Forever Dads; A Gay Couple's Journey to Fatherhood

by Tony Zimbardi-LeMons

 Sample Chapters

Forever Daddy

Now that I’m an expectant dad, I find myself completely hormonal. Logically, I understand I’m not pregnant. Lately, however, I cry at everything and anything. Certainly if I see any TV commercial involving kids, Band-Aids, cookies, or puppies, I’m a goner. The gay parenting documentaries continue on TiVo, as do the visits to the gay dad’s Pop Luck Club meetings.  I’m in a constant state of choked up.  As you can imagine, I feel quite emotional as Antonio and I drive through the gates of Vista Del Mar Child and Family Services for our first mandatory parenting class.

We walk into the building where our class is to take place and I immediately notice a little boy of about 8, sitting quietly and alone in a corner of a long corridor. It is 8:30 on a Saturday morning and there aren’t any people around. The place is dimly lit and all the rooms are closed with their doors locked, except for our classroom illuminating the far end of the hallway. The boy looks small for his age, with large, sad eyes. I look him right in the eye, nod, and smile. He looks back for a moment, and then looks down. I am overcome; my eyes well up. I think to myself that he, or someone just like him, could become our son. It’s only our first day and I’m already overcome with emotion, I duck into the men’s-room halfway down the corridor, leap into a stall, lock the door behind me, and let the tears flow.

Seeing this boy triggers the memory of a story a gay dad relayed in one of the documentaries we watched on Logo. The dad spoke of how one morning about a year after the adoption, his 4-year-old son came into his bedroom and said, “Daddy, I had a dream about you last night.”

The dad asked, “What was it about, honey?”

His son began: “I dreamed that I was walking down the street with my suitcase looking for my forever daddy. I knocked on one door and asked, ‘Are you my forever daddy?’ And the man said ‘No.’ then I knocked on another door and asked, ‘Will you be my forever daddy?’ And he shook his head and said, ‘No.’ Then I knocked on your door and you opened it and I asked, ‘Will you be my forever daddy?’ And you said, ‘Of course, I would love to be your forever daddy.’”

At that point, in the documentary, the dad was crying as he relayed this story, and as I watched, I cried, too. And now, I find myself crying again, alone in a bathroom stall, at the thought of a 3- or -4-year-old boy walking down the street with a suitcase, looking for a daddy. It makes me wonder if the boy I just passed in the hall would ever find his “forever” daddy or mommy. I am overwhelmed with sadness and elation at the same time—sadness that there are so many children out there looking for parents, and elation that I am one of the lucky ones who one day might get to become someone’s forever daddy.

  

Another kind of Pride

Southern California Pride season usually opens in May with Long Beach Pride and ends in November, in Palm Springs. Well, Antonio and I haven’t made it to a single pride event so far this year; and it isn’t looking good for the rest. Truth be told, we didn’t make any last year either. I wonder, as the first generation of gay men and women to grow up out of the closet, if after 25 years of rainbow flags, coffee mugs, mesh tank tops, leather Teddy Bears and disco dance tents, perhaps we aren’t simply becoming anesthetized to any sense of our own gay pride—or could we simply be evolving?

Those were the thoughts running through my head on L.A. Pride weekend as we drove down Wilshire Boulevard Saturday morning foregoing pride events for new car, uh, make that dad-mobile, shopping. Suddenly we were at our destination, the VW dealership.

Antonio and I are probably the only two gay men in Los Angeles who have never owned an SUV. Now however, with our planning on adopting two kids, suddenly an SUV feels like a practicality rather than a gay fashion statement. We walk through the lot with a very straight-looking, more likely than not, “hetero,” Latino car salesman; and he asks Antonio, “So what makes you think an SUV might be right for you?”

“It’ll be for the kids,” Antonio responds.

“How old are they?” asks the salesman.
Without yet saying the word “we,” Antonio replies, “Not sure, they’ll be adopted sometime this year.”

And without missing a beat, the salesman replies, “That’s great, congratulations to the two of you, I’m sure you’ll make great parents.”  Wow, I thought, times are changing.

The next morning as people, pets, and floats gather along Santa Monica Boulevard for the Pride parade, we’re driving out to a discount store in the Valley to purchase bunk beds. Antonio asked the salesman about mattresses. The salesman inquires,

“How old are the kids?”

“We’ll, they’re not here yet,” Antonio replies.

“We’re hoping they’ll be between 3 and 5 years old,” Antonio continues “And neither one of us has any experience picking out kids mattresses or dealing with issues like bed-wetting. Can you make any suggestions?”

At that point the furniture salesman turns and says, “Wow, that’s great that you guys are doing this. Now as one dad to another, let me tell you, you’ll need to get some waterproof mattress pads from Kmart, you may want to get some foam padding as well to make it more comfortable for the little ones, and then put the foam padding between the mattress and the mattress pad…”

And on and on did this guy go, a very experienced and again, obviously straight dad, offering some wisdom and fatherly advice to two expectant gay ones. As we got back in the car, I thought to myself that maybe there is hope for our kids’ futures; that maybe they really will grow up in a more tolerant word where gay and straight dads offer one another support and advice. It seems to be already happening. And suddenly, as we drove home with bunk beds in tow, I was overcome with a renewed sense of gay pride.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forever Dads; A Gay Couple's Journey to Fatherhood

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