'Times Two': Twins with a twist

On a sunny morning in the old-fashioned, Mayberry-like community of Sea Cliff, a very modern family sat on the porch of their white house with brick-red trim. Thomas Ellis-Henderson, 2, balanced on the lap of one of his two moms, pointing out the red blooms of a hanging plant. "Flower," he told his "twin," Kate.

Thomas and Kate's parents have searched for a word for their children's relationship but can't come up with a better one. That's because the story of Sarah Kate Ellis and Kristen Henderson's children is so unusual.

The mothers tell their tale in "Times Two: Two Women in Love and the Happy Family They Made" (Free Press, $24), which hit bookstore shelves nationwide in April.

It's not necessarily bookworthy when a lesbian couple uses artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization to create a family. But when Ellis, vice president of marketing at Real Simple magazine, and Henderson, a member of the all-female band Antigone Rising, became frustrated by Ellis' fertility issues, they decided to try simultaneously, using the same anonymous sperm donor.

On the same day in 2008, Ellis had embryos implanted by in vitro fertilization and Henderson was artificially inseminated. Then, they heard the news: pregnant, and pregnant, with due days three days apart.

The book covers Ellis and Henderson's coming out and dating life, their selection of a sperm donor (two favorite traits: 6 feet tall and high SAT scores), their pregnancy attempts (from Henderson's attempt at inseminating Ellis at home using a needleless syringe to traditional IVF in a doctor's office), and their heartbreak when Ellis miscarried during an earlier attempt.

"It's been very cathartic in a lot of ways and very therapeutic, but also nerve-racking," Henderson says of opening up their private lives. "You just don't realize the intimacy of it." She says it was akin to letting her father read her diary. "You could just be mortified."

While theirs is a tale of creating a family in today's society, the story reverberates on other levels as well, say gays and lesbians. "It shows the entire world we are more alike than we are different," says David Kilmnick, chief executive officer of the Long Island Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Services Network, which works to end homophobia on Long Island.

Suffolk County Legis. Jon Cooper (D-Lloyd Harbor) has advocated for marriage equality and has been with his partner, Rob, for 31 years. They have five children, ages 16 to 25. He echoes Kilmnick.

"It's all about changing hearts, one person at a time. The way to do that is by getting stories like this out there and educating the greater straight community that there are loving, committed, monogamous gay and lesbian couples," Cooper says. Those couples face the same challenges as heterosexual couples: "How do you juggle going to a soccer game and picking up your other child from ballet at the same time?"

But they face more challenges as well: Ellis and Henderson tell of having to adopt each other's children to both be listed as parents on their birth certificates, for instance. And, of course, heterosexual couples could never have dual pregnancies.

Ellis and Henderson relate their at-times humorous story by alternating voices.

Writes Sarah of finding out Kristen also was pregnant: "The next nine months were supposed to be 'The Sarah Show,' co-starring her supportive and loving partner, Kristen. Who was going to fill my every craving at the oddest hours of the night? Who was going to rub my feet?"

Says Kristen after their children's births, which happened three weeks apart: "My heart left my body on the days they were born, and it was now roaming around the earth in them."

Ellis says that while the couple had some concerns about backlash from people who disagree with what they've done, so far response has been positive, and she and Henderson are proud of how their book might influence young gays and lesbians.

"For them to see the possibilities, to see the generation before them is trying to move us forward, I think that's really important," Ellis says.

DETAILS

WHAT: Readings of "Times Two: Two Women in Love and the Happy Family They Made," with short performances by the band "Antigone Rising"

WHEN | WHERE: 2 p.m. Saturday, 5/7 at Forest Books, 182 Birch Hill Rd., Locust Valley

-7 p.m. next Wednesday, 5/11 at Book Revue, 313 New York Ave., Huntington

INFO: Free; Forest Books: 516-759-1489; Book Revue: 631-271-1442, bookrevue.com