Sara Wheeler's
life has become a contradiction. Once a proud lesbian,
she's now a pariah among gays. Once in a committed
relationship with a female partner, she's rethinking
her sexuality. And now she's doing something she once
would have considered unthinkable: arguing that gays
don't have the legal right to adopt children.
Wheeler is coming
to grips with the fact that she's become an outcast for
taking this step in a custody fight for her child. But she
says that isn't what her fight is about: ''It's about
motherly rights.''
Wheeler, 36, and
her partner, Missy, decided to start a family together
and share the Wheeler last name. In 2000, Sara gave birth to
a son, Gavin, through artificial insemination. Two
years later, they decided Missy should adopt the child
and legally become his second parent.
Georgia law
doesn't specifically say whether gay parents can adopt a
child, so the decision was up to a judge in the Atlanta
area's DeKalb County. After an adoption investigator
determined that both partners were committed to the
child, the judge cleared the request.
The couple's
relationship later soured. Missy wouldn't comment for this
story, but her attorney, Nora Bushfield, said Sara became
involved with someone else and wouldn't let Missy and
Gavin see each other.
Sara acknowledged
the other relationship, saying ''regardless of my
action, it doesn't make me a bad mother.''
Sara and Missy
Wheeler had split by July 2004, and Missy was fighting for
joint custody of the boy.
The two sides do
agree about one thing: The case is about a mother's
rights. ''Everybody seems to forget we're not talking about
lesbian rights,'' Missy's attorney says. ''We're
talking about a child who's been bonded with a
mother.''
Sara made the
legal argument that, since nothing in Georgia law
specifically allowed adoption by gays, the adoption should
be tossed out.
Her first lawyers
warned her the case could set gay rights back a
century. She hired a new attorney and asked the DeKalb
County court to toss the adoption that she had
previously pushed for, claiming it should never have
been approved because it runs afoul of state law.
News of the
tactic whipped up Atlanta's gay community, one of the
largest in the South. Lambda Legal, a gay rights
group, made a legal filing with the Georgia supreme
court supporting Missy Wheeler. ''There's something
about this case that's just tragic,'' said Greg Nevins, a
lawyer for the group.
Laura
Douglas-Brown, editor of Southern Voice, the
city's main gay newspaper, penned a column accusing Sara
Wheeler of ''self-hating.'' ''We owe it to each other
not to lash out in ways that damage the entire gay
community,'' she wrote. ''Your own family may be
destroyed, but don't destroy ours too.''
Sara said she
felt like she had no choice. ''I'm not doing anything else
a mother wouldn't do to fight for her son,'' she said.
''Some people may think it's the unthinkable, but if
they were put in my shoes, they'd do the same thing.''
It didn't go so
well. Her lawsuit seeking to throw out the adoption was
rejected by the DeKalb County judge and later by the
state court of appeals.
Then the Georgia
supreme court, in a 4-3 vote in February, declined to
hear the case. Only months earlier the court had upheld the
state's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, which
Georgia voters overwhelmingly approved in 2004.
Justice George H.
Carley, who voted with the minority in the
adoption case, declared he was ''at a loss to
comprehend'' why the court refused to consider a case
of such ''great concern, gravity, and public
importance.''
Sara Wheeler is
asking the state supreme court to reconsider her case.
Such a request rarely succeeds, but the narrow vote gives
her hope that one justice might be swayed.
''There's nothing
that states this is an acceptable adoption,'' she said.
''If Georgia wants to allow it, it needs to make proper
laws.''
As the legal
motions flew back and forth, the two women established a
workable routine. The 7-year-old boy goes to Missy Wheeler's
place every other weekend and on Tuesday nights. The
rest of the time he stays with Sara Wheeler,
who ferries him to karate practice, plays tag with him
outside her apartment, and takes him out for pizza every
Friday.
The case has
taken a toll on Sara. Aside from a few gay friends, she has
turned away from the gay community. She no longer dates and
doesn't go to gay clubs or events anymore. She said
she is rethinking whether she is still a lesbian and
whether she should abandon dating for good.
''I just don't
feel comfortable in that scene,'' she says. ''I'm just
trying to figure it all out.''
She knows she's
seen as a betrayer, but in a sense she feels she was the
one betrayed. ''Before I'm anything, gay or lesbian, I'm a
mother,'' she says. ''And the most important thing is
to make sure my son has a relationship with his
biological mother.'' (Greg Bluestein, AP)
