New Book: Polyamory and Pregnancy
The first complete guide to pregnancy in polyamorous relationships, Polyamory and Pregnancy covers every step of welcoming a new life into your polycule. Whether you are planning ahead for future children or are on your way to the baby shower, you will find something here to help on your journey:
–Unexpected pregnancies
–Planning for pregnancy
–Important decisions during and after pregnancy
–Poly-friendly prenatal care
–Birth certificates and paternity
–Custody and co-parenting
–And more…
I admit I'm prejudiced to like the book because I had a hand in editing it. Jessica writes from experience: she's the mother of three children all born into polyamorous relationships, she has lived in polyfamilies for much of the last 10 years, and she has seen a great deal of the good and bad first-hand. The book is full of considerations that you may not have thought of, starting from conception and continuing through birth. If you or a poly partner are pregnant or someday might be, the book could be a life-changer.
Burde runs the thoughtful Polyamory on Purpose blog of practical information and advice. The book is the first in a series of Polyamory on Purpose Guides that she plans to publish about once a year. Future titles, she says, include Safer Sex for the Non-Monogamous, The Poly Home and Raising Children in Polyamory. She also writes fiction and has a novel-length erotic fantasy that she hopes to release as a webserial later in 2013.P.S.: A nice pre-convention writeup about Atlanta Poly Weekend appeared in the Georgia Voice, "the news outlet of record for the state’s LGBT communities and their allies." (March 14, 2013).
Update: Here's Jessica's own post about the book's launch, and an excerpt about the "What if" discussion that any people doing PIV sex need to have like right now.
[Permalink]
7 Comments:
as someone who has been unable to have children with my wife, i find the language on infertility in the samples i read to be very insensitive and uninformed:
"maybe the primaries can't have children together due to incompatible plumbing."
incompatible plumbing? what a shi**y way to refer to it. i'm glad the author is "insanely fertile," but many people are not. and it does not often take "several years" to be successful with fertility treatments. sometimes it work the first time within a month or two, other times it doesn't work at all. either way, the author even admits to not be an expert on the subject, so why even write about it? i'll be passing on this book, thank you very much...
I think if it's read in context, what the author meant by "incompatible plumbing" was if both of two people are male or both are female.
Pregnancy isn't an option in my case. Considering the title of the book, I assume it's probably not going to give any advice I could use... But I'm still curious.
Would any of it apply for adoption in polycules? Or is all of it only focused on the pregnancy itself, and not on preparing for the baby, dealing with legal matters, etc.
As I said, the title just says "pregnancy", but the article makes me wonder.
Anonymous, I am sorry I upset you with the way I handled infertility. I freely admit that I know very little about the subject. I wrote about it inspite of not being an expert because I thought it was important to include it as an issue the polyamorous relationships might face.
As Alan says, the "incompatible plumbing" quote was specifically intended to refer to partnerships where both people are male-bodied or both people are female-bodied,and thus are unable to start a pregnancy together. It was not in anyway intended as a reference to infertility.
Alice,
Some of what I cover might apply to adoption, but as an adoptee I tend to see adoption as a whole other situation that deserves a book of its own.
A great deal of what is there would apply to wider situations within the polycule. If other people within your polycule get pregnant, it can affect your relationships as well, even if you are not in a relationship with the pregnancy person directly. I do address preparing for the baby, legal matters such as custody and the status of poly-partners who are not bio-parents as well as poly-partners who are not bio-parents choosing to take on a parental role in a child's life, some of the ways polypartners who are not bio parents can be given legal standing in a child's life and similar issues. I do touch on adoption briefly there, as three-party adoptions are becoming more common and it may be possible for a polypartner to adopt the child of other people in their polycule so all three are legally parents.
I choose to title it "Pregnancy" because I started from the question of "What do I wish I had known about dealing with pregnancy and polyamory when I first became pregnant?" So everything there is directly related to the impact a pregnancy will have on a polyamorous relationship (or relationship network), but actually very little of it is about the actual pregnancy (there are enough books about morning sickness and fetal growth and doctors visits out there that saw no reason to duplicate.) Basically, if pregnancy will impact a poly relationship, or if a poly relationship will impact a pregnancy (or decisions immediately after the birth) I tried to cover it.
I do understand this isn't a book for everyone, but it is definitely not JUST for the biological parents.
I'm glad I read this article. I'm poly and in my first pregnancy. My relationship is only within the bounds of me and my two mates. Both of which are currently male, one transitioning to be female, so I just wanted some ideas on how to handle the poly part of it. ESPECIALLY co-parenting. It's bad enough that some of this seems stretched into so many different places. One partner wants one thing and the other wants something completely opposite. And I just want to find a middle ground that doesn't require me going beyond my own boundaries. Plus I don't want my child to learn some of the bad habits I have, or especially one of my mates in particular... he's such a mess and barely cleans up. So... I just bought it and I hope it'll help a little. :)
naiverose, Congratulations! I hope your pregnancy goes smoothly and you and your parenters have much joy in your child.
I hope you find the book helpful as well, but it may not cover what you are looking for. There is relatively little in there on parenting, the focus really is on the pregnancy more than the parenting. I have plans to write a book specifically on parenting in poly relationships, possibly in collaboration with Dr. Sheff, who has done a great deal of research on children raised in poly relationships.
Post a Comment
<< Home