I am volunteering for Referendum 71. I am signing up today. I have never heard about this until I read it on your blog. News like this is not widespread to Washingtonians unless they live in the Seattle area. I have a big mouth and maybe I use it for some good for a change. God knows we need a change.

Thank you for posting this.

I have received email after email overnight from people I don’t even know wanting to know what they could do.

First – I still am awaiting an apology from Garnett Frederick the phD social worker who to said to me “anti-gay, city and state” he denies saying it but God, he and I know he said that to me – as well as many, many close friends and families – knows he said it because it was the first words out of my mouth when I reached them by phone. As far as I know he has never been sanctioned or disciplined for this hateful comments. He still works as a medical Social Worker at Jackson Memorial Hospital – Ryder Trauma Center: the information is on their web page :

Patient Relations
If you or a friend/family member are a current or former patient of Jackson Health System and have questions or comments concerning the care received or the overall experience at a Jackson facility, please contact Patient Relations at 305-585-7341. website for Jackson Memorial is: http://www.jhsmiami.org/

Be forwarded [typo: forewarned?] that I filed an official complaint on their website about 2.5 weeks after lisa’s death – after her two funerals – and it was lost – finaly found – 4 months later and was NEVER addressed. So you may need to be persistant.

Then there is the governing body for Social Workers – Nat. Assoc. Social Workers (NASW) – their Ethics and Professional Standards: http://www.socialworkers.org/nasw/ethics/default.asp

And finally the Jt. Commission that accredites Hospitals and like facilities. http://www.jointcommission.org/
And finally – there is the Florida Governor and Legislature – that there are no laws to protect family in their most vulnerable time, is unconscionable. Here is the site for Govenor Christ’s site: http://www.flgov.com/

For me I need to still sit with this setback and help the children understand who continue to ask question and are as shell-shocked as I am. Thank you all for your support – my only hope continues to be that this doesn’t happen to another family – regardless of how you define yourselves.

Take home lesson? All the Advanced Health Care directives (another recent CA case here) and Registered Domestic Partnerships and even pleas from 9 year old girls from their hospital beds (sounds extreme? nope: happened in California, recently) cannot and will not erode the homophobia of individuals who KNOW there is a legally-sanctioned, “separate” status to our families. The bipartisan New Jersey commission that studied this confirmed: separate actually ENSURES there will be no equal. Their words:

This commission finds that the separate categorization established by the Civil Union Act invites and encourages unequal treatment of same-sex couples and their children.

Because when it comes down to a moment of crisis, it is not what’s on the books somewhere in the statehouse that makes the difference, but what’s in the heart of the individual.

We have our work cut out for us.