What’s In a Name?
Maybe nothing much, but I kept mine, and my daughters bear it, too. What happens after that is entirely up to them.
Sitting in the doctor’s office for my toddler’s annual checkup, I wondered whether they would once again botch her name. They had for the past few years as the result of what was initially a simple error.
When they first asked about preferences and nicknames, I told the office that although her name is Everly, we often call her Evie (pronounced EH-vee). They interpreted that as Evie (pronounced EE-vee), in alignment with most of the rest of the world, even though that would only make sense if her name was EE-ver-ly, not EH-ver-ly…which it is not.
Regardless, I never corrected them. We end up at the pediatrician’s so infrequently that it didn’t seem worth mentioning. My spitfire toddler (rightly) disagreed. As the doctor was ending the appointment, he told my daughter that it was good to see her, and he would see her again next year. That’s when Evie looked him dead in the eyes, like he was the biggest moron who ever lived, and said, “My name is not [EE-vee]. It’s Everly.”
The poor man was so taken aback by her directness that he stuttered something about whether that had changed recently. He has four children of his own and sees kids all day long in his practice, so you’d think he’d be used to some sassy toddler talking to him like he’s not intelligent, but he was most definitely caught off-guard.
I tried to ease the awkwardness by saying that everyone calls her Everly at school (which is true), and that there are a lot of kids in said school who are named EE-vee (also true), but the real honest response would have been to say that I’ve let him butcher my kid’s name for two years because I didn’t think he was a big enough presence in her life for his mistake to matter.
To be fair, I often let random strangers mess up my name without correcting them. If we just met in the grocery line, and we’re making small talk about pickle brands, I’m going to let you call me Carrie, if that’s what you heard me say when I introduced myself. If you wrote “Harley” on my coffee cup (or “Harvey” as one woman did recently), I’m not going mention it.
We aren’t friends. This is an issue with a very short expiration date, as I’m probably not going to ever see you again or, if I do, I’m going to have to reintroduce myself because nothing about our connection was anything more than surface level. A pediatrician we interact with once per year falls into this category for me. Not for my daughter, apparently. We should have shared notes ahead of time.
To be fair, I’m far pricklier about my last name. Not about the pronunciation, which I let people butcher with abandon (it’s Puh-trow-vic, not Pet-row-vic or Pet-row-vich, although that last one is the pronunciation from the old country—Slovenia, not Russia or Poland—before my grandfather Americanized it). I’m most insistent about maintaining the name I was born with. As such, I’m forever and always a Ms. Petrovic, never a Mrs. Newman.
My husband has always been cool about that. When we discussed marriage on our third date, I was immediately clear that I wouldn’t be taking his name. I’d dated insecure men in the past for whom this was a sticking point (some dudes seemingly want to spread their name like semen all over you), and I needed this to be a non-issue for the person I ended up with. It was important to me. R. couldn’t care less.
We both had our reasons. Despite bearing his father’s last name—a surname that changed from the one he received at birth when R.’s dad was later adopted into another family—R. never connected with it. By the time we became an item, he’d long been estranged from his father. He once mentioned considering changing his last name to match his mother’s maiden name, although I’m not sure how seriously he took this idea.
There were other reasons, too. R.’s first wife changed her last name to his, despite his having told her that it did not matter to him. Not only was it a paperwork nightmare for her to update everything the first time, it was a secondary nightmare when she decided to change it all back following their divorce. I’d be lying if I said paperwork didn’t play into my decision on some level. Altering your given name seems like a whole goddam thing.
My primary reason for remaining a Petrovic, however, has to do with my creative work. Have I written anything so extraordinary or viral or recognizable that readers would be confused by a surname change? Absolutely not. But my work is still my work, and I’m proud of it. I don’t want some man (even a man I love and cherish and plan to spend my life with) to put his name on it. I don’t want anyone getting credit for what I create in this world but me.
The topic of names gets thornier when you bring kids into the mix. I know a lot of men who are progressive about their wives keeping their respective names. Many of them tend to show their traditional side when it comes time to determine whose name goes on the birth certificates. My husband was an exciting exception.
Before Everly came into the world, before she was even an apple in our eyes, I told R. that I would really like for our child to have my last name. While R. has an older brother who has a son that will keep the Newman name alive in their specific clan, my dad has four sisters, two of whom married and took their husbands’ names, and then went on to have two daughters of his own. The Petrovic name in our clan dies with me (my sister took her husband’s name, too).
R. was good with that. The state of Texas seemed baffled. When the midwife filled out the online form to get our daughter’s birth certificate, the system seemed to short-circuit when she attempted to align Everly’s last name with mine instead of R.’s. The result? Our daughter’s official birth certificate lists her as Everly Grace Petrovic I. EGP, first of her name. It’s pretty funny, but I also really love it. It feels powerful. I think my daughter feels that, too.
Things got a little trickier when we found ourselves surprise pregnant with another baby girl. I’d been sure at first that Everly was a boy, and that made my name feel more secure. It would be passed to a new generation either way, but unless society changes a lot by the time my kid comes of age and potentially has a family of her own, it could then die with her. That might have been less the case with a boy, but again, you never know. He could have chosen to take his wife or partner’s name or pick a new name or not give his name to his kids whether he had them or not.
All of this is fine with me. I’ve always said that my goal was just to pass the name along one more time. Whatever my daughter chooses to do with her name is entirely up to her. It’s her right to keep it as much as it is to change it. It never truly belonged to me. It was always hers to have and to hold and to do with what she will.
Baby number two was an unexpected upset to the apple cart. We hadn’t planned for this conversation, and R. and I found ourselves slightly at odds. I assumed the baby would bear my name as well. After all, the precedent had been set, and we hadn’t had a boy that would presumably lock in the name. R., understandably, wanted at least one of his kids to have his name, to feel like there was a part of him also attached to them via their names.
Ultimately, we decided it would be too confusing to have one kid with one last name and another with the other. R. didn’t want people to think that our girls weren’t sisters. It’s already awkward enough when people make assumptions and are confused about Everly’s last name or whether R. and I are married. For the most part, I infuse a bit of humor. I did all the work to bring them into this world. Why shouldn’t they get my name? It works, especially since we know every joke is only half a joke.
And yet, I still receive mail addressed to Mrs. Newman. R. continues to carry Everly’s birth certificate when the two of them travel alone in case some hot-to-trot TSA agent questions whether my husband might be trying to kidnap the kid that looks exactly like him but does not share his name. Going against an established norm is rarely easy. I prefer to think of the effort as worth it, even if the only result is that it forces a person here or there to confront and question their expectations.
Because all of these questions and conundrums are temporary anyway. My kids could come out as trans and want to change their given name. They could hate their names and decide to pick something that feels more appropriate to them. My girls might eventually partner (or not), have children (or not), follow my lead with naming conventions (or not). R. and I are raising them to be their own people. That means we don’t really get a say in what they do later on down the road.
The one thing that the doctor’s office incident of 2026 proves is that my daughter is proud of her name. She’s going to assert who she is, even when her mother sometimes drops the ball. And Everly is right. Our names are important. How people address us is important. Standing up for what we desire is important, and we all deserve to be called what we want to be called.
Some people will still feel compelled to ask what’s in a name. How much do our earthly designations matter in the grand scheme? I’d argue quite a lot. I’m not alone. In a question of whether a rose by any other name could possibly smell as sweet, my daughter is clear: Her name is not Rose, it’s Everly, and she’s exactly as sweet as she is.
With pleasure,
Bored Aquarian
P.S. You may have noticed in the past that I’m pretty protective of my daughter’s name and privacy. She is too young to make decisions about what gets shared online on her behalf. In this case, she was assertive about her name, and I felt it was fine to share the story of how forceful she was about being addressed appropriately.
That said, I will only be keeping this post up and open to the public for a few days. After that, it will be behind a paywall for subscribers, and I’ll go back to calling Everly by her internet names, E. and Bean. Thanks for understanding!