The gay and lesbian rights movement has scored big victories in the last few years, including the legalization of same-sex marriage in several states across the country and the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, giving legally married, same-sex couples more than 1,100 protections and rights of marriage that were previously denied to them.
As more states legalize gay and lesbian marriage, more and more same-sex couples are starting to consider marriage and the possibility of having children. As a result, there will be a greater need for support groups and resources for these couples as they begin the process of starting their families. Here are several organizations that offer resources to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals, couples, and spouses.
The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center has been a stalwart organization in its steadfast support of alternative relationships and families for the past 30 years. Located in Chelsea, the Center “provides quality health and wellness programs in a welcoming space that fosters connections and celebrates our cultural contributions. The Center provides a secure place to come together and plan, share knowledge and expertise, and to share our future as a vibrant community in New York and around the world,” according to its mission statement.
The Center offers a program called Center Families, which has been in existence for more than 20 years and serves as a model for same-sex family organizing. In addition to providing opportunities for families to meet and befriend each other, the program has support groups for gay and lesbian parents and prospective parents, individuals and couples, and counseling, free legal clinics, and other networking opportunities for those living in the tri-state area.
Some of the support groups offered by Center Families deal with foster care and adoption for same-sex individuals and couples. Another support group is called Biological Parenting for Men and is co-led by Howard May, a psychologist who devotes 50 percent of his practice to working around relationship issues with gay men. Married and living in Chelsea, May and his husband, Darren Rosenblum, decided to conceive their daughter through gestational surrogacy, in which one woman is the egg provider and another woman carries the fetus.
“Essentially, it’s a support group for men who are thinking about biological parenting, so it’s specifically geared towards surrogacy,” says May of his program. “What we do each month is a drop-in group, so whoever wants to come can come. People come in during all different stages of the surrogacy process. Some of the questions people may ask are ‘How do you do surrogacy?’ ‘How do you find a surrogate?’ ‘Are there agencies?’ or ‘I am already into the process, and how do I deal with my agency?’ ‘I have a concern about the health or behavior of my surrogate, how do I deal with that?’ We talk about these kinds of issues.”
May discusses in his group the impact of becoming parents, and how it affects the relationships of men who are part of a couple. First, the men discuss why each partner wants to become a parent. Then the group members talk about how they have been handling the parenting process, if they have adequate support in raising their children, how they’re dealing with the reactions of others, and what impact they think parenting is having on their relationship.
May’s advice to couples who are considering starting a family?
“The only really specific advice that I have is talk about it. Vocalize your concerns. Don’t be afraid of expressing whatever your fears are, because when you express them…they can be addressed.”
Similar to the services his group provides, May also recommends a website called Men Having Babies, a non-profit organization that spun off from a program at the Center. Men Having Babies began as a peer support network in 2005 for biological gay fathers and fathers-to-be. It offers monthly workshops on a broad range of topics and holds an annual global seminar. As its online resources have developed, it has been able to reach out to more than 1,000 men from around the world.
May and Rosenblum used an organization called Circle Surrogacy to conceive their child. Based out of Boston, Circle Surrogacy is one of the oldest and largest surrogacy agencies serving gay parents all over the world. With more than 17 years of experience, the agency thoroughly screens prospective LGBT parents and matches them with gay-friendly surrogates and egg donors. The agency also believes that all parties in the birthing process should openly know and communicate with each other, which will eventually have a healthy impact on the child as he grows up and wants to know about his birth.
Another organization that May refers same-sex families to is The Family Equality Council, which has been in existence for more than 30 years. Originally called the Gay Fathers Coalition, the group in later years came to include lesbian moms and bisexual and transgender parents. The Council says its purpose is to connect, support, and represent this country’s three million parents who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, and their six million children.
May and his husband and daughter attended the group’s “Family Week” last summer in Provincetown, Mass. Celebrating its 17th anniversary, “Family Week” has always been a joint venture hosted by the Council and COLAGE, another national LGBT family support group.
“For one week, this kind of gay family resort in Massachusetts on Cape Cod is almost entirely gay people with kids,” May recalled. “They just bring people together. There’s programming the whole week. There are lectures. There are playgroups for the kids. There are different types of events based on the age of your kid. This was the first time we had gone, and it was really quite amazing. There were people from all over the country.”
Another advocate of the Family Equality Council is one of its Board of Directors, William Sherr, who lives near Park Slope, Brooklyn, with his husband, Estevan Garcia, and their three adopted children. For the past 13 years, Sherr and Garcia have opened their home to more than 20 foster children and adopted one of them. Besides taking care of his family, Sherr runs a service called OutbabyNYC, which caters to the needs of same-sex families.
“We work on changing attitudes and policies, so that all families are respected and celebrated,” says Sherr. “They really just try to get us to come together and raise our voices to ensure full legal and social equality for all families.”
Through the Council, Sherr and Garcia held a mixer for family equality at their home this past November. The couple also chairs an annual dinner at Chelsea Piers in the spring to help raise money for the Council. This year the “Night at the Pier” dinner will be held on May 12, 2014, and tickets can be purchased on the Council’s website events page.
How can straight families support same-sex families?
“Talk to your kids about how all families are equal and that all families are different,” says Sherr. “If they have the means and wanted to donate to the Family Equality Council, they can see what their works are doing. If they live in New York, plan to attend ‘Night at the Pier’ in May and show [their] support for the Family Equality Council.”
Allison Plitt is a freelance writer who lives in Queens with her husband and young daughter. She is a frequent contributor to New York Parenting.
