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Sunday, June 17, 2007

Advice Needed

I've got a couple of questions and I'm hoping yall can help me out by sharing your experiences a little bit and/or offering some advice.

The first one has to do with last names. Obviously M and I have different last names. I've been married twice before so I've had my share of names and I'm finally back to my maiden and have no plans on changing it again. Besides the secretary at work said I wasn't allowed any more name changes....too much paperwork for her. ;o) And M is not the name changing kinda gal. So? What last name will our child have? Do we hyphenate out last names? M's last name is pretty unique. Since we aren't legally married and I'm carrying the child the last name will have to be mine right? I don't know. Can we just add M's last name to mine and hyphenate it? Or some people have more than just 1 first, 1 middle and 1 last name right? I mean can we use Abigail/Hunter, Middle Name, M's last name as another middle name and then My last name as the last name? We really want to include both last names somehow. M's last name really needs to be on birth certificate some how. You think the second middle name thing would work? Is it written somewhere that you can only have 3 names?

I know we really need to speak with a lawyer and we will but until then I'd like to hear what yall have done.

We don't really have any laws behind us in VA. There's no second parent adoption. No civil unions. No nothing. So all we have are some papers that we can print off HRC and have notarized but there's no guarantee that'll mean anything if something were to come up and the courts were to be involved. It's not fair. We're a family just like everyone else. Why can't we be treated the same!? ERG!

Ok the second thing has to do with telling your families about the pregnancy. Did your families know you were trying? If not when did you tell them your were pregnant?

We haven't told our parents anything! They know we are a couple but know NOTHING about starting a family. We've told a few close friends and they've been nothing but supportive and we'll tell more when we're a little further along. But how do you tell your families? I know they wont disown us or anything. They would've already done that if they were going to. I think they are going to be concerned for us and the child. I mean in how people will treat and accept/not accept us. I just want them to understand that this child belongs to BOTH of us. We are BOTH the mommies. I don't want M's parents introducing the child as M's roommates kid or my parents trying to come up with a "dad" to tell people. And M has 3 young nieces who are going to wonder and ask questions and I don't think I'll be able to set back and not say something when they ask about Miss Kim and her belly and who the dad is. I know it's not my place, it's their parents, to tell them, to try and explain to them that Miss Kim and Aunt M are BOTH the mommies. I just hate the thoughts of tip-toeing around and not speaking the truth. I've done that my whole life and I refuse to do that again or with our child.

I'm not too concerned about the rest of my family. I think my brother and new sis-in-law will be ok with it and I could care less what my non-brother and his perfect family think.

It's a baby for heavens sakes! Who wouldn't be excited?! I know. There will be people. But come on now. It's a miracle!

Ok, I'm done ranting.

Anyone care to share?
****
Need a laugh? Might be TMI and M will probably kill me for posting this but I think it's funny.

So everyone knows about sympathy pregnancy pains and how the partner gains weight right along with the pregnant mommy and all that jazz right? Anyone ever hear of sympathy pregnancy missed AF?

M is 2 weeks late! LOL!

She did hold the vial of little swimmers and was awfully close when they went for a swim. ;o)

9 comments:

lit.geek.mia said...

I think the laws vary by state on names, but in Michigan you can have more than three names but no more than four on your driver's liscence. I wanted to hyphenate my last name when I got married, but I have two middle names and so I ended up just changing my last name.

Also, one of my friends got pregnant when she wasn't married, and instead of giving their daughter either of their last names, she and the father gave her an entirely different last name. Which, uh, she was sixteen so that explains the insanity. Anyway, my point was that obviously the baby wasn't required to have Drea's last name.

I think if you call City Hall (or wherever births are registered) and ask they could probably tell you.

Amy said...

First of all, congrats to you both!!

Regarding names, my partner changed her last name to mine so that our family would have one name. It was one way to ensure that to the outside world we were equal parents.

Regarding telling your family - Both of ours new of our journey so it was easy and everyone was ecstatic. My partner's young cousins were always confused about our relationship and we've never confirmed anything but they know that we are both their new cousins moms and they saw us throughout the pregnancy so they new I was the one pregnant. We are fortunate that we were assigned to a judge that would hear same sex 2nd parent adoption cases so we're both legal parents which helps but in the end, I think it's the way we interact with our daughter and the shared last names that should take the credit.

I believe that the hospital in our case anyway would only use the birth mother's last name as it appears on the insurance card in the absence of a father for the birth certificate so we would not have been able to use a hyphenated combo of the two unless it was legally designated. Otherwise, what would stop people from coming up with all kinds of funky name combos for their kids.

Anyway, good luck with whatever you decide...

Eryn said...

we've been thinking about this for years and now that i am preg we have to make a decision. when A. and i got married we both kept our names. and neither of us are will to change. but as a two mom family, we feel it's very important for us to have some kind of last name connection. so, i think we have decided to hyphenate the babies name (even though it will be a 7 syllable and 17 letter last name!). we don't see any way around it. we are also now thinking about hyphenating our names (if we're doing it to the kid, we should have to too) this is a compromise - i don't see it as changing my name but rather adding another name to it.

good luck. it's a tough one!

tbean said...

When my parents got married, my mom kept her last name. When they had me (and my siblings) they gave us all two middle names: one they chose and one that was my mom's last name. Then we all have our dad's last name as the fourth name. It's a mouthful, but it works, and if you're not into hyphenating, then it is a nice compromise. (You could also just chuck the chosen middle name and use your wife's last name as a middle name?)
So many options....

amy said...

I changed my last name to my wife's so that our family would all have one name and we wouldn't have to explain to our children why we didn't have the same name. To me a name is just a name, but a family is your solid base. You can legally give your kid a different last name than yours, we have friends here who the bio mom gave the kids the non-bio's last name. It feels disjointed in a way to me. And we told my parents, who had a hard time with it after the 1st trimester, and the risk of miscarriage was down. My mother flipped and the whole pregnancy I was told that if anything happened to me they would take our kid away from Sweets, great huh? My mom was worried that Sweets would date another woman, if I died, and that woman may be mean to my child and Sweets, being the non-bio mom wouldn't care. CRAZY, what people think, isn't it? Now three kids later my mother loves Sweets and actually treats her better than me, and says that she would never dream of taking our kids away from Sweets. (she also says that she doesn't REMEMBER ever saying that in the first place) CRAZY! Good luck in your decisions. I hope this was helpful.

hotomiky said...

Move to Maryland and be closer to us! winks ..

Regarding to last name-- our children have both of our last names. We were able to put our last names on the birth certificate when we filled out birth certificate forms at the hospital. Our kids can use one last name for school purpose rather than using whole full names...We might change later on when children are older and they decide hwat last name to use if this will be easier than having full last name-- We did this to protect ourselves not having to worry about losing the kids. I cannot imagine losing my two precious babies!

Congratulations! T told me the good luck you both got!

20 more days left!!

H-

Merr said...

We didn't realize you could give your kid whatever last name you wanted and just assumed he would have to have mine because I had him. So we gave him Sum's last name as his 2nd middle name. So, yes he has 4 legal names on all his documents. I think now a days it doesn't matter. Some kids have like 5 or 6 names! We chose not to hyphenate the last name so he wouldn't have to deal with signing or writing such a long name. He just goes by his first and last name.
As for telling your family, we told right away, but they knew we were trying. Actually my mom didn't know we were trying, because when I told her she asked "HOW". That is totally your decision based on how your family might react, and how you feel about that. I didn't care what my family thought. They either choose to accept it or not.

ECand3 said...

We are in NJ and we used Cin's last name even though I gave birth. For our 1st, cin had to adopt, but we applied for the birth certificate and SS card with her last name. No problems. For the twins, the new law had already been in effect, so she doesn't have to adopt them. They have her last name, too.
It's not that I don't like my name, but I am not especially attached to it and it seemed so important to her that they have her last name becaue she didn't give birth to them. I also did not want to go thru the torture of changing my last name and hyphenating - too much work. Hope this helps.

Anonymous said...

I wanted to say I support the both of you and a BIG thank you for the break down of the Baby Making cost it reminds me of those "Priceless" commericals.