My wife and I didn’t think legal marriage would ever be an option, let alone that Park Slope (the Brooklyn neighborhood where we live), would become the capital city of lesbian moms with overpriced strollers and perfectly groomed androgynous babies. It wasn’t until the law shifted in our favor and we settled into domesticated bliss that it occurred to us that we, too, could have tax breaks and nursery rhymes. I realized I had suppressed my strong desire to parent all along. My biological clock was ticking loud and clear; it had just been muffled by a lifetime of society making me feel unworthy.

Now that we’ve agreed to go down the path of parenting, the options for how, exactly, we get a bun into the oven are approximately two parts strange and one part creepy. It’s weird to be a lesbian and spend most of my life happily doing most things without men, only to realize that my biggest life decision now requires not only a man, but the part of a man that I’m most squeamish about. It’s one thing to have brunch with a guy. It’s quite another to embed his sperm inside your body.

There are so many instances of mothers, including lesbian moms, telling loving stories of conception. I had this idea in my head that the whole thing would be beautiful. There would be music playing and soft lighting and my wife would make passionate love to me and then…what, exactly? Passionately inject me with a turkey baster? Passionately watch me have awkward sex with a strange man — or worse, with some man I know?