Twin FAQ

[pantryslut]

1. Are they identical or fraternal?

Fraternal.

2. Who's the father?

This is complicated. Genetically speaking, black_pearl_10 is the father. Legally speaking, thanks to marriage laws (hey, didja know that one of the purposes of marriage is to 'legitimize' children, that is, give them a legal father regardless of genetic parentage?), imnotandrei's name is on the birth certificate and thus the legal father, unless we try and mess with this down the road, which we might -- and possibly become a groundbreaking test case!

3. Where did you get their names from?

Mostly, I liked the way they sounded, that's all. 'Frances' is Steven's grandmother's name. 'Simone' was inspired by a radio ad for the opera, but also for Nina and de Beauvoir. 'April' and 'Leah' are my own whim.

Their second middle name is G.'s last name; their last name is the same as mine.

4. Can I come over?

If we know you personally, sure.

5. Can I hold them?

Yes. Wash your hands first.

6. How are the cats doing with all this?

Surprisingly well. Coaltrain is extra-needy, and Fritzi is overcoming her natural wariness, but overall, they seem to be adjusting just fine and mostly ignoring the babies.

7. Are you guys getting any sleep?

No. Well, OK, a little sleep, but not much.

8. Which one is Scooba and which one is Roomba? How do you know?

Simone is Roomba; April is Scooba. I knew which was which positionally in the womb, but I didn't know their names until I met them in person. (They actually spent a day as "Baby A" and "Baby B" b/c I hadn't had a chance to really meet Simone properly -- she was in the NICU and I was all IV'd up.)

9. Which one is older?

Simone, by two minutes. She is also the bigger one.

10. When can they come out to play?

In about a month.


Any other questions? Ask away!

Comments

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

I knew that Steven would be considered the legal father in most matters, but for some reason I didn't anticipate that this meant his name would have to be on the birth certificate, no ifs, ands, or buts.

There was a whole demographic segment to the birth certificate paperwork that is now just irrevocably fucked as a result, too.

[srl.livejournal.com]

The legal principle here is "presumption of legitimacy"--- unless the genetic father specifically, through a legal proceeding, steps up and asserts his paternity and willingness to be legally responsible for support, the two legally-married people are the parents of the child. That's English common law, with us since the 17th century. The early 20th century brought us a lot of innovations, like the idea that an unmarried woman can't just assert her babydaddy's identity on the birth certificate without his consent. (But birth certificates themselves weren't all that common in the US before about 1900.)

Another legal principle in the US is that birth certificates are prima facie evidence: rebuttable in court, but by default they're presumed to be truthful. New York State even has something to this effect on their birth certificates, at least the ones from the 1970s I've seen: "We're only documenting that this is what the mother/parents said at the birth. We're not saying it's true..."

The tear-off section for "sensitive" statistical data that shouldn't be tracked back to the person happened sometime in the 1930s, I think, and IIRC it was about tracking whether the mother had syphilis. The huge array of questions they ask now about prenatal care, drug use, etc, was an encrustation of the 1960s, mostly--- and California asks many more of those questions than the US Standard Certificate of Birth asks. And yes, you're right about the demographic section being irrevocably fucked now, since there's no good way to answer the demographics bits accurately without having a system that normalizes "genetic father" as separate from "legal father."

I've been trying to figure out how to describe this in my project, since the 2 basic purposes of birth certificates are 1) biostatistics and 2) identity regulation (at both the individual level and the constitutive level--- who your parents are, and how many parents you can have.) And it turns out that, particularly in matters of parental identity, goal #1 and goal #2 usually are diametrically opposed when kids aren't born into heteronormative nuclear families.

One of these days, I'm going to find someone who can explain for me how the government corrects its numbers to allow for the possibility that people are lying (strategically) about their baby-daddy on the confidential section. The statistical uses of birth data only work when the system can collect data that's correct enough to make up for falsification factors.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that a birth certificate is a legal document, not a medical document. So the mother's husband, the man who has legal responsibility for the child, is supposed to be named as the father. The customary way to transfer that responsibility is adoption, and there are plenty of precedents where biological fathers adopted children who had other legal fathers presumed at the time of their birth.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

there are plenty of precedents where biological fathers adopted children who had other legal fathers presumed at the time of their birth.

Yes. But according to a couple lawyers we've talked to, they know of no case where the mother remained still legally married (and not separated) to her husband, but the kids were successfully adopted by the nonmarried biological father.

Doesn't mean such cases don't exist, but.

For now, we're holding off on any more legal action than what we've already done (we have a parenting agreement on file) and see what the future brings.