• Graphic report All the keys to infertility, a growing problem that "does not discriminate"
  • Women Motherhood: practical guide to planning pregnancy and (if possible) not to get caught by the bull
  • Single mother The journey of a pregnant woman thanks to a donated embryo: "If I knew, I would have frozen my eggs before"

When they had been dating for 10 years, Sole Rodríguez and Ángela Flores thought about having children, like many other couples settled in their thirties. Their sexual condition prescribed alternative methods to conceive that desired baby, that is, as lesbians they are, a male did not enter the equation.

They underwent medical treatment and today their daughter just turned four. According to data from the Spanish Fertility Society, one in 10 babies is born in Spain by assisted reproduction techniques. In this bag of families are those affected by infertility problems, women who decide to be single mothers and also lesbian couples who, like Sole and Angela, opt for the ROPA method (Reception of Oocytes of the Couple).

It is an in vitro fertilization treatment in which one of the women provides the egg that will be fertilized with the sperm of a donor, and the other gestates the embryo. Thus, both parties participate in motherhood in a more egalitarian way. Today, Lesbian Visibility Day, this couple gives their testimony and example of the new family model they have formed in Alcalá de Guadaíra (Seville), where they live.

"It's the way to feel it more ours"

"We've always known we wanted to be mothers. At the beginning of 2018 we went to an informative consultation, in April we started the treatment and in June I was already pregnant, "explains Sole. They, like all those who use the ROPA method, sought a more equitable involvement. "We believed that in this way we would be more united to raise the girl. In addition, I was always clear that I wanted to be pregnant and Angela, the opposite. It was the perfect way to feel it more ours," he says.

It was not his case, but sometimes, the distribution of roles is marked by optional criteria. Dr. Pascual Sánchez, medical director of the assisted reproduction clinics Ginemed, explains that when a couple is as clear as they are, they try to respect their decision. However: "If they ask us for advice, in the fertility study we see who has the best ovarian reserve, so that it is she who provides the genetic material, and who is in the best physical condition to get pregnant." "If they later expand their family, there are couples who reverse the roles," adds Sánchez.

Sole, from Seville, and Ángela, from Barcelona, decided to move to Alcalá de Guadaíra in search of a friendlier environment than a big city to start a family. They hesitated, because of the prying eyes and unsolicited opinions. But, for the moment, everything is going as it should, that is, normal, neither more nor less: "We have never noticed any rejection. At school they treat us very naturally and do not talk about father and mother, but about families." Nor does she have any complaints about the treatment she received when she gave birth at the Virgen Macarena University Hospital. On the contrary: "We felt very sheltered and included Angela in everything. In fact, in childbirth, she took the child before me," he recalls.

Although there are some chinita along the way, in the form of isolated but uncomfortable episodes in the pediatrician: "In the medical records it is stated that my daughter has an unknown father. That is not the case. It simply does not have. It hasn't had it and won't have it," he protests.

Treatment in private clinic and married by legal imperative

Shutterstock

They, like other couples when they decide to have children, did not raise the hare in their family. They didn't want pressure and until there was no predictor, there was no communication. "My mother asked me if it was legal, if the baby would be born well, if we had gone to a clinic abroad... There is a lot of ignorance," he says.

That cost them money. Currently, assisted reproduction treatments for lesbian women are managed unevenly by the autonomous communities, which may not include them in the portfolio of health services because they are not infertility patients. Precisely, these differences constitute one of the points that the National Network Association of Infertile takes today to the Congress of Deputies in a day of informative character.

Sole and Angela were a common-law couple, but they had to get married in order to register as mothers of their daughter after undergoing the ROPA method. "And we got married. I was seven months pregnant. We wanted to do it when we had our little girl, but we couldn't," she says. In Spain, the Assisted Reproduction Law 14/2006 prohibits the non-anonymous donation of tissues, gametes and organs. Thus, Sole could not receive that embryo from Angela and a sperm donor, because it would not comply with the obligation of anonymity. The equalization of rights for equal marriages allowed this exception with a single condition: to marry (being a de facto couple is not enough, since it is not considered that it provides sufficient guarantees to avoid fraud in the donation of gametes).

This procedure (the passage through the 'vicarage') makes it possible for the non-pregnant woman to also be the mother of the child born to her wife, without having to initiate an adoption process. And so they did. "If the egg had been mine, it wouldn't have been necessary, but we were clear about it," she says.

"I'm a mom and my wife is a mom. I breastfed her for two years and she is very attached to me, but instead, she looks very much for Angela to play, to read, to do any activity ... For her everything is natural, although sometimes she has asked why she has no father. We've worked on it a lot at home," he says. The girl, whose surname is Flores first and Rodriguez second, may soon have a little brother and may also inherit those blonde loops. "He's a clone of his mom," ditches Sole.

  • Motherhood

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Learn more