What All Households Can Learn From LGBTQ+ Family-Building

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4 hours ago

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As a queer midwife, I'm steeped in the day-to-day of queer family formation. From supporting clients through choosing a sperm or egg donor, figuring out which conception method is right for them, and navigating all the complex emotions that arise throughout this process, LGBTQ+ family-building comes with its fair share of complexity and, often, moments of complete overwhelm.
To support in building resilience through the challenges, I remind my clients of the many ways that going through the process of growing our queer families helps us prepare for parenthood — and these are lessons that can benefit all parents, not just queer ones.
Family goes beyond the nuclear, and as LGBTQ+ parents, we often need to involve outside help in the form of donors, medical providers, lawyers, and other professionals. This need to rely on outside parties can be burdensome, but it also helps us branch out of the (often limiting) nuclear family structure and find support with other people, creating a powerful web of community that can hold our families as we grow.
All parents and families need outside support to truly thrive, whether from blood relatives or chosen family, neighbors, medical providers, midwives, or doulas. Understanding from the beginning that family building isn't just about two people will support your whole family system as you become a parent.
In LGBTQ+ family-building, we sometimes require the genetic contribution of someone outside of the partnership to help us grow our families. This can lead to complex feelings for the non-biologically related parent, since our culture puts such a heavy emphasis on the importance of biological connection in families.
But it's not just LGBTQ+ people who need to come to terms with the fact that they may not be biologically related to their child and expand their vision of what family means. We are at a moment in human evolution where infertility rates are at an all-time high—one in six people experience infertility.
Undoing the idea that biological connection is the most important factor in bonding with our children helps everyone thrive as parents, regardless of whether they encounter fertility challenges along their family-building process.
We know that the traditional gender roles of 'mothers' and 'fathers' are outdated. In heterosexual couples, research suggests that couples who share the workload of household duties and childcare experience more relationship satisfaction overall.
It's powerful to define the work of relationship and family through a lens of equity and mutual aid. All families will benefit from this approach, and the children who grow up in these environments may have an easier time passing on this message to future generations.
Grief is often an inherent part of LGBTQ+ family-building. People may grieve the inability to create a family without the help of an outside donor, that they need to go through extra legal and financial hoops to protect their families, or experience a pang of emotion every time somebody asks 'but who's the real mom?'
LGBTQ+ family-building offers ample opportunities for us to feel and process our grief—but family-building in general can bring about this painful emotion, and normalizing this helps all parents thrive.
Dr. Maureen (Mo) Satyshur, clinical psychologist and queer parent, says, 'LGBTQ+ family building is a process that simultaneously requires and offers people a way to release their grip on expectations and control. So many wonderful parts of our lives come with the grief and anxiety of not having full control, and the family building process can teach us all to work with those difficult experiences while staying connected to the joy and vitality of our ever-changing selves, families, and world.'
All parents, regardless of their relationship status or sexual orientation, may experience the grief of infertility, miscarriage, or pregnancy loss. There's also other griefs like parenting during climate change and the fact that we cannot protect our children from the pains of the world. When we normalize that grief is an inherent part of growing our families or just simply existing, all parents (and children) benefit.
I'm of the opinion that seeing the world in new and creative ways is essential for humanity's ability to grow, evolve, and support the healing of future generations and the planet. Being queer and growing queer families offers a window into doing things differently—and I believe that is what this world needs. Thinking out of the box is a benefit of the queer experience, but one that isn't inherently tied to sexuality. We can all show our kids how to think creatively and see alternatives to the ways that things have always been done—and what a gift this is for our children.
When my clients are struggling through any aspect of LGBTQ+ family formation, I remind them to try, as much as possible, to remember that every step of this process gets them closer to the goal of becoming a parent. When things get hard, internally or externally, it presents an opportunity for us to grow further into the parent (and person) we want to become.
It's a powerful offering to our children to work so hard to bring them into the world. And everyone, no matter their sexual orientation or relationship structure, can benefit from the intention and growth opportunities inherent in the LGBTQ+ family-building process.
Read the original article on Parents