Lgbtq Parenting

When your child reveals that he or she is attracted to the same sex, how you respond may have a lot to do with your faith. Doesn't the Bible say that's wrong? Will we have to leave our church? Worst of all, you may wonder, "Do I have to choose between my Christian faith and my child?" Susan Cottrell is a mom who has been there and wants you to know that loving and accepting your gay child does not mean abandoning or even compromising your faith.

Unconditional: A Guide to Loving and Supporting Your LGBTQ Child provides parents of a LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or questioning) child with a framework for helping their LGBTQ child navigate a world that isn't always welcoming.

In Baby Making for Everybody, queer millennial midwives Ray Rachlin and Marea Goodman use their professional expertise to demystify the dizzying process of pursuing parenthood as queer and solo people, offering detailed, gender-affirming, body-positive advice. The result is a much-needed compassionate step-by-step guide for every aspect of the complicated, messy, and glorious process of building a family.

Drawing on dozens of intimate audio interviews with families from all across the country, award-winning psychologist and writer Andrew Solomon redefines what it means to be an “ideal family” in America today. Solomon observes that America, led in large part by the women’s, civil rights, and gay rights movements, has undergone a radical social shift in the last few decades. Although the structure of family has changed, economic and legal structures lag behind and need to adapt to accommodate this explosive new reality.

In the face of so many injustices across society for LGBTQ+ people, it can be easy for parents of young children to feel helpless and hopeless. While they may not be able to address every problem across the country, there's a simple place to start: right at home. Rainbow Parenting is an indispensable stepping stone for adults who want to raise and teach kids in a queer and gender-affirming way, but might not know how.

The 21st century has seen very positive movement for LGBT+ rights. In the last few years, the overturning of DOMA, the SCOTUS ruling in favor of the Marriage Equality Act, American transgender politicians elected to office, and landmark moments such as Apple becoming the most valuable company in the world under the leadership of an openly gay CEO have advanced LGBT awareness and understanding. In a world full of LGBT questions, The ABC's of LGBT+ has the answers.

Greg and Lynn McDonald had never interacted with members of the LGBTQ community until they discovered their son was gay - and without resources or support, they had no idea how to handle this discovery. At first, they tried to “fix” him, to no avail. But even in the earliest days of their journey, the McDonalds clung to two absolutes: They would love God, and they would love their son. This audiobook follows the McDonald family’s journey over the next 20 years.

In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado's engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming. And it's that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope - the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman....

Kesa Sapiro had to grow up fast. With her parents gone and a little sister to protect, Kesa has spent over a decade of her life trying to keep a roof over their heads. She's learned the hard way that love is a luxury and that the price is way too high. When her sister Josie announces she wants to marry a boy she's known for less than a month, Kesa immediately forbids it. Shannon Dealan's floored when her son-by-choice says he wants to marry a girl he's just met. Shannon has real reason to scrutinize any strangers who come into Paz's life. She's not about to let him do anything stupid.

Gerrold, a science fiction writer from California, adopts a son who has a slight behavioral problem. He believes himself to be a Martian. Gerrold begins the long, involving work of trying to earn the acceptance of Dennis, a hyperactive eight-year-old who desperately wants a father's love, but is so insecure he feels he must be an alien. Gerrold's semi-autobiographical memoir of the first two years with Dennis is a funny, endearing, heartbreaking, and beautifully written testament to fatherhood.

n this unforgettable meet-cute, Samantha Allen traces her story of self-discovery during gender transition and the life-altering partnership that began with a simple hello in an elevator. Feeling “unfinished” at the liminal age of twenty-six, the author had already accumulated decades of emotional baggage growing up in a Mormon family and living with gender dysphoria. When she met Corey midtransition, she felt even more like an awkward shape-shifter. Now Samantha shares how taking a chance on that fortuitous encounter meant having the courage to be herself.

Jenn Berney was one of those people who knew she was destined for motherhood - it wasn't a question of if, but when. So when she and her wife, Kelly, decided to start building their family, they took the next logical step: They went to a fertility clinic. But they soon found themselves entrenched in a medical establishment that didn't know what to do with people like them. With no man factoring into their relationship, doctors were at best embarrassed and at worst disparaging of the couple. Soon Jenn found herself stepping outside of the system determined to disregard her. 

The Savvy Ally: A Guide for Becoming a Skilled LGBTQ+ Advocate is an enjoyable, humorous, encouraging, easy-to-understand guidebook for being an ally to the LGBTQ+ communities. It is chock-full of practical and useful tools for LGBTQ+ advocacy, including: current and relevant information on identities and LGBTQ+ language; tips for what to say and what not to say when someone comes out to you; LGBTQ+ etiquette and techniques for respectful conversations; common bloopers to avoid; and more.

When George Hodgman leaves Manhattan for his hometown of Paris, Missouri, he finds himself - an unlikely caretaker and near-lethal cook - in a head-on collision with his aging mother, Betty, a woman of wit and will. Will George lure her into assisted living? When hell freezes over. He can't bring himself to force her from the home both treasure - the place where his father's voice lingers, the scene of shared jokes, skirmishes, and, behind the dusty antiques, a rarely acknowledged conflict...

Laurie and Matt Krieg are in a mixed-orientation marriage: a marriage in which at least one partner's primary attraction isn't toward the gender of their spouse. In the Kriegs' case, Laurie is primarily attracted to women - and so is Matt. Some find the idea of mixed-orientation marriage bewildering or even offensive. But as the Kriegs have learned, nothing is impossible with God - and that's as true of their marriage as anyone else's. In An Impossible Marriage, the Kriegs tell their story.

In her groundbreaking first book, Gender Born, Gender Made, Dr. Diane Ehrensaft coined the term gender creative to describe children whose unique gender expression or sense of identity is not defined by a checkbox on their birth certificate. Now, with The Gender Creative Child, she returns to guide parents and professionals through the rapidly changing cultural, medical, and legal landscape of gender and identity.

Dan Savage’s mother wants him to get married. His boyfriend, Terry, says “no thanks” because he doesn’t want to act like a straight person. Their six-year-old son, D.J., says his two dads aren’t “allowed” to get married but that he’d like to come to the reception and eat cake. Throw into the mix Dan’s straight siblings, whose varied choices form a microcosm of how Americans are approaching marriage these days, and you get a rollicking family memoir that will have everyone - gay or straight, right or left, single or married - howling with laughter.

When Desert of the Heart opens, Evelyn Hall is on a plane that will take her from her old life in Oakland, California, to Reno, where she plans to divorce her husband of 16 years. A voluntary exile in a brave new world, she meets a woman who will change her life. Fifteen years younger, Ann Childs works as a change apron in a casino. Evelyn is instantly drawn to the fiercely independent Ann, and their friendship soon evolves into a romantic relationship. An English professor who had always led a conventional life, Evelyn suddenly finds all her beliefs about love, morality, and identity called into question.

No matter who we are or where we come from, we all play on the same playground. There are certain collective societal messages we hear growing up that we either consciously or subconsciously believe. As a result, we develop certain belief systems from which we operate our lives. Chris Tompkins’ Raising LGBTQ Allies sheds light on the deeper, multi-faceted layers of homophobia. It opens up a conversation with parents around the possibility they may have an LGBTQ child and shows how heteronormativity can be harmful if not addressed clearly and early.

Your child has identified as nonbinary, and many parents won’t have had the first clue what was coming. You probably don’t know what to think or what to feel. You don’t know how to act, what you are supposed to do, or how to give your child the support they need. That’s why I wrote this guide for parents, a guide that you can refer to at any point during your journey when you are uncertain of what to do, how to feel, or when you just want to understand how someone else managed the situation.