Growing Up Hayden

 

We’ve named our blog, Growing Up Hayden because we feel it’s a testament to what it is to live in the now, in a world where the LGBT community is fighting for acceptance and equality.  Our content is focused on all aspects of what it is to live, love and thrive in what’s still a very judgmental world.  Growing Up Hayden is a live narrative that we hope will continue to illustrate positive changes and a more and more loving, open and welcoming world.

Happy National Adoption Day

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A few years ago when Josh and I first wanted to adopt, we were surprised we couldn’t find an online resource that gave us a comprehensive list of gay-friendly adoption agencies – driven by reviews from our own community. This is one of the main reasons why we decided to start Hayden’s List. We didn’t want to just give people a comprehensive list of LGBT friendly adoption agencies though, we wanted to give people a comprehensive list of LGBT friendly everything.

It’s been a little over a year since we’ve launched and we’re proud to announce that we have over one-thousand reviews on Hayden’s List. We’ve given our community the power to raise their own voices, and here’s a big THANK YOU to all of you who have in fact raised your voices! Your reviews have already made a difference to other LGBT community members and families.

Happy National Adoption Day, from our family to yours.

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Here We Go

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The very first flight we took with our son was when he was only a few weeks old.  We were heading to a wedding in Los Angeles.

Those who know us know all too well it was only fitting our son would be on a cross-country flight before turning one month old. We were new dads but as all parents know, it’s a learn-on-the-job type gig.  Spend twenty-four seven with anyone and you tend to figure them out quite well.

As we sat at our gate at Logan Airport I watched as two women across the way chatted and pointed at us. I hadn’t really thought about comments or stares. We were flying from Boston to Los Angeles after all, two fairly progressive cities.

After a few moments one of the ladies came over, took my hand, which at the moment was burping my child, moved it down and said, “No, you burp here.”

I just looked at her. Did she really just do that?

First off, it’s strange when anyone I don’t know touches me but even after just two short weeks of burping our child every two to three hours, we quickly figured out the “right spot.”

I moved my hand back, he burped, and I just simply smiled, hoping she would walk away.  Instead she asked, “So, where is his mother?”

I honestly don’t remember how I responded.  Does she go up to single mothers she sees and asks where the father is?  It was at that moment I realized that no matter where we are or where we’re traveling, we stick out.

This didn’t and hasn’t stopped us from traveling, of course.  Our son has now been on roughly thirty flights in his twenty-seven months on this earth.  He even has his own frequent flier card.

It was right before his second birthday, our last “free flight” as he was still a baby and we were heading from Los Angeles to Louisville, Kentucky to visit some of our dearest friends.  As we sat on the flight from Las Vegas to Louisville I immediately felt the stares.  If a woman in Boston has the gall to ask me about my child, what would they say in Kentucky?  I braced myself.

In the middle of the flight I got up to use the restroom and the flight attendants were all in the back catching up on the latest news and life updates.  As I approached they all smiled and said, “We are all sitting back here talking about you guys.  You guys are just such a cute family!”  It made me smile.

As we landed in Louisville the family in front of us turned around and welcomed us to Kentucky.  They told us everything we should do, see and eat during our stay and asked us all about our son.  Their conversation was genuine and again I smiled.

Today we’re headed home for Thanksgiving, on our way to Kansas City.  Walking through the airport, a now-familiar family routine, I know we still stick out.  We may not look like the other families returning home from their Disney World vacations but we aren’t so different.  We are just like them: proud parents taking a trip to Grandma’s house with our beautiful son.  As we board the plane our son shouts out, “Here we go!” Everyone, buckled in their seats, joins in, “Here we go!”  Our little guy starts to laugh.  I smile bigger than I ever have.

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Florida Fall Festival: Palm Trees, Food Trucks and One Gay Family

Recently we went to our new town’s Fall Festival. We felt drawn to it immediately, not only being the new town we would call home but because it centered around the Fall Season. A season in which we loved during our short stint living in New England. Pumpkin patches, corn mazes and trees painted in various colors by Mother Nature, fall was by far our most favorite season in Massachusetts. So off we went to take it all in.

Here in Florida, there’s no pumpkin patch or corn maze, rather food trucks and bouncy houses for the kids. The trees are still the same color; bright green palms like time standing still.  I immediately began feeling nostalgic towards New England, wondering what our old friends were doing to take in the fall day far up I-95.

As we entered the festival anxiety set in. I was feeling out of place. It was as if I was dressed in drag, carrying a Rainbow Flag and blaring Cher on my boombox.  We stuck out. “One of these things is not like the other…” was replaying over and over again in my head. I wanted to look busy, like any other family and blend into the crowd but the more I tried to blend the more I felt everyone staring.

We walked through the crowds and I watched as my husband stopped by every booth. He wanted to try the jams, look at the trinkets and talk to everyone he came into contact with. I never noticed the jams or the trinkets, I kept looking to see if anyone did a double-take. What if they don’t accept us? What if our kid isn’t invited over to play with their kids, because of our “lifestyle?” How would I explain that to my son?

By this point Josh had ran into multiple people from high school, all of whom asked for his number and wanted to get together. He was in his element, so happy to be home.  Why was I freaking out? I didn’t want to let on, even to my husband, how uncomfortable I felt – this was his home after all.

As we went to leave our son noticed the balloon booth.  Anyone who knows our kiddo knows he can’t leave anywhere without a free balloon. Back in L.A. he would come home everyday from the grocery store with a new balloon. The ladies in the check out lines always held old balloons just for him. He would walk through our back door proudly holding his “Happy Administrative Assistant’s Day” or “Happy Nurses Day” balloon. That’s my boy, I thought. As I approached the booth I realized it was the local church that was giving them away. We went up to the pastor and he gave Hayden his balloon and immediately a smile came across his face.

His balloon didn’t last very long. Within minutes he let go and off it went up into the sky, but his smile didn’t fade. “Bye balloon!” he shouted.

The fall festival wasn’t exactly as I expected but my boys had an incredible time. Experiences are what shape us and make us better people. We came here to expose those in the South to our beautiful family, I have a feeling they will in turn have a huge impact on me as well. Maybe sticking out is exactly what I need right now.

Mommy?

Being an LGBT parent is like being in a sub class of a sub class. We might be making great strides for equality, but it’s still slow going for LGBT parents. When Hayden says “Mommy,” I’m wondering how I might explain to him that his daddies are passively discriminated against?

I knew early on that there would be so many things I’d have to explain to Hayden as he grew up. I just didn’t expect our light-hearted, happy two year old to start asking about mommy so soon. We always knew the mommy question would come.

A small child can’t figure out that two guys can’t make a baby, and our adoption agency (Adoptions With Love) did a really good job at preparing us for long term questions like that. We have support groups and had to go through weekend classes on it. (If only straight couples had to go through what we went through to have a child!) We laid the groundwork for him to have a relationship with his birthmother if he chooses to so so later down the road. For now I know he isn’t really asking where is HIS mommy as much as he’s still in the I-learned-a-new-word-on-TV phase. We watch Sprout TV basically an off shoot of PBS. So we are talking we watch The Wiggles, Caillou, and Sesame Street. In a world that says it’s striving for equality, the media outlets still focus on a mom-dad based family.

Sure there a fair share of “Will & Grace” shows introducing gay characters to society as if we’re “new.” But in the world of children’s TV we are still stuck on Mom+Dad=Family. Occasionally they skirt by with a single mom or single dad to represent different types of families. But all in all not too much has changed since Mr. Rogers. Hence Hayden’s new word.

Awhile back I watched the movie “The Giver” while Scott was out of town. I remember reading this in sixth grade. It was a part of a school program where everyday the teacher read a book to the class for thirty minutes. The story is about a twelve year old boy who lives in a seemingly utopian community. He is selected by the community elders to become the receiver of memory. I mean, how grande does that sound? It’s like this that he meets the Giver: the elder in the community who is entrusted with all the previous knowledge from people before their time. The Giver teaches the boy about everything: color, beauty, love, and hunger, pain, suffering.

Watching this movie all alone, I admit: I teared up. It moved me to know that part of my job as a parent is to show Hayden the amazing world we live in. To show him all the beautiful places and people in the world. To watch him in a school play, witness his discovery of how things work and see him falling in love. The realization quickly set in that I would also have to hold him when he has his first heart break, be there when he falls off his bike, to do my best and explain to him about death when he realizes our dog Louie is no longer around.

The question of mommy is just another one of the lessons daddy is going to have to teach.
Both of us, that is.

Your husband?

It was 2012 and my phone rang. It was our neighbor letting us know that our garage door was still open. Being late at night he knew we must have left it open, and was being neighborly and looking out for us. They were a sweet family, always so polite when we saw them. We would talk about the weather, our yards and their kids. As I would leave the husband would always say, tell your brother we said hello. I always just smiled and in my head would think, “I’ll tell him later tonight when I’m sleeping with him.”

It wasn’t just our neighbors that thought we were brothers, it was a common occurrence while living in the south. Whether a neighbor, waiter or fellow passenger on a plane I never corrected them. At times I felt courageous and would say “partner” but all too often I quietly smiled and disregarded my relationship that I was so proud to have.

So returning to Jacksonville this fall I knew the time would come. Being away for four years and living in New England and California people asked all the time about our relationship, and over time I became more confident in saying “husband.” At first it was our neighbors in Massachusetts, then to our regular waiter in Los Angeles and eventually I even found myself correcting passengers sitting by me on a plane – when they would ask about my wife, I would proudly correct them and say husband. Now though, I was back in the south. Would that confidence fade?

I figured it would be at a party a few weeks in, or out at a restaurant a few months after our move. But it happened on day one. Yes, day one. We were outside our storage unit when an older woman pulled up in her SUV. She asked me if I would help her unload an old trunk from her unit. Without any hesitation, I must have forgotten I was out of L.A. and I said:

Me: “Let me grab my husband to help us.”
Her: “Your what?”
Me: “My husband. He’s right over there.”
Her: Looking puzzled and pointing at him, “Your….what?”
Me: “My husband ma’am, we’d be more than happy to help you.”

She continued to look puzzled while we helped her. As we lifted the trunk into the car and closed the hatch, we noticed the “Take Back America” bumper sticker on her car. She tried to give us a tip but we declined. We said we don’t want a tip, but asked her to do a good deed for someone else down the line. She then asked about the little boy she saw us with earlier. We told her about our son and she asked when we got married. We told her our story and then we politely said we had to go. As we drove off she smiled, still looking slightly puzzled, and waved. All we could think was, we may have been the first gay couple, actually gay dads, she had ever met in her life.

We may not have changed her life that day but we did expose her to our life and our family. My beautiful family – me, our son and my husband.

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Things Kids Say

Kids say the darnedest things.

Like the other day when I went to breakfast with one of my best friends and her four year old son.  We’re waiting for a table and her son walks over to the hostess and says, “I’m taller than you.”  Everyone smiled and the hostess, blushing a little, graciously replied, “Yes you are.”

My friend retrieved her son and walked him back towards where we were standing, “What do you say to that?” she whispered to me.  The hostess was, in fact, a “little person.”

They say there are two honest people in the world:  drunks and kids.  And it’s true, things kids say provides comic relief. It helps us as adults see the world through more innocent, honest eyes.

I remember a rare trip I took with Scott to the Philippines.  Rare because I hardly ever travel with him because he’s working.  But this time we were there to volunteer at an orphanage. We taught the kids dance classes, fixed up buildings, and did neighborhood cleanups.  Scott and I were sponsoring a child there at the time and it was amazing to actually be able to meet him.

One afternoon while at the family’s hut some of the kids surprised me by asking, “Are you a gay?”

I don’t speak Tagalog but I sensed the parents politely telling the kids that wasn’t polite to blurt out these questions.  In the States I might have felt more embarrassed.  But because I was far away from home, I just laughed and replied with a smile, “Yes, I am.”

It was a milestone for me but I also feel it was a milestone for a country deeply rooted in Catholicism.  Especially seeing as how we were on a very rural island in the middle of nowhere.  Just the fact that these kids would even ask me such a question is proof of some kind of worldly progress.  When a child learns something, a barrier is broken.  We can all learn a little something when a child breaks the social barriers we put up. There is always the hope of change in the eyes of a child. And they really do say the darnedest things.

Why Florida

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Sitting out on the deck with my mom for morning coffee makes me remember why we’ve come back here. It’s like being on a family vacation, but this is real life.

Since day one Scott and I have always talked about big life decisions.  We always talked about our long term goals, the “where do you see yourself in five years, in ten years” conversations.  Not that we always make the right decision, but we always make it together. And making the decisions together early on confirmed we’d be just fine together.  We knew we wanted a family. We knew we wanted to raise a family in a home. And we knew we wanted to give our family all the 2.0 versions of the things we wanted to do over.

I was very adamit to Scott that I wanted to settle down into a “forever house.” Maybe not the house we would retire into, but at least the house we would have to raise Hayden. By the time he started school, I wanted to be in the house we would see him graduate high school from. I want to be in the house we build all the memories in: school plays, holidays, dances, dinners, marking how tall you grow on the wall. I may be “progressive” or “liberal” but I’m also Martha Stewart, a step ford wife, a clutch my pearls kinda gal.

In all our plans and dreaming of the future, we shared a similar vision.  We both wanted the house, the family, the extended family nearby, the summers in Europe, we wanted the dream. Originally we left Florida to start our family. We moved to California to pursue that dream. And ultimately and maybe ironically the reason we moved back to Florida was to fulfill that dream.

My mom is so happy to have her son and grandson here. She proudly takes Hayden out to the country club and Hayden loves playing with his cousins. We are looking for the neighborhood to build our dream home, planning the family summers in Europe. We are also planning for our next child. We are in a place where we can affect change in the LGBT community. We are home.