How to tell her her full name

[Themiddlemum]

I was in a relationship with my daughters "father" when I was very young and he was 20 years older, he was very abusive. Including sexually assaulting me during pregnancy and directly after. I left him when my daughter was 7 weeks old. The surname on her bc is 2 separate names. So think- Smith Jones.

He had approx 7 contacts with her in a contact centre and then chucked the towel in, 13 years ago. We haven't heard from him since.

I've always just used the first part of her surname- "smith" e.g school, drs etc. With no problems.This year we applied for a bank account for her and I had to send in her birth certificate, the bank account was confirmed and they sent the debit card, I was bracing myself for having to tell her her full surname, when the card arrived they had just used "smith" (nothing to do with me, thats just how it arrived) then her N.I letter arrived, again with just the Smith part of her surname.

We are planning on going to Disney in the new year so ive applied for her passport, its arriving this week. Obviously I'm not going to get lucky with the surname again and need to tell her. Its filled me with anxiety and worry for years, I've no idea how to say it to her. Please help, any suggestions? Thanks

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.

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

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 did think of this tonight, but it felt kind of sneaky, if i did it without her knowing. And if I suggested it to her a bit pushy.

I can't lie, I wish I hadn't ever put that name on her bc.

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.

Yep that's why I'm telling her..

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.

I've already explained her going by that name wasn't appropriate for a child, so she wouldn't have been in on the decision making process as there wasn't one.

Yes I agree. Sounds like a right faff.

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

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

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…

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.

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 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.

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.

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.

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 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 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.

You really need to step away from this thread if this is as gentle and respectful as you can be when replying to the victim of multiple extremely serious crimes trying to navigate this situation.

I am quite shocked by how some people are happy to speak to an abuse survivor.

Hmm..are there really people who would want to meet someone who raped their mother to try to stop them being born? I understand they might still want to, & that should be supported, but it does seem less than likely.
I mean I don't want to meet someone who hated me so much he put me in physical danger. Not to mention his behaviour to my mother..

Just tell her again, he wasn't a nice guy but your name is partly his because that's how she was registered. And on official documents it has to be written that way. But that's not how you've chosen to spell it her whole life due to what happened. However, she's free to choose if she wants to use it anytime but I doubt she will. If it was me, I'd legally change my name as soon as I could.

Not everyone wants to know what evil & abusive fathers looked like, or background details.That is not an innate desire. I regret every piece of information I was forced to learn by the court about my so-called 'father.' Op has said she gave details & her DD didn't seem interested. She can offer more, her DD should know if she wants. But knowing more if she doesn't want to could be harmful, esp any detail of the abuse.
Exactly, MissTrip, I can't believe how insensitive people are being to OP, who was in this horrendous situation as a teenager. It's not 'shameful' she found this hard to tell.
Yes, it should have been had earlier. But have some respect & empathy. No survivor can do everything right.

Op, yes these evil people can be incredibly manipulative. It is horrible some people have no instinct to protect their children, the opposite..
You were v strong to get out to protect your DD at such a young age. My mother was 35 & had great difficulty despite not living w him full time. I can't imagine what that was like at only 18.

There's this quote from Colette from The Vagabond (based on her abusive marriage) that sums up what I think of women who survive what you had to : ' You can be certain that long patience, and griefs hidden, have tempered and sharpened and toughened this woman until everyone cries, ' She's made of steel!' No, she's merely made of woman, and that's sufficient.'