Double barrel last name

[Anonymous]

99.99% of married couples who go with one name go with the guy's. That's what's left out of this discussion. That's a big reason people want the double barrel, because that default tradition isn't OK with many women... including me.

[Anonymous]

I have mixed feelings about my double-barreled last name: both names are pretty unique, and my first name is not super common either, which makes spelling and pronunciation a challenge for people when they see it written for the first time. It's especially difficult when I'm on the phone with a company like my bank or health insurance, and have to spell it out letter by letter every time.

Another somewhat negative aspect is that since no one else in the world has my name, I am very easy to Google--all the search results relate to me, and if you search for me on LinkedIn or Facebook, you're pretty much guaranteed to find me. I don't love the idea that anyone who meets me can just look me up and find a bunch of stuff...I guess this could also be a problem with unique single last names as well, but the chances of this phenomenon increase sharply when you put two last names together, so just putting that out there.

On the other hand, I love the cultural significance of carrying on multiple of my ancestor's names, and there is a story to my full name that is unique to my family's experience, which I enjoy sharing with people.

I think you have to look at the specific names you would be putting together and decide based on that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids have a hyphenated last name. It is a total of 9 letters so not too long. It has never once been an issue on planes, school, doctors office and whatever other parade of horribles people like to trot out. Many of their friends also have hyphenated last names and it’s not a big deal at all.

I was reminded that this was the right thing to do when I driving DS and his teen friend around and the friend was saying, yeah my mom’s last name is X, she doesn’t have the same name as the rest of us.

The “right” thing to do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:99.99% of married couples who go with one name go with the guy's. That's what's left out of this discussion. That's a big reason people want the double barrel, because that default tradition isn't OK with many women... including me.

I think that’s pretty well understood by basically everyone, which is why it wasn’t stated. Didn’t need to be.

I definitely respect why someone wouldn’t want to take the last name of their husband/partner but I have to admit the idea never really bugged me (despite being quite committed to gender equity and equality work generally).

Why? Not sure. While understanding the broader implications, when I got married 10 years ago I personally just didn’t feel much angst over keeping the last name I was born with (which, as with most folks, was my father’s) compared to taking on the last name of someone I was choosing to build a life with. We have friends who have made up a new last name to take together. That’s neat. And had the bonus of pissing off both sides of the family, ha!

More relevant to this discussion…I am interested to see how naming logistics continue to evolve as keeping’s one’s name/hyphenation become more and more the norm—imagine a new standard for kids will slowly arise.

[Anonymous]

I kept my given last name when I married, and we used it as a middle name for our kids. We didn't hyphenate because I thought hyphenated names were kind of unwieldy.

25 years later, I feel differently. Our hyphenated last name would have been just 3 syllables. I don't mind having a different last name from my kids, but it does bug me a little that I just blindly went with my DH's last name--we never even discussed using my last name. Hmph. Also, my kids went to a high school with a large Latino population, so double names were common and no one any trouble dealing with them. And finally, one of my kids actually uses his middle name (my surname) a lot--he writes his full name on schoolwork, uses all 3 names in his signature, etc. We should have hyphenated!

[Anonymous]

This is such a one generation thing though

Your kids can't possibly plan to hypenate their kids names, so you're saddling them with a difficult name they will have to jettison once they have kids.

Or you'll have a grandkid named John Smith-Jones-Martinez-Garcia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is such a one generation thing though

Your kids can't possibly plan to hypenate their kids names, so you're saddling them with a difficult name they will have to jettison once they have kids.

Or you'll have a grandkid named John Smith-Jones-Martinez-Garcia.

By this logic, why do people give girls last names at all? Most just end up jettisoning them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We hyphenated our kid’s last name and I think it makes it easier, since her name includes both mine and my husband’s (neither of us changed names upon marriage). It’s a total of 5 syllables combined, so not too cumbersome. So there’s no confusion in travel, doctor’s appointments, camps, etc. about whether I’m related to her, which would have happened if we had given her my husband’s name since there would be no overlap then.

This is why we gave our son a hyphenated last name. Also, since we aren't married, I had considered giving DS my last name only, but that didn't seem fair to his dad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m seriously considering giving my baby both my and my DH’s last name. The whole thing would be easier if we had simple and short last names but both are uniques and mine is very long!

Aside from the practical issues (like fitting both names on forms), I can’t imagine this would be an issue. Experiences???

My wife really wanted her last name to be part of our son's name. Instead of having to worry about it causing issues on forms, sports jerseys, etc. later in life we just decided that my wife's last name would become a second middle name. Like most folks, the middle name is rarely used so we still get to have both family names without any issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m seriously considering giving my baby both my and my DH’s last name. The whole thing would be easier if we had simple and short last names but both are uniques and mine is very long!

Aside from the practical issues (like fitting both names on forms), I can’t imagine this would be an issue. Experiences???

My wife really wanted her last name to be part of our son's name. Instead of having to worry about it causing issues on forms, sports jerseys, etc. later in life we just decided that my wife's last name would become a second middle name. Like most folks, the middle name is rarely used so we still get to have both family names without any issues.

I’m sure you would feel the same way if your last name became the “rarely used” middle name too, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is such a one generation thing though

Your kids can't possibly plan to hypenate their kids names, so you're saddling them with a difficult name they will have to jettison once they have kids.

Or you'll have a grandkid named John Smith-Jones-Martinez-Garcia.

Yet women are expected to jettison their given names upon getting married, so this seems like a fake concern.

[Anonymous]

We used my last name as my kids' middle names.

Simple, perfect, not confusing. Less than 100 or so people have my last name in the U.S., so it's also a perfect connection for me and my kids.

[Anonymous]

Don’t do it. So annoying to book anything, spelling, etc.

My maiden name is my middle name and same for my kids. DH has a super short easy spelling name and it is so easy. I grew up with a unique last name that people spelled incorrectly ALL the time. If you have a long unique name and so does your Dh, that is horrible for your kids. Their name will get botched all the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:99.99% of married couples who go with one name go with the guy's. That's what's left out of this discussion. That's a big reason people want the double barrel, because that default tradition isn't OK with many women... including me.

+1 - this seems to be missing from a lot of the discussion and suggestions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:99.99% of married couples who go with one name go with the guy's. That's what's left out of this discussion. That's a big reason people want the double barrel, because that default tradition isn't OK with many women... including me.

It's not left out. You can give your kids your last name. You do not need to double barrel.

I changed my name, mainly because I wanted it to be simple when we had kids and I wanted to have the same last name as my children. If you want to keep your last name, I think that's completely fine! But unless your last name is also up for discussion as The Family Name, it doesn't seem like the feminist move many women think it is. Because they have kids and still give their kids their DH's last name, so then the woman is the odd person out. That sucks to me.