Not single, not married: Similarities found for same-sex partners, heterosexual couples
DEMOGRAPHIC PORTRAIT OF GAY COUPLES
By Mike Swift
Mercury News
Article Launched: 03/02/2008 01:38:48 AM PST
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_8427113?source=most_emailed (http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_8427113?source=most_emailed)
Jeanine and Nichole Soterwood have made the same emotional and financial commitments as most married couples. They share a name. They have stood before a justice of the peace and exchanged vows. They both own their house and are the parents of a 4-year-old son, Isaac.
But one thing about the Soterwoods is clearly not the same. They aren't married, because they can't be. Instead, they are among nearly 109,000 same-sex couples who live together in California - double the number of any other state. The most the Soterwoods could do is register with the state as domestic partners - a step roughly 43,000 California couples have taken, and that the Soterwoods moved specifically from Arizona to do.