Theo and Christo Menelaou have made (medical) history by becoming the first set of gay parents to have children using both of their DNA through a surrogate. Here’s how it happened.
Theo and Christo Menelaou of South Africa had always wanted to have children together, but knew that their adoption process would be more difficult than that of the average, opposite-gendered couple.
“It’s very hard to be accepted for adoption and we were told we would always come after heterosexual couples,” Christo explained. “And then we just never thought we’d ever find a person who would want to be a surrogate to a gay couple.”
The couple, however, happened to find and meet their surrogate at a local trial and were able to proceed with the pregnancy sooner than they had expected.
Both Theo and Christo fertilized one of the mother’s eggs, and during the pregnancy, doctors discovered that one of the eggs had divided.
The couple were advised to terminate two of the fetuses to ensure the safety and development of their child, but they refused.
The triplets had to be born prematurely via C-section and all barely weigh over a kilogram each. In the coming months, one of the triplets have to undergo heart surgery.
As a safety precaution, all three of the children were also fitted with alarms that monitor their breathing.
Theo and Christo had to wait a few weeks until all three triplets were considered healthy and strong enough to return home from the hospital. Joshua went home first, then Zoe and Kate in the following week.
Both fathers couldn’t be more thrilled to finally start a family together.
You can see all three triplets with their fathers in the following news clip:
