Guardianship and Name Change

[laurieann]

My daughter and her boyfriend(parents of a 5 year old) are incarcerated in a foreign country for the next 5 years.I have their child and am sole support.They wrote a document granting me custody if anything happened to them abroad(which did).This has not been a problem and no one else wants her.It was notarized.The childs' father has not contacted her nor shown little interest in the past year.We are due to retire in a few years and we would like to have his parental rights terminated so we can giver her our last name.She will then be able to get SS benefits when we retire.We just want guardianship.My daughter is disabled and on SSi and SSD.The child has health insurance thru this,but no payments.UI am my daughters' payee .Having our last name(same as my daughter does) would help her in this tragic event.If anything happened to my daughter,he would have rights or his family.They are lowlifes that have not seen nor helped her,nor him in the past year! We feel she needs stability and is young enough to bounce back,so we want to go further than just that notarized statement.What should we do?

[Mr. Knowitall]

You can go to court, seek to formalize the guardianship, and petition to have his parental rights terminated. As laws vary by state, whether you can even do that, and what you would have to do, will vary by state. Don't assume that a name change will magically entitle the child to Social Security survivor benefits; consult a lawyer about the situation.