We’ve been dying to have kids together pretty much since we met! We’ve been dreaming about growing our little family since very early in our relationship, and I cannot wait to start. But we have to wait, at least just a little bit longer, for a few reasons. But we are at a very exciting place right now – we’re planning our planning!
Let me explain…
We want a baby, that much we know. But there are so many decisions to be made about how to have a kid that it’s a little overwhelming. AND we have the added complications of us living in Canada, where Bek is not a citizen and likely won’t be for another 3 years or so. So in addition to the complicated legal considerations that the average queer couple has to manage, we have to make sure we cover all our bases in terms of having our kids legally recognized as both of ours in both countries (and ideally having dual citizenship for them). And there are all kind of decisions to be made that we don’t even know about yet! And the decision-making takes time, as does actually putting plans into action. So if we want to be actively trying to get pregnant in about a year-and-a-half, we need to figure out what our plan is going to be pretty soon! So, we’re now in the process of figuring out HOW we’re going to figure out HOW to do this thing!
INITIAL (and overwhelming) THINGS TO GET SORTED OUT
1. Where is a baby going to come from? It’s going to come from me. My egg, my belly. We want at least two kids, but we aren’t sure yet about where the second one will come from. There was never much of a question that I would have at least our first baby. I definitely want to get pregnant, and am ready now, so it’s on me for round one!
2. How are we making said baby? You know what’s overwhelming? Shopping for sperm. Have you looked at those catalogues? I’m not gonna lie, it feels weird. And there are other means of getting the stuff – like friends, family members, anonymous designated donors, but I’m not sure of what we should be taking into consideration when deciding what to do. I tend to get a little overthinky about these things, so this all this makes me more than a little nervous.
3. How much is this going to cost?
- If you go the sperm bank route, it’s gonna cost you. Here’s some prices for various sperm bank services…
- One option is: “Do it all at the clinic” One hospital I looked at had a bring-your-own-sperm set-up (frozen from a bank, not in a jar from your friend) and the cost was about $1300 not including the cost of your sperm. The cost of just the sperm for something like this is between $450 and $700+shipping.
- Another option is: “You do it yourself with a lot of guidance and medical consultation” The place we’ve looked at (of the three major companies that meet the Health Canada standards) there is an initial consultation of fee of $150. Then a first round of the at-home insemination program (which includes a before and after consultation, access to and assistance with selecting from their donor catalogue, instructions, two vials of your selected donor’s semen, and all the gear one would need to knock themselves up) costs between $1,690 and $1,990 depending on whether you want to know the ID of the donor in the future. Then any subsequent rounds cost between $1,240 and $1,440. Honestly, this is actually cheaper than I had expected when I first started looking.
- Yet another option is: “You’re totally on your own” I know most readers are in the US, so I had a look at some pricing in the states. One company that you can just order direct from and they send you your frozen samples, and you do what you will with it, costs between $100 and $1,100 depending on whether it’s anonymous or non-anonymous, the motile sperm/straw count, and whether or not it’s washed (which if you aren’t familiar with sperm washing, it basically “separates sperm cells from a man’s semen, helping to get rid of dead or slow-moving sperm as well as additional chemicals that may impair fertilization” – it’s supposed to pack a little more punch, as it were). Plus shipping!
- If you want to use a known or designated donor, but want it assessed, stored, processed, and provided to you through a clinic (you get your donor to donate at the clinic and they screen it, freeze it, wash it if you want, etc.) the cost is about between $2,300 and $3,000. Or, you can have a known or designated donor youjust gives you a fresh sample, use a syringe at home, and its free.
- There are legal costs too. And if you think going the “known donor with a fresh sample so its free route” is cheaper, you may be wrong. If you plan on having your donor release all parental rights, you should be paying for a good laywer for both yourself and your donor to get all your paperwork in order. And whether or not you have a known or anonymous donor, free or paid for, you’re more than likely going to want to do a legal adoption for the partner that is not biologically related to the baby. We’ll probably need to hire a lawyer before we even start things, because we have a complicated situation, and some of the legal considerations might play in to how we decide to get pregnant. So that won’t come cheap, and add to it additional fees and costs throughout any adoption process.
4. What are our legal considerations? I don’t know how it works in the US, but in Canada (at least in my province) you can actually put two people of the same sex on the birth certificate – but only if you don’t know the ID of the other biological parent. If you do know their ID you don’t have to put them on the birth certificate – you can put only the one biological parent (in my case, me) on the birth certificate when you initially submit it, then reapply afterwards to put your partner’s name on it. In either case, some laywers recommend STILL filing for legal adoption for the non-bio parent just to make sure all your bases are covered. Not everyone might be as concerned with this aspect of the process, but because we are from two different countries, it’s a major concern. We need our kids recognized as legal both of ours in both the US and Canada. We aren’t sure yet what is involved in what might be considered an international adoption if Bek adopts a baby that I conceive.
5. What do we need to be doing to figure all this out, and what is the smartest way to move forward? The first exciting step we’ve taken is that we’ve enrolled in a class for the Spring! We’re fortunate enough to live in Toronto where we have both a large LGBTQ Community Centre and a large LGBTQ Health Centre, and they jointly run queer parenting programs which includes a class for queer women* planning to start families. The class covers all the different ways and means, and covers all the basics of what you need to know about legal and medical stuff, and hooks you up to various resources. We’re counting on this to introduce us to all our different options, and help us narrow down how we want to both get pregnant and sort things out from a legal perspective.
*Their parenting programs are AWESOME. They have the same planning course for queer men and queer pre-natal classes, plus all their programs are trans-inclusive. AND they recently started a program for FTM, transmen, and transmasculine individuals looking to biologically conceive. So we’re pretty stoked to be plugging into this great resource network.
So I guess that sums up where we are. Still very much in the information-gathering stage of things, but working towards figuring out how to make our decisions and how to start planning. The class is really the first big step, and I’ll admit that I am kind of counting on it to sort of hold my hand through the initial stages of fully investigating our options. This is scary stuff! In the best possible way.
Um, so anyone else in the same boat? I’d love to hear from anyone else who is anywhere along in the process!!!
I’m not even thinking about it but it is interested to hear about all the options, even though that is for at least another 3-4 years for me. Are the classes free? I have a friend in Toronto and she says the community up there is much more understanding when it comes LGBTQ becoming parents.
Awww Mandy…wow! Thanks for posting this. It’s makes head hurt to know all the hoops you have to jump through and how long, costly, and daunting the process may seem but I’m so happy for you guys that you’re gonna have a baby some day sooner than later!
Mandy, Have you gone through any sorts of fertility tests to get a better sense of how “able” you are to get pregnant? Christina and I have talked about this for us just to make sure she can get pregnant before we invest all this money into trying, when it may turn out that she won’t be able to conceive. I’m curious if you’ve done this or thought about it.
Dear god, why is is so expensive?! Every time I look at the numbers I’m like, forget affording the baby, I’ll never be able to afford the sperm!
I have most of those things planned out, my dear girlfriend (of almost two years now) famously said once when I brought it up to her with the stellar conversation opener “So, I think you should have the first baby,” “Can we talk about this in three years?” So in the meantime I plan the actual next addition to our family: a dog sister for our cat son. ;)
Mandy, my partner and I are in the same boat. Well, a similarly baby-brained boat that is floating nearby. We are at the planning-to-plan stage, with the goal of us (me) trying to get pregnant in another year or so. There is so much to learn, and it’s not easy to find great and reliable information. We have already started some meetings with our laywer to take care of regular stuff (domestic partnership, DPOA, wills, etc) but they also specialize in same-sex issues (parenting, adoption, etc), which is great! My ob/gyn is a fertility specialist so I plan to start there and ask some questions at my annual exam next month, then really get to researching our options and how things fit in with our healthcare plans. Lucky for us, we are all set on the citizenship issues but that is another big hoop to jump through. I hope to see more of your experiences posted here, or for you to share anything else that you’ve found helpful along the way! Thanks!
It’s fun to see So You’re Engayged take a spin this direction as my partner and I are doing the same. :) Wedding is over – time to think about babies! I’m so jealous of straight friends and their free sperm and accidental (but wanted) babies!
So is “So You’re EnGAYged” soon to have a “So You’re Having Gaybies” spin-off site? :)
This is such an awesome post, thanks Mandy! My partner and I definitely have babies on the brain. We are getting married October 1st and I want to start trying in the spring for babies! This post was so informative i’m ready to start researching. I think I need to enjoy the wedding planning first though!
Oh man, Mandy, my initial reactions are awe and overwhelm: I so want babies and there’s so much to plan! And, it’s really helpful to start thinking about it as a bi-national couple. Oh the complications & can’t wait to hear more!
I have never been so jealous of a place before… I wish I lived in Toronto right now. My partner and I are in the pre-planning stage and I’ve never felt quite so alone. I so wish I could go to a queer center and find answers and people who are in the same position as I am. Right now its a struggle just to find an OB-GYN who isn’t a total putz.
A good friend of mine in Boston developed this kit to help conceive at home. She developed it specifically with the LGBTQ community in mind as a spin-off of her larger, family owned reproductive device company. She was featured in a Curve magazine web article in October.
http://www.totalconception.com/
http://www.curvemag.com/Curve-Magazine/Web-Articles-2010/Stephanie-Berman-Talks-Total-Conception/
It’s definitely worth a look!
Thanks for all the positive response, everyone! We are, indeed, pretty dang excited! Glad to hear other people in similar situations, or at least thinking (and worrying!) about some of the same stuff.
@Cynthia: The community here really is great, and I feel so fortunate that we will be able to enter into this with so many great resources and people around us. The classes are not free, but are quite affordable (I think there may be an option for a sliding scale for those who may not be able to afford the fee). http://the519.org/programsservices/familyandchildren/queerparentingprograms
@ Erica C: No haven’t done any tests yet, though we’ve talked about it. I know we what you mean – you want to know that it’s worth putting the money and effort into it. I’m not sure if it’s standard for most people in our situation or not, or what whoever we work with will recommend it. It’s definitely a question I need to investigate sooner rather than later!
@Becky: “So You’re Having Gaybies”? I like it. Now you’ve got me thinking…
@Dusti: My fingers are crossed that it’s actually as good as I’m hoping it will be. This will be our first attempt to step outside of our own little head-space and reach out for some help. It is pretty lonely, I know what you mean. Do you live in a smaller city/small town? I can’t imagine trying to figure out this process in a smaller area – my thoughts are definitely with you! Thank goodness for the internet! I know that for me http://www.mombian.com was a lifesaver for initially starting to explore resources and start feeling like this was something that we could actually make happen!
My partner and I just got married on Saturday :) and now we’re going to be planning a family too. We are unfortunately in the exact scenario you mentioned of living in a rural place (in Nova Scotia) and not having access to resources. Our family doctor was only able to give us the name of another lesbian couple on her prescription pad!!! I am impressed at the amount of information you’ve managed to collect so far, and also excited to see it may be somewhat relevant to us as we are also Canadian. It’s overwhelming, though. I’m super curious to see how these classes you are hooked up with will go. I would love to hear more about it. I’m sure we will have more questions as we start to delve into the research… we don’t really have anyone except for one other couple locally (who do have a baby) to talk to about our options! Bring on the Gaybies blog!