To give a brief summary, Lesbian Bed Death Explained talks about how during sex and orgasm the brain produces oxytocin and dopamine. The two neurochemicals interact to create the feeling of love, which helps bond the partners. Estrogen seems to enhance the effects of oxytocin, which can be felt for days after, while testosterone seems to diminish the effects. It speculates that we, lesbians, are constantly breathing in each others pheromones and swapping neurochemicals for an extra dose of estrogen and oxytocin every time we hug or kiss or touch, which reinforces the bonded feeling leaving us with out the strong need or desire for sex because the neurochemical pathways are already buzzing. The end of the post suggests the antidote for oxytocin is adrenaline. So if you're in a rut and you need a little jump start, do something that will give you an adrenaline rush.

I am always fascinated by articles about lesbian bed death (LBD), why it happens and how to avoid it. I dont' know why either. I guess the concept of not having sex with the person you love is so, I don't even know the right word for it, strange, foreign, ridiculous, that I have to try to understand why a couple would live like that. And you don't have to wait too long to see an article about LBD in any lesbian publication. While I think the post, Lesbian Bed Death Explained, offers an excellent explanation that makes me think, "yeah, that makes perfect sense," I refuse that believe that LBD is real, or maybe I should say inevitable and/or exclusive to lesbians. I find this particular explanation interesting because when I think of the couples we know, Betty Please and I are probably a lot more bonded than most, and the oxytocin explanation sounds like good reasoning for this.

While I have known a few couples to suffer from bed death, their ultimate problem was that they were not right for each other and they should have split up years before. In the end they did break up. I think, it's probably not uncommon for the sex to disappear a bad relationship, but why in a good one. So why has this term, lesbian bed death, inserted itself into our vernacular, become that butt of our jokes, and brought with it a fear of what "inevitably" lies ahead in a long term relationship.  I don't buy it, and I'm not alone. Deb of Let Me Go On and On writes about LBD and cheating in her post My Short Lived Resignation.

I recently came across an article in this month's addition of Curve Magazine about LBD (Lesbian Bed Death). This upsets me a great deal because they focus on LESBIAN bed death. I mean, I know many heterosexuals that are chewing on ice and waking up with morning wood. Why are we just focused on the lesbian community not getting some in the bedroom? Can't we safely say that all of us are at risk for BD (bed death), gay or straight? Baffles me. We've pigeonholed ourselves into this category of sexually deprived lesbian women.

I do believe it is natural and normal for sex in a relationship to die down a bit after a few years. Geeze, if it didn't no one would ever get anything done. After a few years of "bonding", a couple should be pretty secure in the relationship and shouldn't need constant reassurance, but maybe a little reminder once or twice a week. I think it's very easy for us all, not just lesbians, to get caught up in our busy lives and I think, no scratch that, I know, a lot of people put their sex lives at the bottom, or close to it, on their list of priorities. And that's not even with kids thrown into the mix. Add kids and now you're operating at a whole new level of hecticness and exhaustion.

Melissa Doak, a columnist at The Imperfect Parent writes about how kids affect her sex life in her post Not Your Average Fairy Tale, In Search of Romance.

I've spent some serious money on avoiding lesbian bed death in the last six years, and all of it has had to do with removing the kids from the scene. (Okay, well, most of it... I did drop some dough at that store in San Francisco....) It's no accident that in our family budget breakdown, I'm responsible for the vacations. First there are the hotel rooms. They run $150 to $300 a pop. Because God knows there is nothing sexy about a Super 8. And usually we need more than a night at one of these swanky establishments -- it takes us a couple of days to forget we're parents... oops, remember we're lovers... before we can get in the mood.

Reading things like that makes me worry about my relationship as we are getting ready to start trying to conceive. I know kids will change us in ways we can't imagine, but I hope we don't lose us and that we will still prioritize time to enjoy each other.

Certain Magician, who blogs at Superstitious Magic, suggests that there are reasons for bed death specific to lesbians in her post Death to Lesbian Bed Death.

Another reason for the speedy demise of romance among lesbians, may be their penchant for collecting cats. The bed becomes laden with cats (dogs, ferrets, parakeets, peeves and resentments), making sex close to impossible without disturbing something.

OK, so I threw that one in for fun, but I am all too familiar with animals wanting to be on the bed. I'll be the first to admit, it's just plain creepy. And it does take a certain level of concentration to be able to ignore a cat who desperately wants your attention, or a dog who wants to curl up next to you and rest their chin on your hip at the most inopportune time. But we never let that stop us. And let's just say, I have friends, straight friends, who suffer from this same problem with their animals, so this is not specific to lesbians.

Perhaps I am wrong, and lesbian bed death does really exist, specific to us. The magazines and television shows would have you think so. But I don't think it does.  What do think? Is it real?

Also check out:
Cherry Bomb: Episode 1 "Commitment Issues" at AfterEllen
Sugarbutch's Second Aniversery, at Sugarbutch Chronicles(probably not safe for work)
The Big Lie: Lesbian Bed Death, by Suzanne Iasenza, Ph.D. at Fridae

Can you imagine if you had that one person, but they were the one person you could not marry? Can you imagine if your love for that one person could be equated with mental illness? Can you imagine if you were, or could be, discriminated against for loving that one person? Can you imagine if you had worry that someone might act out against you in a violent way just for being with the person you love? What would you do if it were you? Would you sit back and accept it, or would you fight for change? Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin decided to lead the fight for change.

Phyllis and Del met and became friends in Seattle, 1949. They fell in love and began a romantic relationship in 1952. In 1953 they moved to San Fransisco and bought a home. In 1955, while seeking larger lesbian social group, Phyllis, Del and few friends started a lesbian organization called Daughters of Bilitis. Though beginning as a social group, Daughters of Bilitis (DOB) quickly became more of a political organization. Del became the DOB's president and Phyllis took on as editor of the their monthly magazine, The Ladder. They used much of their time and money to run DOB and The Ladder. By 1958 chapters of DOB began opening up in larger cities across the country. By the late 1960's the organization had grown, the focus of DOB began to shift away from Phyllis and Del's vision. The leadership changed, pushing Del and Phyllis out of the organization they started which ultimately lead to the collapse of DOB.

During the 1960's and early 1970's, Del and Phyllis also became active in San Francisco politics. As part of this work, they worked to end police harassment at gay bars. They helped to form the Alice B Toklas Memorial Democratic Club, which worked to help get lesbians elected to public office. They have both served on city commissions and task forces. They were also instrumental in getting the National Organization for Women to pass a resolution affirming that the oppression of lesbians is a feminist concern, and Del was the first out lesbian elected to NOW.

In 1972 Del and Phyllis published their book Lesbian/Woman. Their book Lesbian Love and Liberation was published in 1973. In 1976 Del published one of the earliest books on domestic violence, Battered Wives. In 1979 an affordable women's health clinic was opened in their names, Lyon-Martin Health Services, in San Fransisco.

On February 12, 2004, following Mayor Gavin Newsom's directive to grant marriage license to same-sex couples, Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon were married by the San Francisco City Assessor. A photograph of their embrace at the ceremony catapulted them to national attention and changed the face of gay marriage for much of America. Sadly, their marriage was soon nullified by the Supreme Court of California on the grounds Mayor Newsom did not have the authority to issue the marriage licenses. Phyllis and Del then joined the law suit to challenge the constitutionality of the California law to limit marriage to opposite-sex couples. On May 15, 2008 they were victorious, the California Supreme court ruled it unconstitutional to ban same-sex marriage.

On June 16, 2008, at 5:01 pm, Mayor Gavin Newsom married Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon in a private ceremony. It fills my heart with great joy that these two women, who have spent their entire lives leading a tireless fight for fairness and equality, can finally stand up in front of friends, family and community and have their relationship looked upon with equal recognition. It is a time to celebrate and congratulate. It is a time to thank them for having the courage and the strength to be who they are and to stand up and take the lead. I know I don't have that kind of strength, I'm so appreciative that they do. I'm so happy they got enjoy the right to marry, something I imagine they never thought they'd see.

See what others have to say about these two wonderful women:
congratulations (again) phyllis & del, by Epiphenita
phyllis and del by THINGS according to me
Love is...by Jill on Feministe
Why this queer isn't celebrating, by Jack onFeministe
Love, Love, Love by Dorothy Surrenders
Who says lesbians and gays cannot form committed relationshipsby Paula the surfer mom at lesbiatopia

Image Credit: Woman Vision

Now I must admit, and some may find this odd or hard to believe, but, I've never been to a Pride event. I have spent some time lately thinking about why it is I've never been, and I don't really have a good answer. But I'm sure inquiring minds want to know, so I'll give it a shot.

When I was younger, I had a difficult time accepting that I was gay. During that period of time in my life, I avoided anything that would remind me, or maybe make it real to me, that I was a lesbian. I mean sure, I was crazy in love with a girl and I knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her, but I still couldn't wrap my brain around being gay. That just wasn't me. Pride was definitely out of the question back then. No way, no how. Not me.

I think a large part of my issue about being gay, or accepting that I was, was that every one we knew who was gay made being gay their entire identity. Instead of being gay being just another thing among all the other things about them, it became them. It consumed them. Instead of just being themselves they would conform to fit a stereotype with in the gay culture. I didn't want to define myself like that, and I didn't want others to define me that way either. Instead of letting being gay be a part of who I was, even a small part, I buried it away.

It took me many, many years, or maybe a decade, to become comfortable with who I am. I even see that the gay part of me is an important piece of who I am. These days I have no aversion to going to Pride and no real reason not to go, other than my anxiety of being in a crowd which I can deal with, but I just don't have any desire to go. I don't know why, I guess maybe I don't know or don't understand what I would get out it. Betty Please, on the other hand, has really wanted to go the last few years. We've talked about going since it's something she does have a desire to experience, but we never prioritize it and by the time she thinks about it we always already have plans on the weekends we could go to either of the two festivals with in a few hours drive from us. This year is, of course, no different. There's always next year, right?

While I may not see the importance in my attendance at a Pride event, it makes me angry to read that the Mayor of Birmingham, Larry Langford, refused to sign a proclamation for the city's annual Pride parade.

Langford told the News, "I don't think I'm intolerant; I just don't condone the lifestyle. I'm not going to endorse, condone or condemn anybody. I'm just not going to sign the proclamation." from Mayor Sulks, but Birminghams Pride goes on, Planet Out.com

Fortunately, permitting actually goes through the police department so the parade went on. So, actually the mayor was saying he couldn't stop the parade from happening, but he was sure going to make sure to state his objection. I wonder if that political move was really necessary.

Just in time for Pride season, the Obama campaign came out with an Obama Pride page on is official campaign website.

"While we have come a long way since the Stonewall riots in 1969, we still have a lot of work to do. Too often, the issue of LGBT rights is exploited by those seeking to divide us. But at its core, this issue is about who we are as Americans. It's about whether this nation is going to live up to its founding promise of equality by treating all its citizens with dignity and respect."
- Senator Barack Obama

Many supporters have organized to march, and have already taken part in the Pride parades across the country, carrying Obama Pride posters.

While most US Pride events are happening in the next few weeks, some have already come and gone for 2008. Karen Ocamb, recaps LA Pride in her post L.A. LGBT Pride and Politics at The Bilerico Project.

Yes, Pride has always been a party. But something was markedly different this year. It was a very relaxed celebration. No one wanted to "fight" anything. We won - we won marriage, we won a new president and we will win against the antigay ballot initiative.

The only problem is - we haven't won yet.

Donna Rose wrote about attending the first ever New England Transgender Pride Rally in Northampton MA, in her post Transgender Pride at the Bilerico Project.

Little by little, however, the transgender community is finding its own identity away from its larger, louder, more established GL (and sometimes B) siblings. It is finding that it has unique needs that are not being met in the context of the broader community and, in fact, often get glossed over or missed as part of the bigger movement. Some in the community see this as reason to "secede" from the GLB communities (as if such a thing were even possible) while others are simply finding ways to celebrate our own unique identities in our own ways. It is in that spirit of celebrating our uniqueness that Transgender Pride has been born.

Redqueenruns writes about not attending Pride this year in the post Gay Pride at The Red Queen.

I can't say that I have been to a Pride celebration in some years though. I guess I just really can't say that I feel proud to be gay. Don't get me wrong, that is not the same as saying that I'm ashamed to be gay. To me it is like saying I'm proud to have brown hair, blue eyes, or freckles. In the scheme of things, being gay isn't very important in my life. The things that matter to me have very little to do with being gay. The health and happiness of my partner is at the top of my list and it would matter very little to me if my partner were male or female. The well-being of our families comes next...

I can relate to what Redqueenruns is saying, that's pretty much how I feel.

So is anyone planning on going to Pride or have you already been this year? Can anyone tell me what I'm missing and why it's important for me to go?

Once I finally decided to give it a shot, I bought my skates, I ordered all the gear I would need, and I signed up for the fall session of co-ed, no checking hockey. Not classes, a league. Nothing like jumping right in. I anxiously awaited the first day. I was so nervous, yet I was so excited. Then a new thought, a thought even more terrifying than being the new girl who could almost stay up on skates, filled my head. Locker room! Oh. My. God. I would have to change in a locker room. You know. Like, with other women. I had flash backs to my anxiety filled locker room days of high school PE. Now the thought of being the newbie was far less dreadful to me than the thought of changing in a locker room.

Now I realize that no one really has great affection for changing in locker rooms. And I also know that everyone is in there for the purpose of getting in and out of their gear. But, it still fills me with great anxiety. I am getting more comfortable in the locker room as time goes on, but as I've been thinking about this post and why the locker room is a place I fear, I am beginning to see that it isn't a simple issue for me.

One of the big issues I have with the locker room is that I am gay and the other women are not. Now that may seem silly to some, but you wouldn't let a man change in the women's locker room. And boy do the women react when a guy accidentally tries to enter the women's locker room (the locker rooms are not labeled or specifically permanently designated) I think too, that I feel some amount of guilt about being unintentionally deceitful. By that mean, I didn't come out to everyone in the locker room on the first day. And while I think it is completely obvious that I am gay, I think in reality it is only obvious to other gay people and straight people with gaydar. At the same time, I've never hidden or lied about it either. When everyone is talking about their spouses or boyfriends, I talk openly about Betty Please. Yet judging by recent comments made in the locker room, it would seem some people are not clued in. I guess my point to this is that I wouldn't want anyone to feel like I violated their privacy because they didn't know I was gay, and if they had they might have changed their locker room behavior.

Tied to this issue, I feel a bit of guilt for being in the same locker room with people, some of whom I might find attractive. Not that I do, but I could. While I would never take advantage of the situation, it just doesn't seem right to me. It's not that they, or anyone else, would ever know, but I would know. And it doesn't seem fair for me to be in the position to potentially see someone I find attractive nude, or nearly so. Of course, I'm so focused on changing as fast as I can, and getting my bag packed exactly as I like it, cause I'm a tad OCD, that I really don't have time to think about these things at the time. But that doesn't mean that it isn't in the back of mind fueling my anxiety.

The biggest issue for me though, is my modesty. I am super modest around women other than Betty Please. Way more so around women than men. Even though I know that the women in the locker room aren't or don't think of me in that way, it doesn't change the way I feel. I would be so much more comfortable if I could change in the men's locker room. They may not be, but I would be. Which would seem to make little sense, since I'm sure there is a much greater chance of someone thinking of me in that way in the men's locker room. I know it's not logical, but neither is modesty.

Of course there is the aspect of scrutiny by the other women and how they perceive me. How will they size me up and judge me. Not feeling like I fully fit in as a women, this is an issue I deal with outside he locker room too, but there is a certain vulnerability in being nearly naked that seem to amplify this. I think lachlan captures these feelings well in her series of post about Saree shopping while in India.

Of course, the social expectations for conformity turned into a pressure cooker by the time the teen years hit. I remember the misery I felt when it seemed like I had no choice but to girl it up; the alternative was more merciless teasing if I didn't. I permed my hair, wore fewer boyish clothes, and just gritted my teeth. There were many moments of humiliation and embarrassment and feeling like I was an impostor. I'd look around me, and all the other girls looked natural and comfortable and didn't seem a whit out of place. I, on the other hand, looked like a teenage drag queen.
read full post Saree and Cargo Shorts: Embracing Beauty Differently (part 1), on Lachlan's blog My So-Called Blog

Then there is also something about being in a room full of people who are soon not going to be strangers, but teammates or competition. People you build some sort of relationship with week after week, people who are not just random locker room overlaps in the locker room before or after working out at the gym. It's the same 12 or so women every week. It never really changes. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it wouldn't be any different for me.

It wasn't any different for meg, who writes at randomness, when she took a trip to some hot spring while traveling in Europe.

Perhaps the most unnerving part of the hot springs was the lack of modesty in the locker rooms. I know we're in Europe and I know we're all girls in the locker room together, but seriously? I felt like I was in 8th grade again changing for PE. I wanted a room with a door. Luckily I found a bathroom to sneak into to change my clothes. On the way out to the springs, there are signs telling us to shower before getting into the springs. They make a very clear point that we are to shower without our suits on. Yeah, I don't think so. I shower as is and do my best to ignore all the naked people around me.
read the full post on being naked in public on meg's blog randomness.

Some people locker room fears aren't as great, zoom! writes about her new experiences in gym culture.

Gym culture is interesting. I do some of my best people-watching there. Everybody's doing the same thing but mostly in isolation from each other. It's a pretty intimate culture so the collective isolation is an interesting contrast. I mean, you're all sweating and contorting and panting together in front of a giant mirror, but God forbid you should acknowledge one another's existence[...] I try to be discreet in the change room, but I'm fascinated by so many things, and I can't help but check out things like what kind of underwear everybody wears. And now I think I should upgrade my own underwear, because maybe other people are checking mine out too.
read full post Inside the women's change room, on zoom!'s blog kitnut.

Yeah, I too fear that people are checking out my underwear. And now she's just confirmed it.

I wondered if I was the only one who felt this way. Was this just another one of my quirky anxieties? Do I just over think everything, and make things bigger than they are. Well, yes. But still. So, I asked in the post Locker Rooms, on my blog, what others thought on this topic. The response was a bit surprising. There was quite a mix of answers which gave me a lot to think about. It made me think of few things that may be at the root of my extreme modesty towards women, but that could be a whole post in itself. What I would deduce from most peoples "get in, change and get out" comments, is that a lot of people are not completely comfortable in locker rooms. More people than I would've thought, agreed with me and then had a few things of their own to add. I'm still trying to distill it all.

I hope I've hidden my fear well from the rest of the women I have to share a locker room with. The last thing I'd want to do is stick out further than I feel like I already do. I don't like it when I look up when someone asks me a question and I see them sitting there topless, but I've learned to deal with it. I know some people are just more comfortable with their nudity than others. I will never be comfortable in that setting, so I'll just have to pretend that I am.

So what about you, do you have locker room anxiety?

After doing a little Internet research, I found a Forrester Research study which found that gay men and women are among the early adopters when it comes to new technology and online tools.

"Gay men and women are tech-savvy consumers who use the Internet and tech devices at significantly higher rates than their heterosexual counterparts for shopping, banking, entertainment, and community building," said Jed Kolko, principal analyst at Forrester.[...] In addition to being wealthier and better educated, gay men and women are avid Internet users. Eighty percent of gay men and 76 percent of lesbians are online, compared with 70 percent of straight men and 69 percent of straight women. Gays are also one-third more likely to have broadband connections and have been online longer than heterosexuals. Twenty-nine percent of gay men and women have been online for more than seven years, versus 18% of heterosexuals.
from GayMediaExpress.com

Now, obviously I can't speak for all lesbians, but I can say that Betty Please and I are total gadget geeks, and have been online and had broadband for way longer than most. And though I like to let a product go through it's first redesign to make sure the bugs are all worked out before I buy it ( a quirk that comes from working in electronics design), we are usually early adopters by comparison to most everyone else we know. I had always attributed Betty Please and I being early adopters and Internet junkies to the fact we are just geeky people, but maybe tech savvy-gadget geek is a gene that comes bundled with gayness.

All joking about tech savvy-gadget geek genes aside, I don't think that tech savvy is the real difference at work here. It really doesn't explain the 15% gap between the gay and straight bloggers, even when all things are equal with income and education. I know plenty of tech savvy early adopter types who don't blog, and I know many not so tech savvy people bareliy living in this decade tech wise who do. So if it isn't tech savvyness, is it time, or free time that's the factor? At first thought I thought maybe, but moms are busy, busy people and there are lots of mommy blogs. If they can find time to blog, most anyone can.

I think blogging has little to do with being geeky or tech savvy, or having free time, and a lot to do with relating to and connecting with others like yourself. I think more gay men and women blog because they are searching for a connection to community that they may not have otherwise. The need to connect and be understood by a peer group can be a powerful drive.

For those living in small or highly conservative towns/cities, or who may not not be out, blogging may be the only way to connect with the GLBT community. The only way to feel not so different, not so alone. It's hard enough to find people you really click with in life, now try narrowing your options down to a small fraction of the population. And if you live in a small town your options are really limited. If you are lucky enough to have a local gay bar or other type of hang out, it's likely you see the same people week in and week out. They know you, and you know them. You probably know all the gossip about them, all their exes, and their whole life story.
Hell, you probably went to grade school together.

Blogging provides the benefit of anonymity. You can just be who you are, or you can be who you want to be but are afraid to be in your everyday life, without fear of prejudice. It allows us to see past stereotypes and to get to know people you might have otherwise thought you had anything in common with. Blogging allows you to communicate with other with whom you have common experience. It allows you to build a community and a support network with out even leaving the comfort of home.

When I started blogging, it had nothing to do with my tech savvyess or following the latest trend. I started blogging to find me, and to find a place where I fit in. Or I should say the gay part of me who needed to know that Betty Please and I are not alone. A place where there are things I don't have to explain because we all share common experience. I started blogging to find other 30 something, long term coupled, RPG playing, video gaming lesbians, with less mainstream taste in movies and music, because in my town they don't seem to exist. But that's what's great about blogging, you can almost always find what you're looking for.

Here's some of the geeky I've found.

Lesbian Geek-it's about comics, sci-fi and fantasy, gadgets, anime, computin, and RPGs. What's not to love.

Lesbian Gamer- it's all about video games of all platforms

Dancing About Architecture- thirty something lesbian geek who likes sci-fi and RPGs

I Live Under a Rock- silly observations, life stories,and life as a computer geek

I'm not fully sure why a higher percentage of gay men and women blog than straight ones, but I think "to find and build communtiy" is a reasonalby good theory. I'd like to see the break down of percentages of straight men, straight women, gay men, and lesbians who blog. I would be willing ot bet that lesbians bloggers are the highest percentage, but I could be wrong. Anyone else have a theory on this?

I realize that probably most everyone feels screwed by the federal government on tax day, like they are shouldering more than their fair share of the burden, but if you are a married straight couple you probably file one set of federal taxes and one set of state taxes as a joint household. If you use a tax preparation company, you pay one fee. If you do them yourself, you do one household set of taxes for federal and state, and you're done. But, if you are a gay couple and you use a tax preparation company, you pay a fee for each partner to have their taxes done. And if you do them yourself, you have the headache of figuring out for whom it makes the most sense to take which deductions in order to minimize your overall tax burden as couple, and you have the joy of filling our 2 sets of federal tax forms and 2 sets of state tax forms.

So you might be asking, besides having to pay more to the tax prep places and having the headache of figuring out how to divvy up the deductions, what's the big deal about not being able to file jointly. Well, in my house the big deal is about a $3,000 difference. Oh yes, we pay about $3,000 more by having to file as single than if we could file jointly.

Nancy Polikoff, who blogs at Beyond (Straight and Gay) Marriage, says that filing jointly does not benefit those who earn equal wages.

Marriage reduces taxes for couples that have one wage earner, or two wage earners who earn vastly different incomes. In other words, the "traditional" husband-as-wage-earner, wife-as-homemaker family is greatly advantaged by our tax rules. Their "bonus" for being married costs the government $30 billion. When two equal wage earners marry, they pay more taxes. So same-sex couples who marry would simply become a part of this unfair system; those with one primary wage-earner would benefit and those with two more equal wage-earners would lose out.
read full post Tax Time-Not a Reason to Support Marriage Equality.

Perhaps the vast majority of gay couples fall into the equal wage earner category, I somehow doubt it, but I don't know. I also don't know what tax bracket she's talking about. In our case, Betty Please makes about 2/3 again what I make, and the difference is, as I've already stated, $3,000 between us filing as single rather than jointly. But even if I recalculate our taxes using the same total household income, but making us equal earners, the tax burden would still be less if we filed jointly. So, maybe you have to be in the upper-upper middle class for it to be to your disadvantage to file jointly. Or maybe I'm just missing something, which is always a possibility.

Our taxes are pretty straight forward, and not completely complicated. Yet. Diane Silver, who blogs at In This Moment, says

More confusion ensues if couples have to deal with certain expenses, mortgage interest deductions, Roth IRAs, real estate losses or capital gains or losses. Depending on their financial situation and the craftiness of their accountants, same-sex couples can easily end up paying more in taxes than married heterosexuals.
read full post Hope and Politics- What April 15 Teaches Us

To further complicate things, what happens when you throw kids into the mix, as I hope is soon in our future. What if one of us becomes a stay at home mom while the kids are young? A question I need to remember to ask our accountant.

Equal wage earning argument aside, anyone who is lucky enough to be providing health insurance for their partner and/or family through their employer, is still going to get dinged by taxes on the imputed income for health insurance. For those who have never had a reason to know what imputed income is, imputed income for health insurance is the fair market value of the portion of the insurance the employer provides to cover the partner who is not the employee. That amount, the fair market value, is reported as income. So while your actual salary may be $45,000, it gets reported as say $50,000, or whatever the value of the insurance provided by the employer is, but withholding is only done on actual salary. Which means come tax time, it looks like you made $50,000 but only paid tax on $45,000. And just to be clear, this is a federal tax law issue, it has nothing to do with the employer, to whom I am grateful that they offer same-sex partner benefits which are super kick-ass.

In our case, the tax on the imputed income comes out to about $1,000. That's $1000 of tax a year that we wouldn't have to pay if we could file jointly. Not to mention that the portion of BettyPlease's paycheck that goes to pay for her insurance coverage comes out pretax, while the portion that comes out of her paycheck to pay for my insurance is taxed. And, if you have a medical spending account that comes out pretax, as Betty Please does, only the employee can use that spending account, not the partner.

So, $3,000 a year more that we pay in tax than a straight married couple of the same income. Do you know what we could have done with all that extra money we've been paying in taxes? We could have been stimulating the economy. We could have put money in savings. We could have taken a vacation or two. Hell I don't know. All I know is that it's our money. We hold everything jointly, there is no mine and hers, it's all ours. And because we aren't a straight married couple we have to give more of it to the federal and state governments, and it pisses me off. And I haven't even touched on inheritance tax, which makes me even more furious. Cause, yeah, I can see how it's fair that I should have to pay inheritance tax on 50% the value of our house and assets should something happen to Betty Please. What? It makes no sense me. But that's a topic for another time.

While there are things we can do to better protect our futures and our assets, it only makes it some what better, not foolproof, and certainly not equal to marriage. I think Sara Whitman, who writes at Suburban Lesbian Housewife said it best.

Heterosexuals get to say, "I do." All done. No additional legal work required, if a spouse dies, everything is transferred without tax or question. You check the "married" box. The government definition of their marriage is powerful insurance. read full post Tax Time Deliberation: Married or Not?

I couldn't say any better than that.

Check out these bloggers who have also written on this topic.

Paula, posted Tax Day: A Time to Remember Discrimination Gays and Lesbians Face at Queercents.

WittWriterGal, who writes at NOT Available on MySpace, posted Tax Day...Warning this is a cursing rant
(warning loud music plays, can be disabled on in sidebar on right.)

Also see the Advocate article Tax Day 2008: The Cost of Being Gay, by Lara Schwartz

I'm sure most people, or at least I hope most people put as much thought into family planning. Word to your mother(s) wrote about her concerns for the time being right to have a child.

C and I are spending a considerable amount of time processing the various aspects of conceiving a lil' one, as we have some definite concerns. I tend to be more reactive about issues, while C is more contemplative. As such, we tend to find balance whenever major decisions are to be made in our household. I realize any person or couple planning to conceive a child confronts the "is it the right time" question in some respect...read full post the right time to have a child

At least I know we aren't alone.

Despite our questioning our readiness for parenthood, it's never been a matter of "if" we have kids, it's always been "when." While we've been waiting for "when" to get here, we've been able to sort out the the how we'll proceed with trying to accomplish forming our family. Would we first try for biological children, and if so which of us would be the biological parent? Or would we each try to become a bio parent? Would we ask someone we know to be sperm donor, or go with an anonymous one? Or do we skip the biological route all together and go straight for adoption? Not easy decisions to make, there is so much to consider.

We've spent the last few years wading through our options, made some tough decisions and have come up with a plan. We've set some personal and financial goals with deadlines, so the "when" is now in sight. Which is good thing, because we're not getting any younger and my clock is really tick, Tick, TICKING. And I don't necessarily mean my biological clock, but my becoming a mom clock, because it matters not to me if our children are biological children to one of us, or if they are adopted. I just want a family, and know that we're ready now.

My moment of certainty came about 6 months ago. We were asked to consider adopting a 5 month old baby girl through a private adoption. None of the stuff we'd been worrying about came into play when deciding, and boy did we want to say yes. Our only concern, and the reason we said no, was that there were not enough degrees of separation between us and the biological mother who is not a stable individual and who wanted an open adoption. We thought it would be too complicated, had the potential to be chaotic, and the possibility to end in a devastating manner. Having gone through the process of making that decision, I am now certain that we are ready.

In my recent anxiousness, now that we have a "when" in sight, I've had some crazy thoughts which deviate a bit from our plan. I've been thinking, since we're in our mid-late 30's and it could take us a while to get pregnant, why don't we increase our chances by both trying to conceive. But then I fear we could end up like Carey and Steph, who blog at Uterus x 2, who now have nearly 5 month old and new born, as in born today, twins. I'm sure we'd be thrilled if we were them, so the thought has not yet left my mind. Call me crazy, I'm sure Betty Please will when she reads this.

So until "when" gets here, I'll be spending my time scouring the blogs in the blogroll of LesbianFamily.org.