How to tell her her full name

I don't think the name is the issue here. She knows she has a Dad.
I think the passport is the ideal situation to bring him up and let her know that she can ask you about him, that you won't be angry or upset. She must have bitten her tongue many times for fear of upsetting you, bless her. She probably doesn't want to know details of what he did, just background stuff, maybe seeing a photo. You should be proud that you managed to get away from him and protect her.

She might not be able to form thoughts about this yet or put it into words but the desire to understand where we've come from (ie the factual sociocultural information is innate. She will have to and will possibly want to learn about her heritage even if it's painful for you. You don't need to discuss anything about what he did or who he was, you can keep it to the facts. He was born in X. His mother worked as a Y etc.

I think you should be less dramatic. It’s a name. It’s her name, that you gave to her for a reason. She’s 16. She knows she has a dad somewhere. Of course she’ll have questions - the fact that you haven’t had any discussions with her is pretty shameful. She doesn’t need to know specifics about all of the abuse etc, but she deserves some sort of explanation about who her dad is, why he isn’t around, and why he’s named on her birth certificate. You owe her more, as her parent.

She's old enough to know everything you know about her father and his family.
Tell her while she is still living under your roof so that she can question and talk until she's happy with the information she has.
Nothing about her father changes the type of person she is.
I would accept her curiosity and even expect for her to want to meet the father at some point.

He sounds horrendous, OP.

I wonder if he's committed other assaults. It would be great if your DD gave the police a DNA sample so that his DNA is on a national database. Any match that comes up from any crimes he commits would lead them straight to him, via your DD. And it would also match to anything he's done that he hasn't currently been caught for, but for which there's DNA in the database.

The only flaw in the plan is, I can't think how you would present that to your DD. "Oh, by the way DD, your bio dad is so awful that I think there's a high chance his DNA is in the police database, or might be some day."

If she ever learns the full truth about him anyway, off her own back, then giving a sample would be a great way to make sure he's brought to justice if he ever does/has done anything to someone else.

I agree with this, but would add "... and if you'd like to make the official stuff match, there's a way you can do that fairly easily." If she's not done any public exams yet, it'd be worth checking with the school exam officer whether they use her birth certificate name for exam entry and certificates. If they do, it'd be worth having this conversation in plenty of time to do a deed poll name change so the certificates are in the name she wants to use, as the exam boards won't change the name later.

Could be worse. At least you gave her yours as well. There are such a lot of mothers out there who wish they hadn't used the abusive ex's surname on their child's birth certificate.

I don't think it's that big of a deal. Presumably the surname you use for her is the same as yours? You tell her that Smith Jones is on her birth certificate but it's been easier to use Smith since it has been just you and her. She can call herself whatever she wants but there will be some official documents where she will have to put the Jones part down too.

I think the most important thing is you don’t make it a big deal - if you make it a big deal then she will follow your lead and think she should consider it a big deal.
I would almost mention it in passing - ie How exciting I think your passport will come back soon and we can book X trip. By the way before I forget I think there is a chance since your legal name is X-X that this might come back as this on the passport. If you decide at 18 you want your name on your passport to be just X, we can always change it then.

I was driving past our ivf clinic in London with our twins when they were 6 and pointed to the clinic and said to the kids - look that’s our ivf clinic where you were made. Mum and dad had trouble falling pregnant the usual way so we went to this clinic and they helped us get pregnant with you. They took mums eggs and dad’s sperm and mixed them together and put you both in my tummy. So who feels like ice cream…

With all due respect, your daughter is nearly 16 and doesn’t know her own name. That’s quite something to hide.

She’s old enough to change her name by deed poll at 16 I believe.

I grew up using DMs surname despite DFs being on my birthday certificate. As a kid it was easy. It started to be something I needed to work around after I left school.

All my qualification certificates were DMs surname. Bank account in DMs surname. NI number arrived in DFs surname, but I was using DMs surname, so I had to explain that to the tax office when I started working. When I applied for a passport and driving licence it was all in DFs surname. Then there were things like tenancy agreements when my payslips and utility bills were under one name and my ID another.

I'd had enough when work booked a trip under DMs surname, being the name I used, yet my passport was in DFs surname, meaning I wouldn't be able to travel. It was actually cheaper to change my name officially than it would have been to amend the booking.

I know it's not the point you're looking for advice on, but thinking ahead to the next ten years for your DD, having everything under one name makes things easier.

This is an odd thing to cover up. I understand why you’re sensitive about her name and parentage, but it doesn’t change the fact that he is her father. Frankly you should have had the conversation beforehand. The hyphenated surname shouldn’t be something she is unaware of at 15. You might not feel you lied, but you never corrected her understanding. She should have been aware and decided for herself what she wanted to go by instead of the decision being made for her.

As others have said, giving your daughter the information won’t summon him in a puff of smoke. But it will just make her feel more included/involved in things instead of things happening that she has no control over. She likely has a huge disconnect to the idea of having a father, and finding out she has his surname for the first time when seeing her passport at 15 might feel weird given they have zero relationship. It’s like having this huge black hole of lack of information.

In the UK, there’s no such thing as an official name. Your name is just what you go by. So if she’s always gone by “Smith”, chances are she’s ignorant to “Smith-Jones” and genuinely is non the wiser that name exists anywhere. It will be weird for her to see the full name for the first time. She might have questions. She might not. There’s no benefit to anyone to put off having the conversation. I don’t think you need to wait for the passport to arrive to start that discussion.

She doesn't need to know all the details of the things he did, surely.
She does have a right to know her own name though.

I don't know if it's been mentioned but it could be a problem for her having her official forms of ID she might rely on in the future with different names.
I think you need to look into this especially for when she's a bit older eg university, driver's license, rental agreement etc

I can see the thread has moved on a lot, but is withdrawing the passport application and redoing it an option? I ask because my passport has the name I actually use and was brought up with, not my birth certificate name which is slightly different. No deed poll needed, either.

I simply applied in my preferred name and put the birth certificate name in the "also known as" fields. This is what I do when applying for any official documents, from driving licence to marriage certificate.

Once your DD is 16 you don't need his permission to change her name. My DDs father has not been a big part of her life, he's not a nice person and she's worked that out for herself over the years. I remarried and when she was 16 she legally changed her name by deed poll to my husbands surname, she didn't need permission from myself or her father to do so

What an horrendous thing to have to endure.

My friend had to listen to her father raping her mother repeatedly, throughout her childhood and her parents are still together.

{He has probably got older and less sexually abusive now}

It has without doubt affected her as an adult, { her sibling was adversely affected , too}

At least you had the courage to leave, with your Dad's help. ⭐

Just as well you did, or you could still be undergoing abuse, now.

My friend was in a similar situation and found out when getting a passport as a teenager that her birth certificate surname was different to the nme she had always used. Her mum explained that the name she was known by was her ‘real’ name but the birth certificate was wrong as it was out of date. She had to wait to 18 to change it by deed poll. That’s what she did.

Ohh yes- It's very hard to lose a mother so young. {Attachment disorder anyone?! 😬}
A psychiatrist said it's the worst age to lose a Mother, as the child cannot understand or process the loss, or grieve properly as they could if they were older. Sorry that you too had to endure this loss.

The utter nonsense spouted about ''Children are resilient, they will forget their mothers''...no , they don't. They remember the upset on a profound level.

So many adopted children -adopted early- have terrible Attachment disorders.

It undoubtedly really affects a child.

As for losing a father young, or not having them present in a child's life, it does have an effect, but probably lesser than losing a mother.