Somewhat surprisingly to me, one of the questions I haven't been asked much is what the baby is going to call us. It's been a discussion around here since before we were truly planning to have a baby. Neither of us has an ethnic background who's name for "Mom" we want to use. We could go the whole "Mommy Allie"/"Mommy Jenny" route, but how long before the "Mommy" gets dropped and the kids are just calling us by our first names? I don't really like that. I'd be okay with being Mama to Jen's Mom or Mommy... but again, I'm concerned that Mama is a name that's too babyish for an older child to call their mom. So, names are still up in the air.
On a related note, I've been reading a some books about lesbian mothers and have a few others on my bookshelf.
Two that I've read are Confessions of the Other Mother: Non-biological Lesbian Mothers Tell All and Who's Your Daddy? I thought both were good... sometimes funny, sometimes thought-provoking. Both were fairly quick reads.
Some others I'm hoping to get a look at before the bean gets here are Don't call me daddy : a lesbian mom on sperm donors, not being pregnant, and the ups and downs of being the other mother (currently on hold and the library) and Families Like Mine, Children of Gay Parents Tell It Like It Is (on my bookshelf).
So, mommies, what do your little ones call you?
This is something that we have puzzled over as well and just can't come up with a good solution. I'm curious now that you have a baby what you all decided to do. Perhaps if I keep reading I'll find out.
ReplyDeleteRight now we're trying to do Mom and/or Mommy for Jen and Mama for me. Family and friends who are in tune with that sort of thing have been good about trying to refer to us using our names of choice, and I think to some extent Oliver will pick up on what we call each other and what other people call us, but he may also come up with names of his own, and I we'd be open to that.
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