the three whys.

i figured there would be some questions to answer at the beginning of the blog, so here goes...

1.) why in the heck are you thinking about having a baby?? you're too young/single/lesbian/living a sinful lifestyle/against God's plan/etc!

contrary to the beliefs of some, i'm no longer young nor single (i don't give a rip if the government doesn't acknowledge it). as to whether or not i'm living a sinful lifestyle, go back and read the comment wars in my lj. we could debate about whether or not lesbians can have babies, but i'll cut that debate short: they have. and are.

i think there's probably one or two of you reading this who AREN'T antagonistic towards me (gracias), and for those folks, here's the rel conversation on this topic.

isn't it weird? just the concept, producing and then being responsible for another human being? it's a HUGE deal, which is why i was ambivalent about it for a long time. since making a permanent committment to esther, i've known that she is totally unambivalent about it. she wants babies, end of story. at times i felt wary about that--do i want them as much as she does? is it a bad thing if the answer is no? what harm will it do my eventual kids if i have them less than enthusiastically?

but over time, my personal emotional reaction to this idea just...shifted. like so many things. i was talking to a friend online last week (i'll call her znai, because i do. call her znai.) i mentioned that i was reading baby name lists on the internet (and by the way, it turns out i'm totally old-fashioned in my taste in names, but i'll hold back on that post until i feel that i've earned it a bit more) and she asked me when the heck i had gotten so serious about this whole thing. she knew we were thinking about it, someday, but when did it become concrete? and the real answer to that question was, just, i just knew. i just suddenly felt more sure about the whole thing. and there you have it.

it's an awful lot like back in 2001, when i was trying to decide if i was going to become a campus pastor. i was worrying over the decision for quite a while, fretting, making lists, praying feverishly, etc. then i went on a missions trip to russia for the summer, during which one of my stated goals was to pray for an answer to that question. well, i completely forgot to focus on it at all during the summer, and on the last day, i realized i already knew. i wasn't worrying about it anymore; i had peace.

i'm sure i can find other things to worry about now :)

and...as to whether or not it's against God's plan. i'm not going to lie; i've struggled with this one. clearly, we are going to have to enlist professional help in this endeavor--and what does that mean? but here's what occurred to me the other day while i was showering. certain folks may think us trying to have a baby is like bucking God's plan--He said "man+woman" and we ignore Him and do what we want. i can see how you might think that. but in the end, we're not disagreeing with God's plan at all--we're totally affirming it! we think life and conception and the miracle of gestation are totally awesome things. we're not against the equation of sperm+egg, we just personally don't have any sperm, so we need to get some. that's really all it is.

think about this--a heart transplant patient. one of the wonders of modern science. but in no point in his or her medical journeys was there a redefinition of blood or vein or muscle or beat. the patient totally adores and affirms these things. just because they were willing and eager to use medicine and technology and financial resources to do so doesn't mean they are denying the original concept.

the heart transplant patient needs help to get access to a new heart; i need help to get access to sperm. neither one of us wishes hearts and sperm would just go away. seems simple to me :)

or you could just go with esther's far simpler answer to the question of why it's ok for us to consider in vitro: "Jesus was conceived by IVF, wasn't he?"

2.) the heck are you writing a blog for? you're not so smart!

you are totally right. i am completely not smart about this, not at all. but the other day, when i went searching for resources and found almost nothing, i was crushed. then i posted a plea for help on a livejournal community for lesbians, and within hours got all sorts of useful links to blogs and communities and webpages and book recommendations. i get all veklempt about community in general, and it was a very happy thing to realize that there IS a community of people engaged in exactly the same process. so, maybe i can somehow be a part of that. and maybe, just maybe, i can offer a unique perspective on a couple of points. trying to do this overseas, eventual immigration issues (since i am an american citizen and my wife will just get turned away at the door), etc. we shall see.

3.) why does it have such a weird name?

i work as an administrative assistant at a translation company. i like it. anyhow, my desk is right next to the two in-house translators, and the other day, one of them was working on the subtitles for an educational film about gestation (totally a sign :). in the english, one of the labels said "the early embyro," and she enlisted my help to try and figure out the best translation for this into spanish. the upshot is that we found that the word "precoz" is often used in spanish medical documents to refer to this beginning stage of the embryo...not exactly the same meaning of "precocious" in english, which i tend to associate with 6-year-old classical violinists and the like, but simply meaning "in the opening stages." which my new family is. and it's awesome.