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My wife and I are planning to get pregnant this year with our first child, and I’m already hearing a lot of weird questions about “who the father will be.” What do I say when people ask me such invasive questions?
—Not Your Business
Something I commonly see for LGBTQ+ parents and parents-to-be is experiencing a barrage of unwanted questions and comments from family, community, and strangers throughout every stage of the family building process. It’s not uncommon to get questions about specific fertility treatments, who the donor is, and whether or not people used the same one for multiple children, or “Which one of you is the real mom?” These questions point to a lack of awareness about queer family dynamics in the general population, if not outright ignorance about how our families are made.
I find it helpful when navigating unwanted conversations to have a few simple, nonspecific, and firm phrases in your back pocket that you have practiced at home, so if you get caught off guard by a nosy question, you’ll know how to respond. You can share whatever information about yourself and your family you feel comfortable sharing — these responses are for the times that you don’t feel like getting into it with your uncle or the person at the hardware store.
Here are some examples of questions people commonly get, and a couple of sample answers that you can use in these situations:
“Did you use the same donor for both of the kids?”
“We’ve decided to share donor information only with close family. Have a great day!”
“I completely understand being curious, but that is a personal question.”
“Did you do IVF?”
“I don’t feel like getting into that right now.”
“Actually, it was immaculate conception.” (wink)
“Which one of you carried?”
“We are both his/her/their moms/parents, and we both carry him/her/them now!”
“That’s actually a personal question.”
Try practicing your chosen answer out loud before you’re in this situation, so it feels more natural to you in the moment. Family building offers many opportunities for building skills in setting boundaries with the people in your life — and hopefully this can serve as practice for the many times people will offer you unsolicited advice or intrusive comments throughout the parenting journey.
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Absolutely! I’ve found it helps to assume that it isn’t personal, some people just get very odd when a social interaction goes “off-script” from what they’ve experienced before. But having a planned line and then moving on (often asking them a question about a preferred topic) works great. My two favorite kinds of lines are the vague response/tautology:
“So who’s the sperm donor?”
“Oh, we just went with what felt right for us.”
And the light joke.
“So how did you decide who would carry the kid?”
“High stakes rock paper scissors.”
“… Rock paper scissors?!?”
“Yep. The high stakes kind.”