Working Backwards

Hayden 1 day old.

Spoiler alert: Hayden is here!!!  But... I really want to revisit this project.  There are so many reasons that I stepped away from this blog: I had a really hard time putting my emotions into words, and was struggling to process.  BUT moreover than that, I couldn't find the time, because boi, girl, or otherwise, PREGNANT PEOPLE NEED NAPS!

But I have more time now, and although my point of reference has kind of changed a bit, I still feel like I have important things to add to the conversation about being trans and carrying a child.  Obviously, I cannot speak for every other trans person who has taken on this life changing task, but it feels unfair, to myself, to not share

some of my favorite truths that I picked up along the way.

Not to jump the gun, and I want to go more into the meat and potatoes of

my feelings and experiences... But I feel amazing about this journey.  Although it wasn't our vision of the way we would get our baby, it is the way we did, and because of that, we wouldn't change it.

 

Just two stinkers.  Hangin' out

Our child is amazing.  She is beautiful beyond what we could have imagined, and I don't mean magazine attractive.  I mean, I look at her and see love, and happiness, and hope.  I see a world that is better with her in it... And I see her Mom in her (we are quickly learning how little relevance genetics have in our feelings about our baby).  They already have a special

bond that is beyond measure.  Amy is Hayden's Mom...  and it is pretty clear that she is going to be a Momma's girl.  And my heart skips a beat thinking about that.

I just sit and look at her...  And I think this is the most amazing thing I have ever done (and I have always believed myself to have led a pretty exciting life.)  It was one of the hardest, most humbling experiences I have ever had...  And I am not the same as I was before.  We took risks, and we made sacrifices, and we were pushed to our limits.  We learned about patience, and perseverance in ways that can only be taught through experiences that are made to test the very fiber of who you we were as people.  I am not saying we didn't come away with scars, because we certainly did, but when all is said and done, those scars are a small price to pay for our eventual reward.

Throughout this journey I feared that being pregnant would cause me to lose parts of who I was...  But in the end, I lost nothing.  I gained pieces of myself that I never knew I had...  I can't wait to share that with you.  So now we start at the end.... and work our way back.

 

The Guy in Khakis in the Hot Topic

So... I took a long break.  I had lots of feelings and emotions, and honestly, they were a bit much to handle.... and I didn't feel like I could process them in a way that would be healthy for blogging, so I have been a little silent lately.  Good news is, I feel great now.  I want to try and process some of the feelings I have had in writing over the next couple of weeks, but wanted to get something down quickly to rekindle my enjoyment of writing this blog.

So without further adieu....

So here is my a little comparison for the day.  Imagine it is 1999... and you are a punk kid (JNCOS, dog chain, studded belt and ringer tee included.)  All of your friends are also punk kids.... BUT, you also have a job at the mall that has a strict khaki and polo dress code.  One day on your 15 minute break from the Sunglass Hut, you walk down to the Hot Topic...  as soon as you walk in you feel out of place.  The guy behind the counter looks at you strangely, as if you aren't in the right place (also, you are not sure if this look is real or imagined).  You know in other social circumstances you may share a great moment of bonding listening to Blink 182's, "All the Small Things" but in this moment, in this situation, the guy with the spiked dog collar couldn't think he was more different than you.

You press on anyways.  You know what you are there for... and you know that even though it doesn't look like it is a place where you should be, you know you have the proper equipment, it is just hidden under your polo/khaki costume.  So you proceed to the chained wallet section (because for the 2nd time this year you have broken the piece that snaps onto your belt loop).  You choose one that suits you (probably red with sparkles like a 50s dinner seat) and you proceed to check-out.  All the sudden the guy behind the counter realizes you DO belong there.  You obviously had a desire for something in the shop, and although on the surface it doesn't look like this is your place, it is somewhere you had to go to get something that was necessary.

That's what going to the midwives office feels like.  Foreign and strange... not because I don't belong there, but because it looks like I don't belong there.  So maybe chain wallets and babies aren't the same, but I think you get the picture.

So... I'm Not the Only One....

I think I pass a little bit better than you,
Mr. Seahorse...

I have a new favorite animal.... It is the seahorse...  and here is why:

From:  Male Seahorses Are Nature's Mr. Mom, Researchers Say (although I find this title totally offensive, the article is still fascinating, if you leave out the heteronormativity...)

"When seahorses mate, the female inserts her ovipositor into the male's brood pouch (an external structure that grows on the body of the male) and deposits her unfertilized eggs into the pouch. The male then releases sperm into the pouch to fertilize the eggs. "It wouldn't be that interesting if the brood pouch were just a flap of skin where the females put regular fish eggs and they developed in the bag instead of on the sea floor," Jones said. "But the male pregnancy in some species of seahorses and pipefish is physiologically much more complex than that."

After the female deposits her unfertilized eggs into the male, the outer shell of the eggs breaks down, and tissue from the male grows up around the eggs in the pouch. After fertilizing the eggs, the male closely controls the prenatal environment of the embryos in his pouch. The male keeps blood flowing around the embryos, controls the salt concentrations in the pouch, and provides oxygen and nutrition to the developing offspring through a placenta-like structure until he gives birth."

So... I am going to start thinking of myself as a sea horse...  perhaps this will help with visualization during birth.  I was just REALLY excited to find this little fact out and needed people to know about this immediately. 

Becoming Baba

Here I am with our niece... Although I
had planned to  be her "Ancle", she had
 different plans and lovingly refers
to me as Didis, or Didi. 
(Taken at 6 months pregnant)

So... when it came to names I wanted to be called by my child... I was at a loss.  For a long time, I thought I would be a Doodah... which was a made-up name that I am can't even remember the roots of (although, I do know we had a dog name Doodah and one point in my childhood, and I know for a fact that the dog and the name for parent I had chosen were unrelated in any way.)  We have two feisty Jack Russell mixes and when they are misbehaving/being annoying/needing fed, Amy still tells them to "Go see your Doodah...", So I imagine I will remain a Doodah to our two fur-kids for evermore....

But then, my friend Paisley, sent me this fascinating article about Baba's: 

Why Hart Doesn’t Have Two Mommies

And I was going to write about my self-discovery and how I had chosen to adopt this name, etc. etc. etc., until I went back a re-read the article and although, our circumstances are different I felt like the author did a great job of describing their rationale....  But here are some highlights if you don't get around to reading the hole article...

1.  I have never been interested in being a Mom, or Mommy, or Mama.  Those words just don't feel right to me.... And like the author states, being a "Dad or Papa" felt like to much of a "project".  Reclaiming the masculine form of parent, seems like a huge undertaking and not something I imagine being ready for, while trying to juggle diaper changes, sleep deprivation, and all the other things that come along with parenthood.  After a while, explaining to people why I had chose Dad would become "BECAUSE I SAID SO"... which does no good for anyone.

2.  Baba has roots in different languages around the world... some where it is a masculine term, and other's where it was feminine.  I love this, because I love trivia... and because I feel like there are roots there.  Its like the universe gave us this excellent word, and I intend to make good use of it!

3.   I don't want to be the only gender queer parent in the world...  Because I have done enough of feeling like I don't belong.  There is a fine line to not feeling like you have a place, and changing yourself to be in a place that doesn't fit you.  I have learned this lesson repeatedly...  I like that there is a word for it, because I feel like that gives it power.  Knowing there are other Baba's out there makes me feel like I am not alone in this...

4.  A bit like/unlike the author... I, too, hope that people assumed that Amy carried the baby.  However, unlike the author, I am carrying the baby.  So... if I had my wish... they would assume Amy carried the baby... but they won't say it out loud, because it isn't important enough to do so...

So...  I will start out as Baba... and if our little one takes to that name, I will gladly accept it.  If she chooses something else, and I feel comfortable with that, I may roll with that as well...  I just want to be her parent...  And I want her to know that we have a very special bond regardless of what I am called.

Pregnant Boi in Blue and Pink Zones

In our 7th month of pregnancy, in Minneapolis,
with Mary Tyler Moore! 

For the majority of my life, I have spent time living as close to the "middle" as possible...  Which is damn near impossible when it comes to gender, because our society has given us very little middle ground.  So I have at least tried to choose what I wanted to choose, because I wanted to choose it... not because it was specifically male or female.  So I guess, this would  be an introduction to the difference between gender neutral (a space where gender one attempts to live in the middle of two genders) and gender open (a space where one picks and chooses from options regardless of what gender the typically, or stereotypically "belong" to). 

Anyways... pregnacy has forced me into a great many spaces that are typically "Pink" zones... ladies only.  And somedays I feel like a great pioneer.  And some days, I just want to be myself, without explaining, or discovering new ground, or planting flags, or manifesting destiny, or any other pioneering tropes...  So, I feel like by being forced into overtly female spaces, because of the law of averages I have subconcsiouly drifted more towards male "things".  I don't know how I feel about that, or really what it means, but it has definitely been interesting.

I would say the hardest Blue and Pink Zones, which I have navigated my whole life are bathrooms.  Just as a bonus, when in the 7th month of pregnancy, not only does your body start to rapidly change, you have no chance at doing the things you are normally physically capable of, and your feet are a constant reminder that you have "met your limits" for the day... you also have to go to the bathroom... a lot.  There was at time in my younger life where I would consume only the very smallest amount of water s that I never had to use the restrooms in public... and specifically in my rural/suburby high school, where kids were less than supportive of "difference".  But now, I am told drink, drink, drink.. and if I don't drink water, I feel crappy.... but if I do I have to go to the bathroom multiple times on out of house excursions.  Here are some strategies I have developed:

As you can see here, anyone who wears dresses, or doesn't,
or is a child, or little person (or maybe the small person is
average height and the two larger people are giants)
or you are in a wheelchair can use this bathroom.

1.  Dear God, let there be a family restroom:  I have read on some blogs that trans people are don't feel like they should use family restrooms,  because they have been set aside for a specific purpose.  I choose to ignore the word "family" if the sign includes it, and just think that the stupid sign, with the broad shouldered man AND the lady in the skirt, and imagine I fall somewhere in between those two things and therfore, the bathroom is intended for me (just as much as a male or female restroom would be intended for me.)  I certainly don't spend much time in there anyways...  On average it only takes me a minute to go, and then I am out!

2.  Duck and Roll:  There is a certain cadence of walking I have adopted when entering an all female restroom.  Peek around the corner, and eye up the scene.  Tuck the head, making eye contact with no one and approach the nearest stall.  I feel like, if I know what I am doing in there no one will ask me to leave, and if I walk fast enough, no one will have the chance to stop me.  Once safetly nestled in the stall, I do my business and listen very carefully until the coast is clear and I can make a clean get-a-way.  Amy is excellent help in this strategy and has also played the offensive line to my quarterback, allowing me to get in unnoticed.

3.  Belly out Chest Out:  Not my favorite strategy, but sometimes it is necessary when there is heavy traffic restrooms... like at our recent airport encounter.  This one is simple... look as pregnant as possible.  Remove hat (if wearing one), push bump out, and remove oversized outer garments.  Put hand in the small of the back and walk slowly in and look as tired as possible.  If there are any other pregnany steretypes that you see in the movies, now would be the time to use these tricks.  For ythe most part, Hollywood has designed pregnancy anyways, and somedays you just have to capitalize on that.  This one is hard, because it seems to be such a performance of pregnancy and femaleness, because thats what it is.  All morals and Theory aside, somedays this is the one that gets me through...  So this is for one of those "non-Lewis and Clark" days when I want to be a person first and an advocate later.

This list is not exhaustive...  nor is it perfect.  And bathroom situations will continue to be uncomfortable for the rest of my pregnancy, and probably the rest of my life.  But they are, unfortunately, a necessary evil.

Pregnant Boi and the TSA:
We recently spent some time travelling to Minnesota for a wedding.  And on our way back, I was just too tired to opt out of the body scan (sorry Paisley).  Like any other traveller, I took my shoes off, my jacket off, all of my belongings were removed from the pockets, etc. This left me in brown maternity pants, and an Old Navy V-Neck shirt.  Now again, I must mention, I am in my seventh month of pregnancy, and my body has changed drastically in the chest and stomach area...  But I stepped into the scanner, got into the arms up position, got scanned, and then waited... and waited, and waited, and then waited.  The agents whispered to each other, and looked confused, and then more whispering.  Eventually, after a long time, they asked me to step out, showed me that there were some places on my body were they had made some questionable discoveries, showing me the diagram, of a person, on a blue background with questionable areas over their chest, and belly.  They awkwardly asked if they could do the scan again.... and I agreed.  Second time: no discussion, no problem.  I stepped out... and the screen  reflected a person on a pink backgrond, with an "Okay" stamp....
Amy then explained to me (she had gone through security first and had watched the whole "show"). The first time they had scanned me as a male and shockingly found extra fluid in my pregnant stomache, and chest... but don't worry, as a female, I am no threat to national security.
There are so many thing I can say about this experience, and I am not sure how I feel about all of them, but I guess it is at least a little bit exciting that I am still passing, even if it is to a 70 year old TSA man.

A Different Kind of Passing...

When I was a kid there was a Double A hockey team that played out of Louisville, Kentucky, where I grew up.  My Dad being from New York, insisted we have season tickets.  So multiple times a week from October to March, we would head out to Broadbent Arena, sit in section 232, and cheer on the Louisville Ice Hawks!  After each game, we would go to the greet the team as they came of the ice, at which time if any of the players had broken a stick they would hand it over the little barrier to some deserving kid.  I noticed pretty quickly that that "deserving kid" usually turned out to be a boy... and, well, I wanted one of those sticks.  So, for the first time, I started to "pass".  I slicked back my hair, wore a cap, loose jeans, and a big black Ice Hawks t-shirt.  It kinds of became my uniform.  Now, trying to "pass" for this reason (to gain a privilege that your current gender doesn't allow) has many cultural implications about privilege and assimilation, but I will leave that to the academic theorist; for purposes of this story, I was a kid, who wanted a broken hockey stick, and in doing so found a more comfortable identity.

Robin Hood..  I think may Mom may have
curled my hair to offset the mustache

I can't say that's where it all started.  I was never a "girl"...  but it was at that point that I really grasped that dressing up like a boy was freeing to me AND as a bonus the "doing it to get a hockey stick" line, kept my parents at bay at least for a little while.  So, I started to dress-up like a boy when I had an excuse...  I went as Robin Hood the next year for Halloween.  And when we went through the local Fire Station Haunted House, a volunteer grabbed by Mom's foot and I felt brave enough to say "Get Off of my Mommy!"... you see Robin Hood was portrayed as brave in the Disney Cartoons, where all the princesses were busy being saved.  (Of course I have learned now that girls can be just as brave as boys, but my 9 year old brain only had Disney paradigms to work off of.)  Dressing like a boy made me feel like the best version of me.

Summer uniform: Polo and shorts

Fast forward...  So now I dress "like a boy" all the time.  Current daily uniform: khaki cargo shorts and polos.  In the winter: khaki style pants, and V-neck sweaters.  It is pretty simple.  I wear vests and ties when I have to dress up.  But as I got older, I stopped "passing".  I don't know if it is because my face no longer looks like a 12 year old boys, or what, but unless the person is in kindergarten (I insist that children have a better handle on gender than adults do), people barely ever recognize that I am not female.

So I have had an obsession with "passing" as a not pregnant person for as long as can.  It is not that I am not proud to be carrying our baby... because I am.  It is important work, and I get that.  But, to me, it is an interesting social experiment, as well as a way for me to bow out of the "Mommy" culture, where people are constantly reminding you to not pick-up heavy things, and take sit down breaks as often as possible.  Obviously, our close family and friends know that I am the "belly parent", as well as anyone reading this...  But I want to maintain as much anonymity at work as possible.  I work in an environment where as work policy dictates, a biological child, would be treated differently than a non-biological child, and so it is important to me to keep both of those words (bio v non-bio, which I DETEST anyway) out of people's brains.  If I could move to the mountains and never let anyone know who carried this child, that would be my druthers.  But we don't live in a vacuum, and so I have decided to be open with those people I am hoping will be understanding, and just maintain some belly parent ambiguity for those I don't feel comfortable engaging in conversation on the subject.

So here is the interesting thing... I have no idea if it is working.  We are currently 21 week, 6 days along, and I am certainly different shaped than I was 5 months ago.  But larger polo shirts do wonders.  I am aware of the ways that I stand that make things more obvious...  Amy and I currently play a game called "chubby guy/pregnant guy", where I stand in different ways and Amy tells me if I just look like I have just gained weight, or if I look pregnant.  I am still in that stage, where I feel like I just look like I have a beer gut, and no one wants to ask someone if they are pregnant, when it might be that they have just been indulging in a not so healthy food regimen.  I also think my masculinity will keep me in the clear for a while as well... because most people's brains don't process the gray area between male and female, and so being "male-ish" is not compatible with "baby carrying".  I am depending on people's ignorance in this respect, and maybe I will be surprised.

And I know it is just going to get harder.  This little bit is going to keep growing (I have been reminded), and at some point, I will probably no longer be able to hide it.  So my plan is to stop hiding the baby from people, and just start hiding from people altogether.  Luckily, I work in an office of 2-3... and I am thinking I can find creative ways to not need to go to our main office for large gatherings... where people may feel the need oogle.

My other current "passing" trick... I am growing a beard... and a nice one at that.  I grow facial hair naturally; when we were trying to get pregnant, I had my hormones tested left and right because the Doc was SURE I had too much testosterone that was causing me to grow such nice facial hair ("such nice facial hair" are my words, not her's)...  turns out I am just an anomaly.  Ever since I was about twelve, I would sneak into my Dad's bathroom and use his shaving cream and razor... I don't know if that promoted hair growth, or I willed it to grow with my mind.  But it is a nice thick dark little goatee.  It is my theory that people will be so caught up looking at my beard, that they will completely forget to notice anything else.  If that doesn't work, well, at least I think it looks good.

One Year Ago Today...

On this day, a year ago, Amy and I took an irreversible step on our journey to parenthood.  After many discussions, meditations, prayers, and even silences, we had come to the conclusion that she would be handing the baby holding reigns over to me.  It was a huge sacrifice on her part, and I will always be grateful to her.
So on this day last year, we went to the Doctor's office, and long story short, we made the first attempt at getting my body pregnant.  I will never forget how scared I was...  Because I am a member of what some may call in lesbian-speak (again, not a lesbian... but down with the jargon) in the gold-star club.  So in simple, biological terms this means that I was officially a sperm-free zone... and that was about to change.  I had also spent a very long time ignoring that I had biologically female sex organs, and up until about 7 days before had never been to the OBGYN... by the time the 23rd rolled around, I had been pap-smeared, poked, prodded and probed,  and given a shot in the butt to get ovulation timing correctly.  So I was beginning to feel like my "girl parts" had become a side-show (this particular office was an on-call office, meaning you saw who was there... so 3 appointments, meant 3 different audiences to my downstairs...)
Due to some unfortunate work circumstances, immediately after the appointment (yeah, the one I was sure would be traumatizing and need several hours of debrief), I had to drive for 2 hours to do a 2 night overnight work trip.  I don't know if it has come through in previous posts, but Amy and I are VERY close...  maybe some would say unhealthy close.  Some days, it is really hard to get out of bed to go to work because the snuggles are JUST. THAT. GOOD.  Anyways, she is my safe space, and my home, and I never like being away from her, but I figured this would be excruciating.  I went to sleep away camp my whole childhood (starting in 2nd grade) and never felt homesickness until the first business trip I took away from my wife (lame... I know.) 

This is my rainbow.... as I rode out of town.  I have
often wondered if it showed up, just because it
made a great plot device in a story....

So anyways, as I am riding out of Columbus, after the world's most uncomfortable appointment, in which I feel like I had crossed an irreversible line that I never planned on crossing, and then had to leave the only person that felt like a safe space, there was a perfect rainbow.  (Please see footnote about rainbows... are blogs supposed to have foot notes?  Well.. this one does)
 Now, this blog is certainly not about religion... but let me tell you, in that moment, I knew that in someway, someday, everything was going to work out.  Now... I wish it had been an omen for that moment, and that attempt...  and of course it wasn't, because then we would already have a baby.
So here we are, one year later, almost 5 months pregnant, planning doula appointments, thinking about registries, knitting blankets (well... I don't knit, but Amy does) and reflecting on how we got here.  The world is so strange, and scary... but some days it just makes sense.  In that moment, with that rainbow, there was a certain amount of clarity... although completely muddied by own expectations.




Rainbow Footnote:  I love rainbows...  I love them because they are a naturally occurring bit of magic.  There is not other perfect color scheme where one color leads to perfectly into another with blending and shades in between!  They are also scientifically amazing (I teach kids about rainbows, so I know a thing or two about refraction and prisms)...  But the whole gay pride rainbow has REALLY gotten in the way of my love of rainbows.  NOT EVERY RAINBOW IS ABOUT BEING GAY!!  Sometimes I want kids to make a rainbow craft, because it is, AGAIN, the most wonderful color scheme, and then I have to second guess myself, because I don't want people to think that I am trying to trick their kids into queerness by a slip of the spectrum into one project or another.
So... I love that rainbows are a sign of pride, but I hate that I feel like I can't use them everywhere I want because it may get me into trouble!

Coming Out as Pregnant... Or Trans... Or Both....

Telling people you are pregnant is really exciting... Especially the people who didn't see it coming!  But every time we tell someone, there is a bit of a fear of the reaction....  Not all of these responses have happened directly to us, BUT, just because they haven't happened, doesn't mean we don't have a fear that they will....

So lets discuss...

1.  Who is the Mom?, Who's having the baby? and Who's knocked up?
More often than not people are asking who is pregnant...  which is not what all of these questions represent to us as queer parents. 

Who is the Mom? can be answered with: Amy is the Mom.  She has chosen Mommy, Mama, Momma to be her parental moniker... I have chosen something else, which I will discuss is a later blog entry:  Becoming Baba. 

Who's having the baby?  This doesn't mean what it seems either.  Because AMY AND I are having a baby.  We have been on the same page about this since day 1, we have both been at every appointment, we make joint decisions, etc.  So the answer to this is WE are having the baby.

Who's knocked up?  I just wanted to add this one because I find this phrase so offensive...  No one should be using the phrase knocked up.  A quick search of etymology reveals that this term comes from brothels in the 16th century, which were called "Knocking Houses".  Yuck.... Not the same as my experience friends... not the same.  Want more info? Click here.

But the fundamental issue with all of these questions:  Who is pregnant? is a deep and emotional one.

Well... if you must know...  I am carrying the baby.  But I am okay with saying WE are pregnant.  Amy has done just as much work as I have.  When I am sick, she is taking over my household responsibilities... When I am tired, she is there to make sure I am comfortable... When I need a Snickers Bar and a Gatorade, she will happily retrieve them.  So while I may be the "acting baby house" for 9 months, that in no way makes me more of a parent.  If anything, Amy has taken on way more responsibility than I have.  I mean, puking certainly isn't comfortable, but I would rather puke for 15 minutes than do all the laundry, all the house work, make the bed, do the dishes, etc...  And I get to take more naps than usual...  So I definitely don't feel like I should be given any more medals than my wife, for what I am doing.

Of course people are going to be curious about this.... and maybe I am more guarded about it because I don't want there to be any doubt that Amy is as much of this kiddos parents as I am.  We live in a shitty time (although getting quickly less shitty) and all these questions about being biological related on top of living in a state (and working for an organization) that doesn't appropriately recognize our family structure makes it really hard to want to be forthcoming about who the biological parent is.  This makes it very hard to swallow when this is one of the first questions we are asked.  We are open to answering this... with the right timing, and the right audience.  But, I don't feel the need to discuss who's "knocked up" with the person that I sat in front of in biology class, who cheated off my tests and chewed tobacco during lectures.

2.  How did THAT happen?

Okay... I get it.  You have questions...  Well I do to.  Remember: the way we make our babies is very different from the majority of the population BUT I have just as many questions of my friends who make their babies in the privacy of their home.  I think making babies by having sex is weird.  That is weird to me... BECAUSE that is not my life experience.  You may think making a baby in a Doctor's office, or with a needless syringe after visiting the sperm bank is weird... BECAUSE that is not YOUR life experience. 

Lets just face it... making babies and growing them in our bodies is weird.  Of course it is natural... but so is people who can flip up their eye-lids. And there are people out there who don't think it weird, and I respect that totally!  I just think it is bizarre (and not bizarre gross, but bizarre fascinating!). 

The point being... lets celebrate first... and then I would be happy to talk to you (in whatever detail I am comfortable with) about our baby making experience.  My first question to a bio male/ bio female couple would never be: so, was this planned or an accident?  Was there foreplay?  That's inappropriate... And you asking me about any and all procedures involving our private parts is inappropriate as well.

3.  Who is the Dad?

YIKES!!!!!!  Simple mistake... you are asking (hopefully) about the donor.  If you took High School Biology, you should know, it takes vital ingredients to make a baby... and in our household, we only have one.  So OF COURSE we had to acquire said missing ingredient.  This is not always the most comfortable thing to talk about it either... because it means that one of us, will not be biologically related to our child... and, that kids, is a fact of life.  No way around it (for now...)  But we know this, and have dealt with it, and talked it through, and gotten to a place of mutual understanding.  But when the capital D(ad) word comes up... it stings a little. 

We will answer questions about the donor for close friends and family... but to the general public, just know that we picked a great person from an EBay like menu, and are happy with our choice... AND YES, they have been screened for diseases...

4.  Is this really a good time?

This is not one we have heard... but it is one that I fear.  It is never a good time to have a child...  I mean, if someone said: would you like something that cuts your income in half, keeps you up at night, could possibly turn out poorly if you do something wrong AND poops on itself?  The answer would be a resounding no.  There is never enough time or money to be a parent... until you are one.  Just because we got to (or "had to" as I see it) plan out when we would try to have kids, doesn't mean that anyone gets to judge our decision.

THE ULTIMATE NO-NO

I think there are many pregnant people that would agree... they don't want people touching them... especially in a growing belly that isn't always comfortable.  I generally don't like to be touched AT ALL and as my body grows and changes, I think this will become even more important.  If I want you to touch my baby gut, I assure you, you will be invited to do so.  Until you are invited, please stay out.

But this problem is deeper than that.  Amy is very feminine...  She likes skirts, dresses, makeup and (what I would call) unreasonable shoes.  So in the paradigm of procreating people, she is the pregnant one, right?   I mean... I wear the ties and the pants (not the metaphorical pants, the real ones) so it is fairly obvious that the more feminine of the two of us is carrying the child.   And we are aware that this will be the assumption, and once the baby is here, I am more than happy for people to think that Amy carried the little munchkin.  Its cute when people ask Amy how she is feeling, and she gets to say "I feel great, but Chris spends most mornings draped over the toilet."  What is not cute is when that assumption turns into an inappropriate belly pat on my non-physically pregnant wife's tummy.  Its like a bad episode of "Let's Make a Deal" where you have CLEARLY chosen poorly as to which curtain you should look behind.

So my overall advice, keep the belly pats to yourself, unless invited... and ESPECIALLY if you aren't sure which belly the baby is in.

MY INTENTIONS...

So like I have already covered... it was never my intention to be pregnant... and then it was not my intention for anyone to know that I was carrying the baby (which I would still like to maintain a shred of amniotic anonymity).  There is an awful lot of biological parent privilege... or "Mommy privilege" that I just don't want.  I don't need the comfiest chair, I don't need the first helping of food, and I certainly don't need anyone telling me to not pick up anything that weighs more than 15 pounds (I have done my research and our midwives have told us nothing over 50 pounds... which is not something I pick up on a routine basis anyways)... and I don't want people to assume that I am any more of the parent to this child than Amy....

Then I decided I did want to share my journey, with a select audience...  People who may be interested, people who are thinking about possibly being in our position someday, or people who maybe have an understanding of some of the issues that have arisen and will continue to arise throughout this process.  I have put together a very carefully crafted group on Facebook to share the journey with... (so that means if you see this in a status update, that you were specifically chosen... congrats!). 

So, I am finally ready to come out as a Pregnant Boi...  I am the one who is currently acting as the baby's housing unit.  And I am not a woman.  I don't want to be called Mama (I have yet to find the perfect way to address this with people, especially medical personnel.), and I don't want to be treated like I am breakable.  I just want to keep being me, and not be shoved into a whole other category of people that I don't necessarily feel I belong with.

Pregnant Boi's Pregnant Introduction

Here is my last picture before becoming the pregnant boi.  I don't know why I snapped this on the way to the
Docs office that day, but I think it is kind of special.

Hello,
I am the pregnant boi.   Or in people first language, the boi who is pregnant...  but most people call me Chris.  There are a lot of different ways that I could describe how we got to this point, but it is a long and complicated story, with lots of plot twists, anti-climaxes, semi-climaxes and other types of plot driven narrative devices... But alas, this specific blog isn't about BECOMING a pregnant boi, as much as it is BEING a pregnant boi.  But since becoming pregnant is an important part of being pregnant, I will outline the important facts of the matter in a bulleted list.

• I have a wonderful wife, Amy, who supports me and loves me and wants nothing more than to raise a family together.  We started plotting how to have kids before our second official date... and not in a lesbian joke punch line type of way (which wouldn't really fit because neither of us identify as lesbians... again, another story entirely...), but in a "we fit together well enough that we could imagine bringing up a small portion of the next generation together" way.  I must also mention that we had known each other for a total of 4 years before that second date.  Kind of like two puzzle pieces that have always gone together, but were stuck at opposite ends of the puzzle table, and then when you put them next to each other, it is obvious they should have been together all along...  I could go on and say more romantic stuff all day, but I will spare you...  Long story short... no one really had to convince us that having kids was for us... it was kind of inevitable.
• Being pregnant was never in the plan for me.  I may spend some of my time explaining more about this... but simply put, I never had an overwhelming desire to carry a child.  Maybe gender politics had something to do with it, or the fact that child birth never seemed like something I could (or wanted) to handle...  But anyways, through our process of BECOMING pregnant, there were different things that popped up that led us in this direction...  Amy will carry a child some day... it IS something that she has always wanted.  But because of circumstances beyond our control (dumb insurance policies, poor doctors communications, maternity leave issues, among other things that could lead me into a full on soap-box rant, etc.) I ended up in the saddle, or maybe I should say stirrups....
• It took us a long time to get pregnant.  We wanted to be that couple who visited a doctor once, and took a home pregnancy test, and never looked back, but that wasn't in the cards.  It took us 10 tries over the course of 1 year and a quarter, which is draining physically, emotionally, financially, spiritually and many other -ally's.  The process vastly changed my outlook on life, and what sacrifice really means.  It also means that this baby will always be one that was fought for.  Throughout the whole process, there was one thing that didn't change... and that the fact that, no matter, we would be parents.
• But what this blog is really about is, I'm not a woman, or a man, or boy or girl.  I have adopted the title of Boi, because that feels most comfortable.  Obviously, to become pregnant one has to have female sexual organs: and that I do.  But that is one of the only things that is uncomplicatedly female about me.  I love who I am, and it has taken me a long time to get here.  I feel like I have finally reached a place in my life, where I can just be me and do what I want without someone telling me I can or can't do that because I am a boy or a girl.  In political terms, I would say, I am an independent, but usually caucus with the males.  Practical examples:  Showers (baby, bridal or otherwise) are not my thing... so we have a tradition that during these events I go to hang out with the boys.  However, I am also a sucker for pedicures, shopping and interior design (now on the stereotypes scales these could make me female, or a gay male...) and my love for color and flamboyance often has me thrown in with dandies.  So to sum it all up... I am just me... (except for the parts of me that, not unlike any other human being, wants to fit in, which we will also discuss ad nauseum.)

Loving this book.  You should read it too! 

So...  I am sure I am forgetting something... and will fill in the cracks later.  I just needed to start writing, or it was never going to happen.  When I first decided to become a pregnant boi, I looked all over for information about what this "condition" was really like...  My searches mostly turned up blanks...  You can find tons of articles on how to keep wearing high heels throughout your pregnancy, but there wasn't a lot of information on how to avoid switching out my fruit of the loom tighty whities for maternity underwear (which I didn't even know was a thing...).  I did find a great comic book called "Pregnant Butch" by AK Summers and I am currently winding my way through that amazing piece of literature.... and I am sure I could find something academically written somewhere about the queering of pregnancy, this and that.... but I am not looking for academics here.  I am looking for real language that pertains to real people that is accessible to and for the regular Joe, Jane, Joe-Jane  and Jamie Schmo's of the world. 

I guess I am inviting you on my journey.  I don't know what all I will talk about, but I think for the good of my sanity, I need this project.  If there are others pregnant bois, or pregnant bois to be out there in the world, or anyone really who draws any insight or comfort from my experience that is a complete bonus.