Having a Baby with My Gay Best Friend – WWYD?

[pehkis]

Hi all,

Long-time lurker, first-time poster – be gentle!

I’m in my mid-30s, single, and have always wanted to be a mum. My best friend (let’s call him J) is gay, also single, and has always wanted to be a dad. We’ve been friends since uni, practically family at this point, and recently we started seriously discussing co-parenting.

We’re both financially stable, live in the same city, and have very similar parenting values. We’d do 50/50 custody, raise the baby together but in separate homes, and aim for a really amicable, supportive co-parenting relationship. We wouldn’t be romantically involved (obviously), but we’re incredibly close, trust each other completely, and neither of us wants to wait around hoping to meet ‘the one’ just to start a family.

Has anyone done this? Any co-parenting experiences, good or bad? Am I being naïve thinking this could work without a partner in the traditional sense? Also, any practical/legal considerations I should be thinking about?

Would love to hear thoughts – handhold and tough love both welcome!

Interesting that you characterise a joint financial enterprise, like buying a house together, as being ‘quite a big commitment’. Whereas the business of creating an actual human being together is … what? Something a bit more flexible you can just arrange to suit yourself?

Adding to the chorus that 50/50 is rough on kids and tbh I would struggle being away from my child 50% of the time too.

I know people do it, and yes it could work but anecdotally the friends I know who did it as kids/ remembering childhood school friends who did it found it to be a sliding scale of quite traumatic to completely frustrating/ impractical. It’s such an upheaval especially for little kids and in the baby/ toddler stage the likelihood is they won’t really want to be totally away from mum 50% of the time.

I wish you the best of luck OP - having a new born is really hard, would the two of you come to some sort of arrangement to live together for the first few years? You could rent one house out and use that as a shared pot of money for the baby?

Just a thought.

I've seen this situation go wrong fpr a friend where both sets of grandparents were overly involved...mainly due to the 50/50 situation, grandparents were brought in for chikdcare - baby ended up going between 4 homes and it was just too much disturbance in routine. Would have been easier if the parents were living together.

Consider the baby years thoroughly.

• While I do believe that children can be happy having two steady homes where they are loved, the endless nights of crying, having no-one to pass baby to, and no-one to give a second opinion of whether this is normal squirmy baby or a sinister horrible tummy ache, would have driven me round the twist! Believe me even for 3/4 nights a week, each night is long and lonely!
• Also consider how you would both feel if either of you got a husband. Obviously, this can work too, but how would it feel if your child was in a single parent household half the week and a double one the other half?
• When the child is older school/nursery etc starts, are you really always going to want to live round the other person? Like fair enough when you set up with a baby, you'll set up in homes close to each other, but people in love, living together with kids can find things get messy when one finds a good job far away, the other doesn't want to move etc. Again many people do it, but when one of you is madly in love with someone else, and their job is taking them to the other side of the country, do you really want the tie of a shared child in that? You hear of quite a lot of people breaking up because :
• A want's new job; Partner B would need to go too, but B needs to stay near the kids, who need to stay near C (their other parent)!

No, but buying a house together for the sake of parenting a newborn is perhaps OTT if you expect to live separately thereafter

I know of someone who did this - except: They were part of a female gay couple and the father was part of a male gay couple. There were many discussions about it and they did end up having a child.
The child lived 50/50 with each couple in a stable environment as far as such moving around can be. I've lost touch with them now, but when I last saw them the child was 6 and well-adjusted.

If you really do trust and love each other and think, REALLY think that you could face all the ups and downs together then I don't think the fact that this isn't what society thinks of as a 'normal' family set up should stop you. Children fit into all sorts of families, if they are loved and safe and confident then they will be happy.

I sort of agree that it would be best if you could figure out how to live together - at least initially that would probably work best. I don't know how that would work for you and privacy /eventual other partners etc but you might find a house with an annexe or an easy to split floor plan etc. but if that's not your plan and you think you'd be OK with it then you do you.

And then just talk talk talk about it, the practicalities and the details. But I'm sure you have.

This isn't that though. This is child living separately with two different parents, not a rich kid moving around to different abodes, I'm not sure what you mean!

From what age do you propose having 50:50 care? Please read up very, very carefully on attachment issues before you make any decisions.

Totally possible and have friends who have managed this really well. Definitely get counselling first, and start with a list of all of the issues people have raised here to work through systematically.

It will all go tits up when one of you meets someone they want to be in a long term relationship with.

I can fully understand your logic with this op and why you'd be very seriously considering it, but from what you've written most of this is about you both wanting to be parents rather than what would be best for a child. I don't think it's fair to set a child up for a 50/50 split with two households. Many kids go through this because its necessity after a breakup but it can be really stressful for kids trying to coordinate where their clothes/ bags/homework etc are never mind everything else that goes along with having two homes. I think if you're going to do this you'd need to pick one home to be their main home and have an open door policy with the other parent. However, that would have real issues if you then do meet a spouse because its less likely they would be OK with that.

I think if you do it you need to be prepared for how hard it will be. You think the fact you’re a bit messier would be too much for you both to cope with. What happens when you have different ideas about parenting. One of you is bound to let the child have more junk food/TV/freedom etc. I think this idea will be incredibly hard on all of you.

Getting out of the house with a baby is like a military expedition.

True - but not if you're only going to the baby's other home! No need to pack everything she will or might need; there's a full kit ready and waiting.

This is really MN doing its thing.

OP, lots of this thread is excellent. People are making sensible points about the practicalities and about whether or not 50/50 is doable or right, and god knows it's the right thing to think through having a baby carefully.

But MN is fundamentally Not Good with families that are not heteronormative. I wish it weren't - I've been here since it were fields - but it's the case.

Of course it is fine, and normal, for you to approach wanting a child from the perspective of wanting a child. Preaching that you should be thinking about what's best for a child is just smuggery - especially when, quite obviously, you are already thinking harder about that than the average parent.

Do think about it really hard. But also, don't assume you have to shoehorn what you want into a shape that looks like a divorced hetero family, or that, if you do this, you will be putting your child in the same position as children whose parents divorce.

It sounds like there's a lot of great things there and you've thought about it really sensibly, rationally, and got lots of good advice.

To echo what others have said, and you've not properly acknowledged in your answers: it's you that goes through the huge physical and hormonal upheaval. Being apart from your baby 50% of the time may well feel like being punched in the heart. Aside from whether 50/50 is best later on, for those early months or years think about a different plan.

Were you raised in one home or two, OP? I was raised in two and hated it. It's miserable never having all your stuff or both your parents. No matter how loved and happy you are, you're never whole. I don't think I'd intentionally want to bring a child into the world for that experience.

I'd rather unknown donor sperm and go it alone (but that's really hard, I know). Bear in mind that if you then meet someone and have kids, your baby is always going to be the one that doesn't fully fit into your 'real' family. Another awful experience for a child. The only one who doesn't get to live with both their parents. And so on. Shared custody is a painful byproduct of the way some families go - it's not a situation I'd ever plan as ideal for a child.

My dd's best friend's,family is a bit like this. I think it works because they're absolutely committed to coparenting and not just making the best of a bad situation, so living near each other absolutely prioritised over career opportunities etc, decisions on schooling, where kids hang out after school etc made on pragmatic grounds rather than parental wishes. You'll have to factor in potential future relationships, illness etc but done well i think it's brilliant, more people to share the responsibility, more resources, more love.

And don’t underestimate the pain of the father not being able to be with his child 24/7. My husband (and all of my male friends) felt such an intense bond (more than the mothers, including me as had a bit of PND). It would have ripped my husband’s heart out if he could only see his child for a couple of hours. Let alone if one of us moved and wanted to start another family.

Read the step parent board, it may give you a bit of an eye opener about how children feel about having to go to each parent every week, then getting a new family and feeling pushed out, etc.

It wouldn't be fair for a baby or toddler to be shifted between two homes. The baby would need to stay with you for at least a year. If he demanded overnights then that's for his benefit, not the baby's. Either get into a relationship with a man or go the donor sperm route. I think the scenario you've proposed is too messy.

Just go out and find a man you actually want a relationship and family with.

Your suggestion will work VERY WELL for J and will be absolutely shit for you and baby. I feel you are completely misunderstanding what it means to carry a pregnancy and care for a small baby.

Baby will need to be with you 100% of the time for a long time. You absolutely cannot hand a small baby or a toddler to a man overnight or for more than a few hours.

Babies are also really fucking hard work, especially overnight.

So him living somewhere else is really, really horribly unfair to you.

Even at 6 months, most babies wake 1- 2 times per night, or more. But most of us have a partner to help us with that. If you don't live together, you'll be doing ALL the hard work while he just gets the fun, ocasional babysitting duties.

And what about the hit to your career and finances? If you were a couple he'd be contributing more and supporting you.

Honestly, it's a shit shit suggestion for you. Great for J.

A dear friend of mine did this, then fell out catastrophically with the father, who had been a very good friend, and it ended up in an almighty and very costly child custody battle. Obviously they were unlucky, but they never imagined that it would have ended up like that when they started so you might want to imagine all the worst case as well as best case scenarios.

You can't be away from a newborn baby 50% of the time, you are completely underestimating the need for you to be close to baby all of the time when they are small. It just won't work.

a big part of me says go for it, I didn’t think children were the be all and end all for me but now I have one I completely adore her. My only word of caution would be on the 50/50 element and how flexible that might be. I know it works for lots of people brilliantly so there’s no judgement whatsoever meant at all here. More just a point for you to consider, whether you could handle that. I’m a working mum but I really wouldn’t enjoy being separated from her 50% if the time. In many cases of course it can’t be helped and it’s much better than being in an unhappy home I absolutely agree, but as you have the choice just something to consider. Good luck to you both I really hope it works out whatever you decide 😊

Babies are designed to be with a primary caregiver most of the time from birth. You really can't be doing 50/50 with a tiny one. Could you perhaps rent very close to each other for the first year or 2? Evolution hasn't caught up with modern lifestyles.