Raising My Rainbow: Adventures in Raising a Fabulous, Gender Creative Son

by Lori Duron | Gay & Lesbian |
ISBN: 0770437729 Global Overview for this book
Registered by winghyphen8wing of Honolulu, Hawaii USA on 3/30/2015
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This book is in the wild! This Book is Currently in the Wild!
4 journalers for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by winghyphen8wing from Honolulu, Hawaii USA on Monday, March 30, 2015
Eight-year-old C.J. loves pink, wants to dress in "girl" clothes, and has felt this way as long as he can remember. This is his story (so far), as told by his mother - taken from her fascinating and inspiring blog. I'm glad that she's chosen to share her family's experiences.

It's never easy to be visibly different: Lori Duron and her family are coping with their challenges as best they can. Love, humor, and acceptance are all crucial elements of their lives, but shouldn't they (ideally) be part of all families anyway? If only more kids could have parents like C.J.'s.

If this was an e-book, I would have bookmarked the part about the differences between one's sex, gender, and sexuality - I think I actually may have done that when I listened to the audio version. (I had the audio first, but I decided I needed to get a paper copy to share via BookCrossing.)

I love the sparkly pink shoelaces on the cover of this book, but I have to admit that I've long preferred purple to pink. (And when, as a child, my parents let me choose what color to paint my bedroom, I chose yellow.)

♥ Download printable 10-per-sheet labels with a rainbow Ballycumber here.

Journal Entry 2 by winghyphen8wing at Honolulu, Hawaii USA on Monday, March 30, 2015

Released 9 yrs ago (3/30/2015 UTC) at Honolulu, Hawaii USA

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Headed to Texas as a wishlist tag - enjoy!

Released for Secretariat's 2015 Never Judge a Book By Its Cover Challenge (week 13*), eponine38's 4 Elements Challenge, and Secretariat's Oh, the Places We Can Go Challenge.

*Week 5: ABCD author

Journal Entry 3 by wingMyssCynwing at San Antonio, Texas USA on Friday, May 1, 2015
A great wishlist tag that showed up in my mailbox today. Well, sort of... It wouldn't fit but it was waiting in the office for me along with another book. Good book day!

Journal Entry 4 by wingMyssCynwing at San Antonio, Texas USA on Monday, May 4, 2015
This was a fantastic story of how to raise a child. How to accept them for who they are. How to encourage their creativity. How to stand up for them when they need your support.
It will be read by a few of my daughters ans some friends before continuing on its journey.

GD

Journal Entry 5 by wingGoryDetailswing at Nashua, New Hampshire USA on Wednesday, June 10, 2015
The book arrived safely in today's mail; many thanks for granting this wish! I'd been interested in this one since reading this Unshelved book club review. [I loved the foreword by Neil Patrick Harris and David Burtka, who enjoyed reading the blog even though their kids - so far - haven't expressed any desire to push gender-stereotype boundaries.]

Later: I enjoyed the book, and was very glad to see such activism regarding young C. J. and his cross-spectrum "gender-specific? We don't need no stinkin' gender-specific!" personal style. While not all the authority figures his mother encountered were as helpful as they might have been, it was good to see how many of them were at least willing to give C. J. a chance.

A few things did grate on me a bit, notably when another mom asked C. J.'s mother what he'd like for his birthday, and his mother replied "Anything that you would get for a five-year-old girl." Wait, what??? I mean, sure, within the context of the "girls-like-pink-and-sparkles" crowd, that's probably a good recommendation, but what I'd get for a five-year-old-girl (assuming I didn't know that she wanted anything specific) would be something I loved at that age: a roughly-realistic set of toy dinosaurs! Luckily, the author's usually better about not equating "her boy likes girly stuff" with "girly stuff is what all girls like", but it still rubbed me the wrong way. [Turns out the mother got a craft kit as a gift, nothing explicitly in the "all-boy" or "all-girl" camp. And C. J. seems to be learning how to cope with unwanted presents more-or-less gracefully, a major step in any person's process of growing up {wry grin}.]

One of the darker elements of the book dealt not with C. J. but with his older brother, who became the target of some teasing - and of one particularly persistent bully - because of C. J.'s creative personal style. That's got to be a tough thing for a parent, trying to support one child's pushing of the envelope without making the other child's life miserable. While it took longer than I'd have hoped it would, she and the school officials managed to get the bully out of Chase's life, but that was still the roughest part of the book for me.

I hope that the book, and the blog it's based on, will help reassure people who have gender-bending people in their lives - and will educate those who find it unsettling. Good book! (And I'll throw in a recommendation for the movie Ma Vie en Rose, a 1997 film that deals with a transgender boy.)

Journal Entry 6 by wingGoryDetailswing at Nashua, New Hampshire USA on Monday, July 6, 2015

Released 8 yrs ago (7/7/2015 UTC) at Nashua, New Hampshire USA

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

I'm adding this book to the LGBTQIA bookbox, which will be on its way again on Tuesday. Hope someone enjoys this book!

*** Released as part of the 2015 Keep Them Moving release challenge. ***

Journal Entry 7 by quietorchid at Saint Paul, Minnesota USA on Tuesday, July 21, 2015
Looks interesting. The odd kids are always interesting to learn about, no matter how their difference/oddity/strength reveals itself.

Journal Entry 8 by quietorchid at Saint Paul, Minnesota USA on Saturday, August 1, 2015
I am troubled by this book; oh, not because of the subject, but because it is presented as so black and white.

Duron is obviously doing all she can to make sure there is a safe and secure place for both her little guys to grow into, but I can't help but react to her fierce protectiveness against people around her, yet never questioning the consumer culture she so obviously buys into herself. Both her children have long lists (admittedly, C.J.'s is longer) of the hot consumer advertised they NEED for Christmas and birthdays, and of course they will get them, lest the Mommy Posse of O.C. disparage Duron's own abilities as a parent.

How is it 'free' to be what you want to become, if the only freedom is to solidly choose between Rapunzel or Ariel? Granted, she allows CJ to choose first between identifying with either GI Joe or Barbie, but why not throw in Babe Didrickson versus Babe Ruth? The choices her children can make end up solidly defined by a mass consumer culture, of which there is no questioning. I found that very disturbing.

Perhaps that is why there does seem to be more of a transgender issue now. It was always there, but there was more wiggle room before; non compliant kids were not so forced into black and white categories by their parent's consumption of a consumer culture. A strong willed enough girl could announce to the world she wanted to be a Fireman when she grew up, because the other three choices (Mommy, Nurse, Teacher) were "Stupid." And no, I never wanted to be a Fireman, but I quickly learned that nonplussed the adults around me so much, they stopped asking 'stupid' questions.

So, an important look at tolerance and empathy that 'odd' children deserve, but empty, with no real solutions or thoughts about how we came to this pass. But if it helps get a little more wiggle room for one child, in our increasingly intolerant culture, the book will have done its work.

Journal Entry 9 by quietorchid at Wolf Memorial Fountain in Albion, Nebraska USA on Thursday, August 6, 2015

Released 8 yrs ago (8/5/2015 UTC) at Wolf Memorial Fountain in Albion, Nebraska USA

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

Left on a bench to find a new reader!
Released as #75 in 52 Towns in 52 Weeks Challenge 2015.

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