[CadensOthrMommy]

Hi everyone, I am new here. I am a 21 year old lesbian. My partner who is now serving in the military gave birth to our son, who is 13 months old. By some twist of fate, his grandparents now have him (they took him away from me.) And I have no legal grounds to take him back. It also doesn't help that the step grandfather is a lawyer.

A good piece of news is that the biological father has stated that he is willing to terminate his parental rights. I was thinking of doing either a step parent adoption 9since we are married--we did so inSan Francisco even though the validity of those documents is still in the air.) Or if not a step parent adoption, if the father could simply sign over his rights to me. If that isthe case, can this be done with just the father and myself? Or does the biological mother need to be present in court? Because she is currently unavailable due to military service.

This is the only way that I can legally regain custody of my child, and I am anxious to do it quickly. He was taken from me on Fenruary 27th and I know that is not a long time, but he is only 1 year old and this is a very critical time in life for him, in terms of development and needing his mommy to be there. If anyone can offer help I would appreciate it.

While I do not have any court documents I do have notarized Guardianship documents. But I was told that they are useless when confronting a blood relative, because the grandmother has rights by blood and all I have is paper and the factthat I've raised him from birth. What is the first step from here? I don't know the first thing to do. Thank you for your help.

Janay