Out of the Ordinary: Essays on Growing Up with Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Parents

While hearing "faggot" yelled at you in a high school corridor would upset almost anyone, here is evidence that hearing "Your father's a faggot" isn't nearly as bad, and that you might find yourself levelheadedly retorting, "No, my father's a transgendered lesbian." This unprecedented collection of short memoirs by adult children of gay, lesbian, and transgender parents demonstrates once again that love cannot be policed or regulated, and that the bond between parents and children transcends petty categories. Kelley Conway's "My Mother and the Nun" describes the confusion a 14-year-old girl feels when her mother falls in love with another woman at the same time that Conway herself is beginning to recognize her own attractions to other girls. In Peter Snow's "Acting Lessons," a college boy returns home to find that his parents, who have always been unhappily married, are still together, and in fact are cozied up on the couch watching television with his mother's lover, Jackie. What is missing from this volume are essays by children who were born or adopted into same-sex families. Without this perspective, the memoirs are somewhat skewed, since almost every writer had to deal not only with a parent's coming out but with a wrenching divorce, often caused by that parent's sexuality. Nevertheless, this collection should prove helpful to therapists, youth counselors, and families with gay members, and contribute positively to the debates on same-sex parenting and adoption. --Regina Marler