Trans man who gave birth to his son reveals how 'f***ing awful' pregnancy was: 'If men had to go through this you would never hear the end of it'
A transgender man in Great Britain who went into gender transition limbo to give birth to his own child is now recalling how "f***ing awful" pregnancy was and fighting a legal battle in his country to be recognized as the child's father.
The journey of 32-year-old Freddy McConnell, who lives in a seaside town in the UK, into fatherhood was documented over three years, starting in 2016, as a documentary film called 'Seahorse: The Dad Who Gave Birth'.
At the age of 25, he had surgery to remove his breasts. After considering a hysterectomy, he did not go through with it, according to a Daily Mail report.
Since he always wanted to be a parent, he considered becoming pregnant before his transition, but quickly decided against it. "I needed to figure out exactly who I was before I had a kid," he explained.
He also ruled out having a child through surrogacy by freezing his eggs. After McConnell stopped taking testosterone in order to conceive, he started having periods again, which he hated. "I don't like the idea that I've got tampons in my bag," he said.
Using a sperm donor, he got pregnant on his second attempt and after a few months of carrying his child, he discovered that the process was not smooth sailing.
"If all men got pregnant then pregnancy would be taken so more seriously and talked about. F***, it’s f***ing awful. If men had to go through this all the time you would never hear the end of it," he said.
He also revealed that he had not fully comprehended what it would take to document his journey into fatherhood. "I think I totally underestimated the difficulty of being on camera and being filmed a lot," he said.
"I remember thinking, 'this is really odd I’ll get used to it', but I never got used to it. This is a film about me having a baby. But what I feel like I'm going through isn't me having a baby or pregnancy, it's a much more fundamental total loss of myself."
After giving birth as a transgender man, McConnell faced a new challenge — he wanted to be recognized as the father of the child and not the mother. However, British law states that legally, a child has to have a mother to confirm its existence, and hence, the General Register Office, refused to recognize him as the father.
In the high court where he filed a case, his lawyer argued that the refusal of federal law to recognize him as the child's father was a breach of his client's human rights. If he happens to win the case, McConnell's child will be the first in the country to legally have no mother.