What a great interview! thanks for sharing. Here's what I found most relevant: "What’s surprised me in the best way is this: everyone warns you that you’ll lose yourself in parenting. That you’ll disappear. ..."
MANY women end up "disappearing" either into their husband's identity or their kid's.
I came perilously close to that myself (the latter), and would jokingly say, "I'm X's mom" when asked my name. I cringe now, because while I ABSOLUTELY LOVED "seeing the amazing changes of a very happy and funny young human" (spot on, Matt!), I had to almost "reinvent" myself once my kid went to college. I also "evolved" and that's great, but while I felt I did share tons of stuff with my kid and gave advice/support in those years, I wonder if it could have been so much more (?) maybe?? Sigh.
So much to unpack here. Kudos to you/your husband for being successful parents!
Such a delight to read this-thanks Aidan for introducing me to Matt. I particularly loved the idea of creativity as inherent in the experience of queer parenting as well as how critical it is to show up authentically. Fantastic to add to the representation of queer dads too. Many thanks to you both!
Wonderful interview. I'm not a parent yet, but I think about what my journey to parenthood will look like a lot. I loved this answer from Matt: "For me, being a queer parent is liberating—but not in the flashy, rainbow-everything kind of way. It’s liberating because there’s no template we have to follow. There’s no default role to perform, no tired script about what a dad or a family is supposed to look like. We get to build it from scratch."
Bravo, gentlemen... My dad passed in 2019 after a very full life of love for me and mother, having stepped in after my biological father and mom's "love of her life" was killed in his '59 Corvette six months before my birth... Dad "Bill-Boy" would often tell me how important it was for him to be the best dad for me, as his father had died from an aneurysm when Bill was 8 years old.
Also, when my sexuality was on the table for disclosure, it was Dad Bill-Boy who said, "This doesn't change the fact that you are my son, and I love you. Your mother is not handling it well, so be patient with her..." My mother didn't handle it well for the next 20 years, after being my best friend until I was seventeen, when she completely shut me out! It took numerous suicide attempts on my part, and my eventual AIDS diagnosis in 1992 for her to just resolve it and tell me, "I just want you to be happy..."
What a great interview! thanks for sharing. Here's what I found most relevant: "What’s surprised me in the best way is this: everyone warns you that you’ll lose yourself in parenting. That you’ll disappear. ..."
MANY women end up "disappearing" either into their husband's identity or their kid's.
I came perilously close to that myself (the latter), and would jokingly say, "I'm X's mom" when asked my name. I cringe now, because while I ABSOLUTELY LOVED "seeing the amazing changes of a very happy and funny young human" (spot on, Matt!), I had to almost "reinvent" myself once my kid went to college. I also "evolved" and that's great, but while I felt I did share tons of stuff with my kid and gave advice/support in those years, I wonder if it could have been so much more (?) maybe?? Sigh.
So much to unpack here. Kudos to you/your husband for being successful parents!
Such a delight to read this-thanks Aidan for introducing me to Matt. I particularly loved the idea of creativity as inherent in the experience of queer parenting as well as how critical it is to show up authentically. Fantastic to add to the representation of queer dads too. Many thanks to you both!
Love the point about the fakeness of the political “war” over kids. A great read! Thank you both!
Wonderful interview. I'm not a parent yet, but I think about what my journey to parenthood will look like a lot. I loved this answer from Matt: "For me, being a queer parent is liberating—but not in the flashy, rainbow-everything kind of way. It’s liberating because there’s no template we have to follow. There’s no default role to perform, no tired script about what a dad or a family is supposed to look like. We get to build it from scratch."
Bravo, gentlemen... My dad passed in 2019 after a very full life of love for me and mother, having stepped in after my biological father and mom's "love of her life" was killed in his '59 Corvette six months before my birth... Dad "Bill-Boy" would often tell me how important it was for him to be the best dad for me, as his father had died from an aneurysm when Bill was 8 years old.
Also, when my sexuality was on the table for disclosure, it was Dad Bill-Boy who said, "This doesn't change the fact that you are my son, and I love you. Your mother is not handling it well, so be patient with her..." My mother didn't handle it well for the next 20 years, after being my best friend until I was seventeen, when she completely shut me out! It took numerous suicide attempts on my part, and my eventual AIDS diagnosis in 1992 for her to just resolve it and tell me, "I just want you to be happy..."
Thank you, Aiden and Matt... Amen.