A father whose son was born through surrogacy earlier this year has said they are still going through the legal process.
Kyle and Robert got married back in 2016 and their son Ruairí was born in January in Cyprus.
Kyle told Lunchtime Live it has been a long, seven-year journey.
"We considered many different options, I had to do a lot of research," he said.
"We looked down the route of adoption and a number of different other avenues.
"Only recently this year we were thankfully blessed with a little boy that we had through surrogacy in Cyprus."
'Still in the journey'
Kyle said it was very time intensive having to meet with different clinics and legal teams.
"It obviously hasn't been the easiest journey, we're still in the journey," he said.
"We're still going through the legal process of it all.
"We don't deem this as fully finished until the day we can finally take him back to Canada to see my family.
"We've been back nearly about eight months and we're still awaiting the opportunity to finally introduce him in person to his grandparents, cousins and aunties and uncles".
'Every family going through this'
Kyle said not being able to bring his son to his family at Christmas is "a bit of a heartache."
"We're allowing the legal system to take it's journey, there's a lot of things that are happening in the background.
"Obviously with the Assisted Human Reproductive Bill with the surrogacy amendments that only recently got green-lighted - we look forward to see what those amendments are [and] how that's going to be played with in our case.
"Every family is going through this; predominantly gay fathers, single fathers and any family who has to actually go down the route of surrogacy.
"It's not always the primary option for a lot of people".
'Let's just do this right'
Gráinne, whose son Oisín was born through surrogacy in Ukraine back in June, has also travelled a long road.
"I started being diagnosed with cancer back in 2014," she said
"In 2015 I had an emergency hysterectomy, and then unfortunately found out I was caught up in that whole cervical cancer debacle.
"It was going through a hugely negative time; I broke up with my boyfriend at the time.
"We were obviously planning to be together, but I felt it wasn't right because I couldn't give him children."
Gráinne ultimately got back together with her boyfriend who she described as a "huge support."
"Then we decided we were going to stay together and I decided let's just do this right - we'll do marriage and we'll have children, we'll look at surrogacy".
Following legal advice Gráinne said they chose to go to Ukraine.
"We started it and then COVID hit," she said.
"We had issues getting our marriage licence because there was no marriages, and then a backlog of marriages.
"We eventually got our marriage licence and then we got out to Kyiv after numerous amounts of cancelled flights.
"We eventually had our embryos sitting in Kyiv and you breathe a sigh of relief, and the surrogate was ready.
"In January 2022 we were meant to proceed with implementation and the war broke out in Ukraine.
"We'd written it off and then we got a letter to say all the contracts were null and void".
'Bundle of joy'
Gráinne said an email six months later changed everything.
"They proceeded and we got married last year and had the announcement of the pregnancy in September," sha said.
"Our darling boy arrived in June and we went out to Kyiv and met the most amazing people out in Ukraine - God help them what they're going through - and they were a huge support to us.
"We have this blessed bundle of amazing joy and he's perfect, and Christmas is perfect, and the house just had a whole new warmth about it," she added.
Gráinne said they will be spending Christmas in Tramore with family.
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