How do you choose who the biological parent will be?

People tend to choose surrogacy because they would like to have a biological child. A heterosexual couple, with viable eggs and sperm, doesn’t have to make a decision about who the biological parent will be because they both can be. If one of them does not have viable sperm or eggs, that decision is made for them and they have to then choose a sperm or egg donor. A gay couple will have a few more choices to make.

A gay male couple, with viable sperm, can have embryos made from donated eggs of their choice and their sperm. We commonly see these couples fertilize half of the eggs with one of the intended father’s sperm and the other half with the other intended father’s sperm. Then they test the embryo quality. If there are quality embryos from both intended fathers’, they then have to choose which one to transfer OR they can do a double embryo transfer and hope they both stick for twins so they each have a biologically related child! They might also choose to have 2 children a few years apart, each one biologically related to one of the intended fathers. 

Science often ends up making a lot of these decisions for you. One intended father could be sterile, so the choice is made for you. One could just have higher sperm count resulting in higher quality embryos, so the intended parents decide to transfer those embryos. Unless the intended parents are ok taking the risk of spending more time and money to transfer lower quality embryos, it’s often recommended to go with higher quality embryos first. 

Surrogacy is used less often in lesbian couples because they have 2 uteruses between them but sometimes neither of them can or want to carry the baby. If they both want to be a biological parent, eggs can be retrieved from both of them and tested for quality. Similar to a gay male couple, it comes down to embryo quality.

There are also factors such as family medical history to take into account. Some intended parents make the decision of who the biological parent will be just by a family history. Some intended parents just simply desire a biological child more than their spouse. Every family is different so take the time to make the right decision for your family.  

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