>> You now get the grand booby-prize of risk: divorce proceedings, higher tax rates (depending on how you file), tax suckiness in general (ever have to file injured spouse paperwork w/ the IRS to keep from getting your tax return garnished?), custody cases (doesn't matter if you had the kid before you and your partner hitched up - the partner now has rights), property ownership, debt and collections, you name it... just like the straight couples have to deal with. You wanted reality? You got it.

When Steve was taken to the hospital in the final days of his bout with AIDS in 1984, I was forbidden to be in the hospital room because I wasnt "immediate family". We'd been together for almost a decade, and his family, who had ignored him not only throughout his illness but for a good 15 years prior to that, were able to skip right through and set up camp. Because they were "blood" and I wasnt, I was tossed out and they got to move in, for the sole purpose, I might add, of punishing him and me and all our friends who had been with us as he dealt with this disease.

Yeah, I'll take reality. And know what? Because I've seen the horror stories that are many of the straight couples around me, I know exactly what I would be getting into. But because I have to work that much freaking harder to get it, I'd also be a damn sight more appreciative.

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