How Do Gay Men Have Biological Children? A Step-by-Step Guide
For many gay men, the desire to become a parent is clear—but the path to get there isn’t always.
You may have heard that surrogacy is the way to have a biological child. But what does that actually involve? How does it work, step by step? And just as importantly—what does it feel like to go through it?
The process of building a family through surrogacy is both highly structured and deeply personal. Understanding both sides can help you move forward with more clarity and confidence.
Decide on Your Path to Parenthood
Before landing on surrogacy, many gay men spend months—or even years—exploring their options.
Adoption, foster care, and co-parenting are all meaningful paths to parenthood. For some, they’re the right fit. For others, they come with uncertainties or limitations that make surrogacy feel like a better match.
Surrogacy is often chosen because it offers:
The opportunity for a biological connection
More predictability in the process
Greater involvement from the very beginning
At the same time, it’s common to hold some tension here.
Many intended fathers feel confident they’re choosing the right path, but still wish it were simpler, faster, or more affordable. That mix of clarity and complexity is a very normal place to start.
Choose an Egg Donor
Choosing an egg donor is often one of the first major decisions in the process, and is also one of the most personal.
You’re not only selecting medical criteria, you’re making a decision that can shape how you think about your future child, your family story, and your own role as a parent.
Some intended parents focus on:
Physical characteristics
Medical history
Education or personality traits
Others find themselves thinking more about:
Whether the donor feels like the “right” fit
How open they want the relationship to be
What they might want their child to know in the future
There’s no single right way to approach this. What matters most is having the space to think through your priorities—and, if you’re partnered, to navigate those decisions together.
Create Embryos Through IVF
Once you’ve selected a donor, the next step is creating embryos through IVF at a fertility clinic. For many couples, this stage can bring up important decisions:
Which clinic should we work with?
Will you use one partner’s sperm or both?
How do you think about genetics and connection?
There’s often no perfect or obvious answer, which is why these conversations matter.
From a medical standpoint, this step involves fertilizing the donor’s eggs with sperm in a lab, then allowing embryos to develop. Some intended parents choose to do genetic testing at this stage to better understand embryo quality.
From an emotional standpoint, this is often when the journey starts to feel very real.
Match With a Surrogate
Matching with a surrogate is one of the most meaningful parts of the process. This is the person who will carry your child—and who, for a period of time, will be closely connected to your life and your family.
Matching typically happens through an agency and includes:
Medical and psychological screening
Background checks
A matching process based on preferences and compatibility
Beyond the logistics, this is where the relational side of surrogacy starts to take shape. It’s common to think through things like how close you want to be, how often you’d like to communicate, and what kind of relationship you hope to have over time. There isn’t a single “right” approach, but being thoughtful about these questions early on can make the experience feel more aligned and grounded.
Embryo Transfer & Pregnancy
Once you’ve matched and completed legal agreements, the embryo transfer takes place. From the outside, this can seem like a straightforward medical step. But for many intended parents, it’s one of the most emotionally intense parts of the process. There’s anticipation, hope, and often a level of anxiety that can be hard to put into words.
If the transfer is successful, the pregnancy moves forward much like any other, just with a different structure of involvement and communication.
You may find yourself navigating:
How involved you want to be during the pregnancy
How to stay connected while also respecting boundaries
The emotional experience of not carrying the pregnancy yourself
What People Don’t Always Talk About
Most guides focus on the steps. Fewer talk about what it actually feels like to go through them. In our work with intended fathers, we often see:
The emotional weight of decision-making
Moments of uncertainty between milestones
Questions about connection, identity, and parenthood
The challenge of balancing excitement with patience
None of this means something is wrong—it’s all part of building your family through surrogacy. And it’s part of why receiving emotional support early on in the process can be so beneficial.
At Counseling With Joey & Associates, we specialize in supporting intended parents through every stage of this journey, combining clinical expertise with lived experience.
