This post is the third in a series. (Please read posts here and here first, if you haven’t yet!)
It was a cold winter day and we were sitting on Jason’s living room sofa, drinking tea. We had dated exclusively for one month, so there was a level of comfort, but still a level of unfamiliarity. We were learning about each other. In this moment, I was peppering Jason with questions about his sister-in-law—his brother’s wife—who had recently found out she was pregnant. I wanted to know all the details, naturally. (I have an intense fascination with pregnancy and birth.) When was the baby due? What would birth be like in the Canadian healthcare system? Would they learn the baby’s sex? What baby names were they considering?
Jason answered my questions, appeasing me with all the tiny tidbits of information he had available. And then I asked another question: What would the last name be?
He said they didn’t know. I learned then that Jason and his brother were not attached to their last name—one of the few connections they had with their hurtful father. In fact, their feelings on the subject were not simply neutral; both of them hated the idea of their future children carrying that last name. Per Jason, his brother and sister-in-law were considering various alternatives for their son or daughter: a hybrid of their last names, a new last name altogether, or other family names.
“But my brother wants to be sure that his kids and mine—the cousins—share a last name,” Jason said.
I thought the right response was empathy. “I’m sorry,” I said. “It must be hard for you to commit to your brother on that right now.”
“Well I want to know what you think about the options,” he replied.
I laughed lightly before registering the seriousness of his facial expression. It felt disorienting—that this man I barely knew was encouraging me to plan our children’s last names with him. (This was the sort of thing I might obsessively consider in my mind, but would never speak aloud until a later date.) But Jason was asking sincerely.
I tentatively gave my own thoughts on baby names: I care more about sharing a last name with my future children than with a future partner. The latter I could take or leave. I tried to speak in general terms, steering clear from the uncomfortable question (Can we choose our babies’ last name now?) Jason had vaguely posed. Which, likely, did us both a disservice. He didn’t get an answer to his question; I didn’t express my discomfort.
This was one of the early, foreboding examples of our mis-matched attachment styles. The more Jason pulled me closer to him, the more I pushed him away.
