Dear MIMster: Whose Name Should My Seven Year Old Daughter Answer?

I am a single mother. My daughter who will be seven years old in July answers my father’s name. Even though my baby daddy never denied the pregnancy when I got pregnant, he was physically there but never contributed anything towards feeding, ante-natal and other hospital bills.

His reason was because he did not have a job then. From my savings and with the help of my dad, I took care of the feeding. Meanwhile, I got beaten by him almost every week even with my condition and he would later come to apologise.

After the birth of my baby, I had some complications and was transfered to another hospital for a blood transfusion. He and a nurse donated blood to me because there was no blood in the blood bank. To cut the long story short, non of his relatives came out to help me.

After 3 weeks of staying in the hospital, my parents came and paid all my bills and took me home. Since then, my daughter has been living with my parents, while I went on to start a new life. In all these years, my baby’s father has never contributed a dime.

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Now, I want to open an account for my girl and I was asked for the birth certificate which I am about to process. The thing is I don’t know whose name to write on the birth certificate as her surname. She has been bearing my own father’s name all this while. Should I change it?