[Jess]

Originally Posted by June

I read the articles this morning and wondered what "The rest of the story" was.

If someone has medical power of attorney and presents it, it must be honored, regardless of the relationship. I mean, you could have anyone have your power of attorneys, even if they're not blood/legal family.

Why was the other partner put into a nursing home? Why were the belongings sold? Was the other partner suffering from dementia or otherwise infirm at the time? Was the paperwork submitted at the time, or discovered later after all this stuff had happened, which doesn't excuse it, but might explain it better.

There are a lot of holes in this story that need to be filled in as far as timelines before I am satisfied that this was an actual deliberate act of homophobia and not just some kind of paperwork snafu with disastrous results.

I don't like being used by either side of the media, and frankly, this feels a bit skewed to me.

It did however remind me of the 1st If Walls Could Talk (someone else go find the video, I'm too lazy) where the female couple had been together for 30 years and when one of them died, the other lost everything even though she had paid the mortgage too. I remember crying hard and long as I watched that.

AND ALSO! Don't use this story as a reason NOT to get protected in your partnership in anyway you can because you think "it doesn't matter". It does.

Tenants in common if you own a house
Legal AND Medical POA's
Wills
Right of Remains
Living Wills - Who gets to pull the plug

There's some other stuff, someone else can fill in. It seems like I have about 7 different documents with my partner outlining what will happen and who's in charge.

Agree! All we can do at the moment is to keep protecting ourselves as best as we can.

This may be helpful...

http://gbge.aclu.org/relationships