Planned single parenting used to be a trend only seen amongst single women using donor sperm. But in recent years, with the increasing popularity of surrogacy in Australia and abroad, more and more Single Men or Gay Males are opting to bring up children on their own.
Surrogacy programs in countries without any surrogacy law have emerged recently for gay males in Mexico, Laos, the Philippines, Kenya and Czech Republic. But these often come with increased risks. So more commonly gay intended parents engage in the US or Australian surrogacy, where the laws and processes are tried and tested.
Clint Priest, from central coast NSW, is one of those. His son Ollie was born on 17 December in the rather unlikely named Riddle Hospital in the town of Media, Pennsylvania. Clint’s mum, his auntie and his niece had all flown from Australia to support him and Amanda, who carried Ollie. After just one night in hospital post-birth, Ollie was in his dad’s care. For Clint, it has been a long journey, marked by perseverance, hardship and totally love.
Meanwhile in Sydney Paul Corbitt would love to fall in love but his focus has always been children. Having never met ‘the one’ he refused to put off fatherhood. Paul welcomed a daughter, Millie, home-birthed in Brisbane on 14 December with the help of altruistic surrogate Rachel. Paul had been lucky to befriend another surrogate Suzan years earlier and Suzan birthed Paul’s first child, Isaac in remote Port Hedland, WA in 2017, after a prolonged labour and far less nursing support.
Running his own Fairlight hair salon has meant sacrifices to juggle everything, but Paul would have it no other way.
Clint and other gay dads will share their journeys and what they learned along the way at Growing Families events in Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland.
