Jonathan and Thomas West, co-authors of A Kids Book About Gay Parents, talk about showing the world that ALL kinds of families are beautiful and possible!
Jonathan and Thomas West, co-authors of A Kids Book About Gay Parents, talk about showing the world that ALL kinds of families are beautiful and possible! .
A Kids Book About Gay Parents (view book)
Full Book Description:
Growing up, the authors of this book didn’t see families that looked like theirs. As the gay dads to 4 adopted kiddos, they’re here to show the world that ALL kinds of families are beautiful and possible! These dads share their journey in becoming parents and the empowering message that no matter who you are, you can build a family—all you need is love (and maybe ice cream and silliness) to make it happen.
About the Author:
Jonathan (he/him) and Thomas (he/him) West are married, gay dads to 4 adopted children, live in Vermont, and are committed to sharing their lives to bring about the change they want to see in the world. Jonathan is a CTO of a software company, and Thomas is a retired US Army veteran and stay-at-home dad.
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A Kids Book About: The Podcast
Jonathan and Thomas Talk About Gay Parents
[INTRODUCTION]
Matthew: What does it mean to have gay parents?
Jonathan: Well, gay parents generally refers to two men or two women who love each other and are parents to kids.
Matthew: Welcome to A Kids Book About: The Podcast! I’m Matthew. I’m a teacher, a librarian, and I’m your host.
The voice you heard just a moment ago was from Jonathan. We’ll also meet Thomas, Jonathan’s partner, shortly.
Each week we talk about the big things going on in your world with a different author from our A Kids Book About series.
Jonathan: Hi, my name is Jonathan West and this is my husband, Thomas West. And we are two queer husbands and dads to four kiddos. And we are the co authors of A Kids Book About Gay Parents.
[TOPIC FOUNDATION]
Matthew: Hi, everyone! I’m so glad you’re joining us today for this conversation about families. We are all part of a family and no two families are alike. Each and everyone is different, and I expect this episode will have you thinking a lot about the ways your family is the same or is different from that of our guests.
Jonathan and Thomas are gay. And they are parents together. Gay parents.
But Jonathan used a different word in his introduction: queer.
The world has not always been a welcoming place for gay or queer parents. And, in a lot of ways, it’s still not welcoming in all places and spaces. Using the word “gay” or “queer” in public may draw unwanted attention or may cause people to treat you differently in a negative way.
Thomas: So, for the longest time, even the word gay, was a difficult way to describe ourselves publicly. That wasn't even something that we did for a very long time because of the time in which we grew up. So it was the… for us, I guess the late nineties, early two thousands.
And “queer”, I think that is one of those words that we're reclaiming. But we, I think just between the two of us, but you've alluded to it, have a difficult relationship with that word because it does come with very negative connotations for our generation. I don't think today's generation, kids in middle school, high school, or even just in college now feel that same way, but yeah, it definitely has. It's taken some work for us to even use that word out loud.
Matthew: Jonathan and Thomas have four kids together. That sounds like it’s probably a really busy and bustling household with lots and lots of love to go around.
But one of the coolest things about families is that sometimes they form without any plan or without dreams of forming. Like a seed in the sidewalk that finds just the right soil and conditions to grow into a beautiful flower.
For Thomas and for Jonathan, having a family was not something that always felt like a possibility.
Thomas: For me, no. It just didn't feel like a reality, something that was possible growing up. And it wasn't until I was in my thirties, early to mid thirties, that it was a discussion that we started having that actually felt like a possibility, but that took effort. That took a lot of effort, not only personally, but in terms of really understanding how possible it was.
Jonathan: We just never saw people or had the ability to see people in our media, like on television or in stories that emulated a gay parent and their family. It's not to say they didn't exist. They certainly were there. And we know that now, looking back, we know that they were there. But for us, it was like, we didn't see it, so we didn't think it was something that was possible for us.
And then it wasn't until we went to a wedding and we saw this amazing family atmosphere with our friends and their traditions and raising, you know, beginning the, the foothold of starting a family that we looked at each other and were like, “This, this is pretty cool. This is kind of what we want.” And, um, I think from there it was… We haven’t looked back since then.
Matthew: It's what representation is all about. Why Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop talks about the need for windows and mirrors and sliding glass doors in books. So many of us don't even see it as a possibility because we've never seen it before. It's very, very hard to imagine something that you have absolutely no context for. It just doesn't seem like it could be a thing.
Jonathan: Representation matters. Period.
[PERSONAL CONNECTION TO TOPIC]
Matthew: Not all families are the same. You know this. But also, not all families have the same access to resources or support or to the things that would make raising kids just a little bit easier.
Jonathan: Yeah, and I think we say this in our book that we strived as parents for that same feeling of family that we had seen around us. But we also valued the uniqueness of families. That not every family is the same. You may have Two dads, two moms, a mom and a dad, a grandparent raising you.
It's all about, ultimately, love and what you value communally as a family. And I think it's both good to be like everyone else, but also you need to support and cherish the uniquenesses that you have for your particular family, because there's no family.
What is the actual phrase that we use? And we always, we, we wrote this one phrase and we, we love it. It's that no family is better than or worse than yours. It's just right for you.
Matthew: “We want you to know, whatever your family is, it is exactly right. And not better or worse than any other family.”
Thomas: There are similarities and differences between being a gay parent and being a cis, normative, straight, I mean whatever phrase you want to use to describe a family where you identify as a, you know, just kind of the average…
Jonathan: “Traditional family.”
Thomas: Yeah, quote unquote traditional family. But at the same time, we do all of the same things that any other parent does.
I mean, we, we unfortunately help our kids with homework. We still change poopy diapers. We still have to make breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We help them take baths and showers. I mean, we do all of the same things that any other parent should be doing.
The difference is that we have to, for our children and within our community, you know, acknowledge, be willing to acknowledge and recognize the fact that our family does look different. And have those conversations with not only our children, but with other members of the community so that they do know that our families, our family in particular is different and that other families just like ours may look a little bit different, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. And having those discussions as early as possible with kids, not just your kids, but with kids is so important.
Matthew: Let’s take a quick break. And when we return, Jonathan and Thomas will talk about acceptance through visibility and what it looks like when that acceptance plays out across our day-to-day settings like school, home, and throughout our communities.
Jonathan: We believe that by getting our family out there, whether it's through social media, through a book, through traveling the country in some of the more difficult areas that our family typically wouldn't be accepted, that we can do one of two things:
Because we're visible, we can not allow people to use the excuse, “Well, I've never seen it before, so I don't know that it exists.” And then once they see a family like ours, and they see how “normal” we really are, normal in quotes, I mean, every family's kind of a little crazy, right? They can make those connections.
And we've had so many experiences where we've gone into a very conservative area of our country, and a very religious, very traditional, uh, family interacts with us, and then by the end of our experience in interacting with them, they go, “That's awesome. It's so great to meet you.”
And I know we've made a connection that we're not just some thing that might possibly occur. We are real and we do the same things and talk about the same things as everyone else.
And then from the other side, it's that by being out there and being visible, that we can make connections with folks who just need validation that people like us do exist and that they can exist just like us. And that's why representation is so important.
Thomas: Well, and I should add that I think we've also personally recognized that not everyone, uses the phrase acceptance in the same way that we do. So not every family is looking for acceptance. They might just be looking to be recognized and acknowledged that they even exist.
Jonathan: Absolutely.
So, I mean, we've, we've been on this journey for quite a while as a family. And we've shared our story for quite a few years now. So obviously our ideas have changed and looking back, we've certainly morphed our opinions on certain things, but ultimately, uh, you know, right from the very beginning, being out there and being a representation is very important.
I think acceptance through visibility is a great way for us to espouse that.
Matthew: We’ll be back in just a moment.
[BREAK]
Matthew: Welcome back.
Today on the podcast we’re talking about gay parents with A Kids Book About co-authors Jonathan and Thomas West.
Listeners, I want to speak a truth about the world to you that you may or may not have already noticed. Sometimes we, as grownups, ask you not to ask certain questions or not to look at the things you encounter in your world with curiosity.
What I mean by that is, often you encounter people or families that look or sound different from you or your family or people you’ve met before. You might ask your grownup “why” and they may or may not give you a satisfying answer. Most likely, this is because they are just not sure of what answer to give.
I want to reassure you, and I’m confident your grownups will agree, that noticing families that look different from yours is absolutely okay. In fact, noticing can even sound and look like love.
Here’s what Thomas shared when I asked if it’s okay to notice that your family looks different from another’s family?
Thomas: I think the short answer is yes, because we do look different. And it's a conversation that we are actively and continuously having with our own kids. And I think it's something that we have successfully done in a way that allows our children to have those conversations with their classmates and their teachers and anyone else in the community that they might be interacting with.
You know, I actually recently… so I grew up in a family that was a divorced family and, but my younger sister recently acknowledged that she grew up in a family that of, I don't know how you'd phrase it, but non divorced, not divorced. And she felt like her family was different. And she felt that in a bad way.
So I heard that and thought, “Man, families just are changing and they look different in so many different ways.” It's not just two dads or two moms or one dad or one mom. It could be a dad and a stepmom, or a mom and a stepdad or, or whatever it is. It could be your uncle raising you, it could be your grandparents raising you.
So yeah, it's absolutely okay to acknowledge that families look different. And, again, the earlier that you do it, the better.
Matthew: We talked earlier about the world not always feeling safe or welcoming to gay parents, let alone LGBTQ individuals. This is not to say that joy does not exist in parenthood for LGBTQ families. It does. Lots and lots of joy.
But it means that, when asked “How does it feels to be gay parents”, the answer is complicated.
Jonathan: I think now the question is kind of like, what's so exciting is that it's not even really a question that really needs to be asked. And especially for one of our children who identifies as nonbinary, I mean, that was something that came to us that we, we technically really weren't prepared for. But we're so proud of how well they are adjusting and telling us how they feel and explaining it at a third grade level, right?
It's amazing how the kids when given the opportunity can have these big feelings that are really important. And me as a gay parent, that’s really exciting because I feel like each generation should be better than the next, right? Or have more capabilities and risks and freedoms and assurances that their life is going to be better than their parents or their grandparents.
And I think for our kiddos, in terms of gender equality and queerness and acceptance, I think it's very humbling, but also very exciting to see how the next generation is taking so much that we strive for and owe to the generations that came before us. And they're taking and running with it. And that's so, so exciting. And I'm just so proud of our kiddos and how they, they, they're taking it on even at a very young age.
Thomas: It feels a little scary to me sometimes to think about what it means to be a gay parent or a queer parent, a different kind of parent. And I say that mostly because there's a level of responsibility that I feel almost as though we're representing a very large group of people. Because if we get it wrong, even in the slightest way, which every parent does… No one's perfect. I think that's hard for kids to recognize in the moment that your parents aren't perfect. And as you become a parent, you realize, Nope, I'm definitely not perfect. Neither were my parents.
But it can be a little scary for me to think that the representation that we have made a very honest and proactive attempt at espousing is seen by a lot of people. And whenever someone gets it wrong, it can, it can be viewed by the public as a whole as a failure of that community to do the right thing and used as an example of why they shouldn't be allowed to be parents. Right?
So it, it can be, it can be scary.
Jonathan: Even one example. I know we've had these conversations with, you know, people, especially on social media where, you know, they will, will post a picture of our family and we'll get some, a lot of great feedback and a lot of positives.
And then we'll get one person who will, you know, throw out a lot of. negative comments and they might bring up one story about something, like Thomas was saying, that was when they got it wrong someone did the wrong thing.
And unfortunately that is magnified or amplified when, you know, we're in the minority and we're encroaching on the overall Um, uh, uh, things that a traditional family would have. And you know, those…
I mean, I came from my answer from a very… from the kid's perspective why I'm proud. I think Thomas is very accurate that it bears a lot of weight cause we don't want to get it wrong.
Matthew: No family is a monolith. No family is a representation of all families or of the way all families should be.
That goes just the same for the queer community. Jonathan and Thomas are just one example of gay parents raising a family.
It hurts my heart to hear of the pressure that exists in our country and in many of our communities for queer families like theirs to not mess up, to not make mistakes, or else they might be pointed to as an example of why not to accept or allow something that looks different from your own experience.
But as I say these words, I know that you, too, listeners, come from families and backgrounds and communities where pressure is put on you to look a certain way or to behave a certain way or to fit in in a certain way. That is not fair and I hope work like the conversation we’re having today can help to undo that pressure. But right now, in this space, I want to acknowledge it, to call it out so that we all can be more aware of it and work to make our spaces more welcoming, more built around love and acceptance and tolerance for others.
Thomas: It's something that I think about regularly, that no matter what kind of parent you are, no matter who you are, in probably 99 percent of the cases, you've made a conscious decision to have a child.
And it's incredibly important that your children, and just generally speaking, the children in your lives know that so that they know that they're loved, that they belong, and that there will always, always be someone who's looking out for them, no matter who it is, and no matter how old they might be.
Matthew: Our time’s almost up. I’m about to send you back out into the world. So let’s take a moment to consider how we can use this knowledge we gained together to help look out for the people with whom we share this world: our friends, our classmates, our family, our community.
Jonathan? Thomas? Are there any actions we, the listeners, can take to be more welcoming, supportive, and celebratory to families of all types, as well as to the kids and classmates in those families?
Jonathan: So personally, I feel that it's really important to start and have the conversations.
So many times we shy away from having discussions. because we're afraid to have them. And I think, specifically, our kids are ready to have the conversations. And I think it's very apparent that when we talk to our kids and without…
I mean, obviously they're exposed to yes, a same sex or same gendered, queer, however you want to define our family, they're exposed to that on a daily basis, but that's not what defines us. So when our kids go to their classroom and they're seeing differences beyond, you know, racial or sexuality or identity, they're seeing much more subtle things. They are much more understanding of these things because they've been exposed to it and they've had the discussion.
You know, this child may say a certain thing because they have a difficulty in explaining things or understanding how to behave in certain situations. It doesn't make them less of a person because they lack that capability. It just means they learn differently.
And for the same reason, our family may have two dads, a daddy and a papa, but you know, some families may be raised in foster care or they may be raised in, you know, two grandparents. But ultimately each of those scenarios does not necessarily mean that they're not normal human being that needs love, inclusion, and trust.
And by allowing ourselves as a community to have these conversations and include, we're not taking away from anyone's rights by including everyone. And I've heard that's recently said, and I think it's so true. I think there's a scariness that is around inclusion that “Well, when we give them those rights, I'm gonna lose my rights.” And the fact of the matter is, no, you, in most cases, you're gonna keep your rights, you're gonna keep your ability to exist in the same way and manner, cause ultimately, we're just saying,”You know what, we also see you over there in the corner, and we think that you are just as deserving.”
And, um, everyone should be under the same rules. And the same amount of empathy and love and inclusion and trust 'cause that's ultimately what everyone strives for.
Thomas: I want everyone listening to this to know that no matter who you are, a kid, a grownup, that you are loved, you are wanted, and you belong.
And no matter what the topic is, maybe it's, maybe it's gay parents, maybe it's a book about adoption. Maybe it's a book about pronouns, that it's okay to not know the answers to many of these questions, but having those conversations, again, no matter if you're a kid or a grownup, is important. And the earlier we do it, the better.
[CLOSING]
Matthew: Thank you to Jonathan and Thomas West, co-authors of A Kids Book About Gay Parents, for joining us today.
A Kids Book About: The Podcast is written, edited, and produced by me, Matthew Winner. Our executive producer is Jelani Memory.
And this show was brought to you by A Kids Co.
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