How 2 strangers struck up a platonic relationship online to have a child together
We look at why people are having kids through platonic, co-parenting relationships
When Tatijana Busic and Brendan Schulz decided to have a child together, their friends and family had mixed reactions — and plenty of questions.
Schulz, a gay man who always dreamed of being a father, and Busic, already raising a child from a previous marriage, met on Modamily, a website that connects people who want to co-parent a child outside traditional routes like marriage.
While they may have seemed like an unlikely pair, their partnership was no mistake.
"This is actually, by design, exactly what we wanted," Schulz told The Current's Anna Maria Tremonti. "In fact, it's better than I think either of us imagined it."
In a society where people are taking longer to launch careers and start families, Busic and Schulz aren't the only people turning to platonic, co-parenting relationships to make their dreams of raising children come true.
While statistics on co-parenting are still emerging, the Centre for Family and Research in the U.K. has said elective co-parenting has been more common among gay men and women. One 2015 study found an increase in co-parenting arrangements between heterosexual men and women.
To learn more about co-parenting, and why people are doing it, Tremonti spoke to:
- Brendan Schulz and Tatijana Busic, co-parents raising their son, Milo.
- Rachel Hope, author of Family by Choice: Platonic Partnered Parenting, and mother of two children through platonic parenting arrangements.
- Andrea O'Reilly, professor at York University's School of Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies.
Click 'listen' near the top of this page to hear the full conversation.
With files from CBC News. Produced by Danielle Carr.