Child custody battles are always difficult, and can be ugly. But a recent Dallas child custody dispute shows the lengths that gay parents must go to fight for the right to parent their non-biological children if they split up from the child’s biological parent. In the case fought out in Dallas family law courtrooms, a Texas mother petitioned for custody of a child she had raised since birth with her lesbian partner (the child’s biological mother).

While recognition of the status of same-sex relationships is advancing state-by-state, same-sex partners (and former partners) still face precarious legal status on many issues including recognition of marriage, civil unions, and partnerships, rights to parent children from a same-sex partnership, inheritance rights, and rights to make end-of-life decisions, among many other civil rights.