Become a parent as an LGBTQIA+ individual or couple

Surrogacy law is complicated and varies from state to state. So don’t let it prevent you from being a parent. You must speak with a lawyer who specializes in surrogacy for LGBTQIA+ couples and singles.

The Special Program of Assisted Reproduction (SPAR) has allowed hundreds of HIV+ men to build their families through surrogacy. Medipocket Surrogacy is proud to have assisted many couples and individuals through this program since 2009.

SPAR is offered in conjunction with the Bedford Research Foundation Clinical Laboratory, which has helped bring over 300 babies into the world safely through the program with no transmission of the virus. Dr. Ann Kiessling’s innovating program combines semen testing and sperm washing for safe fertility procedures.

Living with HIV doesn’t prevent you from having a child safely through surrogacy. It’s possible to have a baby as an HIV+ man through the SPAR program and surrogacy through Medipocket Surrogacy.

For intended parents, the surrogacy process can feel complex: the need for an egg donor and a gestational surrogate, the surrogacy laws for LGBTQIA+ community, finding a surrogacy agency and an IVF clinic. There are many milestones throughout your journey, and working with an agency can help you navigate the events throughout your journey so that you can focus on the most important thing: preparing for the arrival of your baby!

3 steps to finding a surrogacy agency:

1. Research, research, research! Learn all there is to know about surrogacy.

2. Write down what’s important to you in a surrogacy journey. What type of surrogate/intended parent relationship are you looking for? What level of surrogacy support do you want throughout your journey?

3. Make a list of agencies that fit your criteria, and reach out. Finding an agency that “feels right” is important!

Beginning your journey toward gay surrogacy is a big step, so it’s important to do your research! Not every surrogacy agency is a good fit, finding a surrogacy agency with which you have good chemistry and who shares your views about surrogacy for gay individual or couples is key to a successful journey. Also, surrogacy laws vary by state, so working with an agency who has lawyers knowledgeable in ART and surrogacy law is important.

Growing your family through surrogacy means bringing two very important people into your life: your surrogate and your egg donor. You may have a family member or friend who wants to act as your egg donor, or perhaps you’ll find an egg donor in an egg donor database.

If you’re working with a surrogacy agency, your program coordinator will help find you a surrogate match. If you’re doing an independent surrogacy journey, you’ll need to find a gestational surrogate on your own. Surrogacy is an intimate experience, and agencies such as Medipocket Surrogacy will encourage you to form a strong bond with the woman who will carry your baby(ies).

Hooray, your surrogate is pregnant and you’re getting ready to become a parent! You’ll be further developing your relationship with your surrogate, and perhaps even visiting her for appointments. Your agency will be supporting you through each milestone, helping you prepare for traveling for the birth and ensuring you have everything you need to return home safely and securely.
Surrogacy costs and programs
Surrogacy costs and programs
Surrogacy and egg donation costs can be broken down into four categories:

Professional fees
Surrogate and egg donor fees and expenses
Insurance expenses
IVF expenses
Medipocket Surrogacy offers surrogacy programs that provide fixed costs for all professional fees, surrogate and egg donor fees and insurance expenses. While IVF expenses are variable, Medipocket Surrogacy works with many clinics who may offer a similar fixed cost option for IVF services.

Guaranteed costs with our all-inclusive cost program
Our surrogacy programs and pricing are structured to achieve two primary goals for intended parents: success and cost security.

Medipocket’s Journey Protection Guarantee Program is designed to help as many Intended Parents as possible bring home a baby while reducing variable costs.

Journey Protection Guarantee surrogacy costs:

Surrogacy only: $157,750
Surrogacy plus egg donation: $184,750
(both prices exclude IVF)

Our Journey Protection Guarantee offers Intended Parents:

An all-inclusive program that covers all Surrogate fees and expenses for unlimited transfers and any complications that may arise during your journey
Costs spread across 3 predictable payments to help you plan financially
No surprise costs or invoices, even in scenarios that require a rematch with a new Surrogate
The costs outlined above are for our Surrogacy Only and Surrogacy Plus Egg Donation Programs. For more information about the costs of our other programs, please email us or call us at 617.439.9900.

Learn more about our Journey Protection Guarantee Program.

Medipocket Surrogacy is committed to keeping costs as low as possible through strategic partnerships and surrogacy financing options for LBGTQIA+ individuals and couples in the United States and beyond.

Financing Surrogacy Costs
Some intended parents may have the opportunity to qualify for financing for their journey. Please speak with our Parent Intake Team or Consultation Team or by filling out this form.

Assistance Through Partnerships
Through Men Having Babies, Medipocket offers the following discounts for LGBTQIA+ parents-to-be:

GPAP Stage II – 1 pro bono Agency Service(s) per year
GPAP Stage I – 30%. Annual quota: 4 cases per year.

Membership Benefits Program (MBP):
$500 off Gestational Surrogacy program (GS only)
$250 off Egg Donation program (ED only)

Can use both discounts if Gestational Surrogacy with Egg Donation is needed making the total $750.

Finding an egg donor is a big step in your family building journey. Learn how LGBTQIA+ singles and couples go about choosing a donor, what to look for in a donor, and how to agree with your partner on which egg donor is the best match.

How do you choose the right egg donor?
Finding the perfect egg donor can be a stressful process. After all, you are selecting the young woman who will be providing half of your baby’s biology!

If you’re a couple, and you’re both submitting biology for the creation of your embryos, it’s not as easy to have an image of what your child will be like. Making a decision on what the other half of your child’s biology will be can be a little harder. Some intended parents base the characteristics they look for in an egg donor on those of a close friend or family member.

Education? Appearance? Ethnicity? Personality? As you start your search, it’s a good idea to have some thoughts as to what’s important to you in an egg donor match.

And remember, nature vs nurture – not every characteristic or trait is hereditary!

Our advice to finding an egg donor: Be flexible!
Perhaps you have NO idea what you’re looking for in an egg donor, or how to start your search. That’s okay! Some intended parents take the “I’ll know it when I see it” approach and create their list of criteria as they start looking through profiles.

Parents have told us that the ideal woman they thought they wanted as an egg donor, is not even close to the woman they ended up matching with.

Perhaps you have done your homework and have a list of 10 criteria you’re looking for in an egg donor…only to find that there aren’t any egg donors who meet your full list. Re-evaluate your list and prioritize your top 5 criteria and restart your search.

For example, one couple considered education and appearance to be their top priorities. As they started looking through our egg donor database, they weren’t finding exactly what they were looking for. They removed some of the criteria from their search, and ended up finding their perfect woman, whose reasons for becoming an egg donor hooked them immediately.

The more open-minded you can be, the easier it will be to find your perfect match.

This page on how to find an egg donor provides helpful tips on how to go about finding that special woman.

Finding the woman who will act as your surrogate mother and carry your baby(ies) is one of the most exciting milestones during your surrogacy journey to parenthood. Trust your surrogacy agency to help you find the best surrogate match.

At Medipocket, all surrogates will be thoroughly screened prior to a match being presented to you. This helps to reduce match breaks once a match is made and a relationship begins. If fact, Medipocket has the most rigorous application and screening process for women who wish to become surrogates. Learn more about our surrogate screening process.

The first steps to finding a surrogate mother.
Many of Medipocket’s surrogate mothers are excited at the prospect of helping building LGBTQIA+ families through surrogacy. They understand firsthand the joys of parenthood and want to share that experience with others.

Both gestational carriers and intended parents will fill out a questionnaire that asks them about the type of person they wish to be matched with, as well as what their expectations are from the surrogacy journey, and the level of communication with which they are comfortable. It’s important to be honest when answering these questions, as our Matching Team uses these answers – as well as your geographic location and views on termination – in order to find you the best match.

Surrogate matching preferences for gay and trans parents.
When you’re working with a surrogacy agency such as Medipocket, there are certain criteria on which you will be matched with your gestational carrier.

Intended Parent matching criteria includes their preferences on:

Level of communication with their surrogate during the journey
Location of the surrogate mother
Number of embryos to transfer
Views on selective reduction and termination
If you are doing an independent surrogacy journey, you can use the above as guidelines as to what you should be looking for in a suitable match.

3 criteria for matching surrogates and LGBTQIA+ parents
1. Appropriate legal fit

In the United States, each state has its own laws regarding surrogacy. In addition, each country we assist has different requirements and laws regarding surrogacy. Therefore, our legal team ensures that the laws of the surrogate’s home state (where the delivery will take place) complement the laws of intended parents’ home state/country (including laws around same sex parenting). The legal department will always approve a match from a legal standpoint before a surrogate profile is presented to intended parents. We will never knowingly present matches that are not a safe legal fit.

2. Personality fit and surrogacy expectations.

Once the legal team presents its list of safe matches, the matching team reviews the list to ensure good personality fits, since we want this to be a comfortable relationship throughout the entirety of the journey. Both surrogates and intended parents undergo phone calls or in-person meetings with the Medipocket team early in the process; these meetings help determine your personality as it relates to surrogacy. We also look at IPs’ and surrogates’ expectations and hopes for the journey including the number of embryos to transfer and communication styles.

3. Expectations Surrounding Termination and Selective Reduction.

We ask IPs and surrogates their views on termination of a pregnancy as we want to create a match of IPs and surrogates who share similar views. We want to ensure that the views of the surrogate and the views of the intended parents align in the event a situation arises where a reduction or termination is considered. In our experience, many intended parents prefer the option to make the choice of termination.Finding a surrogate mother
Finding the woman who will act as your surrogate mother and carry your baby(ies) is one of the most exciting milestones during your surrogacy journey to parenthood. Trust your surrogacy agency to help you find the best surrogate match.

At Medipocket, all surrogates will be thoroughly screened prior to a match being presented to you. This helps to reduce match breaks once a match is made and a relationship begins. If fact, Medipocket has the most rigorous application and screening process for women who wish to become surrogates. Learn more about our surrogate screening process.

The first steps to finding a surrogate mother.
Many of Medipocket’s surrogate mothers are excited at the prospect of helping building LGBTQIA+ families through surrogacy. They understand firsthand the joys of parenthood and want to share that experience with others.

Both gestational carriers and intended parents will fill out a questionnaire that asks them about the type of person they wish to be matched with, as well as what their expectations are from the surrogacy journey, and the level of communication with which they are comfortable. It’s important to be honest when answering these questions, as our Matching Team uses these answers – as well as your geographic location and views on termination – in order to find you the best match.

Surrogate matching preferences for gay and trans parents.
When you’re working with a surrogacy agency such as Medipocket, there are certain criteria on which you will be matched with your gestational carrier.

Intended Parent matching criteria includes their preferences on:

Level of communication with their surrogate during the journey
Location of the surrogate mother
Number of embryos to transfer
Views on selective reduction and termination
If you are doing an independent surrogacy journey, you can use the above as guidelines as to what you should be looking for in a suitable match.

3 criteria for matching surrogates and LGBTQIA+ parents
1. Appropriate legal fit

In the United States, each state has its own laws regarding surrogacy. In addition, each country we assist has different requirements and laws regarding surrogacy. Therefore, our legal team ensures that the laws of the surrogate’s home state (where the delivery will take place) complement the laws of intended parents’ home state/country (including laws around same sex parenting). The legal department will always approve a match from a legal standpoint before a surrogate profile is presented to intended parents. We will never knowingly present matches that are not a safe legal fit.

2. Personality fit and surrogacy expectations.

Once the legal team presents its list of safe matches, the matching team reviews the list to ensure good personality fits, since we want this to be a comfortable relationship throughout the entirety of the journey. Both surrogates and intended parents undergo phone calls or in-person meetings with the Medipocket team early in the process; these meetings help determine your personality as it relates to surrogacy. We also look at IPs’ and surrogates’ expectations and hopes for the journey including the number of embryos to transfer and communication styles.

3. Expectations Surrounding Termination and Selective Reduction.

We ask IPs and surrogates their views on termination of a pregnancy as we want to create a match of IPs and surrogates who share similar views. We want to ensure that the views of the surrogate and the views of the intended parents align in the event a situation arises where a reduction or termination is considered. In our experience, many intended parents prefer the option to make the choice of termination.

Medipocket Surrogacy believes that strong relationships between surrogate mothers and intended parents lead to smoother, more successful journeys. Regular communication also helps intended parents feel comfortable with their surrogate, and feel part of the pregnancy and process.

As a gay intended parent, building a relationship with your surrogate also helps you tell your child their origin story, and gives him/her the opportunity to know the woman who helped create your family. Because developing a relationship with your surrogate is so important, Medipocket strongly suggests a weekly video call (at minimum) between parents and surrogates via Skype or other video chat forum.

While the first video meeting can be a little stressful, surrogate mothers and intended parents create their own cadence for communication; some speak to each other weekly, some send text updates, while others chat daily and send photos frequently.

Since our inception 25 years ago, we’ve been partnering with various LGBTQ+ organizations, including Gays with Kids, the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center, Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD), Family Equality Council, Men Having Babies and The Association des Familles Homoparentales.

Learn more about our gay parenting partners.