China’s courts were forced to deal with the reality of same-sex couples in a custody case between two mothers that had a bittersweet result.
A 42-year-old woman from Shanghai who wishes to publicly go by “Didi” is attempting to gain parental rights to her two seven-year-old children that she hadn’t seen since 2019. She has won visitation with only one of them.
Didi and the childrens’ other mother married in the U.S. in 2016 since same-sex marriage isn’t legal in China. Both women got pregnant via IVF with donor sperm and eggs from Didi’s wife later that same year and both gave birth in 2017.
The couple separated in 2019 (though they are still legally married in the U.S.) and Didi’s ex took their children to Beijing, cutting off all contact with Didi. With both children only genetically linked to Didi’s ex-wife, Didi had no legal claim to her children.
In 2020, Didi sued for custody of both children, and she has just won monthly visitation only with the child she gave birth to. It is the first time a court in China has recognized that a child can have two legal mothers. However, Didi was not given any visitation with her other child since she did not give birth to him.
Didi was able to see her daughter for the first time in four years and says she “still has faith for the future,” according to The Guardian. “I think maybe she still remembers me,” she said.
“I really love both my children, I want to look after them,” Didi says. Didi’s lawyer, Gao Mingyue, says the Chinese legal system has an “avoidance approach” to same-sex relationships, with rights not clearly defined. Despite the heartbreaking result of not being able to see one of her children, Gao says the landmark case that does acknowledge two mothers sharing custody of a child is a “big step forward.”
