Legal Question in Family Law in Massachusetts

I assume the document surrenders all of his parental rights, if not it should. Once he surrenders all of his parental rights and you adopt the child, he has no basis to object to the name change. You need to double check this with an adoption attorney.

If you are not represented by an attorney in this process, you should be. This is too important not to use an attorney.

If you adopt the child you will be responsible for the child support should you and your wife get divorced.

If this is simply about wanting to change a name, her son can legally change his name when he turns 18 and will not need his father's consent.

This is both a financial and a emotional issue. If your wife is not sure about losing the child support don't do it until she is OK with it.

If you want to change the child's name you have to notify the bio-father as long as the child is a minor. If the Child is 15,16 or 17, the court may ask his views on the subject.

Thanks for your question.

Our office represents clients in your position throughout Massachusetts in step-parent and co-parent adoptions. First thing to keep in mind is that changing a child's last name does not actually change your status to that of the child's legal father.

The surrender form does not actually release the father of any rights, unless and until a Court terminates his parental rights as part of an adoption or other termination action. in other words, the biological father continues to owe child support up to the date of any termination by a court. The biological father's permission will be needed to change the child's name.

Given what you are hoping to accomplish here, and given the fact that the biological father is willing to cooperate int his moment to help you become a legal parent, you may want to seriously consider moving forward.

Good luck.