No Name Change After Marriage

Biological Clock
I wanted to get married and have children. That was one of the big goals in my life. And women have a biological clock. My gyn told me it would be best to start having kids before the age of 35. That affected my dating behavior. When it became apparent that my second boyfriend did not have marriage and children on his bucket list, then that was one of the reasons why I decided to end the relationship.

A few months after I left my former boyfriend, I met my future husband at the end of 1998.

By that time, I had given up thinking about the unfairness between men and women and where it all came from. I could not solve the problem. I could just do what made me happy and learn to not give a damn about anyone else’s opinion. The huge sense of anger about the ever-present sexism I had felt a couple of years ago had shrunk into a dim glow into the background.

So, I just went ahead with my life, basically getting settled into my job in the corporate world and planning to have a family later.

When I dated my future husband and when it became clear that this relationship would be more serious, I let him know that it was important for me that we shared the responsibilities for both work and children later. That meant not only I would work part time, but he would, too, when we had children to take care of. And he agreed to that.

No Name Change After Marriage
In 1994, Germany passed a new law that stated that each person could still keep their former surnames in a marriage.

When I got married in 2001, I didn’t change my last name and my husband kept his surname, too. I didn’t take on a double-barreled name either. I just kept my maiden name. At that time at the turn of the millennium, that was not very common yet in Germany even though we had this new law for 7 years which would have allowed it. Most people still wanted to have a common family name.

We named the children after my husband’s surname (simply because I thought that his last name sounded better than ‘Finger’.)

Sure, there have been incidents when people used the wrong last name for me. At pre-school or when we went to the doctor, they didn’t know any better and addressed me with my children’s last name. Never mind. I don’t regret having kept my surname.

Changing a name takes a lot of paperwork effort as I would see later when we did the legal name and gender change process with my trans child. I’m glad I had to do this process only once.

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This post is part of an online book about my journey with feminism and my son’s transgender journey. You can access the table of contents with links to each chapter here: TOC.

Positive Aspects I Experienced Growing Up as a Woman

In the past posts, I have talked about all the bad stuff of being a woman. All the little misogynistic incidents, all the everyday sexism. But when I share what it has meant to me to grow up as a girl and woman, there are also some more neutral or positive aspects to be mentioned.

Mom’s Encouragement
Despite some discouraging things  my mom did that held me back, I want to mention that she told me, “If you really want to achieve something, you can do it.”

That statement was very important for my self-confidence, and when life became tough, I remembered what my mom had told me.

Gender-Specific Learning
My mom was very much into handicrafts of all kinds and she taught me a lot. And I was eager to learn sewing, knitting, crocheting, and much more. She also taught me a bit about cooking, baking, and about how to cut someone’s hair.

When I was older, my mom taught me how to sew. And I made many dresses for myself. I liked the fact that I could make the dresses or shirts exactly as I wanted them. I could choose the pattern, the fabric, and the colors. I wasn’t stuck with the options that were available in shops, but I had much more influence on the style. If I had set my mind on having an emerald-green shirt with batwing sleeves in a fabric that didn’t need to be ironed, such a shirt was probably difficult to find in the shops. But I could always sew it myself if I could find the fabric.

But when my bike had a flat tire, this was my dad’s job. He didn’t teach me how to do it, but he would just fix it himself. But I also wasn’t as interested in learning how to fix my bike as I was in how to fix a hole in my t-shirt.

So, I grew up with a skillset with the typical gender bias. That can be seen as an advantage or a disadvantage. I see it as neutral. It happened, and there are certain consequences. But I am okay with the result. I can fix holes in my shirts and don’t need to throw them away. And if I don’t know how to fix my bike, I go to the local bike shop and pay them to do it.

Clothing
Not everything was bad about being a woman. I liked being able to wear pretty dresses, jewelry, and fancy, braided hairstyles when I was younger.

When I was in elementary school, I played violin in an orchestra from the music school. And on several Sundays, we gave concerts. I remember that my mom sewed me a new dress for almost every concert because she liked to sew, and she was so proud of me and wanted me to look pretty.

I also saw the advantage that sometimes women’s clothing was much more practical at times. Sure, we didn’t have as many pockets on the pants as the men did. But I remember one hot summer during our high school trip to Rome in Italy when I wore a (self-made) loose cotton spaghetti strap dress and how wonderful that was during the heat. The boys and especially the male teacher were envious that they could not wear something light like that.

Social Interactions with Other Women
I enjoyed friendships with other women and that we could talk about deep personal stuff. I can’t say for sure how this is between men, of course, because I lack the experience, but I think that often between them it is not so deeply personal and open.  My guess is that their talk is more about impersonal stuff and that they keep each other at arm’s length and have more need to state their independence.

Also, the communication style is different. At work, I’ve often observed the interaction between men at lunch conversations. Among men, it is more accepted to make jokes about each other, some playful insults, as if that was a means of establishing contact. Among women, that would be unusual behavior. When I saw that behavior among the guys, I wouldn’t want to be a target of their playful insults, and I was glad that I was not a man.

No Compulsory Military Service
When I was younger, the guys had to do compulsory military service after they graduated from school whereas the women didn’t. In Germany, the compulsory military service was suspended with a new law in 2011. I thought I was lucky that I wasn’t drafted.

Restrooms
In public restrooms, the queues for the women’s restroom is usually longer. But I was really grateful that we got to pee in privacy behind a closed door. The men had to get used to relieving themselves with other guys present. Unthinkable for me.

Dancing in the Follower Role
When I was younger, I did a lot of competition dancing, ballroom and Latin. Dancing in the follower role is different than in the role of the leader.

A couple of times, when not enough men were present at an event, I danced in the leader role. That felt unfamiliar and involved being a lot more active in the mind because I had to plan in advance which steps to dance next. However, in the follower role, I could relax, be receptive, and wait for the lead of my partner. I enjoyed that much more.

So, each role teaches certain skills, and these skills are different. Men who have to dance in the role of the follower, are not trained to be in this receptive waiting state, catching the clues of the next lead.

Acceptance of Parental Leave
My boss readily accepted when I reduced my work hours after I got my first child. He probably would also have accepted it had I stayed home entirely for 1-3 years. But when I talked to a male coworker who also wanted to stay home for about a year after his child was born, he told me that our boss reacted a bit more surprised and also somewhat resistant to that idea.

Taking parental leave is accepted for women but not so much for men even though we have a new law in Germany since 2007 which encourages this for both parents (https://www.dw.com/en/german-family-minister-calls-new-parental-leave-law-a-success/a-3005391).

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This post is part of an online book about my journey with feminism and my son’s transgender journey. You can access the table of contents with links to each chapter here: TOC.

Extended Breastfeeding

Even though I had to wean my first child prematurely (and unnecessarily) due to the RA meds, fortunately, the breastfeeding wasn’t over for him. When I got my second son, I breastfed him, too. And then my older son (2 years old) also wanted to drink again. I let him, sometimes feeding both kids at the same time in football hold. We continued to breastfeed in addition to normal meals until my younger child was 3 years old and my older kid was 5. Then we stopped.

That may seem long for Western societies. But the WHO says, “From the age of 6 months, children should begin eating safe and adequate complementary foods while continuing to breastfeed for up to two years of age or beyond.”  (https://www.who.int/health-topics/breastfeeding#tab=tab_2)

A study in Pediatrics Child Health says: “Natural weaning occurs as the infant begins to accept increasing amounts and types of complementary feedings while still breastfeeding on demand. When natural weaning is practiced, complete weaning usually takes place between two and four years of age […].“ (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2720507/)

Mealtime had always not only meant nourishment to my kids but also physical closeness. And maybe that was due to the prolonged breastfeeding phase. And so, after every lunch, my kids used to both crawl up on my lap, one kid on each of my legs, and cuddle. This behavior lasted until they reached puberty. They were territorial while doing this and wanted to make sure their sibling didn’t overstep the line to their side of mommy. I joked that now I knew what the zipper of my jacket was for. It served as the line of demarcation between the left and right side of my body.

I got some resistance from my parents to my extended breastfeeding. My mom didn’t like it and tried to talk me out of it. One day when my parents visited us, my toddler-age kids wanted to breastfeed. I sat down on the sofa in our living room and started to feed both at the same time. However, when my mom saw this, she said, I should stop. Because my dad wouldn’t want to see “that kind of nakedness”.
What? I was surprised. Nudity was never an issue in our family. We were raised being comfortable with it. Then why couldn’t I just sit down in my own living room and nurse my kids when my parents were present?

I found it not only remarkable that my mom was opposed to it. It was also remarkable that she assumed my dad would not like it–he hadn’t said yet that he was bothered by it–and, in an act of anticipatory obedience, she tried to make him comfortable by admonishing me to change my behavior.

Apart from the whole breastfeeding thing, that is also a behavior of some women that they want to make sure their partner is comfortable and doesn’t go into some choleric fit of rage. Walking in front of him, paving the way, and make sure not a single pebble on the street would make him stub his toe and cause him to go into an angry outburst. Some sort of extended people-pleasing behavior that makes sure not only the woman herself behaves in a pleasing way but everyone else, too.

Or maybe this incident was just extended child-rearing. Like moms would admonish their kids to behave well when daddy comes home from work, she admonished me to not breastfeed when dad was in the same room–even though I was already about thirty-six years old.

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This post is part of an online book about my journey with feminism and my son’s transgender journey. You can access the table of contents with links to each chapter here: TOC.

RA Meds and Unnecessary Weaning

When I had my first child in 2003 and had the sudden onset of rheumatoid arthritis, I needed to be put on meds. At first, I got a cortisone derivative. But later, the doctor wanted to prescribe Sulfasalazine in addition. He told me, that while cortisone was compatible with breastfeeding, once I took Sulfasalazine, I would need to wean my child, who was about 5 months old at that time, from breastfeeding.

I trusted the information he gave me. I didn’t have the package with the pills and the package insert yet. And I went through the process of weaning my baby.

Then I got the first package of the Sulfasalazine and read the package insert. To my surprise, it didn’t say I needed to wean my child. When writing this text, I just re-read the package insert on the internet (this time, the 2020 version). It says to exercise caution. But no need to wean for every case. Dammit! Why didn’t he tell me?

The doctor said, he was sorry, but he didn’t know this. This was a guy who was the chief physician at the university medical institute. I thought, well, making a nice career doesn’t have anything to do with thorough knowledge about the meds you prescribe and with taking care of breastfeeding women’s needs.

Darn, I should have researched the package insert of sulfasalazine! But I am not sure whether it would have been available as a PDF document online in 2003 at all.

Note to self: Never rely on what someone else tells me. I should always double-check what they say.

What I also learned from this incident was that the needs of breastfeeding mothers are not taken seriously in some parts of the medical field. For a rheumatologist, it was just not important to know which medication can be taken while breastfeeding. As if breastfeeding and having RA at the same time were just some statistical anomaly, something not worth giving proper attention to.

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This post is part of an online book about my journey with feminism and my son’s transgender journey. You can access the table of contents with links to each chapter here: TOC.