ABSTRACT
Choices about giving birth may be different for LGBTQ+ parents-to-be. Research shows that health care professionals may make assumptions about birth preferences because of a gestational parent's gender or sexual orientation. LGBTQ+ parents may have more complex social, legal, and/or genetic relationships to their children than the majority of cisgender heterosexual parents; this may affect who makes which choices about mode and place of birth, and who is present during birth. The chapter will examine how the lack of societal recognition for non-gestational mothers can lead to their partners passing choices and control to them, and where the boundaries between this behaviour and coercive controlling domestic violence relationships might be. The chapter will have a strong focus on empowering midwives and obstetricians to promote choices in birth to LGBTQ+ parents-to-be.
