It is a sad decision that we continue to make, but we must feel safe and secure in knowing that we could be able to respond to our own family’s needs and safety wherever we go.

This decision cements the FACT that going to states like Florida are out of the question for us at this time.

I learned of the decision right before I began to tuck the kids in last night, and it was an incredible thing, going through the nighttime rituals, all peaceful, thinking about what that family went through two years ago. And then to know that they found no justice or recourse through the courts this time.

There has to be a next step. Has to be. What Matthew Shepherd and Angie Zapata are to LGBT hate violence, the Langbehn-Pond family is to LGBT partner recognition and the fact that so long as there will be a legally tolerated “separate,” there will never be an equal.

As I was spitting my own nails on Twitter last night, this happens all over; not everyone dies, and not everyone pursues some kind of response from the hospital on behalf of other, future such families. NCLR successfully advocated for a family whose non-bio mom was prevented from being with her 9 year old daughter, in spite of the daughter’s REQUEST for her to be at her side. (Their brief case docket is here.) A woman was also denied access to her partner who had collapsed during the Meet in the Middle rally heat. NCLR and the ACLU stepped in to advocate (their press release here) but my recollection — maybe you know more? — is that the issue is stalled or not resolving very productively, and the hospital is claiming (as did Jackson Memorial) that they are not at fault for discriminatory practices. I hope I’m wrong here. At any rate, it all underscores that all the Powers of Attorney and Health Care Directives and Registered Domestic Partnerships in the world cannot erode the homophobia of a few well-positioned hospital staffers.