Three dads who are raising a son and a daughter have opened up about the dynamics of their unconventional family setup.

Ian Jenkins, Alan Mayfield, and Jeremy Allen Hodges made legal history in 2017 after becoming the first three-way relationship to have each of their names listed on their now-three-year-old child's birth certificate.

Now, in an interview with Good Morning Britain, the three men are sharing how being a "throuple" makes parenting their daughter Piper, three, and nearly one-year-old son Parker, a lot easier.

Check out the interview below:

Jeremy explained to the show's hosts that taking care of young children is a lot simpler when there's an extra adult around.

"It's not for everyone but if you can be in a throuple, it makes parenting a lot easier," Jeremy said, adding: "We have two beautiful children, but we still outnumber them."

Jeremy then shared that their children are able to go to "different parents for different needs."

The fathers also talked about the unprecedented move to list all three of their names on their children's birth certificates.

Jeremy, who entered into a relationship with Ian and Alan eight years ago, said: "We certainly didn't do it to make a point.

"It was really to protect the family, especially our daughter because if I weren't a legal parent to my daughter, and if I were killed, my pension would just disappear.

"I wouldn't be able to take her to the pediatrician, I wouldn't be a legal parent, I wouldn't have any obligations to her. I wanted to make it clear to her and her brother that I would forever be obligated as her parent."

The parents also stated that they are very open with their children about how they came to be a family, with Alan explaining: "Our children know where they come from, and that's always been part of their story.

"There is never going to be a reveal to them, there is never going to be a stressful conversation.

"She knows she has three parents who love her, and she knows where she came from - one of my great childhood friends agreed to be our egg donor, and another friend in our life agreed to be our altruistic surrogate.

"When she asks where she comes from, we say, 'We took a little bit of daddy, a little bit of mama, the doctor put them together and into our surrogate and she grew you, and everyone loves you so much.

"She knows her origin story, in my mind that would be the cleanest way to make sure there is minimal stress over that. Our story is that of the generosity of women."

Featured image credit: Marc Bruxelle RF / Alamy Stock Photo

A man has legally disowned twins that were conceived during a threesome with his wife and another man as he has claimed that he is infertile.

The man from New Zealand successfully disowned his twin daughters and asserted his newfound independence, describing himself as "sexually free."

The case was resolved earlier this year but only came to public attention this week when documents were released by the Family Court, as reported by the Daily Mail.

The legal battle unfolded as the man sought to have his name removed from his twin daughters' birth certificates, marking a significant turning point in a tumultuous post-divorce situation.

The former couple had separated around two years ago but officially divorced only three months prior to this recent court decision.

His ex-wife claimed that his actions were driven by a desire to avoid child support obligations, while the man insisted he was motivated by the need to "defend his honor."

The man has sought to remove his name from the twins' birth certificates. Credit: TwentySeven/Getty

The couple had previously adopted children together, but the man had undergone a vasectomy some 12 years before the twins, who are now teenagers, were born.

What makes this case unique is the circumstances surrounding the twins' conception. At the time, the ex-couple was engaging in regular threesomes with another man, who is believed to be the biological father of the twins. Their mother contended that the arrangement was made to help her become pregnant, a claim her ex-husband vehemently denied.

In her ruling, Judge Traicee McKenzie acknowledged the point of disagreement, saying: "Whether this was for pleasure or to conceive a child remains a point of disagreement, but the fact is that the parties were in this arrangement at the time of conception."

After the couple's separation, their relationships soured, leading to the legal battle that unfolded in the Family Court. Despite not believing he was the father, the twins took the ex-husband's surname, and his name was listed on their birth certificates. However, he sought to remove his name from the documents.

Their mother argued that her ex-husband was involved in the twins' lives, taking them on holidays and buying them presents, with the girls even calling him "Dad." Nevertheless, she acknowledged that he was not a "hands-on" father.

The man vehemently denied her claims, asserting that he had holidayed with the girls only once and cut contact with them immediately following the separation.

The man had a vasectomy prior to the children being conceived. Credit: Irina Zharkova / 500px/Getty

Judge McKenzie took into account the man's "rigid, consistent, and immoveable views" since the separation, emphasizing that he had made it clear from the outset that he wanted no relationship with the twins.

She noted: "There was no evidence in any detail of the nature of that relationship. No evidence of any expression of love or affection between them that would have been expected between a father and his daughter. They were children who lived in his house."

Ultimately, the man was granted a non-paternity order, effectively removing his name from the twins' birth certificates.

Featured image credit: Jessica Holden Photography/Getty

While for many people the idea of a father given birth seems physically impossible, it has become a reality in America, where a man has given birth to a healthy baby four years after he began his transition from female to male. Kaci Sullivan, 30, from Wisconsin, US, had already given birth previously during his time spent living as a woman, with him being the father of a five-year-old boy from a previous relationship. But he and his current partner Steve, 27, managed to conceive last February after Kaci took a break from male hormones for health reasons. Despite receiving abuse online and in the street for having a baby bump, Kaci decided to go ahead with the birth and underwent a C-section in November after seven days in labor. The proud father has revealed that he and Steven will now raise Phoenix as gender neutral until they are old enough to decide for themselves. "The moment the baby came out and I got to hear them cry was indescribable. It's incredible to think that I had made this little human. We are just so happy and grateful and enjoying spending time together as a family. The baby is delightful, loving and sweet. "The connection I've felt to them throughout my pregnancy has been an incredible privilege and the last nine months have brought my partner and I so close together." He added: "Some people have been perturbed by the idea of me giving birth, but I don't engage or respond to them. If I see those comments I just get rid of them." "They will try and find our safe space and violate it with their opinions, but they are jerks. I don't waste my time or energy by giving them anything in return. "Because I don't see pregnancy as inherently feminine, and because I don't subscribe to make-believe gender roles, I wasn't threatened by the idea of pregnancy," Kaci explained. "It didn't make me feel any less masculine." Kaci says that he had always struggled with his identity, with the father revealing that he had been bullied throughout his childhood from the age of four. "I was always an anxious kid who felt intuitively disconnected from myself - and in my dreams I was always a boy." "I daydreamed almost constantly about what it would be like to be a boy. Puberty was traumatizing for me, and I cried the first time I had to put on a bra."  The now father-of-two tied the knot with his first husband in 2010, but he became severely depressed and ended up drinking excessively. When he became pregnant with his first child, Kaci hoped that being a mother would make him feel more feminine. "Throughout the experience, I prayed to connect with womanhood, to identify with what was happening to my body, but I couldn't. "I felt so hopeless and lost. I wanted to die. I fell into such a dark place and I was terrified to bring a baby into that darkness with me. But the moment they put him in my arms it was bliss. Immediately I loved him like I had never loved anything or anyone and I felt such a surge of duty to him." "I couldn't be this depressed and be a good parent to him. If I didn't come out and transition, I knew I would eventually succumb to dysphoria, depression and suicide." "So, when the baby was three months old, I told my husband I was transgender. 'I felt like a ton of bricks had been lifted off my chest when I admitted it to myself." Kaci's revelations led to his marriage breaking down and a lot of his friends decided to cut contact with him as well. But, undeterred, he began transitioning in 2013 by taking testosterone and undergoing a double mastectomy. He met his current partner Steven online and they "hit it off straight away". After a few years of dating, the couple decided to try for a baby in 2016 after Kaci stopped taking male hormones due to health reasons. Six months later, Kaci conceived naturally and went on to give birth to Phoenix. Kaci refuses to answer when people ask the gender of the baby, as he says that it is irrelevant. "I wish people realized that they're not asking me about the baby's gender identity," Kaci said. "There is no way anyone could know that. They're asking me what my baby's genitals look like. This is a creepy question when we break it down. "We don't need to be sexualizing little children. Nobody but your child should be revealing their gender." "Our sex and gender identity have nothing to do with socially constructed gender roles. These are three entirely separate concepts." "The architecture of your brain does not change depending on what color you are dressed in as a baby." While Kaci and Steven will no doubt receive plenty of abuse from those who don't agree with the way they are raising their child, if the baby is healthy and raised in a happy family, who are we to judge them?

A polyamorous throuple are raising their combined five children together as a parental trio, it has recently been reported.

Cheyenne Barnes and James Chorman were in a monogamous relationship together, until one evening out with a colleague lead to a change in their relationship and lifestyle.

29-year-old Cheyenne Barnes had been in a relationship with her boyfriend James Chorman for a year when she suggested they add a third person into their romantic lives.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

According to a recent report, Chorman had initial reservations, though that all changed after the pair spent a night with Barnes' then-co-worker Joelle Temporal, 24, back in 2019.

The trio became a throuple soon after.

Each of the trio has a child from a previous relationship, none of whom they wished to name in the interview, while Cheyenne and James also have two children together.

Now, they are raising their "rainbow family" together in Houston, Texas.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

Cheyenne Barnes said of their living situation;

“People say we’re messing up our kids, but the kids don’t care.”

"My eldest daughter told me her friends think it's cool she has three parents because, 'She can get even more presents' – but she doesn’t look at it that way. She says she has more people to love her."

“All they see is three people who love each other – and love them." She continued.

In terms of the dynamics of their individual parenting styles, Barnes added, “Since I’m the one who watches them most of the time as James and Joelle work, I make a lot of the decisions.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

“We have different parenting techniques, but overall, we usually agree on what we should do, and we do sometimes have a vote, too.”

“We decided I should be the one who mainly deals with discipline, so it remains consistent. Don’t get me wrong, I play with them too but when they are acting up, James and Joelle call me in to deal with them.

“They get to be the fun ones while I’m the bad guy! I’m pretty fair across the board with each child, regardless of whether or not they are biologically mine.

“I always make sure to have a talk with the kids to make sure they understand what they did wrong, so they can think about it in the future.”

Cheyenne had known that she was bisexual her entire life, and so it was she who suggested the idea of polyamory to James roughly six months after the couple's daughter was born.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

“I’ve been bisexual my entire life,” Cheyenne said. “In fact, I knew I liked women before men. I’d never been in a poly relationship before, though.

“I sat James down and said, ‘How would you feel about bringing another woman into the mix?'

“He was pretty apprehensive and started saying one woman was enough for him, and that he didn’t want to complicate things.”

Six months later, after giving the idea some thought, James agreed. The couple set up profiles on dating apps, though they soon realized that it wasn't going to be easy to find an appropriate match.

After several dates didn't provide what the couple was looking for, Cheyenne once again resigned herself to a monogamous relationship and threw herself into her work.

It was then that she met Joelle.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

“At the start, I wasn’t interested in her like that at all,” she remembered. “I’d actually sometimes go home to James and complain about her.

“But within a matter of weeks we started talking and bonding over work gossip and our love of 90s rap.”

After the trio went out for dinner, the idea of the couple inviting Joelle into their lives was born.

“To me, it still felt like it would just be a friendship, but James was quite keen to see if Joelle would be interested in taking things to the next level.

“I was the one that had picked the girls before, but this was the first time James seemed excited.” Cheyenne explained.

 “At first, I wasn’t getting the vibe that Joelle was interested in being in a poly relationship, but I invited her to a party to see what happened.

“Another girl started flirting with me, so I turned to Joelle and said, ‘This chick is trying to get with me, but I’ve told her I’m her with you. Is that okay?’

"She nodded, so I asked if I could kiss her, and she said yes.

[[imagecaption|| Credit: PA Real Life]]

“James was talking to someone else at the time and I told him about it later on. He giggled about it and smiled knowingly at me.

“The party got dull, so we headed back to my house. We went to the bedroom as a trio, and it was surprisingly natural.

“It was the first time for all of us, but it all felt so natural. Joelle had never had a female relationship but, like me, she knew she liked girls like that.”

A month after they became an official throuple, Joelle moved in with Cheyenne and James. The trio hope that by sharing their story, they can encourage further understanding of polyamorous relationships.

 

The horrifying misconduct of a fertility doctor could mean a number of children have “serious” relationship issues ahead of them.

In an article for The Daily Mail, a mum-of-two revealed that she found out she was biologically related to her ex-boyfriend via a text message.

Victoria Hill received a screenshot of her profile on a DNA-testing website alongside a message that read “you are my sister” from her old flame, Ethan, in 2024.

Obviously, she was horrified by this shock revelation from her teenage sweetheart and determined to find out more.

She recalled: "I couldn't sleep for days.

"I kept having flashbacks to the special times we'd shared... it was all tainted. Of course, when we'd got together we'd had absolutely no idea we were related – or that there was even the remotest possibility we could be."

What could have happened if the couple never split up?

The former couple went to school together and had a sexual relationship between the ages of 17 and 18.

Although they lost contact as they grew older, Hill said: "When we bumped into each other at a friend's wedding in our mid-20s, I was struck by a wave of emotion and wondered whether we should rekindle our relationship.

"Thankfully, nothing happened, and I met my husband Ben shortly after. But things could so easily have gone the other way. What if Ethan had become my husband and father of my children? It's unthinkable. The idea that I've been intimate with my own half-brother is torturous enough."

Shortly after receiving the bombshell message, the pair discovered that their mothers had undergone fertility treatment with the same doctor.

At the time their mothers received fertility treatment, in the 1970s and 1980s, it was widely considered taboo, and specialists even advised patients to have sex immediately after the procedure, meaning they might never know who the biological father was.

How are they related?

Hill claims: "DNA tests weren't available then, so paternity could not be proven either way."

The doctor both Hill and Ethan’s mothers sought treatment from, Dr Burtin Caldwell, horrifyingly had used his own sperm for insemination procedures at his private clinic.

Hill explained: "It turned out he had been secretly donating his own sperm to his patients for 20 years. Not only is this morally reprehensible, flying in the face of any code of ethics, but there have been grave consequences for me, my family, and his many other offspring.

"It's a serious issue for my children, aged eight and three, too. Should they stay in the area, they will need to ask potential partners to have DNA tests to avoid unwitting incest with unknown cousins.”

Featured image credit: SEBASTIAN KAULITZKI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Getty Images