Comments on: A Boy Named Sue?

By: Cooper Zale

Cooper Zale — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 15:57:56 +0000

Kim… I never thought of that one, but you are right. As it turned out their names or initials were never an issue, and the only thing our daughter Emma got teased about (in middle school) was being an engaged and conscientious student.

By: Kimc

Kimc — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 07:38:39 +0000

“Emma Zale” would give the poor kid the initials EZ. ER is better, from a teasing standpoint….

By: Sam

Sam — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 00:29:39 +0000

While I carry my father’s last name, and my mother does so as well, she had initially kept her last name (no hyphenation) when she married my father. She found, however, that in the workplace people refused to refer to her as ‘Katherine Clark’ while most of her relatives refused to call her by her original last name (some even stopped talking to her). She eventually decided that her decision not to be ‘male dominated’ did not have to depend on her last name, and took my father’s last name for the sake of continuity. I have to say, their partnership has never been patriarchal, with my mother earning more than my father and in many ways calling the shots in our household.

By: Cooper Zale

Cooper Zale — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 16:52:29 +0000

Emily… at least hyphenating last names was trendy for a while. Not sure what younger couples that are having kids today are doing. What I like about the combined last names is that though some combinations can be awkward to say (I remember meeting a woman whose last name was Kleinpeter-Terrellhoff) they acknowledge a partnership of two people, even two families, behind the birth of a new person.

I think some people take the liberty with a hypenated last name of dropping the first half (which is usually the mom’s part). I have been guilty myself of doing that once or twice and been called on it too.

I am glad your son takes pride in his name and its originality. My kids have enjoyed their Rosloff last name and its connection to big active clan or aunts, uncles, cousins and the rest of the extended family.

By: Emily

Emily — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 01:07:44 +0000

So I’m in the trendy 1%, huh? LOL… I just wanted to leave a comment about your mother not acknowledging Eric’s last name. All of my aunts when they address things to me, it’s always Emily Decker or “Mr. and Mrs. Decker”, even though I never took Dana’s name and made quite a point of it with every family member. Even my parents will address things to “The Deckers” when they know darn well, I still have my family name. Sometimes you just can’t teach an old dog new tricks…

But don’t get me started on the hyphenated issues. My goodness, you’d think we invented hyphenated names! The reason we hyphenated the kids’ names is that I didn’t take my husband’s name and, frankly, I was the one pregnant for 40 weeks and pushed out two 9 pound plus babies, thus, both kids would have my name as well. The problems we’ve encountered with teachers calling our son by one of his last names, like “Decker” is crazy – it’s not that difficult, people! It actually frightens me since these are the people in charge of educating my son – yikes! My son takes this all in stride and takes pride that he is the first Haraldson-Decker in existence; he thinks that’s very cool.