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Wanted: Teens with LGBT Parents
Posting another academic study request, this time for research on teens with LGB parents. This one has a personal tone for me, not because I have teens (my son is six), but because I’ve interviewed the lead researcher, Abbie Goldberg, about her latest book on LGBT parents and on some earlier research about lesbian and [...]
Teen Sexuality: Hard Truths and Warm Love
I’m very pleased today to bring you a guest post by Lori Hahn, who has blogged at Hahn at Home for several years, and is now also a co-editor of the new GLBT blog Our Big Gayborhood. Lori writes below of teen sexuality—an area in which I have no expertise as a parent. I’m grateful [...]
World AIDS Day
Today is World AIDS Day. AIDS has impacted many people we know and many communities of which we are part. Since this is a parenting blog, however, I want to do what I have done in previous years, and highlight some recent statistics about AIDS and children. The numbers, of course, don’t capture the personal [...]
Dr. Susan Love Recruits a Gay and Trans Army Against Breast Cancer
October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. I haven’t posted much about it because I tend to take a skeptical view of the pink bandwagon that gets rolling this time of year. Nothing wrong with raising awareness and money, but some breast cancer survivors feel companies are trying to exploit them and pretty up what is [...]
Free New York Workshops for LGBTQ Parents
I’m judicious in my posting of press releases, especially about purely local events (otherwise, I’d do nothing but post press releases), but this one is in a major city and runs for several months, so I’m passing it along. I know nothing about the organization or their programs, but they have a good group of [...]
New Books Showcase Stories of LGBTQ Youth
(I’ve been meaning to write about these books for a while, and back-to-school time is giving me the motivation I need.) Ongoing incidents of students (and teachers!) harassing LGBTQ students, students perceived to be LGBTQ, and children of LGBTQ parents are one of the scariest and most frustrating things for me as a parent. I [...]
Organizing for Safe Schools in Minnesota
I posted a blurb in my last LGBT Parenting Roundup about the Anoka-Hennepin School District in Minnesota, which agreed to pay a $25,000 settlement to the family of a high school junior after two teachers harassed the boy in the classroom about his perceived sexual orientation. I received the e-mail below from a local mother [...]
How Do I Talk to My Kids About Safe Sex?
[Editor's Note: A reader left a comment on a post I wrote last fall about LGBT resources for teens. She wanted to know about safe-sex resources for her bi daughter. Blogger Serena Freewomyn, who has been a youth counselor and founded the Feminists for Choice site was kind enough to write a whole guest post [...]
(Originally published, with slight variation, as my Mombian newspaper column.) “I felt that teenagers in particular were really affected by anti-gay prejudice,” said Academy Award-winning filmmaker Debra Chasnoff, “but so much of the conversation that’s been had to date about that prejudice has been solely focused on how homophobia affects youth who are self-identified as [...]
Kids of Lesbians Less Likely to Have Mental Illness
Children with lesbian mothers have a lower risk of developing mental illnesses than those growing up with a father and a mother, according to a new University of Copenhagen study. The researchers found that during a 16-year period, five percent of children from traditional families in the study developed conditions such as depression or anorexia, [...]
How to Help Kids Cope with Prop 8
I’ve written ad infinitum about the impact on children of Prop 8 and other anti-LGBT measures. SFGate’s “City Brights” writer and internist physican Doc Gurley, however, offers some practical advice on how to help your children cope with the emotions they may be feeling as a result of the ruling. Here’s a summary of her [...]
GOOD Decision Out of California On Tuesday
No, I’m not talking about Prop 8. I’m talking about the decision by the Alameda school board to adopt an LGBT-inclusive safe schools curriculum. I wrote last week about the brewing controversy in Alameda, so I’ll refer you to that post for the details. Here’s the short version: Supporters of the measure wanted to curb [...]
How Motherhood Earned Me a Free Sex Toy
[While I'm taking a bit of a break this week, please enjoy this guest post by Paige Schilt. Paige is a dyke mama, an activist, a low-femme nerd, and a part-time professor of Feminist Studies. She is also a contributing writer at The Bilerico Project. —DR] When I was pregnant with my son, I heard [...]
Utah Mandates All Children to Be Raised by LGBT People
In a special session of the Utah Legislature, lawmakers of both houses approved a bill that would require all children born in the state to be raised by LGBT people. A delegation rushed the bill to the governor’s desk, where he signed it immediately. “When you look at all the cases of child abuse in [...]
Dr. Susan Love Recruiting an Army of Women
It’s LGBT Health Awareness Week. I therefore thought I’d post a piece I wrote with slight variation for Bay Windows as advance coverage for Dr. Susan Love’s appearance at Fenway Health here in Boston this coming weekend. Dr. Love is an eminent breast cancer surgeon. Some of you may remember her from her guest appearance [...]
Songs for Cold Season from Erin Lee and Marci
Children’s musicians Erin Lee and Marci bring us the next of their regular posts with thematic recommendations for kid-friendly music, plus activities to make the songs an interactive experience for the whole family. Look for Erin Lee and Marci here on the first Monday of each month, or visit their homepage, www.gottaplay.org. I’ve created links [...]
New Bush Regs Could Limit Health and Reproductive Services for Lesbians and Other LGBT People
The Bush administration today issued a new rule that allows federal health officials to cut off federal funding for any state or local government, hospital, clinic, health plan, doctors’ office or other entity if they do not allow employees to exercise their “right of conscience.” This means employees can refuse to help provide services that [...]
World AIDS Day
Today is World AIDS Day. AIDS has impacted many people we know and communities of which we are part. Since this is a parenting blog, however, I thought I would highlight some recent statistics about AIDS and children. The numbers, of course, don’t capture the personal stories, the parents who must watch their children die, [...]
Mmm, Chocolate Milk
Another “we could have guessed that” scientific study: Scientists in Denmark have found that the foods a nursing mom eats can flavor her breast milk. As far as I can remember, though, all of the nursing moms I know were told by their doctors to watch what they eat when nursing, just in case certain [...]
Is Wal-Mart the New FDA?
Is the mega-retailer playing doctor with all of us? Bil Browning of Bilerico fowarded me an interesting article from Forbes that asks this question in relation to Wal-Mart’s announcement that it will stop selling baby bottles containing the chemical bisphenol-A (BPA). BPA has been linked in some studies to cancer and other medical problems. If [...]
