Childrens' surname - What did you do?

[Laurel543]

I have a 2 week old with my partner of 20 years and we are struggling to agree what surname to give the child.

We had planned to get married this year but I unexpectedly (and happily) became pregnant instead. When talking about the marriage, we said we wanted to share the same name and had very loosely agreed that we would both change our names (probably to a name we both liked from one of our family trees). I thought that this neatly sidestepped the problem of choosing one of our surnames and was very happy with the plan. We had talked a little about choosing a name before the baby is born and I have been researching potential names.

Since the birth of our child, my lovely partner, who has never shown any patriarchal tendencies, has decided that he’s not in fact prepared to change his name and is also insisting that the child has his surname. Ideally stand alone but he will consider double barrelling if absolutely necessary.

I am obviously surprised and disappointed!
He has a few reasons for his stand, the main one being that “this is what everyone does” (to be fair, all of our friends and family have given their DC the fathers name, married or not).
I feel pretty deflated about the whole thing. FtI am perfectly happy to change my own surname and feel strongly that I also want to share my child’s surname but I am equally unwilling to change my name to his.
Our names are both pretty clunky and do not double barrel well. There is also no easy way of amalgamating them.

We have reached stalemate

Gave them his. Regretted it massively and once the first was named after him felt like I had to name them all that way.

Double barell it or use one surname as a middle name for all of them.

Pretending that your 'not caring' is completely free choice ignores all the patriarchal conditioning.
I'm very aware of this. I'm not pretending my lack of drive to insist on DD taking my name was a neutral choice.

For context both my one relative who wanted to choose a common last name on marriage, and I, both didn't want to keep Shufflebottom. He was planning to take his wife's last name (also of the Jones variety) and backed down after his DF objected. So the pressure of tradition/patriarchy worked against a very strong preference.

(My DB lives somewhere where women don't change their name on marriage and children take both names. So he went with tradition where he lives though this does mean his DCs have Shufflebottom. They may decide to pass the name on - society is a bit more accepting of unusual names these days ).

I grew them and birthed them from my body so they're mine in a very primitive way their father could never experience, so I'm not bothered what label they bear.
I agree with this. To me, giving a child their father's surname means they get something of their father's, who plays a negligible part in the child's life before they are born. I don't think I am particularly conditioned in this respect because I have never considered getting married, let alone changing my surname. I would have been happy to give our children my surname, but I don't feel disadvantaged in our relationship, so I don't feel the need to insist on something relatively minor (in the context of our relationship).

drspouse I think recognising this is important. Not that we should beat ourselves or each other up if we submit to patriarchy, it's a massive force, and exhausting if we fight it all the time, we do have to pick our battles, and not fight each other. It's ok to recognise we do something influenced by patriarchy (eg. I shave my armpits), but that we may want to do that, and that's ok. But that doesn't mean my armpit shaving is a free choice I'd make if women were free. The truth is that choices are rarely completely free.

I am glad we didn't do patriarchy on the surnames thing, but it does mark our family out as non-conforming and can cause comment. Humans are pack animals, we like to conform, and that's understandable. Mixing my metaphors, it takes a few tall poppies to change the attitude of the whole pack, but while attitudes can be entrenched, change can happen quickly if enough people rebel. I have been amazed how many of my feminist friends have given the children the paternal name, though, and most taken it on marriage themselves. I feel we've entered a 'two steps back' period.

persister why is it that so many men seem to care deeply about passing on their own name and so many women, like you, aren’t fussed? Pure coincidence?

Naming babies after their dads is so obviously only a thing because of patriarchy. Mothers grow and birth the child, mothers end up doing the majority of care in most cases, and in the (quite likely) event of a split, children will usually end up living with the mother.

Giving a baby its dads name is like painting a picture and putting someone else’s signature on it.

DP and I both have double-barrelled names and are weighing up TTC, so this thread has been really helpful in terms of thinking about naming options. Lots of interesting solutions out there.

@Sloth couldn't have put it better!

Mothers grow and birth the child, mothers end up doing the majority of care in most cases, and in the (quite likely) event of a split, children will usually end up living with the mother.
This is exactly our situation and my life is much much easier with the DC having my name. It all makes perfect sense.

Of course this means everyone assumes I married into the name, but that is another Story of the Patriarchy.

I think choices like this are particularly personal. For me giving my eldest two their father’s last name was a way of forcing a level of recognition that he IS connected to them and that he IS their father no matter how crap he is at that job.

Obviously people make different decisions based on the context of their own circumstances. Some don’t give it much thought, some do.

Re the OP, I couldn’t comment re what should be done about the naming but I will say I don’t think marrying a man who pulls this shit days after the birth of a baby is a very good idea.

I’m unmarried, kids all have DP’s surname as frankly it’s less shit than mine! I think that’s the best basis to make a decision on.

IMHO opinion an adult giving ‘everybody else does’ as an argument is being beyond immature and should be told to do one.

You’re not married, he doesn’t even get to go the birth certificate unless you take him with you to register!

The ‘done’ thing among my friendship group is mainly married = fathers name (unless it’s really dodgy) unmarried = mothers name, some people double barrel if flows well.

Feminist perspective? I’ve no idea? I only lurk/post here because it’s the ‘common sense’ board. I have heard the idea floated that children should always take the mother’s name as let’s face it they’re still likely to do the majority of childcare, especially if the relationship breaks down.

Or it's picking the battles that matter, rather than taking a stand over something that you genuinely don't regard as important,

Do you understand the impact of not regarding this as important on women generally?

I think it’s unwise to uncritically accept the idea that children should all take their mother’s names is a feminist statement TBH.

I see it differently. The fact that I am the mother who birthed them and is doing all the work simply made me even more resolute that they were having his name. I was not going to facilitate a lifetime of ‘she’s mental, they aren’t my kids’ by giving them my name.

Incidentally he tried that anyway with just DD (not DS - weird isn’t it that he wanted his son but not his daughter?!) but to lots of faces in court because due to us being unmarried everyone was aware that he had signed the birth certificate and she had his last name.

In many ways giving the mother’s name can act as just another way fathers are able to disconnect from DC by providing a ‘not mine’ excuse.

I gave the kids my name, partly because it is unusual and my husband's is very common, and partly, if I'm honest, to smash the patriarchy in some small way. DH was supposed to take mine when we married but got cold feet, with the result that many people are now unsure whether he's the kids' dad. If he had tried to insist that the kids had his name I would have been highly extremely furious. However had portmanteuing (sp?) been a thing back in the day I might have considered that as we could have made a unique but believable combo.

We were married but had different names. OH weirdly wanted our daughter to have his name and at the time I agreed so all good. As it turned out she is the last person to have that surname and the only one of her generation. She plans to keep it too.

But I really wish I'd stuck my last name in as a middle name. I can't believe I didn't actually! I think I just didn't care at the time and he really did so just went with that (I won on her being veggie on similar basis)

So that's what I'd do now.

Before we got married, we both seemed prepared to take each other's names. I was satisfied enough with that gesture, which seemed genuine, to decide I would take my husband's name.

Our names don't double barrel well.
Our children and I now have my husband's surname.

I actually regret this now.

I wish we had double barrelled, or I had kept my own and given it to the children.

Incidentally I think the question of whether or not you are married is completely irrelevant to this. Is the logic 'oh, he gave me the gift of marriage, now I'll give him the gift of naming our kids?' as though marriage is something the woman is indebted to the man for?

I don't feel disadvantaged in our relationship, so I don't feel the need to insist on something relatively minor (in the context of our relationship).

Do you really think all the men who insist, often quite passionately, that the children must bear his name feel 'disadvantaged'? So why assume that's why it matters to women. I didn't want our child to bear both our names because I'm disadvantaged, I wanted it because we have a relationship of equals, and that means not accepting that it's fine for the man to be put before the woman as long as it's a 'minor' thing.

I'm married but we both kept our own names. My DH absolutely refused to try for a baby until I'd agreed the hypothetical children would have his name.

I argued for weeks. I wanted to double barrel it wasn't even that I wanted ONLY my name. He dug his heels in and absolutely refused to budge. In the end I caved, and we tried and conceived the baby. I have been bitter about it ever since.

We have a great and equal relationship. He does as much childcare as me, nappies, night feeds etc but that child is now 6 and we have a younger one as well. I'm really unhappy that the patriarchy is alive and well in our house with them having my husbands surname and not both of ours.

It grinds my gears regularly. Stick to your guns. As the woman you have the legal right to pick the surname so tell him if he won't double barrel you'll just use yours.

My kids have my partner's name because it is plain and easy to spell (mine isn't). Much easier to live with for our kids - which was my only consideration. Imagine your kid as a teenager and ask yourself which name s/he would prefer i.e. the one with the least embarrassment/hassle potential.

I don't think it is a big deal to not have the same name as your children. It doesn't make them any the less yours, though it can result in some minor additional hassle when crossing borders.

On the other hand, I would be royally pissed off with a partner who put his feelings about names ahead of the best interests of his child. Good luck with that ...

Giving a baby its dads name is like painting a picture and putting someone else’s signature on it.

^^This with bells on.

I don't think it is a big deal to not have the same name as your children. It doesn't make them any the less yours, though it can result in some minor additional hassle when crossing borders

The same could be said to fathers.

I see your point, but actually I don't care about my surname because it's my father's, and his father's and so on - it says nothing about me at all and I feel no connection to it, so why would it matter to me if my children had my patrilineal surname or my OH's? I cared much, much more about not calling myself Mrs after marriage, I never have and I never will.

But maybe you feel no connection to it, not because you're a free feminist who has shrugged off such shackles, but because society told you not to get attached as it wasn't 'yours' to begin with, as you'd one day be expected to change to another man's name?

I don't think going 'lalalala! I'm immune to patriarchy!' is as effective as saying 'hmmm, yeah, I've been conditioned, that's interesting. In that knowledge, and being aware that no choice is in a vacuum, I'm choosing xyz.' Nothing wrong with choosing to give your children their father's name, but it's not a choice made in a vacuum, and neither is your choice to 'don't care', do you see?

@Mytrainwaslate
I agree with literally everything you’ve posted. Too many good points to quote them all

I have an "awkward", "difficult to spell", "nobody knows how to pronounce it" name, versus DP who has a Smith or Jones type name.

So of course we used my name.

Nobody has ever questioned whether DP is DS's dad. He's never had problems with him at passport control etc (has travelled alone with him). He does not care about him less because he does not bear his surname and would be repelled and horrified at the idea.

My surname is mine. It's also my father's - but I like that. I would also have liked my mother's maiden name (my grandmother's name), but I didn't grow up spelling that out to everybody I met. I own my surname. It is not borrowed.

We had five Rachels in my class at high school, and so they all were known by their surnames, except one. Rachel Barnes objected, because she didn't feel Barnes was part of her identity, her name was Rachel, and anyway, when she married, she was going to take his name, anyway, so why be called by a temporary name? Name changed, obvs.

I remember thinking it was a shame she was so set up to marry, and change her name, she denied herself a full name, like the boys had. I doubt a boy would ever articulate a similar sentiment, it's just girls who are taught not to get attached to their own names.

Double barrel or give him yours.

And I would be worried that his priorities are 'tradition' and 'what other people might think' rather than what he agreed with you. You are either in this together or you're not. He doesn't suddenly seem to see himself as part of your team.

I wouldn't marry someone who thought he got the final vote and is so quick to discount your agreement and your opinion, and cared more about what other people thought than what you thought.