Issues with mother

Okay, so I have my own business. My business is filed under a fictitious name that is basically my first and middle name and then the word consulting. I go by my middle name as my last name. I have been in the process for about a year of making this legal.

I had my mother proof a proposal for a contract for me recently, and in the proposal, after introducing myself as First Middle (Last), and then referring to myself throughout the contract as Ms. Middle. My mother does not like that I go by my middle name versus my father's name. Note, she is not married to my father and is re-married so it's not even her name.

I have an EIN and registered with my state to do business under this name. Any contracts I sign are on behalf of my business. I prefer that my clients refer to me by my DBA because hopefully, within the next six months, I will legally be able to change my name. I sign legal documents with my legal name.

I do not think this is any more confusing than a woman who gets married and changes her name legally but continues to use her family name as a professional name. I discussed this with an HR representative once and they said it's not a big deal.

I think she's mostly upset because she sees I'm not using my family name. And this just makes me uncomfortable. I know it's confusing for people when someone is going through a name change.

My clients seem to understand easily. One of my clients simply asked me, what do you go by? And I explained legally my name is X, but I go by Y professionally, so please refer to me as Y. No problem from her.

This is really not an issue, so it bothers me that she brings it up. Lots of people have professional names that they do business under.

It's just irritating. I went through a lot of abuse at my father's hand. I have dealt with a lot from my FOO. Is it so wrong that I want the right of self determination, including my own name?

She is lucky I didn't change my entire name, and only dropped my last name. LOL.

Seesaw

I see nothing wrong with you doing things the way you see fit. I totally think that your mother is over reacting.

Hopefully your mom will get over it, and not give you a hard time about it.

Since you are an adult, you are free to do whatever you want with your name. What if you got married and changed your name? Would she object to that too? You are like in your 30s? Grown woman on your own? Why would she care? But then again I have strange parents too. They sometimes care about strangest things. Nothing surprises me. As my therapist says “don’t let them get to you and prevent you from enjoying your life.”

37 almost 38 Divine.

You have the right to change your name. Your mother has the right to not like that, but that's not your problem. As you say, it's not even your mother's name, so I don't see where this is some legitimate source of distress for her.

Do what feels right to you. At some point, like after the change is fianalized legally, you might do well to say, "Mom, the subject is closed. I'm sorry you feel unhappy about this, but I'm not going to discuss it further." Then do not be drawn into defending your decision. She'll get over it. If not, then she needs to get a life . . . one that doesn't revolve around causing turmoil over what has utterly zero impact on anything of importance in her world.

That last point begs the question of what this is really about. Does she have a hard time seeing you make decisions independently without getting approval from her? If so, then this is exactly the kind of experience she needs to have more of. And so do you. If your father was abusive, this name change may be very good for your soul. Now that's important.

I don't know if it's a control issue. I discuss things with her about my life, as a sounding board, but never as like a giving/taking advice thing. She in no way makes decisions for me or has any bearing on the decisions I make. I think she just doesn't get it....like the only time she has ever seen someone change their name is when they get married so to her it's a huge breach. She also has a lot of denial about the abuse and violence that happened in our home when I was a child. So, maybe seeing me move on and choose to change my name forces her out of her denial somewhat?

I think also to her I just live an unconventional life and she doesn't understand a lot of it. She doesn't seem very supportive of my business either.

Seesaw

Exactly. Not like you want to change your at 16 AND it’s not even her name!

Well my mother was displeased when my daughter did NOT change her name when she got married. She thought it wasn’t the right thing to do. Really? She complained to me luckily, not to my daughter. Names are just that: names. No ones business.

I think you're on to something with your mother's attachment to convention and non-acknowledgement of the abuse. She lacked the independence to leave a bad situation. Your independence is very much in contrast to her lack of it.

Excellent point. So very true about my mother too

Wow, it sounds like a lot of mothers get weird about names!

I live in a country where women don't change their last name when marrying. It's not done. No matter where I got married, I wouldn't have changed it, but here, on top of that, it would have been very difficult (court process) and people would think my husband and I were brother and sister.

When I announced I was getting married, my mother would not let up about the subject. According to her, everyone was asking her if I was going to change my name or not, and she said she kept forgetting what to tell them. I doubt that more than one or two people actually asked! This was years ago, so her recent memory issues aren't related to this. She just became really weird about the issue.

When I finally got it into her head that it wasn't the custom here and I wasn't going to do it, she tried to convince me I should do it anyways, and that my name would sound good with his last name (it doesn't, too many repeated letters).

Interestingly, she has said on many occasions that if she had gotten married at a later date when it was more acceptable for women to keep their name she would have kept hers. Sounds also a bit like jealousy of independence. She didn't want to change her name but caved into pressure, so I should also have to change mine!?!

I’ll tell you the opposite could be true. My ex boyfriend of many years got upset when his daughter took her husband’s name when she got married. Some parents complain no matter what

Truer words were never spoken (or written).

My grandmother complained about everything and everyone all the time. My mother is the exact same way. It's as though they each have the complainer gene in their DNA.