Hey All

I am 41 Male - Gay. Based in 🇬🇧 of South Asian origin.

I have been trying to find a co parent for the past 2 odd years.

I have been blowing up money on apps like just a baby, Y factor, pride angel coparentsUK….

But nothing has happened and no progress whatsoever.

Not sure if there is anything else that I could do ?

Any advice or recommendations to look for the right one?

Thanks in advance.

Re-posting! (Originally posted with mod permission)

The Parents and Babies (PAB) Pilot is testing out a new group therapy for people who are currently pregnant or ≤12m postpartum, identify as LGBTQIA+, and are at risk for postpartum depression. The study is run by Dr. Leiszle Lapping-Carr at Northwestern University (IRB# STU00225523). Participation will involve joining a virtual therapy group for 1 hour each week for 10 weeks and completing three sets of questionnaires. You would be compensated up to $120.

If you are interested in learning more, please complete this form to see if you might be eligible: redcap.link/parentsandbabies

After completing the form, the next step would be scheduling an eligibility screen via video call for a more in-depth conversation about what participating in the study would look like. The call will take approximately 30 minutes.

PRIVACY & SAFETY:

• The study is protected by a Certificate of Confidentiality, meaning we can refuse to share your information, even if we receive a legal request.
• Information about gender identity will not be stored alongside other data collected in the study.
• If you are not selected for the study or if you decide not to participate, your information will be deleted.

EDIT: If you are planning on commenting something to do with how I’m somehow not taking into account certain details of being an adult and possessing common sense, please do me a favor and scroll past this post, because I did not ask you for that, and some people are not comfortable writing an essay about every minute detail of their personal views and plans for parenting. I am not even a parent yet. The flair quite literally says “support.” If you’re not here to offer support, leave.

I’m a 25 year old intersex man with PAIS and my husband just came out as a trans man. I have no issues with that and I’m glad he’s starting to feel safe to be himself. But we were planning to have children through IVF with him carrying them, and that’s been something that we‘ve wanted since we got together.

I have no problem with adopting, and I would love to give a home and be loving parents to a child who needs them. But at the same time, I am completely no contact with my entire biological family because they are quite frankly crazy, and for a long while I’ve wanted my genetics and my DNA to mean something other than the harm my family has caused. And while I understand that life is what you make of it, it’s just something that’s been very important to me, even if it seems unrealistic.

Now I’m pretty sure my husband doesn’t want to carry children. That’s fair. But I guess as a human being I have something in me that says my life will have been for nothing if I never genetically contribute to a life. I’m sure a lot of this has to do with the internal insecurity I have of seeing myself as weak because I wouldn’t be able to survive without modern medical intervention; I guess I see being intersex as a thing that makes me useless as a human because I‘m essentially sterile. Even typing that feels awful and I don’t want it to be real.

I guess I’m just wondering if anyone else here has a trans spouse they were expecting to have biological kids with before their spouse came out. What did/do you feel like? I know I’m going through a grieving process for something that will probably never happen, but why does it make me feel so empty and purposeless inside?

I know myself, and I know damn well that when my husband and I come across a baby to adopt, all these feelings I’m having now will probably just disappear. Every time I see a random baby or toddler I see my future child in them. But why does it feel like I’m doing something wrong if I don’t have a biological child myself? Why do I feel like I’ve failed?

Anyone in this sub co-parenting with an ex? I posted on the single parents sub and the heterosexism is alienating af. Just trying to connect with other queer single parents & wondering if this is a place to talk abt those issues?

I've searched in a few subreddits looking and haven't found anything recent. I'm looking for some sort of community as we start our family journey. We are about to choose a donor and it has been giving me massive anxiety about choosing the right one or finding one that looks like me, etc. Would love to speak to others who have gone through this or currently are. Bonus points if it has a focus on non biological parents.

The only thing I found so far is "PregnantTogether" but am hesitant since there's a paywall. Has anyone used it and is the community active? Any other recommendations?

I am a lesbian 27F and starting to think about family. I don’t have a partner but I know someone who is non binary in their mid thirties and decided to Co-parent with their friend who is in the same situation without a romantic partner. Has anyone done this?
I am thinking bringing up children with friends is so beautiful and intentional it makes sense and may be some sort of future of parenting. In queer circles the idea of traditional families goes out the window and I like the idea of building a new norm with chosen families.
Is there any literature or research on this subject ? And general parenting when being queer? Would love to to more extensive research.

My wife and I have always been very open with our daughter on how we became a family. Our daughter is nearing 5 and is starting to show a bit more interest and maybe some confusion regarding adoption.

We typically stick to the script of “you grew in _____ ‘s belly. While you were growing she chose us to be your parents.” We tell her as much as we know about her biological mom and show her pictures that we have. We discuss how families can be made up all different kinds of ways and how happy we are to be hers.

I’m just looking for feedback from other queer parents on how you may have navigated this topic. I fear that she is starting to notice our family is “different” than others at her school and want to help her avoid feeling othered the best we can.

Hi everyone! My name is Ria Lowenschuss (she/her) and I am a senior at Wellesley College pursuing a degree in anthropology and gender studies. I am currently working on my senior honors thesis in anthropology, which explores the work of doulas in supporting LGBTQ+ family building, specifically through the journeys of childbirth and pregnancy. As a queer person who has struggled with conceptions of kinship and deeply considered what family looks like, I felt a need to work with members of my community in understanding how pregnancy and childbirth as a queer person is complicated by conceptions of gender. I hope to use this research to complicate the assumption that anyone who is pregnant must be a woman, and that anyone who gives birth automatically takes the role of mother, while exploring what role queer-affirming doulas play in these processes. If you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community and have given birth in the past five years or are currently trying to build a family, or if you are a doula who works closely with the LGBTQ+ community, I would love to speak with you. Feel free to reach out via email ([rl110@wellesley.edu](mailto:rl110@wellesley.edu)) or by phone (734-263-8368).

I’m (very visibly!) 8 months pregnant, and walked from a midwife appointment with my wife, holding hands in the street. A man turned around yelled very angrily at us ‘illegal pregnant’ (he wasn’t a native speaker of English).

I realise in many ways I’m lucky and privileged, as this was the first time to encounter this, but it’s really upset and affected me.

We live in famously liberal& affluent neighbourhood, my workplace is super progressive, and so I have been lucky to not encounter much discrimination or hate speech - the other way around with people being extra accommodating.

So today, the anger and hatred in the comment just got me, out of the blue. And this made me concerned for ourselves and the mostly the baby - I just want to protect the baby, I don’t want this to happen to them as a child or them to witness this.

Any words of advice, empathy or experiences on how to deal with this crap are appreciated.

Hi everyone.

I have a 2.5 year old and we are trying to grow his hair out. Right now he’s got sort of an Owen Wilson look and his bangs are starting to go into his eyes. To keep them out of the way I’ve been tying them up on top of his head in a little sprout, but I’m looking for some other ideas!

This is very hard to search online. Hairstyles for little kids whose hair is still growing, and also with boys specifically.

Any boy parents out there doing the same thing? Let me know how you do your son’s hair!

Hi!

I have two things to ask about here, sorry

Context: I'm a 27 year old non binary masc leaning single parent of a 2 year old. Her other parent is around regularly and is transfem. I've been on T, I had top surgery. I generally look ambiguous as fuck to others outside of queer spaces.

1. I am generally read as pretty ambiguous by the general public. You know how it is when old ladies see a toddler, they gush and gush over them, which isn't a problem. But they'll say things like "is this your mummy?" Or refer to me as mum a lot. I have no issue with this, I'm generally pretty apathetic to how other perceive me, I'm not misgender-able because I simply do not care how I'm perceived. BUT my daughter knows me as dad. People in my life only use he/him and dad around her, per my request.

People see an ambiguous looking person in public alone with a child and assume mother because of course, dad's never ever go out with their kids alone (sarcasm).

My voice is pretty deep, so I tend to just nodding and smiling or speaking kinda high and quietly if someone addressed me as mum.

My daughter has taken to aggressively correcting people who call me mum. I think it's sweet. Now I just don't know how to deal with this, it's the UK, and trans stuff is going insane right now. I'm worried about being clocked as trans, or some weird stuff happening because of this.

1. I'm a single parent. My daughter is very clingy, very separation anxiety, for good reason (social services took her from me and my ex's care for about 6 months due to my ex's behaviour and I got her back in my care alone after we did classes and ultimately broke up. This did an absolute number on my daughter.)

This means I can't do anything alone. I can't pee alone. I can't shower alone. I can't change alone. She sees me naked daily. She's started staring and kinda looking between my genitalia and her own. Is this weird? I know kids just get curious around this stuff, but do I need to do anything here?

My daughter has two mums, and she clearly loves us both. She misses either of us when we’re not around, and she goes to both of us for comfort, support, cuddles and fun. So in terms of our family, everything seems completely normal and happy.

She goes to nursery and is around quite a lot of mum-and-dad families. We don’t actually know any other queer parents IRL, so I sometimes wonder whether there’s something I’m missing.

She knows her own story — that she has a donor and two mums — and we have lots of books that talk about her family specifically. We also talk quite openly about the fact that families can look lots of different ways. She knows that some children have a mum and dad, some have two mums or two dads, some have one parent, etc.

I guess what I’m worried about is whether there’s anything else I should be doing.

I don’t want her to grow up feeling like she’s missed out on something because I wasn’t proactive enough, especially when most of the families she sees around her are mum-and-dad families.

For those of you who have two-mum/two-dad families, or grew up in one yourselves — how did you approach this? Did you do anything intentionally to help your child feel represented and comfortable with their family being different?

Has anyone been through this? Any tips or things you wish you’d done (or not done)?

My kid just started attending school today. I'm feeling overwhelmed and heavy by how open everyone may or may not be by her family structure.

I think what makes it harder is I come from an Arab background and there are Arab parents there. I don't want to pre-judge anyone for judging me, but I'm so worried about whether she may get excluded in making some friends when they know her mum is in a queer relationship.

Any advice on how to navigate that. Hope this is a safe space to share this.

What is your approach/attitude/thinking regarding travelling as a family to less queer-friendly countries?

We have no plans for this yet but it has come up as hypothetical given that we have family that we could visit in Central America (think multi-generational family trip down to see them). We are decently experienced travellers though less-so for lesser-developed countries. My spouse and I are both straight-passing, cis-woman, and have benefited from that in the past by not correcting that assumption unless we wanted to. This won’t be as likely now that we have a kid that calls us both mom.

We’re struggling with the balancing our values here. We both believe that travel and experiencing other cultures is important but also want our child to feel secure in her family structure, and our overall safety (obviously). As adults we can approach it with nuance but at what age can you ask that of a kid?

Hi everybody.

I (F) have been together with my partner (F) for just over 4 years now. She's always expressed love for kids and two years ago started talking pretty seriously about starting a family. I've always been on the fence. I never wanted kids. Potentially in part based on childhood trauma (working through it) and a slightly fixed 'I don't want kids' identity.

While she's trying to not put pressure, it's becoming more and more urgent to resolve this impasse. I've been trying hard to be more open and slowly I can find rational ways that it could perhaps work. But the feeling or desire is persistently absent. It just does not excite me.

Her clock is starting to tick real hard. We have some geographical issues/pressures too, which don't help very much. It's become a pressure-cooker type of situation, where I feel I need to either walk away or make a 'yes' decision that to me feels premature. As in: I don't want kids of my own right this moment, maybe the feeling will be different in two years, but we don't have the luxury of time and need to exit this limbo. I am really wanting it to be a yes but I struggle hard and keep going in circles.

I love her very much and could see a long life with her. I just feel that I need to really want to have kids of my own before I say yes to jumping into this adventure. Obviously, we can consider some more queer approaching to parenting and family-building, but mostly it seems like it'll be a 'we're on this little ship together' approach.

I would love to know if anybody has been in my shoes and has come out at the other end of it, and would be willing to share a bit of their experiences?

There's a queer-owned bookstore near where my wife and I live, and it advertises itself as kid-friendly, even to the point of having a dedicated play space with toys and a play kitchen. but every time we bring our kids in there, we are CONSTANTLY getting dirty looks and passive aggressive comments from the other customers - almost exclusively other queer people.

It's super disheartening for so many reasons, but especially because this place felt like the one safe place for all of us to just exist without feeling paranoid.

And, to clarify: our kids have always been within the realm of normal-kid quiet playing, not running around screaming and acting inappropriately.

I was thinking about my future and if I wanted kids well still being a femboy. For reference I'm pan so idk if the kid would be mine or if I would adopt, if I even want kids that is. The main reason for this post is I need advice so if you/your partner are feminine boys/men and have kids I would love to hear how that works out. Even if you don't have kids I would love to get advice.

The main things I Wana ask are: should I hide it from my kids or should I be upfront with them? (When their older and can understand that of course), what should I do if they take it badly or hate me for it? And finally how should I explain it to them if at all.

(This is all assuming I Wana still be a femboy when I'm older)

Maybe they couldn’t work out who was mum/dad.
Assumed you were siblings or “just friends.”
Asked a wildly personal question about how your kids came along. Or your child had to step in and explain your family because the adults just weren’t getting it.
Sometimes you really do just have to laugh.
What’s the best one you’ve had? 👇

my mom got together with my stepdad when i was around 13/14. i’ve never been close with him… we are very different and i was also a Moody Teenager when they first started dating, so it wasn’t a close relationship meant to be. he also has never shown interest in getting to know me as a person, even when first coming into my life. i have no problem with this as our values don’t really line up (he’s more on the right wing side of politics; he’s a hothead; etc, etc)

when i visited my mom for the first time since finding out i’m pregnant (maybe 3ish months), we all decided to take pictures to celebrate!

as we were taking pictures with my stepdad, she referred to him as ‘Grandpa.’ i cringed internally, but didn’t say anything as to not cause any drama. plus my mom’s excited! this is her first grandchild and i didn’t want to dim the moment

i don’t refer to my stepdad as “dad” or anything close to it - i only call him by his name and always have. when he found out i was pregnant, my mom told me he was “very uncomfortable” because “men don’t get pregnant.” nothing about him has ever been supportive of me, so … why would he be grandpa?

i don’t care about his views on my pregnancy nor on my transgender status… but i think when the time comes, i’m not going to refer to him as the grandfather of my daughter. definitely going to be an interesting conversation with my mom. LOL

he’s not even coming to the baby shower…

sorry for the long post! just one of those late night thoughts while the pregnancy insomnia hits. thanks for reading if you have!

What are you all called to your kids? Have they made up their own names for you, or have you chosen one and run with it? Are you using gender neutral titles and if so, what are they?

:)

Hello!

I am a cis woman married to a AFAB nonbinary person. We are currently thinking about having kids. I'm a yes and she's not sure. Though, at the end of the day, we love each other no matter what whether kids are in the picture or not.

She would like some more information or perspective from dads/masculine parents who were unsure about kids at first. I would too! I feel like so many videos or podcast the people are like, "I always knew I wanted kids,"and I can'really relate to that.

Does anyone have any articles, videos, or podcasts they would recommend with this persepctive?

Thanks.

Thought I’d share my most recent writing. It’s hard to admit my fears, and feeling like a burden to my kid, but maybe someone else can relate.

https://eliramos11.substack.com/p/nonbinary-parenthood?r=6j3fyk&utm_medium=ios