- I am my authentic self,
and I'm also the parent
my children need me to be for them.
(soft music)
We've been married for 13 years now.
- We've been together for 15 years.
- We have two children,
Jonathan and Jeanette,
10 and eight years old.
- We have three kids.
So, we have four-year-old
twins and an eight-year-old.
- Family means to me,
my two dads and my brother.
- Mama and Mo-pen and Bella.
- We've actually been
married for two years,
this will be year number three
'cause we were just allowed to
get married a few years ago.
- Before then, it was like,
we would call each other wife
and I would be waiting
for someone to be like,
"you can't do that"
which people would say.
- Because at the beginning,
we were kind of just making it up
and then it was kinda like,
yeah that's actually what it's called,
we're actually married,
and she's my wife, yay.
- Yay.
- Family is at least two people
who can rely upon each other.
- Most people don't have
two dads or two moms.
- No one in my class does.
- What?
- One of the things that I remember
when we first had our children,
was when we'd be out in public,
the stares that we would get.
- The struggle of, sort
of how people view you is,
it's a battle everyday.
And funny enough, people will
really, like, in the elevator
ask you questions about
your family and your life.
- I've also taught my children,
not all questions come from a bad place,
sometimes a person will ask a
question they just don't know
and they want to know.
- A family is a big sister or brother
and a mommy or a daddy.
- [Boy] And a doggy.
- They love us, they
want to take care of us
and they want to be with us.
- I think in some circumstances
they will have it harder in life,
but in other areas, I think
they're gonna be stronger.
I mean, who better to parent you,
than people who've had to
persevere their whole life.
- For them, you know, what
they have is their norm,
so I don't know that
they would say anything
more different than any other kid.
- I'm lucky to have my momma
and my M-O and my siblings.
- We are crazy, we are dinner and a show.
We're never boring.
- Whenever we're at,
like, my friend's house,
my dad always like starts dancing
and he always makes everybody laugh.
- DeSean, he wants to
always have, go shopping,
dress up and, always, he wants to have fun
with me and Jonathan all the time.
- My children will be prepared
to deal with the world,
they'll be prepared to deal with people
who will embrace them
and they'll be prepared
to deal with people
who won't embrace them.
- You can get married, you can have kids,
you can have all these things.
- It's the best feeling
in the whole wide world,
to have that experience.
- There's no one I would
rather parent with,
especially as a gay
parent, other than Joel.
(soft music)
(swishing, squeaking)
