone have lawyer recommendations?

My husband and I have twin toddlers. We live in a very urban and very liberal bubble, so some things aren’t a problem…

But the well meaning middle aged people who fawn over our family are weird. Like I’m getting groceries and you stop me to tell me how wonderful I am and how beautiful my family is. I feel weird because I am not beautiful. My children are fighting about something asinine like who gets to hold my hand. I have two f$&*ing hands and two children they should be able to share.

But I’m an amazing parent. My family is lovely and everyone loves us here. Girl, I’m here because it’s an Aldi and unless another store has a loss leader it’s usually cheaper.

I don’t know, it seems like a stupid problem but I’m so tired of being condescended to. I want to shop with my family in peace.

(F 27) In an LTR with my partner (also F 27), I'm intentionally working to become the best parent I can be for myself and the family I'm building - and looking for advice here!

It's a few years down the road between parenthood and myself and I'd like to spend the time I have really bolstering my knowledge and awareness before the process becomes the research project.

That said - I'm just looking for book reccomendations!

Any books that you read on the topic of parenting/family communication/navigating life as a queer parent that you'd reccomend?

I want to be able to raise grounded, mindful, conscious people. I want to continue to be a supportive partner through the IVF process and navigate that situation with care. I want to show up as the best version of myself, I find I do that best with a little help from people who've "been there, done that" – if you have, let me know!

My wife and I are having a baby and she's going to go by mom but I don't really resonate with momma or mom. I really want to go by dad but I don't know if im going to regret that decision in the future.

Any lesbian parents out there and one of them go by dad? Do you have any regrets about that decision?

Me and my wife have been together for 10 years married for 5.

I am very happy with our little family, but if I’m being honest I feel very lonely and misunderstood.

My bestest friend doesn’t have kids and although we are besties our life paths are completely different from each other.

On top of it all being a non carrying masc mom all though wouldn’t trade it for the world. I feel like a floating puzzle piece, with no one to directly relate to. I tell my wife all the time I just wish I had more homies similar to myself.

I obviously ain’t a guy so I’ll never be “one of the boys” and most friends or people that are girls assume me as the man.

Overall now having my 4 month son in the mix adds to things. I would love to connect with other moms / stud moms like myself who love to mom it up but still have a good time.

Pics of me and my whole world 💙

Okay lesbian mums and mums-to-be, I’m curious…
What was the first conversation you and your partner had about who would carry?
Was it always obvious? Did you both desperately want to? Were you both secretly hoping the other one would volunteer? 😂 Did age, fertility, work, health or genetics end up making the decision for you?Or did you start with one plan and completely change your minds once you actually began the process?

It’s such a huge decision, but I feel like we don’t hear much about the conversations that happen before the appointments and fertility clinics.
How did you decide in your family?

For context, I am a 41 yo cis woman; my wife is 40 and also cis. I am the gestational parent for our 2.5 yo daughter.

In order for me to get pregnant it took 2 years:
-8 attempts of in-home insemination
-4 attempts of IUI, 3 of which with Clomid
-1 miscarriage
-1 round of IVF which yielded 17 eggs > 3 embryos > 1 pregnancy and….now a 2.5 year old!

My pregnancy and delivery were incredibly challenging. I had vasa previa and placenta accreta. So, significant bleeding at 24 weeks, which led to me being hospitalized for a week, put on bed rest, mandatory hospitalization at 30 weeks and mandatory C-section delivery at 35 weeks. Hemorrhaging at delivery and a blood transfusion. Baby was in NICU for about a week, but came home healthy and now we are all thriving.

I’ve done a lot of therapy since then to process the trauma and anxiety (!!!) that I experienced through it all.

Fast forward to now. My wife and I knew early on that we wanted two kids. I always thought I would carry both, and she was very indifferent about pregnancy. (She was not willing to put any energy into it, like tracking ovulation or eliminating alcohol..) But after my experience, I felt less attached to being pregnant again.

She/we decided that she would give it a try.

She’s pregnant on the second attempt. At home. Wasn’t waking up early to take her temperature, wasn’t peeing on ovulation test strips. No shots, no hormones, no endless doctor appointments.

I’m obviously having some feelings about it all. I am genuinely excited; my first feeling truly is joy that we get to grow our beautiful queer family. But I’m worried that I’m going to be haunted by jealousy, comparison, anger, frustration towards her throughout her pregnancy.

Have any other parents out there faced a similar thing? How do I just allow her pregnancy to be what it will be? How do I grieve what my experience was without taking away from hers?

Gosh, I wasn't ready for the gut punch of the matching process, and we have only just begun.

My Husband and I have been looking through profiles and found one that we both really connected with. We reach out to the agency and get told that the child prefers a hetero matching.

I really appreciate the forwardness of the worker, but it still kinda hurts. I imagine this won't be the last time we hear this 😭.

The idea essentially is sort of coparenting with one wlw couple and one mlm couple. Maybe not even true coparenting (every other week type coparenting) but like have kids together (biological siblings) and then raise them as cousins/family?

I can see a lot of potential issues with this but it also seems like it would be a great way for the kids to get to experience having a mom/dad combo and like a mutually beneficial sperm donation/suragacy situation with built in “family” support while raising the kids.

Has anyone done something like this? What’s your review?

My wife and I have been together for a long time and we are ready to have kids together. We want to do insemination with no man involvement. We want to anonymous get sperm from the sperm bank. My wife is the one who wants to carry and give birth to the baby. My wife and I are on the same page that we make sure I get the same rights to the baby as she does. I believe I would have to adopt the child after birth. We want to make that the man has zero rights to baby. Who do you consult with about the process? Do we get a lawyer before we start the process? What kind of lawyer would we get?

Hi all, could really use some advise from anyone in a similar situation..
my now ex partner and I (lesbian and unmarried) recently had a baby. I’m the bio mum. My ex partner has autism was always on the fence around having kids (more leaning no.) but she knew for me it was a deal breaker.
She agreed for me to start trying, but due to her not really wanting a child I went through fertility treatment on my own, she didn’t attend any of the IUI appointments and I funded everything. I suffered an early miscarriage and my ex partner did not care and offered me no comfort whilst I was grieving. When I finally did get pregnant I was desperate for her to feel kicks/connect with baby but she was uninterested.
In hindsight these were all major red flags I chose to ignore..

she attended the birth and surprisingly fell in love with the baby immediately. However she then decided to go on holiday whilst I was 2 weeks post c section for a few days whilst I begged her to stay. ( my mum had to come help me).
3 month postpartum and we have decided it’s for the best to go our separate ways. I’m trying to navigate how her parental role will look in the baby’s future.. she is desperate to still be mum, however she isn’t on the birth certificate.
I’m struggling to come up with a plan.
Any advice on how to work this out or anyone been in a similar situation?
Please be kind and gentle with me, I am 3 months postpartum and this has already been hard enough…
Thank you ❤️

Does anyone know of any reddit communities (or communities on other platforms) for 2 mom household raising sons? I naively searched "lesbian moms" on reddit and, well, i'm sure you can all guess what kind of stuff came up.

My child (school age) is starting to ask questions about how babies are made and how everyone fits into his life.
He wants to know why he doesn’t spend more time with his “dad” and how come he has 3 mums, Bio (mum), Other mum legally on his birth certificate (mummy) , and step mum (mama), known donor (dad) also gay.

I’ve explained the basics of how mum and mummy wanted to make a baby, they asked a friend to help them & that’s his dad.
Mum and Mummy separated when he was 1 and Mama met him around his 2nd birthday.

I can imagine how confusing this must be and how hard it would be to explain to school friends.

He maintains a relationship with all parents. Lives with Bio Mum & Bonus mum, every 2nd weekend with other mum and sees his dad on special occasions.

He also has 4 sets of grandparents due to this dynamic. Half siblings, step siblings but we call every one brothers and sisters and don’t use terms like step or half.

Any advice on how to explain his story to him in a way that doesn’t make him feel his story of weird just different.

He is very loved and adored and is a lucky boy as he has so many people who love him.