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Bringing potential co-parents together
Hi all,
I’m Ellie, one of the founders of the Queer Platonic Co-Parenting group. A few years ago my partner, Leo, and I realised we could use the obstacles in the way of us becoming parents to redefine parenting itself. That’s when we decided we wanted to co-parent.
But what exactly (and we’ve been asked again, and again) do we mean by platonic co-parenting? For us, the ideal situation would be to find another queer couple - or single queer person - and have biological kids with them, who we raise as a group. In this setup, we’d all have equal parental responsibility. But this is far from the only definition of co-parenting. There are those who would like to be more of an aunt/uncle/sharent figure to a child, rather than a fulltime parent. There are those who have children already, and are looking for other people to be a part of their lives. We believe that people of all sexualities and gender identities deserve a shot at parenting, and that the kind of parenting model we follow shouldn’t have to imitate the hetero, two-parent nuclear family.
In January, we held our first meetup for potential co-parents. We’d like to thank everyone who came, especially those who helped out. Also, big shoutout to the LGBTQ+ Community Centre, who provided us with the perfect venue. Our main takeaway from the event was that there is a huge drive to create a co-parenting movement in London, and in many other areas of the UK. The momentum is growing, and we’ve been overwhelmed by supportive messages from people who want to help us make this happen. If you were at the January meetup, I think you’ll agree (and I’m sorry to sound corny) that there was so much positive and hopeful energy in that room. It was also lovely to see some media coverage of the event, in the form of this article by Sophie K Rosa from Novara.
We’ve now formed an organising committee, and it’s through that group that we’re planning future events that will hopefully be bigger, broader, and a little more streamlined. If you’d like to see what we have lined up for the next three months, please head to our Insta or see below.
As well as in-person events in London and Brighton (see the list below), we’re planning a webinar in June, in collaboration with the Dutch co-parenting organisation Meer dan Gewenst, in which you’ll hopefully be able to hear from some existing queer, platonic co-parenting units, about their journeys. The Netherlands – it turns out – is Europe’s co-parenting capital, and we can learn a lot from the infrastructure activists there have managed to create.
I’m looking forward to meeting more of you at upcoming events, and – if you have any questions – please feel free to message us on Instagram.
Take care!
Ellie
Upcoming events
15th April in London: meet up for people who want to build queer platonic co-parenting partnerships. There will be a 20 minute talk about how coparenting agreements work from lawyer Natalie Sutherland, and then there’s time for general socialising, and a speed meeting table. From 3-6pm.
22nd April in Bristol: a meet up for people to discuss different parenting frameworks. This isn’t organised by us but our aims are aligned! From 11-1.30pm.
20th May in Brighton: a meeting for anyone interested in discussing and finding out more about queer platonic co-parenting. From 3-5pm.
21st May in London: a meet up for people who already have children and people who want to support people who are already parents - the aim is for these two groups to meet and see what works. From 3-6pm.
Get in touch if you want to help out!