She adds, “We’re both working people, so we need to figure out how we’re going to have childcare and all those things.”
In vitro fertilisation is never easy, with each round having a success rate of 25-31 per cent for women of Rebecca’s age, but the unfairness stings. She says, “I actually have a friend at work who was at the same clinic, who got all of her care for free from the NHS, while I’m paying all this money.” The NHS offers three rounds of IVF to eligible couples, but proving eligibility can be the sticking point.
Since they embarked on the gruelling and costly process, Rebecca and her wife Suki* have discovered that they might now qualify for a treatment called IUI or Intrauterine Insemination.
It involves injecting donated sperm into the woman’s uterus, but without any form of stimulation to increase egg production. To Rebecca this would be “basically just shooting a vial of sperm up there and hoping for the best”.
And it wouldn’t do what the two women want – to involve both partners in the childbirth experience. Full in vitro fertilisation means that Rebecca’s eggs can be harvested and combined in a lab with donor sperm, then, if embryos develop, they can be implanted into Suki’s womb – a process known as “shared motherhood”.
“There’s something innate about having a child that you have made together,” says Rebecca. “I still have this urge to have a baby that has my DNA.”
BJ Woodstein's book.[Missing Credit]
How much and what sort of fertility treatment gay couples are offered on the NHS varies across the country. So it’s a classic “postcode lottery”. Progress has been promised, and in 2023 seemed imminent. A married lesbian couple claimed victory over their local NHS trust after they launched a landmark legal test case. Megan and Whitney Bacon-Evans – influencers known on YouTube as Wegan – settled out of court with the NHS Frimley Integrated Care Board.
They had been horrified to discover that same-sex couples were asked to pay for 12 rounds of artificial insemination privately at a cost of tens of thousands of pounds before they could become eligible for NHS treatment.
After Megan and Whitney applied for judicial review, their trust agreed to change its rules to give same-sex couples the same access to fertility treatment as heterosexual couples.
The legal action and publicity around it even led to a government U-turn. Maria Caulfield MP, then undersecretary for health and social care in Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government, undertook to expand access to NHS fertility treatment for same-sex couples and single women by 2024.
But it was a false dawn. In September 2025 six MPs tabled an early day motion in parliament saying that the promised changes had not materialised and called on the government to “ensure that all members of the LGBTQIA+ community are provided with fair and equal access to fertility treatment”.
BJ Woodstein, 46, says that Jewish gay couples face a double whammy of ignorance and discrimination, especially outside London. “You’re dealing with the healthcare system, where they don’t really understand us, and it just ends up being really frustrating,” she says. “My wife Fi and I went to a fertility clinic, and they wrote on our file ‘Diagnosis: same-sex couple’ as though it was some sort of illness that we had, when really it was just that we had no sperm.
“It seemed like a really offensive way to interact with us. Later, when I was pregnant, I asked, ‘Could we get genetic testing? Because, as you know, there are certain genetic illnesses that Jews are predisposed to,’ and they didn’t even know what I meant.”
BJ Woodstein.[Missing Credit]
The honorary professor of literature is also a writer, translator and consultant and now the proud mum of children aged 11 and seven. She was so disappointed with the way the healthcare system treated her and the lack of clear guidance that she wrote a handbook on the subject. She describes We’re Here! A Practical Guide to Becoming an LGBTQ+ Parent (Praeclarus Press, 2022) as “the book that I wish that my wife and I had when we were going through it all”. It covers both emotional and practical aspects, everything from blended families to surrogacy, adoption and of course the practical challenges of getting pregnant for lesbian couples.
Before the advent of IVF, women would come to informal arrangements with male friends, the use of turkey basters as a tool for impregnation entering into the culture and becoming a frequent target for humour.
But, says Woodstein, experience has shown that there are good medical and legal reasons why women might not want to go down that route. It might be difficult to get clear information about inherited illnesses, and some women have found that biological fathers who profess no interest can suddenly demand paternal rights once the child has arrived.
BJ Woodstein's guide to Jewish pregnancy and birth.[Missing Credit]
Woodstein found the healthcare system geared exclusively towards heterosexual couples. “What my research suggested was that if you can prove that you’ve been trying to get pregnant for either six months or a year, depending on your age then you might be eligible for fertility treatment on the NHS.
“But as a same-sex couple, how were we supposed to prove that? We can’t claim that what we’re doing is ever going to make a baby.”
A spokesperson for NHS England confirmed that the availability of IVF varies from area to area, saying: “Integrated care boards are responsible for commissioning IVF services and making decisions for their areas, balancing both the needs of people in their local area and the resources available. All ICBs have a responsibility to ensure services are provided fairly.”
Despite the obstacles, Rebecca is trying to have a positive view of the future. “I’ve dreamt of being a parent since I was really young,” she says.
“I see my wife with our friends’ kids and she is so animated and funny with them, I just can’t wait to see her teaching our kid to bake. She’s going to be an amazing mum.”
BJ Woodstein’s latest book is Be Fruitful: The Jewish Pregnancy and Birth Guide (Praeclarus Press 2026, £12.59)
*Not their real name
