If you kept your surname, what about your children?

[MonsteraCheeseplant]

Just that really. Assuming that you are not Spanish, and that you are married to your spouse, but you have different surnames. Double barrelling is the obvious solution but if you each have three syllable surnames it's not really acceptable is it?

We are married and I kept my name, but baby has her dad's name.

This doesn't bother me overly - but there was a family middle name that was very important to me, so that was the thing I really wanted included.

We both have equally silly sounding last names, frankly. Double barrelling didn't sit right with me for that reason.

DS has both our names. Mine first then DPs but not double barrelled just next to each other like a pp above.

His surname - it's less quirky and odd.

I did ask them recently if they'd like mine (they're teens) and they're thinking about it.

Funny how it's always the men who have "nicer" surnames on these threads

DS has both surnames, no hyphen. Spanish style in fact (we're not Spanish).

If the parents have different surnames, the child should always have its mother's surname. The father's surname could be an additional surname or a middle name. But it should never be the only surname.

If the surnames are too long to use them both, and the father really doesn't want his surname to be relegated to middle name (many mothers agree to that, of course) then you could consider blending the two surnames in some way, if it works.

Funny how it's always the men who have "nicer" surnames on these threads

Or easier to spell/more interesting/more important to him than her name is to her.....

Presumably many of these men with the 'nice' surnames will have sisters who are married. Do their husbands give up their surnames to take on their wife's 'nicer' one?

iStruggleWithThePast

Presumably many of these men with the 'nice' surnames will have sisters who are married. Do their husbands give up their surnames to take on their wife's 'nicer' one?

None of my sisters have given up our surname upon marriage.

But none of us have inflicted it on our children.

I did point out to my children that if they changed to my surname, they would have completely unique names in the entire world, as there are so few of us.

That has its pros and cons. I quite like it.

My children are too young to get married or change their names. They are named after both parents though (not double barrelled).

They have DH's surname but I got more say on other names which suited me.

The number of women who proudly tell me that, oh no, they didn't change their name on marriage but become a little sheepish when I ask whose surname their kids have...

I kinda went with the general consensus that it should be the father's name. The pregnancy had caused quite a stir as it was 😳I do definitely wish I had fought harder , most unlike me !

My DD has my surname. It means nothing to me as a name - my parents chose it as their family name a few years before I was born - but she certainly wasn't having anyone else's name but mine.

Double barrel but we do have single syllable surnames.

Not married. Daughter has dad's surname as the only forename we could agree on went better with his than with mine (which is a bit of a mouthful, but certainly not worse than his). I wonder whose surname she would prefer?!

We double-barrelled. DH wanted no hyphen but I pointed out that then the first of the two surnames (which would have been his, so this was quite noble of me!) would inevitably just disappear into being a middle name.

My name is much, much nicer than DH's so I secretly suspect that DS will drop the first half of his double-barrel by his teens anyway.

Funny how it's always the men who have "nicer" surnames on these threads

I think there is a difference between changing your name on marriage because his is nicer and choosing the nicer of the two names for your children. The children are not changing anything, they start with neither name, it’s only sensible to choose the nicer one. Had mine been nicer I would have insisted we use that one. Not sure what would have happened had they been equally nice or not nice.

I’m not a fan of double barrelling because either one surname gets dropped pretty swiftly (negating the point) or the double barrelled child ends up with a worse dilemma if they have their own child.

"I'm not going to have a completely different surname to my kids, that ain't happening."

Their dad might feel the same way.

Double barrelled with a hyphen. We split and I’m remarried to a man who also has a child with a double barrelled hyphenated name. Works for us as should any subsequent kids come along we all have different names with common elements so will be the wider Jones-Smith-Brown-Rogers clan

I think there is a difference between changing your name on marriage because his is nicer and choosing the nicer of the two names for your children.

But roughly equal numbers of men and women will have the same 'nice' names. Yet on threads like this you'll always hear women say that their husband's name is 'nicer'. Almost never the reverse.

Double barrelled, names go really well together. DS can drop one in future if he wants to.

@pollyputthepastaon exactly the same here...my usually fairly easy going laid back husband was absolutely adamant our children would have his surname and no double barrelling going on. He didn't care at all about me keeping my name but the children had to have his. We had huge arguments about it for years before we had the children! Now they are 10 and 8 and I really don't care too much anymore. They have my surname as their middle name.

"the double barrelled child ends up with a worse dilemma if they have their own child"

No, actually.
I always had two surnames and had no problem deciding which one to pass on to my child (for reasons I won't go into).
If I hadn't had a clear preference, you could choose based on the surname that's shorter, the surname that goes best with the other parent's surname, the surname that's easier to spell... or if you really can't decide, mother passes on her mother's surname and father passes on his father's surname. Done.

The patriarchy does run strong in this country. I kept my name and the children have dh’s. It seemed to be the done thing and too much to argue. Double barrelling didn’t work.

Hundreds of millions of people in Spain and South America seem to get by perfectly well with a double barrelled system.