Having lived while Black for some time, I say you have to prepare your children for both the possibilities and probabilities of life and of how they walk in this life and are/may be viewed. 

My mother and extended family prepared me for how I might be viewed as a Black girl/teen.  As a Black woman who reared a Black girl and a Black boy in the innercity (both as part of a marriage and as a single parent), I had to prepare my children for racism.  I had to prepare them thata lot of people who did not know them would have prejudgments about them based on their skin color and gender.  (We lived in Boston during some of the anti-busing days and during the Charles Stuart case where Black men and boys were harassed by the police because of Stuart's false accusations).

All of this to say, we have to protect our children and being prepared for ignorant people as well as on the look-out for wonderful people is part of that preparation.  And it can be done without crushing a child's spirit or making a child paranoid.

I hope this helps even a little bit.

I believe that if the world lives long enough, we will all be able to feel welcome.  We've made tremendous progress although, not being finished, we have plenty more to achieve.

 Good and plenty!

thanks for this post - I have really enjoyed looking at those blogs so far.  So much love!

I met Julie and Samantha (not their real names) when my family moved to our house, three years ago. They are a lesbian couple who is raising a little girl. Before I met them, I didn’t really have an opinion on gays. I never met a gay person. I didn’t HATE gays of course, but I just couldn’t care less.

Julie and Samantha became my friends. They completely changed my outlook and turned me into a huge supporter of gay rights. They are not activists and never initiated a discussion on being gay. I was the one who started asking them questions, out of curiosity. They changed me by simply being there where I could see them, quietly living their lives, working hard, raising their daughter and minding their own business. I remember talking with my husband about them, before we invited them over to that first dinner that started the friendship, and telling him “they are so NORMAL!”

You said:

I'm not a huge fan of GLBTQs who spend a lot of time saying "we're just like you!" but when it comes to families, we really are just like you.

Amen to that. You really are.

Vered DeLeeuw
www.momgrind.com

you may not be expressively sentimental, but I've seen signs of a bit more going on inside. 

Anyway, not sure I should talk on the subject matter, after all I might not be in balance. ;-) 

What makes you think I'm not like hetero folk? I existed in that world once.

And what I've got to say now isn't funny, not that the above was.

We know what children face growing up gay, or being the children of parents who are gay. My kids have to live with being the children of someone, who in the eyes of many, would say I 'changed sex.'

You know how it was my plan to wait until my youngest was out of high school. My therapist laughed at me, said I'd never make it, and didn't.

So there are children out there who are the children of transgendered parents, and they face a pretty tough road if that fact is known.

Go easy on such children, folks. They do have loving parents, and they are great kids... well in my case, 'kid' no longer works so well. The family may be divided, but such is America... in the end, we are still a family in our own, fractured and disassembled way. 

nelle

"and started crying about how much she hated her teacher, how mean the teacher was, how the teacher yelled at her about not being able to finish her book, how the teacher didn't let her do two books or two projects but said she could do one for Mama for Mother's Day and one for me at Father's Day, and how she never wanted to look at that book, never never never ever again, how she knew it wasn't my fault but she was so upset she just HAD to yell and cry."

That story both infuriates me and makes me want to cry! It would break my heart if that happened to my son.

Great post!!