When people wonder how to explain LGBTQ families to their children, it’s really as simple as this: We love each other.
Love makes a family, the saying goes—but love alone isn’t enough. For LGBTQ parents and our children, making a family may also involve an excess of paperwork; assistance from medical, legal, and social service professionals; and logistics that would put a military division to shame. Yet love is the binding force among these components, the magic that makes them all worthwhile even as we work to eliminate the inequities we find.
Love, for an LGBTQ family, also means standing up for our families when others tell us we shouldn’t exist; writing ourselves onto forms that ignore or mislabel us; and also, sometimes unfortunately hiding who we are so we can retain the jobs that support our families.
Love means seeking out books, songs, and shows that reflect our families and writing them into existence when they do not. Love means supporting our children in telling their stories about our families in their own time and their own way.
As for any family, too, love is the thousand little things we do to put dinner on the table, make sure the laundry is clean, and teeth get brushed. It’s soothing skinned knees and broken hearts, and watching with pride as our children learn and grow.
Love makes a family, but love also sustains it. Wishing you and your families much love on this day and every other.