Hello,
I have a 6 year old daughter. When she was bron I did not list a father on her birth certificate. The relationship I was in was not good. He left, ad I have had no contact with him since she was born. I was on medicaid when I was pregnant, and to continue receiving benefits after her birth, I had to file for child support. I put his name as the father. I was granted child support, but the case has since been dropped. He is unable to be contacted. I got off medicaid shortly thereafter, and still to this day have had no contact with him, and although I have made many search attempts, can not locate him. He was served to go get a paternity test, but did not go, so paternity was never established, and he never signed her birth certificate. I am unsure at this point that he is, in fact, her father.
I am now married, and have been with my husband since she was 5 months old. She is entering Kindergarten this year, and I want to change her last name to my married name (she has my maiden name now). Is there any way to just change her name without having to go through the hassle of continuing to try and contact the possible father/s? I am not trying to push through with a legal adoption, we do not need a piece of paper for my husband to know our little girl is his daughter. I just want to change her name to our family name. She has no idea she is different, and I'd like to keep it that way until she is old enough to understand. I would like to list an article in the newspaper, but am unsure on the wording of it.........any ideas with that???
In the mean time, If I go to the courthouse to petetion for name change and filll in father "unknown" could I have it done?
Any help you can give will be much appreciated. I am located in Broward County Florida.

