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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 [...]
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(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 [...]
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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, [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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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, [...]
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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 [...]
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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 [...]
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FroYo the Way to Go for IVF, Study Claims
Helen and I used in vitro fertilization (IVF) to conceive our son. We did not, alas, have enough extra embryos after implantation to freeze any for later use. (We did, however, use a tried and true frozen sperm “pop-sicle.”) I was still interested, however, in a new study from Copenhagen University Hospital, which reports the [...]
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Author Seeks Couples for Sex Guide
(Oh, the search engines are going to have fun with this post. . . .) Passing along this information; I’m not associated with the project, but I thought it might be of interest to some: An invitation from Felice Newman, author of The Whole Lesbian Sex Book: Lesbian, Bisexual & Queer Women Couples: Have you [...]
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Saving the Earth: A Lesson Gone Too Far
It’s Earth Day. My son’s preschool had a series of related activities and discussions all last week, and he’s had the Earth on his mind. After going through several pieces of toilet paper during a pit stop the other day, he held up the final one and asked “Mommy, if it’s clean, can I leave [...]
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Cynthia Nixon, best known for her role in Sex and the City (less known for her inclusion in Mombian’s “Most Powerful Lesbian Moms” list), has become an ambassador for breast-cancer organization Susan G. Komen for the Cure. Nixon is a breast-cancer survivor herself, and the daughter of a two-time survivor. She spoke with Good Morning [...]
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Working It Out
This week’s poll is in honor of season three of Work Out, which provides just enough women’s-sports coverage (and lesbian visibility) to get us through the gap between the end of March Madness and the start of the WNBA season. (Then it’s on to Wimbledon, the Olympics, and the U.S. Open here in the Mombian [...]
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La Leche Leaves Out Lesbians
I’m all for breastfeeding. My partner breastfed our son. While its health benefits may still be argued by some, I take the general approach that natural is usually best. At the same time, I fiercely defend a woman’s right to make the decision about whether to breastfeed and for how long. The question has too [...]
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Cold Spell
We’ve been beset with colds here at the House of Mombian, thanks to the petri dish that is our son’s preschool class. Whenever he comes home with a sniffle, I start popping the vitamin C in the vain hope it will slow the oncoming train bearing down on my sinuses. Enough strained metaphors; it’s time [...]
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