anyone had/raised a child with a friend as co-parent?

[singlemumqueries]

Hello! Long term MNer, namechanging for obvious reasons.

I couldn't figure out which of the 'becoming a parent' subsections this fitted into, so I am braving Chat. Please be kind!

I have one non-biological DD, who is my ex-partner's child. I adore her. I always wanted more children and have been considering whether I could manage to do fertility treatment on my own. My ex and I were a same-sex couple, so I am already familiar with the logistics of fertility treatment.

I'm now in the early stages of discussing with a friend of mine whether we might do IVF together. He's gay and wants to be a dad. I know there are a ton of things to think about; we will take legal advice and we'll write up financial agreements; he has offered a lot of financial support and wants to play an active role in a child's life. Since I had been considering going it totally alone, I don't feel too worried about the possibility he may have overestimated his contribution there. We are both keen to discuss and agree how much would be 'too much' from his side; what I might be comfortable with, etc. I plan to discuss what happens if (god forbid) I end up with long or short-term health issues or we have a child who needs extra care.

If you are or have been in this position, I would love to know what you felt were really good decisions you made, and what you should have considered that you didn't. What have I forgotten?

I don't have children (never wanted them) but funnily enough I was thinking about this earlier. If I did want a child I'd prefer to have one with someone I knew but wasn't in a relationship with. So many people get divorced these days, if you're not together in the first place you'll never split up!

Well, that last bit is certainly true!

I suppose the equivalent would be the relationship breaking down and us becoming non-amicable co-parents, which would be sad. We would be like to avoid that!

Why do you have to give birth to have your own child ?

My (gay) cousin and his friend have a child
together- she was single and approaching the end of her fertile years so approached him and asked him if he would like to do it, and he agreed. They actually had twins but one had various developmental problems and only survived a few weeks. But they co-parent their little boy beautifully, my cousin is in a LTR and they (he and his partner) both consider themselves fathers. They have a wonderful relationship with their son and his Mum. It’s really lovely.

I didn't - I'm not DD's birth mum or her bio mum.

@AngeloMysterioso - I'm so sorry for your cousin's loss of one of her children. But that is lovely and encouraging, that the parental relationships worked out well.

No i know you are not.

Why not adopt ?

I think perhaps you're not very familiar with the adoption process. Even married couples where one parent does not work are quite strictly vetted and sometimes not approved to adopt. I don't think anyone is letting a single mum working a 40 hour week adopt!

I am very familiar with the adoption process.

So you will know how hard it is to be approved.

Also ... my question was about people who've co-parented with friends. Is that you? If not, I'd really like advice from people who're in this situation. HTH.

and part of your opening post was ' I am already familiar with the logistics of fertility treatment.'

so you are well aware of how difficult they can be, as well as expensive ?

hence my question why do you have to give birth to your own child ?

and asked if you had considered adoption.

This is a difficult point to raise, but....
You need to discuss openly and honestly about how you will both feel if the anomaly scan and other diagnostic tests show abnormalities that could indicate disability. Would you wish to proceed? Would he? Do your values align with regards to termination?
Would your friendship survive if you terminated an abnormal pregnancy against his wishes?
Would your friendship survive if you proceeded with an abnormal pregnancy against his wishes?
I think it's really important to be on the same wavelength here, even if feelings may change down the line, core values are likely to influence decisions.

Thanks, yes, that's definitely something I had thought about (he's older; I'm not that young). I agree it would be necessary to be really clear what we felt.

Would also be worth going over parenting styles. Like go through scenarios and see if both of you agree on basic parenting. You wouldn't want say one parent doing cry it out and the other not agreeing on it. Resentment could build if your not on the same page regarding punishments and the like.

Thanks, that's really helpful. I had thought about smacking (absolute hard line in the sand for me!), but crying it out would be important too.

I would think about how you would both feel if one of you relocated with or without the child. Would the other parent want to move with them? Would that be possible?

It doesn't seem a very likely possibility for various reasons.