This week the Some Families hosts catch up with Mike Wooller. Mike talks about growing up with two mums in the 90s, his experience at school and how having same sex parents affected his own coming out. Our hosts discuss Stu’s son wearing a dress, celebrating identity and gay agendas.
Full transcription below.
Mike Wooller: So I suppose I’m coming from the first sort of generation of kids to grow up with, I suppose to parents of the same sex. It really really wasn’t a common thing. When I was growing up. I didn’t really clock that there was anything different to any of my peers until I was kind of later in primary school when I think I think I must have been around year five, and other kids started running away from me saying we’ll catch the gay. This is what I would say is that my experience is a product of the time. So we’re talking late 90s, early 2000s. Being gay was not as accepted as it is now.
Lotte Jeffs: Hello, and welcome to some families, the LGBTQ plus and everything in between parenting podcast, which explores everything from starting a family, having a family, raising teenagers, being the child of somebody who was raised by gay parents, being at school being bullied, transparents, surrogacy, adoption, fostering biological children IVF.
Lotte Jeffs: And if while you’re listening to us, and you have any feedback at all, maybe we’ve said something that you disagree with, or maybe you have a particular story to tell or a different point of view. Please don’t hesitate to get in contact with us. We really, really want to hear from you. You can find all of the details of how to contact us in the show notes or you can just find us on Instagram Some families or on Twitter at the same handle or you can drop us an email at some families pod at StoryHunter Cote UK. So thanks so much for being here. And on that note, Stu, how are you and what’s been going on in your life?
Stu Oakley: Hi, Lottie. again this week, we are not seeing each other face to face. However, I am seeing you face to face through our fantastic video conferencing app. We are still in the midst of our global pandemic. So we are calling in this week to one another again, the show will go on the
Lotte Jeffs: show will go on with literally the band on the Titanic. But
Stu Oakley: yeah, it’s been an interesting week again, spending lots and lots of time with the kids at home. My son this week in particular has he has been enjoying wearing his sister’s clothes out in the garden, his dresses
Lotte Jeffs: we Yeah, it’s super cute.
Stu Oakley: It’s something that I know that you and I have discussed previously as well about addresses and little boys and dresses. And I must admit, I did have a point where I was slightly unsure if I’m just being videos, I was slightly unsure of how much I could embrace it. There was a slight niggle in the back of my brain, I think which really surprised me because being a gay parent and being queer parent and celebrating all forms of, of identity. I think it surprised me because I suppose it’s how people would view me as a gay parent with with a son that that had was wearing a dress if I’m being brutally honest.
Lotte Jeffs: I think that’s so interesting. And I can totally understand why you feel that and it’s almost like you feel like people are judging you and, and that you have somehow pushed your gay agenda on, on your kids. And it’s, you know, you’re encouraging it. And, and I think so often as gay parents, we just want to be seen as, quote unquote normal. And is this sense that actually, you know what? We don’t necessarily want to just be, quote unquote, normal. We’re queer, and we love that and we’re embracing that and we want our kids to experiment and be themselves and be individuals and be whatever queer means to them. Maybe they’re straight, but maybe they still like wearing dresses and why not? And I think kind of getting to that place of feeling like we don’t owe society anything. We don’t have to fit this heteronormative idea of family and that doesn’t make us any less than, I think is like a real milestone in our parenting journey not to the word journey again. But do you know what I mean?
Lotte Jeffs: So what do you think changed? Do you like why do you think it was something that you just decided Actually, you know what, let’s go with this because I
Stu Oakley: It’s what I believe in, I believe in celebrating identity and celebrating who you are. And I the only thing that was stepping in my way in my brain was the fact that exactly as you said that people would feel that I was pushing my gay agenda on him. Where it’s been totally his own decision. He’s picked it out of his sister’s wardrobe. There has been nothing we’ve given him to to entice him and you know, it’s a beautiful dress, why wouldn’t he want to wear it and feel fabulous and fantastic in it? And, and I love that and I love that about him and I, and I will, we will support whatever he wants to do so
Lotte Jeffs: and you and your husband on the same page with it, or have you had any kind of conversations about how you manage it.
Stu Oakley: We’re completely on the same page about it. My husband’s been just as supportive as I am about it. I mean, at the end of day, he’s only two. He, you know, he’s a two year old. He just wants to just wear whatever he wants to wear. And he’s starting to have an opinion about what he wants to wear and it just so happens it’s a dress will he be doing this when he’s four or five? Probably not. He may do and if he does, we will you know 100% support him on that. He also loves to wear clips in his hair and he wants an Elsa plot like his sister but adorable oh my god so cute. And as we get him a bit of clip on hair, that’s not going to happen. The other thing that he’s been doing this week though that I do need to work out how we saw out is for some reason he’s developed this thing of calling his brother faggy. And
Stu Oakley: I’m calling him little foggy and he just spends his whole day walking around going little faggy Where’s little faggy, faggy, faggy?
Lotte Jeffs: He got that from
Stu Oakley: I think it’s come from Aggie we my my daughter. says Aggie all the time because we’ve said it to her we say stop getting so angry about things or stop as a short for getting so kind of aggressive or you know, whatever about it, but, and I think he’s picked it up from her and twisted it into faggy. And now my brother, little faggy So,
Lotte Jeffs: I mean if we’re worried you’re gay agenda. That is another level.
Stu Oakley: My son in a dress call is a little faggy.
Lotte Jeffs: I love it,
Stu Oakley: but actually talking about gay gender or influence we can have on our children’s life. I’m so excited about this week’s guest.
Lotte Jeffs: We are talking to someone called Mike who is 32 and was raised by two women and I’m super excited to speak to him because obviously myself and my wife raising our daughter and I have so many questions for him. He’s probably going to wish he never called Come on our podcast. But Mike actually works in the podcast industry. He works for Acast, which hosts our podcast. So he knows the score. And he’s up for nobody’s getting self into.
Mike Wooller: Hey, guys, thanks for having me on.
Lotte Jeffs: Thank you for coming on. So do you want to just start maybe by telling us a bit about your upbringing, who you called your parents and where you grew up? And anything else you’d like to share with that? So
Mike Wooller: I suppose I’m kind of from the first sort of generation of kids to grow up with, I suppose two parents of the same sex it really really wasn’t a common thing when I was growing up. So for context, I’m from Portsmouth, which is a small city on the south coast for anybody that doesn’t really know I was around five years old when my mum and dads broke up. And the reason they broke up was because my mum came out and said, Hey, I’m gay. Obviously, the right thing to do was to kind of split up and divorce at that point in time. And then within a couple of years, my mum met her current partner, Caroline, who has essentially been my mum for the last 25 years. So, yeah, I’ve lived the majority of my life, having two mums, and obviously went through all the ups and downs that life has to throw at you. And with that being my experience has been, you know, a journey. And there have been moments where, you know, I realized that I wasn’t in the same situation as a lot of my peers and friends when when I was growing up being being gay was not as accepted as it is now. It was a completely different ballgame. And growing up through that, and and coming to the time we’re at now where, you know, it’s it’s a relatively accepted part of society. And I’d be really shocked if somebody had something bad to say, yeah, it was it was very different. I suppose. That’s a good summary. It was different.
Lotte Jeffs: When did you first realise that it was something different or did you know kind of as soon as it happened in your, your mum’s partner moved in that this was not what your friends were experiencing
Mike Wooller: really interesting. You say that actually because, um, I didn’t really clock that there was anything
different any of my peers until I was kind of later in primary school when I think I think I must have been in around year five. This brings me back to an experience when I was in the playground and I think somebody Mum, or dad or parent had been talking. And other kids started running away from me saying, we’ll catch the gay. I didn’t know what gay was at the time. And unbeknownst to me, I’m now a gay man. And you know, I’m gonna get married soon and all of that stuff. I had no idea what gay was at this point in time. And up until then, I don’t think I’ve ever realised that there was anything different about my upbringing until that moment when people were saying We think we’re going to catch the gay from you. So it’s really interesting. Obviously my mom was dating before she met her currently partner she was dating. I know that women had come around and they’d go out for the night, we’d be left at the babysitter on the odd Saturday, and she’d introduce us, oh, this is my friend. But I’d never really thought of it as anything other than Oh, this is my mum’s friend, you know, until the point where Caroline became part of our lives. And my mum was obviously in a committed long term relationship. And Caroline became my stepmom and my mum and I would call her my own biological mother now, but Yeah, we did. We didn’t realise that was anything different, really. And I’m speaking from my brother here as well. I don’t think either of us realise anything was different until the moment I was at school and kids brought it up as as an issue, which is really sad, but that is how I think I realised, I thought, Okay, this isn’t This isn’t how my friends live at five years old. You start to kind of go to your friends houses for dinner. whatever it might be. And you see this sets up, and I realised that this isn’t. This isn’t the same. There’s something different.
Lotte Jeffs: Do you remember how that made you feel at the time?
Mike Wooller: I think I was actually indifferent until until I had that moment in the playground that was just saying, Well, I think up until that point, I was completely indifferent to it. It was just like, that’s how it is. I was so young, I think I think at that age you what’s great about kids, and I think you’ll agree is that they’re so innocent, and they don’t put judgment on anything at all. Until they, they’re taught it by example. You don’t grow up with that as an innate trait, like you’re not a dick by birth, you have to be taught your deck, and somebody has to teach you that behaviour. So at that age, yeah, it’s just one of those things. You just kind of accept it. Oh, well, this must be normal then because this is this is how it is.
Stu Oakley: So did you speak to your moms about that, as well?
Mike Wooller: So I think what’s interesting here is that I didn’t really even question things until I got a little get older. So when I got a little bit older, obviously, I started to realise that my friends had a mom and a dad. Most of them did. And some of them might have had a single parent that was looking after them, usually a mom. And it was strange for me that I had two moms. And I realised that was different than I did broach the subject. And I remember Actually, there was a conversation at one point where, you know, they sat me down and said, we’re gay. This is this is what being gay is. And it wasn’t as Frank as I would have liked it to be. I mean, I think if I could go back in time, and kind of engineer how this would have happened, it would have been, this is how it is this is our relationship. Some people like members of the opposite sex, some people like it’s the gay chats, the classic gay chat. And we happen to be gay and this is why we live together. We love each other. But you know, that doesn’t mean we love you any different. It was never It was never really kind of explained it that way. It was just a kind of this is my partner now. She’s going to be living with us. Okay. And that’s it. And I think at that point in time you’ll be so young you don’t really you don’t question it and I think that’s a great thing because you’ve not really been poisoned, I suppose.
Lotte Jeffs: Did you bond quite easily with your mum’s partner when she came into your life?
Mike Wooller: Yeah, she was great, just brilliant. And I just remember really getting on with us so well and she wanted to evolve us as much as possible from day one she was she was so you could tell that she adored us as kids from day one. It was it was fantastic. Really. What
Lotte Jeffs: Did you have just interestingly like thinking about myself and my wife and our separate relationships with our daughter did you feel that you had a different kind of relationship with both of them like one was more who you went to for like, comfort and the other one was the person you went to for more like rough and tumble or like was there like divisions of Die rolls in that way
Mike Wooller: Really? strangely. No, actually, though it was it was a very, I think, I think early on, obviously you develop trust with someone, just as people who have got a step parent would would would know. You develop trust with your step parent over time, and then and then you can become more kind of intimate and close with them and you share more with them. But in terms of roles as the the mother, the mum and the dad, not in that sort of gender sense, but a lot of people you know, who have a mum and a dad, the dad will want to play sports with them, and then they’ll have more of a kind of intimate sort of emotional relationship with a man. And for me, that was never the experience has always been kind of both parents were always there and available for me anytime for both purposes. It was about who’s free. I love that. Yeah. And I think I think that was a great thing because it meant there was always somebody available no matter what. No, it’s not that Oh, I’m busy right now and you’re like, well, I need to wait until you’re free for me to be able to You know, talk to you about this issue because I could just go to the other parent. And to be fair to them both, they were always pretty free and always available and always around me to talk to and I still to this day,
Stu Oakley: So talk to us about school then Mike. So what was the experience like when you were a school and going through this at home, and
Mike Wooller: it wasn’t great at points, and the majority of the time, it was absolutely fine. And so I did have that kind of early, early exposure to homophobia and what that looks like. And then when I moved on to secondary school, and as you expect people get more boisterous. And like I said, the context of this is it was 1520 years ago when we were living in a different world. We used to get phone calls in the middle of the night at like 230 in the morning from unknown numbers, and essentially homophobic abuse down the phone and it would be people that I’d gone to probably people that I’d gone to school with and shared my phone number with calling our house in the middle of the night, spewing homophobic insults to my mom’s and then laughing and hanging up. And that went on for years. I think the last time it ever happened, I must have been, like 16 years old. And obviously people grow up eventually and stop doing stuff like that. But you know, it wasn’t a full day. Yeah, well, that’s it. Yeah. Luckily, some people and you know, and but yeah, that was really horrible. And, at the same time, obviously, I’m going through my own internal struggles with my sexuality because I hadn’t quite clocked that. I mean, looking back, it was obvious, but I hadn’t quite thought that I was gay at that point. So it set me back personally as well. Experiencing homophobia, even if it’s not towards yourself, is quite damaging to someone of that kind of formative age. And
Stu Oakley: and yeah, it’s always dealing with the homophobia and dealing with the people calling you gay or calling on mums out as gay before you’ve even internalised yourself and worked out how you are feeling as a gay man.
Mike Wooller: Yeah. And that’s actually that’s actually something that I thought
Mike Wooller: I was speaking to someone about this a while ago and what what I realised was that even I, whilst obviously struggling with my own sexuality, I remember hearing comments from from people about, about them, and kind of turning it and using it against them. I remember my mom always wore jeans she always was. She was this is the nightlight, I’m talking like the 90s and early 2000s when like, you know, gay room and the trend was doc Marten boots on my mom had a row of like 10 pairs of Doc Martens in various states of wear. And I remember people making comments about those things and I would say, oh, why don’t you always wear those boots, you know what caught us some nice heels and that will come from people. That I was at school with that would have made comments. And it’s almost as though that in that that homophobia was internalised by me, which is really horrible, to be honest with you like it’s really, really hard.
Lotte Jeffs: And how did it affect you coming out to your thumbs? Did you because I mean, one would assume that it would just be super easy because they’re gay. And so therefore, it’s easy for you to be like, Hey, I’m gay, too.
Mike Wooller: No, it wasn’t easy at all. I couldn’t say the word. When I remember the day I came out and I drove to my Auntie’s house, because she was like the super liberal family member, the one that like, used to live in London in the 60s and was, you know, partying down or every weekend and I knew I could say anything, so I drove to her first of all, and you think that I’d be able to tell my mum’s because, you know, they’re gay. And I actually genuinely I have no idea why I found it so difficult. It was actually a really tough thing to do. And I think one one thing that would have made it harder is the fact that I hadn’t been exposed to any gay men. My mom’s friends were predominantly women. I think I’ve met one gay man in my entire life, to be honest with you up until that point, so it made it a little bit harder. But it was really difficult. I couldn’t say the words over I know that they both knew full well, what I was about to say, but I couldn’t say the words and you’d think and every everybody says to me, oh, you must have found it so easy to come out. And it would have been like, Oh, well, you know, it’s fine. It was not at all it was really difficult. But then the context of this is that I had a dad and I had a stepmom on the other side of the family that weren’t quite as supportive. Perhaps.
Lotte Jeffs: Do you think you worried that your dad would feel that you were gay because of your mom? That it was her fault?
Mike Wooller: Yes, actually, I think that’s a big part of it. And interestingly, He when I came out he’s kind of since taken this all back and apologised, you know, it’s all fine. And I remember when I came out he actually said to me Oh, I bet your mum and Caroline are happy about this. As if I’d been groomed to be a caveman this isn’t even you can be brought up into the most accepting loving, liberal Modern Family and still have problems with those those kinds of things. And that’s nothing to do with your upbringing is to do with external factors and it’s the people outside of your family that you really have to worry about because they’re still prepares you know, people are friends and friends are thinking or saying a certain thing. You are affected by an you’re influenced by it.
Stu Oakley: One thing I wanted to ask is how you feel about the new service, the new education policies that are coming into place where as part of relationship education, children in schools are going to be taught about all All sorts of families and all sorts of relationships, including queer families. I mean, do you think that would have how much of a difference Do you think that would have made you at school having that in place?
Mike Wooller: I mean, yeah, I wish I absolutely wish that that was that was part of the curriculum. When I was growing up. I was never taught that, that people could have two moms or two dads growing up, never taught that. Actually, funnily when, when I grew up. I was never taught that people would just have a mum or just have a dad. You know, it was always mom and dad. And that’s it. That’s what a family looks like. Anything outside of that is not a family. That’s just a purse. Yeah, no. And the other background to this is I went to Catholic school, which obviously was never going to talk about anything outside of the the atomic family unit prescribed by Jesus and so that that that meant that I was never exposed to anything, anything at all to do with LGBTQ relationships or identities, it was never ever really spoken about. So yeah, I mean, had that been, you know, part part and parcel of law and, you know, put into the curriculum when I was at school, you know, things could have been really different. I think it’s amazing that the kids can go to school now. And if they’re in the situation that I was in, they can be made to feel that they’re not outliers, and they’re not abnormal and their family is is a normal and loving and perfectly fine family. And I think also, it’s the effect that it has on third parties as well, you know, like, educating the people that were the ones that were running away from me in the playground, or the ones that were that were phoning us up at four in the morning, you know, saying, oh, you’re a lesbian. You know, that’s what has more of an impact. In my opinion, it’s about it’s about educating the People that that are the ones that usually would cause all of the trouble when they feel that stuff’s normal. It’s not, it’s less likely they’re gonna use it as a sort of weapon against other people that are different to them.
Stu Oakley: Especially if they’ve had it from a young age as well. So it does just become life. Somebody has two moms, somebody has two dads, somebody has one mom, etc, etc, then it never even becomes an issue.
Mike Wooller: And that’s it. And I think, you know if, I mean, I wish I wish so much that that was that was a normal thing. When I was growing up. I really do. But, you know, I was shielded from it. I was always I was aware that that there were people out there that hated gay people. And, you know, God was Iowa. You know, it happened, you know, I witnessed it, you know, firsthand sometimes, you know, I was made aware of those things were also taught, you know, this is what some families look like and it was great. One thing that was great is that my some of my mom’s friends also had Kids so I wasn’t the only person I knew that had two moms. You know, I had a couple of friends that also had two moms. But that’s because they were in the same friendship group, you know? And but it was my network. Yeah, that’s it, I had a net Well, that’s a good way to describe it. It’s I had a network of kind of friends and acquaintances that were in the same boat as me, I think actually, that’s really, really important. It’s actually akin to, when you when you’re gay, it’s really important to have a network of, of gay friends that you can kind of reflect your experiences on each other. And it’s a support network, I suppose. I don’t think you ever want to feel like you’re the only person in your situation. So just being exposed to people in that same
Mike Wooller: in with that same setup is, you know, really, really useful.
Lotte Jeffs: So, Mike, I was wondering if you had any advice for me as a gay parent, you know, my wife and I, we just want to get it right. You know, and maybe they Something you experienced with having two moms or you didn’t experience that she had, that maybe you could impart your wisdom to me.
Mike Wooller: Yeah, I think this is what I would say is that my experience is a product of the time. So with talking late 90s, early 2000s, you know, I’m in my 30s now. And at the time, there was no information out there about the nobody was ever going to tell me that this the setup that my family had was normal and is fine. And this is what some families look like. I think, you know, kids now have the benefit of you know, the messaging out there is that this is actually absolutely normal. And, you know, you’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. You’re part of a loving family, but I think I think something that would have been really, really useful for me it was that Frank, honest, conversation very early on like this is what this is this you are going to be when you go to school, your friends are going to have families that probably look very different to us. And that’s fine. And that’s because of X, Y and Z. I think just I think spelling it out and not worrying about confusing your kids because they don’t get kids don’t get confused. That’s that’s a myth. I don’t think kids do get confused about things like this. If you say anything to kid and they’re like, Oh, cool. So might my nieces and nephews have all this? From my my stepmom side of the family. They’ve all grown up knowing that I’m gay and and they’ve never had an issue. Obviously, they’ve never been confused about it. Of course not. You know, I have a partner and we’re going to get married and they’re like, Oh, cool. They’re like, it’s not an issue, I think but I just think it’s I think is extremely important that kids know that. They don’t need to be told that they’re different. I don’t think that’s the case. I I think they need to be told that and it works. The same thing goes for straight Straight families. I think that, you know, if you’ve got a mom and a dad, it’s their responsibility to tell kids that there are families that don’t look like ours. Some people have two moms, some people have two dads. Some people have one mom, one dad, some people have neither some people have a guardian, you know. And I think it works both ways. And I think it’s also for same sex parents, it’s important to tell kids that our family doesn’t look like the majority of families out there. And that’s fine. And I think as time goes on, that’s becoming less and less necessary. But I would have benefited from it from that early stage to realise that you know, I am different, but it’s fine. And no matter what anyone says, it’s not a problem. And I can always go to them with concerns if somebody says no, because at the time I remember when the kind of homophobic stuff was happening when I was at school, I didn’t realise I could just go to them and say, by the way, this is happening and something might have been done about it. So it’s really I think It’s an acknowledgement of, of the points of difference to your families compared to your kids peers. But really just offering that sort of open forum, I suppose is a good.
Mike Wooller: I think my mum’s a lot more my biological mom is a lot more sentimental and that kind of you know, that sort of shoo shoo kittens cheek Polly kind of relationship whereas whereas Caroline has always been I can have a laugh and I call her up and I’ll have a laugh and a joke with her for for like an hour on the phone. Just talking about absolute nonsense. So yeah, it has developed that way. I’m always able to kind of reach out to them both on an emotional level and that’s never been a problem. But yeah we do have you know they’ve they’re different people as well i think
Lotte Jeffs: Mike, thank you so, so much for coming on our podcast and talking to us. I’ve personally really found it lovely and reassuring and wonderful to hear your experience. And thank you for your advice. And for being so open and honest with us.
Mike Wooller: Thank you so much for having me on. It was It was great. Strangely, I’ve never really had the opportunity to speak about it in that way before. So yeah, it’s quite nice, like a white screen. Well,
Lotte Jeffs: you You’re a great role model for lesbian moms, for sure. You’re a good looking guy. You’re articulate. You’re wearing a nice jumper. They did. Well.
Mike Wooller: Thank you so much. I’m very embarrassed now.
Lotte Jeffs: Do you know I think Mike is the first I’ve ever met who was bought up by same sex parents
Stu Oakley: I think it’s the first person that I’ve spoken to who exactly says guys growing up with gay parents?
Lotte Jeffs: Isn’t that crazy, given how many people that we know in the world that is so rare still, or have that generate if the generation before ours,
Stu Oakley: I think it’s the generation thing. I think that now, we know and we know of so many people that are going through parenting, or our parents, and we’re talking about different generations. So Mike is in his early 30s. So we’re talking about the mid 80s, when he was born, and his and his mum’s got together. So that was a very, very different time, especially for gays, lesbians as well, but also for gay men in the AIDS era. And so I think now the explosion of gay parenting is a is a fact of the steps that we’ve taken and the rights that we now have as as LGBT plus people.
Lotte Jeffs: Um, I found it really reassuring talking to him. One that he’s such a sorted, articulate and sort of great role model for being the kid of gay parents. But also it was really nice to hear his advice and just to kind of think,
Lotte Jeffs: what can my wife and I do with our daughter to just make sure that
Lotte Jeffs: we make it as easy for her as possible, I guess. And like, I really liked his advice of just being really open and honest with her and I think I can imagine myself going the other way of trying to pretend so much that we’re normal, and like not bring it up with her as anything, not normal. And you do that with The best intentions, but I guess Mike’s point was like, actually he would have quite liked it if they’d address the fact that this was a bit different and that’s okay. And so I what I’ve kind of taken from speaking to Mike is like to lean into the, the discomfort or the difficulty in some ways and not make it something that it’s not okay to talk about and, and just from a really early age, lay the foundations for that being a conversation that we can always have.
Stu Oakley: Yes, celebrate, celebrate the difference, celebrate the fact that you are queer parents, and that, that is that is who you are. And that’s who you’re, you know, your daughter will be your daughter will be the product of two fabulous queer women. And yes, that’s a that’s a great thing to celebrate. We’re in a place where, hopefully, especially by the time that we’re talking about another 15 years As what 10 1012 years to our lot are at that kind of teenager age at school, so who knows what the world is going to be like them? I thought it was interesting. I I didn’t share a story that I had actually when we were talking about my own stepmom. It just made me laugh when you were talking to him about how he embraced Caroline when she first moved in. And it made me think of my my dad’s partner. When she moved in with my dad. I was four. And her name is Gwen and I always used to spell it given. And in a complete, psycho, weird moment, one night I woke up early, and I wrote go home going over four packs of post it notes and stuck them over the entirety of my dad’s flat. Oh, she woke up in the morning with this like weird like in a horror film, go home. Everywhere.
Stu Oakley: So sometimes this kids don’t react to step parents in the same way.
Lotte Jeffs: What’s your relationship like now with him?
Stu Oakley: It’s good. It’s good. She’s with my dad. So they’ve been together for 30 years now. Plus, so yeah. And we laugh about it now. And she she says, she’s my wicked stepmother. And we have jokes about it. But I love speaking to Mike. And I think it’s given me a warmth and a positivity to think about because even through everything that he went through, he still said that he had a very positive childhood and he still had a very positive and he’s obviously a very well rounded individual now, so it gives me a lot of hope that you know, that the future that our children are going to go into is one that’s going to be very happy and upsetting super happy about that.
Lotte Jeffs: Hopefully, our podcast today will have brought you some comfort or sense of togetherness and community, this particularly challenging and disconnected time that we’re all experiencing. So I hope you’ve all got the same warm feeling inside that Stu and I have right now after talking to Mike and Stu On that note, it’s been really lovely to see you. Even though we’re on a video conferencing platform,
Stu Oakley: you too Lotte and I just want to add just quickly before we sign off, if you’ve listened to my story, and you yourself have been raised by gay parents and feel you have a completely different version of events or a different slant, you want to put on things you we want to hear from everyone. So please get in contact. We’re at some families pod on Instagram and Twitter. You could email us at some families at StoryHunter, coda UK, we really want to hear from all of you. We really want to hear from lots of different families and people who’ve been through similar yet different experiences.
Lotte Jeffs: Take care everybody. Look after yourselves. Bye bye