via https://ift.tt/2TTuBUV
letters-to-lgbt-kids:
Anonymous asked: Wait, I signed up for a trans kid when I decided to become pregnant? Are you joking or are you really that crazy?
Hey there,
I’m not joking at all and I don’t really see how this would be a laughing matter to you.
Yes, you signed up for a trans kid. And while we are at it, you also signed up for a disabled kid. Autistic kid. Gay kid. A kid who doesn’’t look like you. A deaf kid. A kid who will have interests that don’t match up with yours at all. You signed up for a shy kid and a loud kid and a kid who wets the bed and a sick kid.
That’s the beauty, the miracle of parenthood, don’t you agree? You decide to care for a little person you don’t even know yet. You decide to open your heart and home to them, you promise to nurture and love and protect a tiny human being. How can you promise that, if not unconditionally?
You can’t pick and choose your kid. Maybe even more importantly, they can’t choose you. They depend on you to keep that promise - and not only if they live up to whatever expectations you had.
With all my love,
Tumblr Mom
“This, you see, is the danger of children: they are ambushes, each and every one of them. A person may look at someone else’s child and see only the surface, the shiny shoes or the perfect curls. They do not see the tears and the tantrums, the late nights, the sleepless hours, the worry. They do not even really see the love, not really. It can be easy, when looking at children from the outside, the believe that they are things, dolls designed and programmed by their parents to behave in one manner, following one set of rules. It can be easy, when standing on the lofty shores of adulthood, not to remember that every adult was once a child, with ideas and ambitions of their own.
“It can be easy, in the end, to forget that children are people, and that people will do what people will do, the consequences be damned.”
- Seanan McGuire, Down Among the Sticks and Bones
letters-to-lgbt-kids:
Anonymous asked: Wait, I signed up for a trans kid when I decided to become pregnant? Are you joking or are you really that crazy?
Hey there,
I’m not joking at all and I don’t really see how this would be a laughing matter to you.
Yes, you signed up for a trans kid. And while we are at it, you also signed up for a disabled kid. Autistic kid. Gay kid. A kid who doesn’’t look like you. A deaf kid. A kid who will have interests that don’t match up with yours at all. You signed up for a shy kid and a loud kid and a kid who wets the bed and a sick kid.
That’s the beauty, the miracle of parenthood, don’t you agree? You decide to care for a little person you don’t even know yet. You decide to open your heart and home to them, you promise to nurture and love and protect a tiny human being. How can you promise that, if not unconditionally?
You can’t pick and choose your kid. Maybe even more importantly, they can’t choose you. They depend on you to keep that promise - and not only if they live up to whatever expectations you had.
With all my love,
Tumblr Mom
“This, you see, is the danger of children: they are ambushes, each and every one of them. A person may look at someone else’s child and see only the surface, the shiny shoes or the perfect curls. They do not see the tears and the tantrums, the late nights, the sleepless hours, the worry. They do not even really see the love, not really. It can be easy, when looking at children from the outside, the believe that they are things, dolls designed and programmed by their parents to behave in one manner, following one set of rules. It can be easy, when standing on the lofty shores of adulthood, not to remember that every adult was once a child, with ideas and ambitions of their own.
“It can be easy, in the end, to forget that children are people, and that people will do what people will do, the consequences be damned.”
- Seanan McGuire, Down Among the Sticks and Bones