Have you ever lost your birth certificate and had no way to
recover it? Well, I have. About
10 years ago I wanted to get a passport but I needed my birth certificate as a
source of identity verification. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find it. I looked everywhere, but it was nowhere to be found. I
immediately began to panic.
After I had called my
husband in tears, he calmed me down and
urged me to get online and google what to do. After stumbling my way through
the internet, I figured out that I had to get in contact with the hospital that
I was born in. This would have been easy except for the fact that I was born in
a different country on a military base. Armed with that information I called my
mom and asked her the name of the military
base where I was born.
My mother was very helpful in giving me the name of the base
and even told me the name of the hospital. I was ecstatic! I immediately got
back online to find the hospital. It took me a few tries because the hospital
name was common. I finally
found the hospital and the number and called right away. After being shuffled
around for 15 minutes, I was connected
with the records department. The lady was very helpful and told me that she
could mail it to me for a fee. About a month later, I had my passport in my hands.
Looking back on the incident, I realized that it would have
been easier if the passport could have been transferred electronically. I spent
a good amount of money getting that birth certificate. The cost of the
international phone call and the mail cost were expensive. But what choices did
I have? There should be a system in place for former military families.
Something to get the information that
they need without it being so expensive. It would have been great to be able to
go to a government website submit my information and get my birth certificates
mailed to me.
