Pride Angel Journey - Newspaper cuttings

October 18, 2015 18:41 by PrideAngelAdmin

Every couple of months we pile into the car and land two hours later (or up to four hours depending on the number of potty, nappy, milky, lost toy, food, unstuck sun-blind, sick stops required) at my parents’ house for a few nights. While the children settle in by strewing around the house handfuls of 1970’s/80’s toys, revived from a third-of-a-century hibernation in the loft, I unpack the case and leaf through the dozen or so newspaper cuttings my mum has left for me on the bedside table. An advertisement for chewable toothbrushes for babies, a piece from the local paper about a girl I went to school with…and an article from The Telegraph earlier this year entitled: ‘Is it time to question the ethics of donor conception’. (Of course for some this would be a fairly clear message about their parents’ feelings on donor conception – I, though, simply saw this as a matter of my mum seeing the phrase ‘donor conception’ and automatically reaching for her scissors).
Well, I’ll be honest, it wasn’t an encouraging read, especially since the negative views stressed were those of donor-conceived children of the past forty years or so. And it made me realise that no matter how hard we try to provide opportunities, role models, how hard we try to get it right, there may still come a day when, for example, we need to listen with love and acknowledgement and acceptance to the remonstrances of a furious or miserable adolescent who wants a dad.
But if any part of me starts to question the ethics of our decision to use donor conception, I just need to look at these two beautiful children – beautiful people and remember that outside of donor conception, they couldn’t exist. They are, as we all are, part of that tiny number, those lucky few, that one in a million and something chance of a particular egg and sperm meeting because chance just happened to mean that both were in a certain place at a certain time while some number stretching to infinity tells of the sperm/egg combinations that did never, can never, will never occur. And as the even more unlikely combination of a lesbian woman’s egg and a heterosexual man’s sperm, a lesbian woman and heterosexual man whose lives in no way overlapped until Pride Angel, chance must surely be on their side...
Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 18th October 2015

Pride Angel Journey - Books and Daddies

August 10, 2015 22:36 by PrideAngelAdmin

I walked into the living room to find my parents reading an old book of mine to two-year-old Luna. There was an awkwardness in the atmosphere. It turned out they’d panicked at the appearance of the main character’s ‘daddy’, but explained they’d managed to handle it by saying it was ‘grandad’. Phew! Still, much as Luna is very clear about what being part of an LGBT family means (looking at the page of ‘Dads’ in the Ahlbergs’ the Baby’s Catalogue: “Does Luna have a Daddy?”, “no, two mummies.”) it would be nice to see our own family structure reflected a little more frequently.
Of course there are some excellent LGBT books for toddlers available: in Newman and Thompson’s Mommy, Mama and Me, the mummies are uncannily like Sal and me in the mothering roles they adopt and Luna is clearly convinced that the story was written about her little life. But you don’t just walk into any old high street book shop and find those books. Not in my experience anyway. Not yet.
In the meantime, we might just have to make a few subtle alterations to some of the stories we already read and have Little Red Riding Hood rescued from the wolf’s belly by the woodcutter the sperm donor and Goldilocks tasting the porridge of Mummy Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear.
And if a daddy crops up again somewhere? Well, maybe he’ll be with his boyfriend...
Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 10th August 2015

Pride Angel Journey - The Car

“Milkies! MILKIES!” “We can’t while we’re in the car, Luna – we’ll be home soon for Milkies.” “MILKIES!” [sob] “Sorry my little one, not yet.” But there was a time not so long ago when I would have performed car-seat breastfeeding acrobatics. Back then refusing ‘milky’ wasn’t an option. Now, at almost two she’s disappointed, but there’s potential for moving the conversation on, for a while at least. “Look, what’s jangly sheep doing?” “Bouncing! Jangy seep bouncing!” “Uh uh uh uh!” “Oh Willow, you’ve lost all your toys – look here’s kitten…” “Luna kitten, Luna kitten, KITTEN!” “Shall we sing again? Oh the grand old duke of…” “Sun bwind off. Too bwight! TOO BWIGHT! … MILKIES!” When Willow was born people kept referring to some advert on telly where a parent is driving round getting a baby to sleep and every time the car stops at traffic lights, the baby wakes up. “You’ll know about this!” They said. But we didn’t. We had two children under fifteen months: we hadn’t watched telly in…well…fifteen months. And as for that myth of children going to sleep in car seats…? One day I’ll have my front passenger seat back. I’ll sit back and relax and our biggest crisis as we head down the M1 will be a splash of tea escaping from my travel mug as we hit a pothole. Or that we’ve lost our place in the latest Sarah Waters novel on audiobook. But for now, here I am in the middle back seat between two huge, rearward facing Isofix contraptions. I’m partially buried under a mound of crinkly, fluorescent Lamaze creatures all with terrifyingly huge eyes and at least two limbs joined together by a teething bar. I will replace the four sun blinds with suction-lacking suckers around 47 times during this 2-hour journey. I will sing ‘Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star’ repeatedly for twenty minutes while eyelids flicker and it seems they might just drop off. And I WILL enjoy this chaotic, noisy muddle of a journey, because when I’m back in that front passenger seat, I’ll surely miss it. Article: 15th May 2015 by Lindsey, West Yorkshire

Pride Angel Journey - Apprehensions

Most pregnant women and their partners await the birth with at least a little apprehension – and with good reason: my friends alone have provided me with enough childbirth horror stories to last a lifetime – failed epidurals, forceps and the nightmare that is otherwise known as ‘induction’. We weren’t worried about these things. After my long but calm and straightforward labour with little Luna, and after a good few months of reading books on ‘natural’ childbirth, we were confident that our home birth would be a smooth, gentle, pleasant affair. I still had apprehensions though. Firstly, Luna. She would be approximately 13 months at Willow’s birth. She always co-slept with me; she was exclusively breastfed and still fed through the night; she was unused to other people looking after her and prone to separation anxiety. How could I both be a supportive birth partner and give Luna what she needed? And secondly, how could I be a supportive birth partner? When I was giving birth, the midwife had praised Sal’s efforts, suggesting she could be a professional doula. Sal had planned every tiny detail of her forthcoming labour. I meanwhile, was working full time and spending every spare moment with Luna who would cling to me from the moment I stepped through the door. How could I possibly find time to learn the reflexology techniques, memorise the birth mantras and work out which homeopathy remedy should be used when? We inflated the birth pool and had a practice run: all three of us bobbing about in a big hot tub in the steamy, humid living room. Then, 9 days before Sal’s due date, when Luna was exactly 13 months old, after weeks of pushing trolleys and holding hands, she finally walked unaided – she was ready to be big sister. We had arranged for my brother and his partner to come and stay the weekends either side of the due date – Monday 16th June. They would look after Luna. Sal, knowing that the time was right because we had people to care for Luna, would go into labour on one of the two weekends. I thought it would be the second of the two weekends: surely most babies are late? It was Sunday 15th June. “Lins,” Sal said. I opened my eyes. She was talking at normal volume at 7.30am in a room with a sleeping toddler – why would she do that?! “Lins, I think it’s starting!” Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 7th December 2014

Pride Angel Journey - A Little Bump

Six weeks, seven weeks, eight weeks...we waited for the nausea to become a crippling misery of sickness...nine weeks, ten weeks, eleven weeks...still just a vague queasiness...twelve weeks, thirteen weeks, fourteen weeks and we finally accepted with relief (and a little envy on my part) that not all pregnancies involve eleven weeks of retching, vomiting and despair. After the initial bleeding scare, Sally's pregnancy was to be a low maintenance one, and with a eight-month-old baby Luna to look after, this was no bad thing. Fifteen weeks, sixteen weeks, seventeen weeks... Luna though of course, being a baby, was on the high maintenance end of the scale, and required every bit of attention that two mummies could provide. She had developed a strong attraction to all objects small and swallow-hazardy, an uncanny ability to smear yoghurt into into everything within a two-metre radius of the dining table, and a deep love of "milky" - such that I spent hours and hours and hours trapped under a sleepy, sucky bundle of now rather big baby. So Sally might have had an easy time of it, but lost amidst the nappies and lullabies and bootees and board books, she missed out a bit - on the tummy rubs and pampering and excitement of a first pregnancy. And perhaps I - not having had chance to get to know the little bump so well - missed out a bit too. Eighteen weeks, nineteen weeks, twenty weeks...and that little bump that was really starting to show... Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 1st October 2014

Pride Angel Journey - Swordfish and a Scan

The good news outweighed the bad news, but it didn't stop us feeling awkward. We'd called at Sainsbury's for a pregnancy test on the way to my brother's house. Perched on the edge of the bathroom we whispered in our excitement as we watched that word appear: Pregnant. The bad news was that my brother and his partner had spent a fortune on swordfish for dinner. We googled it. No, as we thought - no swordfish for pregnant Sal, only a very small amount of swordfish for me; I was still breastfeeding Luna. At the table we awkwardly shifted bits of fish around our plates; the next day, feeling a bit guilty and a bit excitable we told them the news: four weeks pregnant. Ten days later Sal woke me to say she'd had some bleeding. "There was a small clot - I'm afraid I think that was it." She wiped away her tears and we consulted the books. And there we found some hope because she wasn't in pain. She took her first sick day in ten years and, settled herself in bed for a day of worried wondering. The following day at the hospital, while Luna entertained herself with the cubicle curtains, we watched as a tiny heartbeat pulsed contentedly. The heartbeat of a little five-and-a-half-week-old, not-yet-baby-shaped blob, bouncing around in its very spacious-looking uterine home. Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 1st Setember 2014

Pride Angel Journey | Niche Parenting

The thing with parents is, there's just so many different sorts. And no matter what efforts we made in those early weeks, it just felt as though we were trying to climb through the wrong shaped hole in the shape-sorter. We've never considered ourselves particularly 'mainstream' in any area of our lives and so some sort of 'niche' parenting was always going to suit us best. Perhaps we'd get on better with the gay parents? Keen for Luna to grow up feeling 'normal', it seemed a good idea to find some other kids for her to hang out with whose conception had involved a sperm-donor, syringe and two lesbians. As I was spending around 12-14 hours a day breastfeeding, I had plenty of time to do a bit of Internet searching. And I did manage to locate a few gay parenting groups online: pockets of same-sex parents with children of all ages keen to discuss teething and tantrums and toilet-training. However somehow, the niche just wasn't quite right. It was too big and vague - more 'spacious alcove' than 'niche.' What we needed was a niche where people actually had a new baby and did the stuff we did, the stuff the books and our instincts had told us to do, which was co-sleeping and baby-wearing and breastfeeding on demand - sometimes for hours at a time. And eventually, I stumbled upon a name for this business - Attachment Parenting. The potential for an alternative niche was developing, and sure enough I found our local AP Facebook group where we could discuss bed-guards and slings and cluster feeding to our heart's content. But I can't help thinking that really, the answer lies in the Lesbian Attachment Parenting niche. The search continues... Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 5th June 2014 Read more Lesbian parenting blogs at www.prideangel.com

Pride Angel Journey - Six weeks

Six weeks. Six weeks old. Six weeks since she slip-slopped out into the lukewarm pool. Six weeks of feeding and pacing and shushing and swaying. The visitors had been and gone, Sal was back at work after paternity leave and annual leave, and I was eager to get out and do some baby stuff and meet some mums. There was 'Mummy and Baby Pilates', 'Baby Rhyme Time', 'Stay and Play' sessions and 'Baby Massage'. So each morning, at the allotted time - usually about 10am - I'd try and break into the feedy/sleepy/pooey cycle and bundle little Luna and myself into the car. Sometimes we'd make it there in one go. Sometimes after three or four minutes in the car, hunger would set in, and we'd pull up for a bit of milky. Sometimes we'd arrive on time. Sometimes... So we'd arrive, Luna snug in the sling, and peering inquisitively over the edge and me, eager to socialise and exercise and generally do something other than rock and feed and change. And things would get started. Stretching or singing or massaging. And after approximately ten minutes, Luna would be tired. Not just tired. Exhausted. In fact too tired to sleep even. Well, she might just be able to sleep, if I were to wander around a very quiet place with her in the sling for an hour or two. I'd look around at the other babies. The happy babies playing and giggling. The sleepy babies...well sleeping peacefully in their car seats. And I'd scoop up baby and baggage and we'd head home. One day we'd do some baby stuff and meet some mums. But for now, at six weeks, we'd stay at home and stick with feeding and sleeping and pooing. Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 18th May 2014

Pride Angel Journey | The trouble with evenings

At some point, and I hazard a guess that it was about Week 3, our peaceful sleepy/hungry baby decided that evenings were a bit of a problem. Daytime was for sleeping and feeding; nighttime was for sleeping and feeding. But evenings were tricky old things, and were only really bearable if spent dangled over one of your two mummies' arms, in what is known in the parenting books as the 'Tiger in the Tree' position. The mummy of the proffered arm should be pacing the room and, if the pacing, tiger-carrying tree mummy happens to be 'Non-Milky Mummy' then 'Milky-Mummy' had better stand by for imminent feeding emergencies. Evenings did just seem to do something horrible to the lovely feed/sleep/feed/sleep cycle. And the longer the cycle was disrupted, the tireder our little baby got. Very tired babies cry a lot - but only twice did we resort to the calming effect of the cool nighttime air and pacing up and down the street after midnight carrying in the sling an exhausted Luna who was using her lasts reserves of energy to wail to the stars. And then at a certain point, some time between 10pm and 2am, suddenly she would feed to sleep and the lovely cycle would be back again until the next evening. And then at around nine weeks the evening trouble stopped altogether. The cycle, which albeit now included quite a bit of awake time in the day, would carry on through the evening, and even though bedtime had settled on a rather late 11pm, the time before that could be spent pleasantly - a drink of milk, a cuddle, a burp or two, a bit of nappy business...all very calm and content. So what was it about those evening? The weariness which comes upon one after spending a whole day feeding and sleeping? The threat of impending darkness and all the terrors that come with it - monsters and witches and creatures of the night? The knowledge that this ordinary day, almost over, was unique and will never be lived again? Of course, we will never know. Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 2nd April 2014

Pride Angel Journey | Russian Dolls

It was a Thursday in October, almost thirteen weeks into my pregnancy when I had the first scan. At last proper confirmation that this nausea wasn’t for nothing – there really was something inside me, something human. I was still being sick every evening but the misery was now tinged with hope and excitement: hope that the nausea might end fairly soon, and excitement at the knowledge of the life inside me. Meanwhile, a tiny being reclined comfortably in my womb as if relaxing on a sun lounger. It looked so laidback, so collected – so different from how I felt. And tiny, yes, but not a bit vulnerable or needy. Not like it might scream for hours, appalled at the shock of life itself. It was time to go public, although by this time it was only really a secret to people who lived far away and hadn’t witnessed the pathetic sight of me gnawing miserably at half a breadstick in between gulps of Gaviscon. We’d been nervous about telling our parents – I wasn’t sure how mine would take to our method of conception, involving a man from the Internet masturbating in our bathroom, but their desperation for a grandchild, the extent of which I hadn’t truly realised, apparently overrode any concerns they may have had. When I was little over seven weeks gone, my mum took the opportunity while the neighbours were on holiday (since it was still early days) to get my old baby clothes and Terry nappies out of the loft, through the wash and hanging on the line in the garden. This child was either going to look ridiculous, dressed in clothes over thirty years old, or like a supercool 70’s retro baby. Close friends either already knew our method of conception or, if they didn’t, were quick to ask. More distant friends and work colleagues tended not to ask and, while part of me wanted to correct their probable assumption that we’d been to a clinic and used anonymous donor sperm, I also felt that the quite intimate details of our child’s beginning were best kept as distant as possible from staffroom gossip. We left our parents to spread the news to the older family members still surviving, and I still experience a slight discomfort when I wonder exactly how much they were told and what their understanding is of how lesbians go about these things; it horrifies me to think that they may be under the impression that I had sex with a man – but perhaps I’m insulting the intelligence of a generation that we have actually found far more accepting of our relationship than the post-war baby boom generation that followed them. Meanwhile, my body was changing. It was around the fourteen-week mark that a sliver of tummy was starting to emerge between tops and trousers. Keen to avoid both a November crop-top look and the risk of catching a chill, I had to reassess my wardrobe. A similarly proportioned friend had very kindly leant me a mound of maternity clothes, and my forage into the bag heralded a revelation: the comfort of maternity jeans with a shrewdly practical elastic-and-button adjustable system on the waistband. There was really no hiding the emerging bump now and one break-time, a group of Year 11 girls cornered me; clearly aware of the delicacy of the issue, yet determined for answers, after a little skirting around the topic they ventured to ask whether the rumours were true. I hadn’t anticipated the screaming that my response inspired, and the anxious educator in me was a little perturbed at their complete lack of concern that their English teacher would be leaving a month before the GCSE exams. A couple of weeks later, one of the girls – interestingly a student who was rather too relaxed where her work was concerned – presented me with a hat she’d knitted for the baby. I was very touched by the effort she’d gone to, and felt a surge of guilt: my knitting needles hadn’t surfaced since the last charity blanket square I’d produced twenty years ago as a Girl Guide and now my baby was reliant on sixteen-year-olds for its wardrobe. I hastily consulted Amazon and ordered a copy of Vintage Knits for Modern Babies, some wool and needles, and hoped I’d be able to find a YouTube video on how to cast-on. Meanwhile, I was unaware that around the country a hum of clicking needles was already picking up tempo; the post-war generation may struggle a little at first with homosexuality, but news of a baby is well within their comfort zone and the automatic reaction of many of our mums’ friends and friends’ mums, it seemed, was to reach for a couple of balls of Baby DK and a pattern. By mid-November, I’d reached seventeen weeks and the misery of the nausea had been replaced by a renewed appetite for evening meals which I could now keep down. My weight started to increase – until now, despite the emerging bump, with two and a half months of minimal food and no exercise, both fat and muscle had been dropping off from the rest of my body. We started to socialise again; I was still rather prone to more severe travel-sickness than I was used to, but we managed to visit relatives in Wales and on the South Coast and for the first time in over twenty years in my family, talk was of babies. We went for an Indian meal with friends, one of whom was two months ahead of me, and we were able to share both the exasperation of being told for the fiftieth time that ginger could solve the sickness problem (it wasn’t even slightly effective for either of us) and the excitement of what we both had ahead. The fact was, that pregnancy was starting to become quite good fun. And all this time I was still only just beginning to get my head round the miracle inside me. I was reminded of the> colourful Russian Dolls I had as a child, especially when I learnt that if our child was a girl, she would already have a full complement of eggs ready to produce her own children: another two generations there, inside me. I was almost ready to don a bright yellow headscarf and paint my lips bright red. But if only birth was as easy as a brief twist and pull of two bits of painted wood… Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 6th July 2013

Are you soon to be a new gay or lesbian parent?

I’m Adam and currently working on the second series of the prime time show Don’t Just Stand There….I’m Having Your baby which airs on BBC3 at 9pm. Last series, first time Dads-to-be were shown how to be more supportive during their partner’s pregnancy and during the birth itself. In one to one sessions with a fully trained midwife, the Dads were taught about many aspects of pregnancy and labour including cervical dilation, pain relief, massage, breathing techniques and birthing positions. They were also given practical home work like wearing an empathy belly, looking after a robotic baby and watching a birthing video. We wanted to help him become the perfect birthing partner for Mum and make the whole experience more positive than petrifying! Last year we worked closely with the Royal College of Midwives in the making of this series and they were very pleased with the result. The first series was very successful and the Dads we filmed found the experience both positive and rewarding as they became more equipped to deal with the arrival of their little ones. This series we would love to meet and speak with gay and lesbian couples who are currently on the journey into parenthood. I would really like to hear your story and find out, as a first time parent, what this means to you and also how we could help. If you have any questions and fancy a chat about the series please feel free to call me on 0208 008 4901 or email me on adam.lonergan@bbc.co.uk. Thanks for your time and hopefully speak soon. Adam. Article: 21st May 2013 www.prideangel.com

Mothercare voucher competition winner | Two mums personal journey

When I met Caitlin in January 2010 I couldn’t help but fall for her. She was originally from Scotland and her charm and the way she made me feel so special and the only girl in the world was immense! She already had 2 sons, Brett and Ashton whom she had via a clinic by artificial insemination. This cost her a fortune but she wanted to be a mother so much. We became inseparable and moved in together in March 2010. The boys became like my own, they didn’t get on with Caitlin’s ex and their father was an anonymous donor. They called me mum from months into us all living together. In August 2011 we had our civil ceremony with our closest family and friends...I felt the happiest girl alive! Thinking back I had an extreme urge to have a baby of my own from around October 2011. The feeling was so strong and I told Caitlin that it was time to look at the options available to us. We found the Pride Angel site in December 2011 and spent hours trawling the sperm donors on the site and looking at information about how to do 'home insemination'. Caitlin had always found the insemination at the clinic too 'clinical' so we decided to try ourselves. We found an ideal sperm donor and after a few messages back and forth decided that we really wanted him to help us. I felt uncertain about meeting our potential donor but Caitlin arranged to meet him to find out more. He was a kind, caring and genuine man. His sister had problems conceiving and therefore he wanted to help those people who can’t have children themselves. He told us to let him know as soon as we knew when I was ovulating and we could arrange to meet him for the sperm donation. I bought the deluxe home insemination kit, we did a few tests runs before the big day. I used ovulation sticks to monitor my most fertile days and it was whilst we were away at a family resort (on our last day there luckily!) that we got the smiley face and I was ovulating! We contacted our donor straight away and arranged to collect the sample. That evening we used the speculum, syringe and syringe extenders. We bought a special lubricant which helped the sperm live longer and move quicker. It was so tense at first, we couldn’t quite believe how far we had come since we first met. We managed to relax in the comfort of our own home, surrounded by candles and a few cheeky drinks :) After the insemination I lay with my bottom in the air against the wall for 20 minutes. I climaxed twice, legs still up the wall. (this is advised as gentle contractions in your uterus can help the sperm along into the cervix) The 2 week wait was horrendous. I went through a rollercoaster of emotions... sad, angry, excited, worried... On the day of my due period Caitlin was worried about me, we were both so stressed and just needed to know the outcome. So... we did a test. There was one dark line across the test instantly and we needed a vertical line for a positive. Caitlin wouldn’t let me see it until the full 3 minutes was up! As we uncovered the test after 3 minutes Caitlin had a massive grin across her face. She had snuck a peek just before. There was a line making a cross = positive. We could not believe it. After one attempt we were pregnant!! I screamed my head off and Brett and Ashton rushed in, we told them and tears streamed down their faces. I could barely breathe and couldn’t believe it. The day after we did further tests just to make sure...all positive. I am now 4 weeks pregnant and couldn’t be happier. We are already buying baby stuff and making plans for our new arrival! We would always recommend the Pride Angel insemination kits. We believe the syringe extenders were vital in getting the sperm in exactly the right place. Thank you Pride Angel!! We will keep you updated on the progress of our baby bean. Winning article: by Rachel and Caitlin 15th July 2012

Gay magazine looking for gay and lesbian couples who have become parents through Pride Angel

QX Magazine is looking for gay couples who have become parents through Pride Angel to talk about their experiences in a feature about gay parenting. Although they are a magazine predominately targeted at homosexual men they would welcome lesbian couples to reply as well, given that this seems to be a widespread issue affecting all gay people. They would also like to talk to gay male sperm donors who have had children with lesbian couples and retain some modicum of parenting contact.
If you are willing to take part then we will send over a brief interview via email. QX magazine are basically looking to assess how easy you find it to be a gay parent in Britain in 2011 and whether you have ever encountered any prejudice from other parents? What was it like making the decision to have a child and how easy was the procedure of going about it? Any other issues you think we should be aware of we'd be grateful to hear about.

Gay and lesbian parenting research - can you help?

Would you like to take part in some cutting edge, exciting new research?

Emilie Garvey, an undergraduate Sociology student at Newcastle University, is interested in hearing from lesbian and gay individuals and couples to take part in an exciting project in a new and expanding area of research: Assisted Reproduction and the Alternative Family. The aim of the study is to explore the experiences of same-sex couples in their decision-making processes involved in starting a family of their own with the aid of assisted reproduction technologies. The study also welcomes participation from gay and lesbian individuals who might start a family in the future or who simply would like to offer an opinion or point of view for the research.

Why is the study being done?

Recent changes in legislation have widened the options available for same-sex couples who wish to start a family. Media portrayals of celebrity couples undergoing such processes have also recently increased public awareness of the decision making process, the social stigma that such couples might have to face and have offered a chance to ‘look inside’ the ‘Alternative Family’. This study, however, aims to research the decision making processes involved prior to, and throughout, the process. The researcher also hopes gain an in depth understanding of the obstacles and hurdles which affect same-sex couples in the UK who wish to have a family of their own.

Am I eligible to take part?

If you are a lesbian woman or gay man, single, in a relationship or in a civil partnership, who have experience of assisted reproduction in starting a family, or who would simply like to offer the researcher an opinion on the issues involved, you are eligible to take part in this study.

To read more go to http://bit.ly/hlKLTU

Zack Wahls defends gay marriage and being raised by lesbian mums

Zach Wahls a 19-year-old University of Iowa engineering student defended gay marriage in a rousing testimony in front of the Iowa House of Representatives this month. Zack Wahls spoke out against a resolution which would end civil unions in Iowa by describing his own experience as the son of two lesbian partners.
"Our family really isn't so different from any other Iowa family," said Wahls. "When I am home, we go to church together, we eat dinner, we go on vacations."

Wahls emphasized the typical nature of his upbringing, as well as his own success. He is an Eagle Scout and a small business owner. He also scored in the 99th percentile on the ACT. "If I was your son, Mr. Chairman, I believe I would make you very proud," he said.

A sixth-generation Iowan, Wahls finished his testimony on an impassioned note. "In my 19 years not once have I ever been confronted by an individual who realized independently that I was raised by a gay couple," he said. "And you know why? Because the sexual orientation of my parents has had zero effect on the content of my character."

Wahls had previously written about the issue in the University of Iowa's student newspaper:

Last fall, I had the opportunity, courtesy of Iowa Public Radio's "The Exchange," to talk with a Tea Partier about this very topic. When I mentioned that two lesbian women raised me, her face turned to shock and then concern. She asked if I ever had yearning to meet my father — an anonymous sperm donor.

My answer was — and remains — "no." And no, I don't feel damaged or that my childhood was somehow scarred. Maybe I have, in some way undetectable to me, been permanently harmed by having two moms. I guess I can't be sure.

Watch Zach Wahls's inspirational speach on youtube

Article: 11th February 2011 huffingtonpost.com

Read more about gay and lesbian parenting at www.prideangel.com

To read more go to http://bit.ly/fvin5T

Raised by a same-sex family?

With the recent good news that Elton John and David Furnish are celebrating the birth of their baby son, it brings to the attention same-sex families and how children who grow up to become young adults view their gay family upbringing.
Research has shown that same-sex parenting does not affect a child’s self esteem or well being, although it would be lovely to hear first hand, about people’s views and experiences. We would love to hear any feedback from any older children, young adults or adults regarding their views about how it has felt growing up as part of a gay family, the ups and downs or reactions from friends or family.

The Telegraph would like to run a news article about this subject area and would like any help regarding the views of adults raised by same-sex parents. They would treat any information received in a confidential and sensitive manner.

If you are able to help in any way, please contact Erika at Pride Angel for further information.

Go to http://bit.ly/hjkDGK

Lesbian mums in dispute: fertility law, child maintenance and what makes a parent

A lesbian couple who had conceived a child together through donor insemination at a UK clinic recently ended up in the High Court after their relationship broke down. Their dispute involved a ten-year-old child, and the issue was whether the non-birth mother (who the court had already given legal decision-making status as a parent) should be ordered to make financial provision for her child.
The story itself of course isn't that unusual - parents separate and divorce all the time and many end up in court arguing over contact or finances. What makes this case interesting is the family was created through fertility treatment and the partner pursued for maintenance was not the biological mother.

The court had to ask whether the lesbian non-birth mother was legally a 'parent' and - specifically - whether her full hands-on parenting involvement in her child's life was enough to make her financially responsible, even though she was not the biological mother.

The answer seems pretty straightforward from a moral perspective. The non-birth mother had been fully involved in her child's care and upbringing, had regular contact with her child, and had successfully (and not long before) applied to court for joint residence and parental responsibility. The law recognised her as a parent for the purposes of decision making and there was no legal father since the child was conceived with anonymous donor sperm.

The child would have only one parent (the birth mother) and considerably less financial security if the non-birth mother was not financially responsible. As the birth mother's lawyers argued in court, it would be 'grotesque' for the court to decide the non-birth mother should not have to maintain a child she had helped bring into the world and was actively parenting.

The law is not always fair. The rules on financial responsibility say explicitly only a legal 'parent' can be ordered to pay. These rules are more black and white than those on matters of contact and parental decision-making, where the family courts often have discretion to act in the best interests of a child.

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