Oh, for want of a map.

I had this dream about a year ago that I was being chased by “bad guys”, and I was running all over the place with my kids in tow, trying to keep them safe. I didn’t know who the “bad guys” were or what they wanted, just that I had to keep my kids safe. Finally, I found a building made of brick, a “safe house”, and I explained to the kids that I loved them very much, and one day I would come back for them, but I didn’t know when. I told them if they stayed with me, they wouldn’t be safe. My then-4-year-old son nodded his head sagely, and escorted his sister inside, giving me one last look over his shoulder before they disappeared to the other side of that door. I sat in my car and cried.

That’s the kind of dream that stays with and haunts a mom for a lifetime.

But it’s true – if it would keep my kids safe, I would give up everything to protect them – even my children themselves. I would give them a safe place to stay and content myself with loving them from afar until the danger was over.

Their father does not see it that way.

Regardless of what jeopardy he may be placing them in, he wants a relationship with his kids no matter what, and he wants it on his terms. He wants to bike the kids a mile and a half in 25 degree weather with a 15 mph wind – and on a bike at 30mph, or even 20mph, that translates to a wind chill factor at below-zero. He’s homeless, and he wants to force me to get his consent regarding education and health for the kids. He failed to get the kids’ health insurance, and B.R. missed a week of school because his dad never scheduled that physical he was supposed to earlier this year.

I get it, people make mistakes, they get hit by hard times. But through all of this, he’s never shown that he’s thinking of the kids first. He’s thinking of himself – and his “relationship” with the kids. The relationship is secondary to the kids’ needs. It grows out of tending to their needs. Babies learn love after an association with feeding has been made. It doesn’t get any more fundamental than that!

After this week, I will have the kids in my home full-time because their dad is homeless. He would like to spend more time with them than just the one day a week I’m currently offering – but I can’t just let him take the kids anywhere, and I can’t have him in my house all the time. We need boundaries. He’s a manipulative, button-pushing guy.

I’ve tried giving him a little bit to work with. But that little inch seems to entitle him to go for a mile. I’m tired of doing all the work to see to it that the kids are well-adjusted and loved in relation to him. I want him to step up and prove himself.

Our court date is at the end of January. I had hoped to work out an arrangement with him out of court, but it seems as though that’s not going to happen – not unless I agree to his terms. He seems to think I’m asking him to give up his parental rights – all I want is for him to think of what the kids need. But he can’t even tend to his own needs, so what am I thinking?

I am so scared. Pickle and I have gotten by ok with having the kids half time, and we want to have the kids full time because it’s a better environment for them here, and hell, we love them. But it’s going to be a big change, especially for Pickle. She’s not a parent – she’s on her way to becoming a step-parent. She’s invested in these kids, but, still, they’re not hers. I can’t expect her to feel as though they are all the time.

I’m essentially going to be a single mom with a little bit of backup.

We haven’t talked about this yet, Pickle and I. We made an “appointment” to talk about it Friday after I get off work – because it needs to be discussed. I have to know where her limits are.

I’m not even thinking as I’m writing this. I’m just nervous and scared. And spitting words out that probably just barely make sense.

I feel like I’m traveling uncharted territory, here.

Stupid labels. And pronouns.

I would like to see more discussion about andro lesbians. There’s an awful lot about butch-femme identity politics, and there’s a good amount on cis/trans identity politics, but I don’t hear people talking about andro politics much.

Why is that?

Is it because there’s a subtle undercurrent of expectation that lesbian relationships either mimic the exaggerated “hetero model” of masculine-feminine dynamic, or be made up of two very hot girly-girls who like to get it on in front of a camera?

My Sweet Pickle is neither butch, nor femme. She’s not a boi. She has no desire to identify as a male. And while she’s content to be a woman (that is the body she was given), she doesn’t much care to throw herself into that identity either.

Sometimes she likes to cut her hair close and spike it. Sometimes she grows it out long. Always, she wears a baseball cap or beanie over it. She’s built like a 12 year old boy – and shops in the husky 12 year old boy’s section of the store. She kinda acts like a 12 year old boy, too. Sometimes.

I read this article, When a Cis-Woman Dates a Trans-Man, which is about how a cis-woman in a relationship with a trans-man is stymied over what to call her sweetheart. He identifies as male, but to call him her “boyfriend” denies the couple their queer identity. To add in the word “trans” as a description is awkward, both structurally and socially.

In an activist community heavily focused on “people-first language” a part of me is inclined to say, “So what? You happen to be queer – you’re in love with each other first. Labels are for jars.”

But labels can be comforting. There are contexts in which it feels right, can be encouraging, to use labels. For example, I am a woman who is in love with another woman, has two children, and my body parts work differently from the average person. Awkward. But if I’m introducing myself in a Deaf Queer setting, for example, I’d want to say, “I’m a Deaf lesbian and a differently-abled mom.”

And that last sentence, reading it, it just feels so empowering. I look at that, and I’m almost in awe of myself – not to sound egotistical or anything. But in a certain setting, that sentence could do amazing things.

So I understand the struggle with labels. And as a cis-woman madly in love with another cis-woman, I know the struggle with partner-defining labels as well. I hate the word partner. Like the author of the article above, I, too, see images of suited individuals shaking hands. But she’s not my girlfriend, either – to me, people over a certain age are not girls & boys anymore, so the terms “girlfriend” and “boyfriend” become obsolete. Lover… gag. Companion leaves a little something out. Sweetheart, quaint and cute, and I can live with it… but it lacks a sense of personal identity.

And then to throw gender-politics into it.

My brother likes to refer to my Sweet Pickle as his “brother-in-law,” or “Uncle” for his kid.

I hate that. She doesn’t identify as male. She’s not trans. It seems disrespectful to all my trans friends out there who work so hard to have their identities taken seriously, and it feels disrespectful to me on her behalf (though she honestly doesn’t care), because that’s not who she is. It seems disrespectful to me because I just came out of a ten-year hetero relationship, and came out as a lesbian, and I feel like it’s my brother’s way of making sense of the whole thing without actually trying to understand it. He’s making me “straight” again.

But she doesn’t care. So why should it bother me?

Because my identity matters, too. OUR identity matters.

She’s not a girl. She’s not a boy. She’s not a man, and she just barely identifies as a woman. (If there was a 12-year-old boy status on the gender chart, she’d probably pick that one)

She’s my Sweet Pickle. She is who she is, nothing more, nothing less.

I’ve come to two conclusions: 1)I hate the gender binary. (Actually, I’d concluded that long ago, it’s just reinforced again) And 2) I want to call her something that isn’t completely devoid of attachment and feeling, and doesn’t have a bunch of other inappropriate-to-us meanings associated with it. And the only place I’ll find that is right here, with the two of us.

It’s try and love me, if you can; are you strong enough to be my man?

She’s disgusted by me.

I had sex with him. Before she ever came along, I thought so poorly of myself, I thought he was worthy of my devotion. And even after I slowly started coming to the realization that he wasn’t, I still procreated with him willingly, created offspring with him.

If you can call having to be drunk to do such a thing “willing”.

I made my choices a long time ago. I will continue to see how those choices’ effect unfolds throughout the rest of my life. I have no option but to accept that, and content myself with what is.

I thought one of those choices was my life partner. I thought that in choosing her – dedicating myself to her in tempest and tame waters – I was honoring myself. She is a goddess to me – not superior to me, but holy, sacred.

She reaches into the depths to dredge out the toxic sludge that’s been rotting away inside for years. In doing so, she enables me to feel the power of liberation – I am free to experience anger and sadness, indignance, pride. In experiencing these powerful emotions, I let them go, and when I do, the bliss settles in. The joy that I have lived, I have survived and triumphed. I have come so far.

Even when it seems I have such a long, long way to go.

She tears me down, but to give me the opportunity to build myself back up again. She guts the foundation and helps me lay the stone and cement. The materials are mine, the tools are mine, even the labor is mine – but I’m not doing it alone.

I can’t wonder if that’s what she’s doing right now.

When she says she’s thinking of walking away because she can’t deal with him anymore. Because looking at me makes her want to vomit, and no one should ever feel that way about the one they love.

Am I strong enough to build myself back up again without her? Do I have that kind of endurance? Surely, I must be. I have to be. I’m only given what I can take, right?

Oh, but I already feel I’m at the end of my rope with everything else in my life.

So does she. Money problems have been ridiculous. Problems with my ex have been outrageous. Everyone’s paying for it.

She compares it to being stuck in a Chinese finger trap. Those woven bamboo dealys that you put your fingers into, and when you try to pull them out, they tighten? But once you relax and release the pressure, your fingers just slip right out of them.

How do we release the pressure?

He’s not going anywhere, my ex. He’s a constant reminder to her of my past. When she thinks of how little regard I held myself in when I was with him, she thinks, “What’s wrong with me? How bad am I?” She questions my standards and it reflects in her self-image.

What she and I have, I’ve never had with anyone else. When we’re intimate, I’m a different person than I have ever been with anyone.

I am completely comfortable with her. I can be myself. I don’t have to fill a role, pretend to be what I’m not. I don’t have to close my eyes and “go somewhere else.” I savor every last part of the experiences I share with her, I look into her eyes – something I’ve never shared with anyone else. I feel like I’m reconnecting with myself when I connect with her.

I have patience with her that I’ve never had for anyone other than my own children. I have love for her that compares only to the love I have for my children. She is part of my family. She may not have made those babies with me, but she makes this family. She fits us all so perfectly, and we complement her. We bring out the best and the worst of each other, the light and the dark.

The words “soulmate”, “best friend,” “partner” … they’re all so vague and they miss the mark. To say she’s “my better half” or “a piece of myself” reflects images rife with codependent meaning. But I have yet to find the words to describe our relationship with one another.

She’s the person I’ve been looking for my whole life, and I found her when I least expected to.

And now, she may walk away because my ex is unbearable, selfish, ill-mannered, and smells bad? Is it bad that I’ll forgive her ten times over for leaving me for her own peace of mind, but if she does, I’ll never be able to look him in the eye again?

How can one person have so much power over me, when I’m not the one giving it to him?

Or am I?

I am invested deeply in her, in our relationship. I’m still a whole person without her, though I’ve grown quite attached to her. I gave her a certain power over me – a shared power – and my happiness. If she walks away, she takes a portion of that with her. I gave it to her because I trusted her, I do trust her.

I know she’ll do what’s right for her, and I believe what’s right for her is what’s right for us.

I just have to have faith.

I need to believe.