You’re not who I thought you were. See, I thought there was one thing all good and decent people agreed on. ‘Children should never be abused or intentionally traumatized. EVER.’ If you had asked me last week if the people I know and love all agreed on that one thing, I would have said ‘absolutely.’

Facebook friends are different. I’m used to seeing some posts by them that leave me speechless. But you? I was sure that even though our opinions on certain issues differ, I honestly believed when I stood on the side of ‘there is never a justification for child abuse’ you would have been standing next to me.

But here I am, looking over at you on the ‘yes but’ side and I can barely comprehend it.

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We are born with our name and die with our name, and whatever is done between those events we do in our name. Unless…

Unless you’re female. In most societies when a woman marries, she forsakes the surname she was born with and adopts the last name of her husband. She might do a hyphenated combo of both names, or keep her surname professionally, but legally that household falls under the name of the husband, including the children born of that union. We carry our children in our bodies, birth them with our bodies, feed them with our bodies and yet…their surname comes from the father. It is still commonplace to hear people say they hope for a male child to carry on the family name.

Most women will tell you it’s fine and it doesn’t bother them. It’s tradition. Many even look forward to changing their names with glee. But does giving up our name have an effect on how we see ourselves?

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