Here is a crazy situation for you! (long)
My MIL is legally not who she says she is and this is why.
Here birth certificate has a first name on it that is close to hers but not hers. I'm not going to use her real name but the difference is like the difference between Sharon and Shania. Pretty close but not the same names. The birth certificate was hand-written in the early 1910's and apparently whoever filled it out did not hear the correct name and put in a more standard name than my MIL's slightly odd change of a typical name. I know of no one else with her name.
Even if I ignore the first name issue, the birth certificate has her maiden name on it so I must show traceability from her maiden name to her current last name. The first change to her last name was due to her marriage to my husband's father. She knows in what county she got married but supposedly you need the date to get the marriage certificate. She can't remember what date she got married. She also got divorced but he filed and she has no paperwork (many, many years ago).
Years after her divorce, she starts living with another man. She refuses to get married (once was enough) but she starts using his last name. She has been using this last name for at least 35 years. There are no legal documents showing how she got from married name to current last name because she just decided to do it on her own.
She retired with a pension from an eastern state under her current name. She also started taking SS 28 years ago using her current name. Back in the old days, no one asked you to officially document who you were. I can't believe Social Security just took her word for it!
As it turns out, her state pension has had the wrong birthday (wrong day of the month only, off by 4 days) in their system for at least the last 28 years. We were trying to use the automated system to check on the status of a health claim and we couldn't get in because we were trying to input her real birthday. The state asked for documentation to prove her correct birthday to change it.
Bottom line, there is no legal documentation showing how she got to be who she is and the problem starts with her birth certificate from over 90 years ago! She has no property so we are not worried about any type of transfers upon her death but it's a little scary that her pension and health insurance don't have the correct information and haven't for the last 28 years. I wouldn't want anything to go wrong with payment of a future claim, especially if it was a big one.
We aren't sure what to do, if anything. We really want to get the pension and healthcare info corrected but the state is rightfully asking for the proper documentation...which does not exist.
My MIL is legally not who she says she is and this is why.
Here birth certificate has a first name on it that is close to hers but not hers. I'm not going to use her real name but the difference is like the difference between Sharon and Shania. Pretty close but not the same names. The birth certificate was hand-written in the early 1910's and apparently whoever filled it out did not hear the correct name and put in a more standard name than my MIL's slightly odd change of a typical name. I know of no one else with her name.
Even if I ignore the first name issue, the birth certificate has her maiden name on it so I must show traceability from her maiden name to her current last name. The first change to her last name was due to her marriage to my husband's father. She knows in what county she got married but supposedly you need the date to get the marriage certificate. She can't remember what date she got married. She also got divorced but he filed and she has no paperwork (many, many years ago).
Years after her divorce, she starts living with another man. She refuses to get married (once was enough) but she starts using his last name. She has been using this last name for at least 35 years. There are no legal documents showing how she got from married name to current last name because she just decided to do it on her own.
She retired with a pension from an eastern state under her current name. She also started taking SS 28 years ago using her current name. Back in the old days, no one asked you to officially document who you were. I can't believe Social Security just took her word for it!
As it turns out, her state pension has had the wrong birthday (wrong day of the month only, off by 4 days) in their system for at least the last 28 years. We were trying to use the automated system to check on the status of a health claim and we couldn't get in because we were trying to input her real birthday. The state asked for documentation to prove her correct birthday to change it.
Bottom line, there is no legal documentation showing how she got to be who she is and the problem starts with her birth certificate from over 90 years ago! She has no property so we are not worried about any type of transfers upon her death but it's a little scary that her pension and health insurance don't have the correct information and haven't for the last 28 years. I wouldn't want anything to go wrong with payment of a future claim, especially if it was a big one.
We aren't sure what to do, if anything. We really want to get the pension and healthcare info corrected but the state is rightfully asking for the proper documentation...which does not exist.