Having a Baby with My Gay Best Friend – WWYD?

That’s total nonsense, They won’t all be fine.

Why would they?? If you make a big deal out of it and constantly cry ans tell them their set up is 'wrong' then they might. If you just get on with it and live your lives then I'm sure they'll be fine.

I do agree that 50/50 is the wrong approach for tiny babies. You haven't addressed this in your answers (I mean, fair enough, I'm not the thread police) but I would encourage you to think that through:

If 50/50 isn't best for baby, that means you become the primary caregiver
If you're the primary caregiver and you don't want to live with J then, in effect, you're a single parent for the first couple of years

So how do you work?
How do you manage every single night feed?
What if you get PND?
What if you get sick, just normal sick?
What if the baby has additional needs and actually needs someone to be home full time with them, how do you navigate that?

In other words, if you accept 50/50 isn't best for baby, know that YOU are the one taking the hit as the primary parent. A lot of men are SHITE once a baby comes along (see: every fecking thread on MN). there's no guarantee J will be different.

I'm not saying don't do it, I am saying only do it if you're prepared for the worst case scenario which is you doing everything...

And, if the thing stopping you living together is the ability to negotiate tidiness levels, how on earth are you going to negotiate co-parenting?

Get a dog and share that.

This isn’t a sensible way of raising a child - there will be heartbreak for some or all of you in the years ahead. Will you really want to let him have your brand new baby 50% of the time? The maternal bond is strong. I couldn’t have done it

I have a friend whose family situation is somewhat related to this.
A and B were exes but friendly and single.
B wanted a baby and A provided the sperm.
Baby is born and has long term AN.
B now single mum with input from A. Don't think 50:50.
My friend C meets A and initially not sure but now they are married with one DC.
B decides she wants another baby an approaches A but in the end goes for an anonymous donor (suspect the words Over My Dead and Body left my friend's lips).
So many things to think about. B has always been single - I don't think she thought she'd get back with A but having two children, one with AN, put paid to that.
So you need to think what if your life moves on and what about your friend?

Yes, that’s not really true though is it. What a strange post.

I agree with others, if you want a baby now do it with donor sperm so it’s your baby. Your friend can use a donor egg and a surrogate.

It’s hard enough to have a baby when you’ve got a supportive partner. I can imagine it’ll be a lot harder on your own but even harder still with this 50/50 arrangement. What happens if you have a cessarean (which a third of births are); you will find it really hard to even move around for the first six weeks; I could barely get up and DH had to hand me baby for feeds. How is this 50/50 arrangement going to work? If he is a drive away you won’t be able to drive for that period. He needs to be prepared to move in or donor sperm and do it on your own but have complete control. I’d opt for that as it just sounds very messy and like sooner or later this is all going to blow up. Imagine 3am, baby crying for hours, on your own and crying yourself, then having to get baby ready the next day to see your friend when he hasn’t struggled through any of this with you; you’d resent him bucketloads!!

😄

And it's all very peachy and twee until one of them has a partner who isn't enamoured of this picket fence and apple pie arrangement that has a child shuffling between houses and friends.
Or until the child realises it's just a plaything of two 'parents'
Or one wants to move, so the 50/50 parenting becomes impossible.
Or one has more children who are not veering between two homes and the poor child that is, wonders why

I'm in that set up (although the dads are a couple) and we're all settled and happy. Our son is 9 now.
I've got loads of advice but the main things I'd say are:
Don't go 50:50, it might sound fair on the adults but it isn't on the child, we do roughly 5:2.
For the first 6 months baby is (pretty much) always with mum
See a solicitor
Don't use a clinic
Talk about how you see the boring things working (deciding on schools, what if child is ill etc)
Live as close to each other as possible

Good luck

And a practical thing to think about is how much do you earn now, likely earnings in future; and how similar are your incomes and how high cost is it for housing is it where you live? Or where you might want to live in future? Parents often move where they live a few times in their kids lifetimes, for work, schools, family needs, etc. You might have a child with some disabilities that require specific accommodation. There needs to be as much flexibility as you can manage. But in practice that can be difficult to make happen as two households in tandem.

Basically your friend likely might earn more due to looking after the baby less, being a man and being paid more, or or having a more lucrative job that you do. Or all three of those.

And then you become the poorer household over time. Making every day differences to your standard of living that kids eventually notice. That doesn’t tend make you feel great if you’re also putting in all the hours to raise your baby on your own.

Then even more importantly where you each live now might in time feel too small or not near a good school or job or family support or whatever you each need. You (rather than the higher paid co parent) might find you can’t afford to live where you want.

And if your coparenting friend can afford the move to a higher cost area because he has the bigger income, becomes the parent near the great school or whatever. Nobody willl argue that’s the wrong thing for him to do. And you’re not in control because you’re friends, not life partners anyway. You don’t get any vote.

But if you’re the lower income household you may find that you can’t afford to move there too to join him. Suddenly high costs of housing and living and relative income disparity mean either your child is commuting a very long way very regularly to see the other parent. Or means that your child will go to live for the majority of their time with the other parent.

Maybe you should.

I think parents who stay together and shouldn’t are frequently far more selfish and unacceptable.

Co- parenting by two happy independent parents who parent well together is far preferable to many situations with children in the same house with both houses parents.

Raising children comes in many forms and love from parents alongside a respectful, happy environment/ environments is what matters.

Go for it op.

Errr….the child ?
What happened to “ best interests of the child “?

Please be assured nothing being said by me is about wanting you to have a heteronormative family. There’s just specific emotional burdens (and freedoms) that might come from making choices explicitly about your relationships or parenting in this set up.

You might not feel them in a relationship where they are already shared choices because they’re with made with a partner. or they are choices that are so heteronormative and implicit and condoned or expected, that you might not even recognise them as choices. So there’s a lot more to be consciously intentional about. And you need to second guess your co parent a great deal because neither of you owes the other your life choices.

If you are straight (you haven’t said), and he’s gay you also might benefit from looking at your own wishes and wants very very carefully and dispassionately in the round. For example if you are hoping to meet a future partner and will then want to have kids with them too. Or your co parent has future kids with a different co parent or some other arrangement. Have you had any therapy to examine this?

Do some research about parenting

Also - I am not sure but you'd need to check this if you really do go ahead you can pin EVERYTHING down beforehand or more how enforceable it all would be.

Basic history. Maternal death is quite common, but also, people have generally had a communal model of child rearing. The nuclear family is a bit of an aberration.

I think this is one of those situations that sounds like it might be ideal - in theory- and nicer for the child to grow up knowing their father well, as opposed to a sperm donor where that won't exist. But lots of things sound theoretically great/logical before you are pregnant and before you've actually had the baby.

Your relationship with your friend will change drastically and you/he may well discover you have views on things that are wildly different to what you expected. I guarantee there will be at least one thing you were 'sure' you'd do/feel before the baby is born that you'll laugh at or wonder about later. Your friend will be the same. You don't know each other as well as you think you do - mostly because you both don't know yourselves as well as you think you do in this very particular and important context.

Just having yourself to consider in terms of parental rights will make yours and your child's life more straightforward.

I know many women that have successfully parented singlehandedly, following a donor or through other circumstances.

The couple who did what you are proposing ended up in court. It was very distressing for everyone concerned.

Agreed. This isn’t an episode of Friends where the children are conveniently elsewhere most of the time to enable a full dating/social life

The child might...

Why not??? If a child has 2 parents who love them, who obviously wanted them, who put in the time and the effort and give them amazing experiences - who gives a monkeys whether they have 2 houses or 1?

It’s a lovely idea but the reality is that 50/50 might seem great for adults but it is extremely disruptive for children. It would be very painful for you if you bond with your baby knowing how distressed the baby could get without you.

its logistically very limiting and an expensive nightmare unless you are near neighbours and willing to both be equally very flexible. Two of everything needed. Would you like to live exactly equal time in two different places? It’s a last resort arrangement. From birth, no way. Babies are born expecting Mum to be the primary carer that’s just how human biology and bonding works,

What is the plan in your situation when one or both of you meet other people and each couple needs or wants to live somewhere different? or time comes when one of has other kids to think about too, and you still have a 50/50 arrangement.

You’re thinking of tying yourself for life, to a friend that you’re not even keen to live with, and then all of their individual life choices. It sounds full of potential stress.