The state gay rights advocacy group Equality Texas has partnered with the national Family Pride Coalition and their OUTSpoken Families program to kick off the “Our Stories” educational training sessions, scheduled to make a stop in Houston July 9.

Equality Texas is inviting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender parents and their allies across the state to participate in a speaker’s bureau training session.

The Houston Equal Rights Alliance, a local gay rights group, has joined in the effort, and is supporting outreach efforts throughout the city as part of its ongoing advocacy campaign for gay Houstonians.

Officials believe the training sessions will give gay parents the tools necessary to become effective and knowledgeable speakers and advocates for family equality. They believe this will help the cause of gay families, since participants in the training sessions will be better able to lobby government officials for change.

“These media trainings are essential in working with LGBT families to tell their family stories among their friends, at the grocery store, and to our elected officials,” says Paul E. Scott, Equality Texas executive director. “For too long, LGBT families have been left out of the definition of ‘family,’ and it is imperative that we share our lives to dispel the myths and stereotypes perpetuated by extremists.”

In an ongoing effort to coordinate education and advocacy efforts, the statewide gay rights organization, along with the Family Pride Coalition, recently launched a media campaign spotlighting gay families. Representatives with the two gay rights organizations say ultimately it will be these families’ stories that will change people’s opinions about gay families.

They point out that for the past four sessions of the Texas Legislature, lawmakers have attempted to restrict same-sex couples from becoming foster parents.

“We know how effective LGBT parents are in reaching our elected officials, and we need to flood the Texas capitol with people willing to stand up for their families.” Scott says.

Eva Thibaudeau-Graczyk, who along with her same-sex partner, is the mother of four small children.

“We are the in-betweens,” Thibaudeau-Graczyk says. “A menagerie of cultures, geographies, colors and lives brought together by circumchance. We exist in a space that definitions fail to imagine. We are an inter-ethnic, transracial, adoptive, female-headed, gay household of transplanted Yankees living in Houston.”

Despite the obvious differences between gay families and straight ones, Thibaudeau-Graczyk points out that both are the same, and have the same values.

“There are so many ways in which we differ from the ‘norm’, but even more in which we are the same,” she says. “ In church one week, the children’s story was about finding God in the in-between’s.

“God was not to be found on the mountain peaks, the blazing desert sands or the ocean’s expanse. God did not reside in the extremes of nature or humanity. Rather, God was found in the relationships between people who chose to share their love and resources with each other.”

The biggest concern for this gay mother is the effects discrimination could have on her children.

“My life would be much easier if I could just live it without having to worry about my children being harassed, or my marriage over-examined and called perverted,”she says. “My life would be simpler if I knew that I didn’t have to scrimp and save in order to pay for a second-parent adoption so that my wife wouldn’t lose custody of our four children if some tragedy befell me.”

The views by conservative groups towards the gay population and gay parents doesn’t bother Thibaudeau-Graczyk

“The religious right and the conservative politicians can spew all the rhetoric they want to about how my family is demoralizing the troops in Iraq with our anti-American family values,” Thibaudeau-Graczyk says. “They can label and villainize us.”

Despite the opposition and discrimination, Thibaudeau-Graczyk’s spirits and family unit will not be broken.

“They can try, but I am not ready to stop telling our story,” she says. “I am not ready to accept injustice. I am not ready to stop believing in the basic goodness of humanity.

“ I keep on thinking that if I can just educate one more person, maybe that will tip the scales. I have my family to think about and because of them, I won’t stop living my life.

“It’s a good life. It’s a blessed life. It’s a life that deserves to be heard.”

According to the organization’s website, Equality Texas’ mission is to eliminate discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity/expression by lobbying the Texas Legislature and other government agencies. The organization was formerly called the Lesbian/Gay Rights Lobby of Texas.

The Equality Texas Foundation conducts research and educates Texans about issues of equality, and helps coordinate efforts of gay and gay-friendly organizations in Texas.

The Equality Texas Political Action Committee works to help gay and gay-friendly politicians elected to the Legislature.

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