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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (April 7, 2000)
27 B o o t l e * o-€ ^Joy Com tinued from P age 25 60.000 children in foster care.) More than 100.000 of these children are awaiting adop tion, according to the national headquarters of the ACLU. The last available statistics show that there were qualified adoptive parents for only 20 percent of these children. Jonathan Kipp helps his son with homework Some activists worry that with gay and les bian families steadily increasing, more and more states will consider legislation to curtail the growth. Daniel Dale and Michael Byerley didn’t realize they could be foster parents three years ago. “W hen I found out different, I realized I’m young enough to still be a parent. It is some thing I’ve always wanted to do,” Dale says. Early on, Dale and Byerley wanted to find support from other gay and lesbian foster par ents, so they started Rainbow FLAG S, a group for sexual minority foster and adoptive parents. W hile most foster parents do not adopt their foster children, the two men are currently adopting two unrelated foster sons. Both are teen-agers and have lingered in the foster care system for years; they’ve been with Dale and Beyerley for nearly three years. Dale says the state supports the idea of sexu al minority foster and adoptive parents on paper, but the real world presents real obstacles. He is working for change around these chal lenges but remains focused on his boys and the daily difficulties they face. “To know that they can always be excited about better things coming is the best thing about being a parent,” Dale explains. [Editor's note: Sadly, M ichael Beyerley passed away on March 29, but Dan Dale plans to contin ue to pursue the adoption o f their foster children.] ecause of the national crisis of chil dren lingering in foster care, adoption and fostering policies have become increasingly inclusive. In many states, includ ing Oregon, being gay or lesbian does not pre clude one from becoming a foster or adoptive parent, though some private agencies still will not work with sexual minorities. W hile several public and private agencies will work with gay men and lesbians, most do not advertise this fact. Recently, however, one local adoption agency did just that. Open Adoption & Family Services Inc. was featured in The Oregonian last year and revealed that it welcomes gay and lesbian applicants. A t about the same time, sex columnist Dan Savage released his book The Kid: What H ap pened A fter My Boyfriend and l Decided to G o G et Pregnant. The book chronicles Savage and his partners odyssey into the world of infant adoption. The experience seems to resonate with a growing number of post twenty-some thing gay men who are pondering a childless future, as did Savage. “At about age 3 0 ,1 began to contemplate my impending middle age with a degree of hor ror,” Savage writes. “What was I going to do for the next 40 or 50 years? It didn’t take me long to conclude I would need more in my life than money and men. 1 would want something meaningful to do with my free time, something besides traveling the world collecting Fiesta Ware and intestinal parasites.” B fa*o'i\y L i i c hildren change lives, and family life will never be the same. Newborn twins, a curious 8-year-old, a rebellious teen, an adult child visiting on the weekends with a baby of her own— being a parent changes everything. For one local activist, becoming a grandpar ent was one of parenting’s greatest payoffs. “We love it!” says Bonnie Tinker, grand mother and founder of LoVe Makes a Family. Tinker says she sees that the community has more and more grandparents every day, and she believes it is important to be working with the grandchildren. She worries that youngsters are getting all the same anti-gay messages children received in the past and that they have to learn to deal with the conflict of loving their grandparents and hearing the way others talk about them. C GROUPS L esbian and G ay P arenting G roup for parents of children ages 0 to 3 years, meets the second Saturday of each month in Eugene. (541) 346-4239 S exual M inority P arents A dvisory G roup advises Port land Public Schools. P.O. Box 5163, Portland, O R 97208; SMPAG@teleport.com; (503) 471-1522 (See “Parents, Politics and Pals” on Page 41 for additional groups.) a d o p t io n O pen A doption & F amily S ervices I nc . 5200 S.W. Macadam Ave., Suite 250, Portland, O R 97201; www.openadoption.com; (503) 226-4870 “We miss him during the day,” Gores admits, reaching over to grab Eggum’s hand. Ov/T Public art of what makes par enting unique and extra challenging for gay men P | and lesbians is not what hap pens in their homes but what occurs out in the world. For some gay parents, being in pub lic gives rise to strange looks or unwelcome comments. Lesbian, grandmother and activist Bonnie Tinker “Where’s mommy today? Are you on your way to “1 often introduce myself as a grandmother, mommy’s house? Are your baby-sitters taking because I think it is important in the commu good care of you for mommy? Did these two nity for us to be visible,” remarks Tinker, who boys steal you from your mommy? Whose baby parents three children with her longtime part are you.7” Savage writes, acknowledging that he ner. and his partner expect to be answering these The search for balance between work and questions for the rest of their lives. family exists for sexual minority parents as it Society is not entirely comfortable with does for all parents. After the birth of her son, men caring for children. Just ask any stay-at- Gores planned that she would take her son to home dad with a breadwinning wife. Gay men work with her. She converted the conference looking to have children may have some diffi culty escaping the societal myth that gay men m molest children. But study after study has con- 2 eluded otherwise. An ACLU report says “a | child’s risk of being molested by his or her rela- | tive’s heterosexual partner is over 100 times o greater than by someone who might be identi- i fiable as being homosexual, lesbian or bisexu al.” The report also states that heterosexual males commit 90 percent of all child abuse (including sexual abuse). John Toles, now a part-time parent since divorcing his longtime partner, says he and his former partner used to get “interesting looks” when they would walk in public with their young son between them. Toles would often explain to people who asked that he wasn’t the dad but the boy’s dad’s partner. Adding to the unpredictability of what can happen is that children, in fact, are often very unpredictable. Buonocore s youngest daughter processes her thoughts verbally, he says. “Sometimes she’ll introduce me as gay. ‘This is my dad— he’s gay,’ ” he laughs, telling the story of his introduction to his daughter’s Sunday school teacher. For some, being out and about only brings positive interactions. Michael Buonocore has chores aplenty as a dad “We haven’t had any nasty stares,” Eggum says. “In fact, people walk up to us and com room in her high-rise office space into a nurs ment about what a beautiful child he is.” ery. At first it was great, she says, but soon Gores found she was putting her clients on ■ JONATHAN K ipp is a Portland-based free-lance hold to respond to her baby’s cries. Since then, writer. H e and his partner have a 16-year-old fo s Gores (“mama”) and Eggum (“yumma,” which ter son and are diligendy working on expanding is Arabic for mother) have hired a full-time their family via surrogacy and open adoption. You nanny, and Eggum has cut back her hours at can reach him at jkipp@ teleport.com . the office. S tate O f O regon , O ffice for S ervices to C hildren and F amilies . (800) 331-0503 INFERTILITY AND SURROGACY O regon H ealth S ciences U niversity , F ertility C onsul tants . 1750 S.W. Harbor Way, Suite 100, Portland, O R 9 7 2 0 1 .(5 0 3 )4 1 8 -3 7 0 0 P ortland C enter for R eproductive M edicine . 2222 N.W. Lovejoy St., Suite 404, Portland, O R 97209. (503) 274-4994 N orthwest S urrogacy C enter . 950 Lloyd Center, Suite 54, Portland, O R 97232. www.adoptionnorthwest.com/sur- rogacy.html; (503) 233-2818 P •ri " PUBLICATIONS A lternative F amily magazine, www.altfammag.com/ INTERNET RESOURCES F amily P ride C oalition , www.familypride.org T he L esbian M om ’ s W eb P age . www.lesbian.org/moms/index.htm G ay and L esbian F amily V alues . www.angelftre.com/co/GayFarnilyValues/index.html P rospective Q ueer P arents . www.geocities.com/WestHol- lywood/3373/ P arenting O nline , www.parentingonline.com