Who Are You? Who, Who (not a call for comments, just a snarky title)

Read the post, then the title will make more sense.

In the south it is common when a woman marries for her to start using her maiden name as a middle name and take the last name of her husband.  Not everyone does this of course, but a good number do as you may not want to completely lose your identity with your maiden name.

Forty years or so ago Mom got married.  When she married she went to the Social Security office (or what ever the procedure was then) with her freshly minted Marriage License and legally changed her name with the federal government.  When Mom did this she was angry with her father and decided that she no longer wanted to be a "Smith" anymore so she set up her legal name as "Jane Mary Doe".  Sometime within the next year or so Mom decided to start using her maiden name as her middle name and started using "Jane Smith Doe".  Years passed, Mom divorced but kept her married name  and has stayed "Jane Smith Doe" so all records, car titles, drivers license, deeds, etc have her listed as "Jane S. Doe"  My WHOLE life I've seen her sign EVERYTHING as "Jane S. Doe".  Do you see where I'm going with this?

Yesterday I sat down with Mom to fill out her Social Security Disability paperwork online.  Mom had plugged all the basic information in, name "Jane S. Doe" address, numbers etc.  I sat down and added the meat to grinder with all the doctor information, drugs, etc etc.  When we finished I had her e-mail the attorney we retained to help us through all this nightmare and there was an error message that said that the names did match what was on file.  You got it, Mom never went back to the Social Security Administration and changed her name to "Jane Smith Doe"   it was still "Jane Mary Doe".  My mother has been running around for 40 years without really knowing her legal name.  This in and of it's self wouldn't be so horrible except there is no way to go back and change the name on the disability application except to go the Social Security office with all the documents we can think of and hope they'll change the name on the application.  Great, my to do list is currently longer than my arm, and now a half day sitting around at the Social Security office is on it too.  I plan on making sure she has all the paperwork, my phone number and sending her alone.  Surely they are used to working with addled people there and can manage to figure something out.

In other news since we discovered the name fiasco I sent her to the DMV to get a WI driver's license and car tags.  Mom's car had to be emission tested which she went and took care of.  The bummer is that it didn't pass and that's one more chore for Hubby to puzzle out.  Mom luckily had no trouble at the DMV, however I filled out all the forms for her and we had to tear apart her files in order to find her car title.  She really needs the "Most unorganized" award.  The DMV was less trouble and she now has her federal legal name of "Jane M. Doe" on her car title and license.

The moral of the story.  Go check your Social Security Card.  I did.  I'm still amazed she's been walking around signing her name wrong without knowing it.  I can't imagine what kind of nightmare this may cause in the future.