- Good morning.
Hi.
One of you always wakes up a little unhappier.
Welcome to the day.
It's a bright one.
Hi, Boo Boo.
I always knew that what I wanted
was to be in a committed relationship and have a child.
That didn't change for me for a second
when I realized that I was gay
and that that meant I would be doing that with a man.
- We're doing it.
You literally say those words,
look at us, we're doing it! - We're doing it!
I really didn't realize how much help you need
if you're gonna have a baby.
Let alone two babies.
Yaayyy! - There it is.
- I'm Daniel.
And this is my husband, Ben.
- Well now I don't know what to say
'cause I'm Ben and this is my husband, Daniel.
We've been together for ten years
- I think our wedding was really the launching point
of our having kids.
Let's enjoy the glow of our wedding
and then let's run at this.
The first thing we started doing
was looking through egg donor profiles.
It really made me uncomfortable because you're objectifying
what they would bring to your child.
Their SAT scores,
their family medical history.
From then on anywhere we went,
we're out at a bar together,
and suddenly we're the guys going,
hey, what do you think about,
look at her.
- Yeah we were.
- Our doctor chose the healthiest embryo from my group
and from Ben's group
and we transferred them to our surrogate.
Then we had to wait for the first ultrasound.
- And we saw two heartbeats.
Or we heard 'em?
- No, we heard them and we saw them
and our jaws hit the floor.
To think that we were both going
to be genetically represented
and suddenly Ben and I were going to be
blood related to each other in a way
I thought probably never would happen being two guys.
- It still just feels crazy to think we're parents.
It's amazing.
Oh my gosh, you guys.
In one moment you guys were right there.
I think we need to get a swing.
I really didn't think about being a gay parent
and how that would be different
'till I became a parent.
If I'm walking down the street with both boys and the dog,
people will see me and go, huh, where's Mom?
And I'm just like,
has any woman in the history of time ever been asked
where's dad when they're parenting by themselves?
By being out in public,
we're suddenly making a political statement
that we weren't necessarily planning on.
You never know.
You never know how people feel
and you always want to be careful.
You know it's our job to make sure they're safe.
Oh you got me.
You got me.
This is parenthood right here.
There you go.
Fun times.
There have been a lot of moments
that I needed someone to turn to.
I turn to you a lot
in those moments.
But the truth is,
I really didn't know how much we would need people.
- Hi.
- The things I needed most
were for people to come and just be here.
I very often reached out
to my group of friends to come help me
and what slowly emerged
was a hard circle group of people that I could count on.
I really don't think I would be able to
have gotten through this without them.
Oh you're already crying.
You are.
- Hi.
- We invited over some of our best friends
and they're here 'cause it's my birthday.
But the truth is,
we really wanted to surprise them
and thank them for all of the amazing things that they did.
Showing up for us
to help us get through those first three months
which were a lot harder than we were expecting them to be.
Hey guys.
- What is this?
- We got you guys little presents.
- [Female Voice] What?
You've got to be kidding me.
- And they are really really just really little things.
- Thank you.
- You've shown up so many times
and,
it just,
we don't have the words.
So with that,
- This is the sweetest thing ever.
- Ohhhhh.
- [Daniel] That was the day they were born.
- Mel, you're in this picture too.
Oh, right there.
- [Female Voice] Where was yours?
- I literally was just falling asleep on the sofa.
- Yeah you just had a moment.
- Holding a baby.
- [White Shirt Woman] I just had a moment
where I just fell asleep.
- [Female Voice] Really cute.
- I think this was the first time I met them.
- [Daniel] It was.
It was the first visit.
- Sean drove through the night
from L.A. to come meet us.
Spent the night in the hospital
and then this is first thing in the morning
the next day.
- That was the craziest day.
- Yeah.
- Our boys,
they won't know you guys as anything different than family.
So we are lucky to be able to extend our family to you
and I'm so happy for our boys
that they get to call you aunts and uncles
'cause really that's what you are now.
To me family are the people who show up when you need them.
- [Ben] When people look at my family,
I want them to see love.