This story has been going around some of the feminist and LGBTQ blogs today. The New York Times article talks about two different families that were kept apart while one partner was in the hospital. Both were legally prepared for the eventuality and were still kept apart.

Ms. Langbehn says that a hospital social worker informed her that she was in an “antigay city and state” and that she would need a health care proxy to get information. (The worker denies having made the statement, Mr. Alonso said.) As the social worker turned to leave, Ms. Langbehn stopped him. “I said: ‘Wait a minute. I have those health care proxies,’ ” she said. She called a friend to fax the papers.

The medical chart shows that the documents arrived around 4:15 p.m., but nobody immediately spoke to Ms. Langbehn about Ms. Pond’s condition. During her eight-hour stay in the trauma unit waiting room, Ms. Langbehn says, she had two brief encounters with doctors. Around 5:20 a doctor sought her consent for a “brain monitor” but offered no update about the patient’s condition. Around 6:20, two doctors told her there was no hope for a recovery.

Despite repeated requests to see her partner, Ms. Langbehn says she was given just one five-minute visit, when a priest administered last rites. She says she continued to plead with a hospital worker that the children be allowed to see their mother, even showing the children’s birth certificates.

“I said to the receptionist, ‘Look, they’re her kids,’ ” Ms. Langbehn said. (Mr. Alonso, the hospital spokesman, says that except in special circumstances, children under 14 are not allowed to visit in the trauma unit.)

In our June meeting we will be discussing how to protect and provide for your poly family with contract law. We will have a guest speaker talking to us about things like wills and estates; also, we will be going over the chapters regarding the law in Tristan Taormino's book Opening Up and discussing Relationship LLC.

In preparation for all of this, we would like to collect as many questions as possible regarding the subject to send to our guest speaker so he can be prepared when he comes.

Leave your questions in the comments and we will forward them on to him.

Thanks!

We will be meeting at the Tool Shed at 7pm.

We will be talking about introducing the idea of polyamory to a partner and negotiating boundaries. We will also start talking about reading Tristan Taormino's book "Opening Up". Copies are available at the Tool Shed, but you do not need to have read the book to attend (although the book is an amazing one and highly recommended for anyone that is in or thinking about being in a non-monogamous relationship!).

As many of you know, QueerCamp happened this past weekend at Bucketworks in Milwaukee. The turnout was a little smaller than expected, but we had amazing topics and conversation ranging from spirituality to transexuality to marketing to queers.

My presentation on Negotiating Non-Monogamy was the first session to kick off the weekend and I got a lot of interesting questions about things like scheduling, jealousy, and coming out. We talked about all the various forms of non-monogamy (not just polyamory) and why you might choose them. The same afternoon we also had a round table discussion on polyamory, so non-monogamy was a well-covered topic of discussion.

I'd like to thank the various members of the Coming Out Poly group that came out and engaged in discussion and learned with us. Thanks for helping us educate people as to what polyamory is, dispel negative myths, and build community!

Tracy and I talked about the possibility of starting an LGBTQ discussion group that would meet monthly. Would you be interested in attending something like that? What would you want to get out of it?

Just so everyone is aware, QueerCamp is this weekend at Bucketworks. You can visit www.queercamp.org to get more information on the event. It's entirely free! Also, here's Bucketworks' site: www.bucketworks.org.

Ashley and I (Boone) will be doing presentations during QueerCamp. Ashley will be doing a Poly 101 session, and I will most likely hold a discussion-based session about poly - to answer questions, discuss poly topics, and other such things. We really hope to see a bunch of folks there and be a part of the community.

Here's a link to my newest article, hope you guys like it, and if you can (*please pretty please with a cherry on top!*) pass the link on to others, the more hits I get the better ^_^

http://www.altdash.com/ShowArticle.aspx?ID=157

We'll be meeting at the Tool Shed tomorrow at 7 like usual. I've not really got a topic, so I'll let folks bring things to do the table. We might discuss some of the books out there on Poly if you'd like to suggest some reading. Perhaps we'll look into reading some passages for next time and discuss. Hope to see folks there.

For those interested in something to do tonight, there is a talk called "I Heart Female Orgasm", tonight at 7 pm in the UWM Union Wisconsin Room.

Also, remember our next meeting of the poly group is April 15th. Hope to see everyone there again.

This month's meeting will be on March 18th (the third Wednesday of the month).

We'll be talking about open communication in relationships and how to bring up polyamory, or the topic of it, to new or potential partners. Bring some thoughts; bring some friends.