The Changing Nature of
Family Ties
Family Diversity Is Here to Stay When Meg Soens ’77 graduated, she feared she would never be able to have a family. Soens was struggling with coming out as a lesbian and because of that, didn’t feel she would ever fit into the traditional family mold of husband, wife, and 2.3 kids. Yet today—at least from the outside—her family resembles a very traditional one: two parents, four kids, and a house in the ’burbs. Though both parents in this family are women (Soens married Celia d’Oliveira in 2004), their goal is like any family’s: to enjoy life in a loving, supportive environment while adding something to the world. Soens found that society, at least in her neck of the woods [Massachusetts], is changing right alongside her and her family.
Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly | Summer 2006
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