This might be a personal question, but...

I am a lesbian.  I am married to a woman.  I am also a mother.  While I was pregnant with my son, I could not believe how freely people felt like they could ask me about the details of how I got pregnant.   I particularly appreciated it when people whom I had just met would follow "nice to meet you" with "this might be a personal question, but...."

So as my partner and I begin to try for a second child, I am keeping this as a detailed account of our journey to parenthood as preparation for you overly-curious-yet-well-meaning people who need a tutorial on how to approach a pregnant lesbian.

Here is a rundown of the standard queries, and why you should not ask them:

"How did you decide who would have the baby?"

• This is offensive for a number of reasons. By asking this, you are assuming that we, and not nature, made this decision.  And you are assuming that the decision about who to carry came easily, which in many cases it does not.  Plenty of lesbian couples try with one partner, and then move to the other partner when the first one cannot conceive. Or maybe one of us has a medical issue, or earns more money and can't afford to take a mat leave.  Any way around this, it is none of your business and you should never ask.  

"Who's the father?"

• Team, what part of lesbian parents do you not understand?  Typically, there is no daddy (although some amazing women are in co-parenting situations and do have involved donors or dads - I don't have those kinds of sharing skills) and I will thank you in advance for just taking that word out of your vocabulary and please just say "donor".  Going back to my girl-at-the-party scenario, however, you still can't ask me about the donor in that situation.  Aside from the fact that it is none of your business, please recognize how the focus on the donor makes my partner feel - she is this baby's parent and her role is confusing and not socially defined and focusing on the guy who spunked in a cup for money is more than a little hurtful. 

"Did you always know you wanted kids?"

• Unless you are Barbara Walters or Oprah Winfrey, you should not be asking me questions about my childhood hopes and dreams. The issue with this one is a little bit nuanced than the others - this is problematic when it is asked in the context of having just met me.  Would you ask this if I wasn't  a lesbian? (If the answer is 'yes' then you are reading the wrong blog, because you've got bigger issues)

When you meet lesbian parents-to-be for the first time, it is not your chance to ask everything you ever wanted to know.  Pretend that I got knocked up the old fashioned way, and then let's just talk about the weather.  It IS a personal question!