Kim Kyu-jin and Kim Se-yeon, the first same-sex couple to announce their pregnancy in South Korea, said that they have a healthy baby girl in their arms.
The couple became officially married in 2019 with a ceremony in New York City, which allows tourists to register their marriages, followed by another wedding ceremony in South Korea.
The couple then conceived through artificial insemination with sperm donated by a fertility clinic in Belgium while living in France. (The couple says they lived in Paris for a year as expats.)
“There weren’t any sperm in France either. In June 2021, a law was passed to allow sperm donation for lesbians and single women, so there was a shortage of sperm, and I had to wait for more than a year and a half. So I went to Belgium, one of the neighboring countries. They say the chance of artificial insemination is about 15%, but I succeeded in the first time,” Kim Kyujin said.
Kyujin: “I just want my child to be just healthy and happy. It’s a tough environment for kids to grow up in, even if you’re not a child of a same-sex couple, so I just want them to feel safe as a child in Korea, and I hope that by the time Rani is my age, it’ll be so natural to have two moms that you’ll be like, “Oh, your mom wrote a book about that.” And I hope that she’ll grow up in a society that respects each other.”
Seyeon : “I hope that we can grow up in a society where we can respect each other. Families look different, whether they’re divorced, remarried, or grandparented, and I think a society where we can have open discussions about diversity is a healthy society.”