Same-sex spouses fight for parental rights

MUNCIE, Ind. — Ten weeks before her due date, Chanda Fouseridge went into the hospital for what she thought would be a routine checkup.

She didn’t realize that hours later medical complications would bring her close to losing her life while bringing two more into the world.

She had just enough time to call her wife, Cheri, who was at home with their 3-year-old son. Cheri rushed to the hospital and was told immediately to put on scrubs. Their tiny, premature twins were born 45 minutes later.

Chanda was losing blood, leaking spinal fluid and had a headache from a bad epidural that caused exploding pain every time she sat up.

Meanwhile, nurses were saying one baby stopped breathing five times during the night and the other had a hole in his heart. Chanda was in no condition to care for them.

But Cheri was there. She began filling out the paperwork for a birth certificate. All of Chanda’s information was written in the spaces marked “mother,” and Cheri put her own information in the spaces marked “father,” after carefully marking it out and writing in “mother.”

Indiana began recognizing their marriage as legal after the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, so they assumed both names could be on the certificate, and the problem was just outdated paperwork. Couldn’t the papers just say “parent” and “parent"?

Turns out, it’s not that simple.

Indiana recognizes their marriage now, but state laws relating to marriage and families haven’t yet changed. Here, family laws are still largely based on biology and paternity.

Legally, Cheri was not the twin’s mother. If she lost Chanda, she could lose the babies as well.

Cheri and Chanda obviously could not get pregnant on their own, but Chanda had always wanted a baby. She told Cheri soon after they met, 13 years ago, that she was having a baby with or without her.

Cheri agreed, and they turned to artificial insemination. They went to a fertility clinic and shelled out thousands for sperm from a bank. They chose an anonymous donor so they would never know who the biological father was, and the father wouldn’t know they chose him.

That’s how their first son, Chaney, was born in 2012.

They went to Iowa to get married just days before Chanda went into labor because Cheri always thought she would be married before having children.

“I was brought up very Republican, very conservative,” Cheri said. “I always thought that I’d be married and I thought that was the right thing to do.”

Her aunt and uncle put together a “fairy tale” wedding for them at a cabin in a national park. Her uncle was ordained because their church would only perform the ceremony but wouldn't sign the license, so he signed the paperwork.

At the last minute, they decided to smush together their last names, Fouse and Shortridge, to create Fouseridge. They wanted to save their son from having a long, hyphenated name to bubble in on standardized tests. Cheri filled out the paperwork on the steering wheel.

Back then their marriage wasn’t recognized in Indiana, so they figured Cheri would have to adopt. They were right, because Indiana’s state code doesn’t address artificial insemination.

Even heterosexual unmarried couples need the non-biological parent to adopt. Indiana offers a second-parent adoption, which allows a second adult to adopt a baby without canceling out the birth parent’s rights.

Cheri had to do a background check and home study. The process included home visits, physicals and reference checks.

Even though a couple lives together, the adoption process treats the second parent as if they are a stranger, said Indiana adoption attorney Joel Kirsh. The process can cost around $2,500.

It’s a little different if a couple is married.

If a husband and wife use artificial insemination, there is one line in the state code that helps them get the husband’s name on a birth certificate: “A man is presumed to be a child's biological father if … (the) man and the child's biological mother are or have been married to each other.”

That only applies to a man and a woman, however. Even though Chanda and Cheri are now legally married in Indiana, Cheri doesn’t get the same presumption of parenthood.

“That shouldn’t have been an issue,” Chanda said.

But to Ron Johnson, the executive director of the Indiana Pastors Alliance, it makes sense, because two women physically couldn’t have had a child together.

“The truth of the matter is you can’t have a child without a man and a woman,” he said. “God has intended that there is a man and a woman involved in raising the child. … I think it’s absolutely ludicrous that we would want to put the names of two men or two women on a birth certificate.”

Cheri and Chanda aren’t the only married, lesbian couple in Indiana who want both names on the birth certificate. A federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of state’s law and presumption of parenthood has been filed.

The case involves Marion, Tippecanoe and Vigo counties, and a long list of same-sex couples who were unable to have their wife’s name put on the birth certificate. Attorney Karen Celestino-Horseman is representing eight couples from Indianapolis. Their stories are similar.

Ashlee and Ruby Henderson were married and wanted both their names on the birth certificate, but were told Ashlee would need a court order to do so, according to court filings.

Nicki and Tonya Bush-Sawyer put both names on the hospital’s confirmation of birth and even got a Social Security card for their son. But when they went to pick up his birth certificate weeks later, they were told there was a problem. It came through with only Nicki’s name on it and a new Social Security card was issued.

“There’s no slippery slope here; we’re just talking about two parents being recognized for a child,” Celestino-Horseman said. “We’re looking for an order from the court that requires Indiana either deny (parental presumption) to everyone who uses artificial insemination, or they can grant it to everybody.”

The court will be hearing oral arguments on April 8.

“There are many legal unknowns following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision of June 2015 striking down marriage statutes in many states,” said Bryan Corbin, a public information officer for the office of the Indiana Attorney General. “It may take time for the lower courts to resolve any remaining issues surrounding the complex, interwoven system of laws involving birth records, divorce and parental rights, property and tax laws.”

This has become a gay rights issue in Indiana with the federal lawsuit, but many states created laws about artificial insemination before same-sex marriage became legal. The modern technology for assisted reproduction has been around since the 1970s.

California, for example, has an entire section of its family code spelling out laws for artificial insemination. It goes further than just putting both names on a birth certificate. There, a couple using “assisted reproduction” can fill out paperwork identifying an “intended parent” prior to the baby’s birth.

The California code says “that intended parent is treated in law as if he or she were the natural parent of a child thereby conceived.”

For Cheri and Chanda, this would have meant Cheri could be filling out paperwork to get their twins medical treatment while Chanda was recovering.

This presumption of parent argument is just one of the ripple effects of the gay marriage ruling in Indiana. There could be more questions about the state code coming. This session, the legislature saw a bill pushing for a change in language to the anti-discrimination law that would specifically add civil rights for gays and lesbians.

It didn’t pass.

To Johnson, from the Indiana Pastors Alliance, this shows how the ruling on gay marriage has opened a can of worms. He believes that marriage should remain between a man and a woman, as biology and God intended, he says.

“We’ve never been here in American history before, so the fallout from this is huge, and we’re just scratching the surface,” he said. “It’s going to take the next five to 10 years to slice this thing out.”

Even if same-sex couples are able to put both names on a birth certificate some day, Indianapolis attorney Barbara Baird said she would still advise them to adopt. The second mother clearly isn’t biologically related to the child, so the birth certificate could be challenged later on.

Baird said this could happen in a divorce, if a couple moved to another state, or if the biological mother died and her family wanted the children. If the second mother were to lose a challenge, she could no longer have parental rights to the children.

There’s legal precedent that adoption is recognized in every state, even if the laws are different.

“My real worry is, everybody thinks the battle’s over with marriage and they aren’t protecting their families,” Baird said.

The legalization of gay marriage did make the adoption process in Indiana a little easier. If a same-sex couple are having a child using artificial insemination they can now do a step-parent adoption.

Kirsh, who has been an adoption attorney for 30 years, said a step-parent adoption can be less invasive because the home study can be waived. It also comes at about half the price.

Cheri and Chanda now spend most of their time in their Farmland home, where they’ve lived since 2005, surrounded by toys, bottles and books.

They brought home the twins, Cincaid and Cutter, after weeks in the NICU, but the months following have been focused on keeping them healthy. Cheri said it’s been a while since they left the house, but they are all doing well.

Cheri worked out her hours as a nurse at Liberty Village Hospital so she works 12-hour shifts on the weekends and is home with the babies during the week while Chanda is working at Ball State University as the assistant director of finance and budgets for the College of Science and Humanities.

They aren’t in the hospital anymore, but Cheri could still lose the twins if something happened to Chanda. And Chanda is still fighting for her life, this time sharing her story to secure rights for her family.

It’s been nearly a year and they still don’t have Cincaid and Cutter’s birth certificates.

“I don’t know, would they go to the state? Or a family member?” Chanda said. “We don’t even want to think about that.”