NOT TONIGHT DEAR, THE KIDS HAVE EARACHES

	Most mothers have retained a remarkable focus on child-rearing, at a cost.

What happens to a lesbian couple post-partum?
The founder of the largest study of lesbian families fills.

Since the first newborn-wail of the lesbian baby boom, children conceived by donor insemination have spent their whole lives under the microscope. But little attention has been given to the mothers. Nothing, perhaps, changes a relationship more than having children, but so many questions about the effect of parenting on lesbian couples remain unanswered: Are lesbian couples with children sticking together? How does motherhood affect their romantic lives? Does it inevitably lead to lesbian bed death?

In 1986 I launched the National Lesbian Family Study to answer these and other important questions.

As a psychiatrist with a large lesbian practice, I was frustrated by the scant data on lesbian moms. I transformed that frustration into what is now the largest and longest-running study of American lesbian families. We began by interviewing 154 lesbians who became pregnant between 1986 and 1992 and have continued to document their lives ever since, allowing us to map lesbian relationship patterns in a way that's never been done before.

What have we learned so far? First of all, these mothers are dedicated parents who have restructured their lives around their children. These are not women who got pregnant by accident. Conceiving their children was a decision that required willpower, courage, and, often, sacrifice.

The study has documented every kind of family evolution. Many of the mothers have re-partnered, adding step-moms and step-children to the mix. Several no longer identify as lesbian and have ended up with male partners. One mom transitioned into a man. The one constant is that most mothers in the study have retained a remarkable focus on child-rearing, a focus that has come at a cost to their sex lives, their professional futures, and, most surprisingly, for their relationships.

The news is not all bad, however. Most notably, the fruit of these relationships, the children, are so far remarkably well adjusted. And partly because of the need to prepare their children for living in a homophobic world, many of the moms have gained a new sense of conviction in their defense of lesbian rights.

We had assumed that these couples would stay together longer than straight couples. But, in fact, by the time their kids were ten years old, nearly half the couples had split up-roughly the same percentage as straight couples at the ten-year point. Raising children, unsurprisingly, leaves little time for sex, sleep, or solitude.

Some of the lesbian couples ran aground because of competition over the children, a pattern that sometimes continued post-breakup. But unlike straight parents-who often get into the blame game about who's shirking responsibilities lesbian moms bicker about /lot getting enough time with the kids. And it starts right away: many co-moms felt left out during breast-feeding and jealous if the child seemed closer to the birth mom.

Some couples tried to avoid this problem by trading off breast and bottle feedings, childcare, and bedtime rituals. In other families, the co-mother for the first child gave birth to child number two.

These compromises may have resulted in more closeness with the children, but didn't necessarily provide a recipe for the couple's long-term success. Typically, the parents were exhausted by caring for infants and toddlers; sleep became more valuable than sex; adult conversations were put on hold; and couples drifted apart, unable to rekindle the spark. Among those couples who are still together, most have sex less than once a month.

The differences with straight couples, however, are often most clear after a breakup. Among straight couples, the mothers bear the lion's share of responsibility after a divorce. Lesbian divorcees distinguish themselves by divvying up the child-rearing-especially if they'd already completed a co-parent adoption.

Partly because of this more equal sharing of responsibility, most of the mothers in our study also continue to make professional compromises. The moms in our study typically work shorter hours or have declined career opportunities so that they can be more available at home.

So, what about the kids? In nearly every case, the kids-half girls, half boys-are healthy, happy, and well-adjusted. Now ages twelve to seventeen, we last spoke with them when they were ten years old. At that time they were good students, had solid friendships, and were "out" about their lesbian moms. Those who had experienced, and been hurt by, homophobia had been prepared for it by their mothers and taught the value of diversity and tolerance. No one seems to have been hurt by the lack of a traditional father figure, as the biological father is not typically a major presence in the child's life even in families where the donor is known.

Having kids seems to have helped lesbians who parent take their own lives more seriously; lesbian mothers don't drink, smoke, or use drugs as often as lesbians without children. And explaining homophobia to their children also forced the moms to be more open and less apologetic about their lives. Any moms who were closeted when they began inseminating were completely out by the time their kids could talk. Beyond that, many of the mothers in our study have become actively involved in fighting homophobia in their communities.

The study, while still ongoing, can conclude already that lesbian parents, while not necessarily more stable as couples than their straight counterparts, produce happy children. They also have something, it seems, to teach the rest of the world about what it really means to be family focused.

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