I changed my name today.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

And I’m feeling really, really sad about it.

I got married last September. I wasn’t going to change my name, as I really didn’t see the point, but after discussing it with my husband, I realized it was important to him - only because he’s the last of his line, and our children will be carrying on the name. So, since I have several male cousins, and a brother expecting a baby son in October, who will be carrying on the name, I decided to go ahead and change my name.

So I’ve been going by Elza Marriedname since last September, but never made it over to the BMV to get my license changed or to the SS office to get my card changed - so my license has been Elza Maidenname for the past ten months. I finally made it over to the BMV today and my license now says Elza Marriedname officially.

I’m sad at not having my last name anymore. I’m happy that my husband and I officially look like we’re married now that we both have the same legal last name, but I kind of miss my maiden name now. I went from one unpronounceable German name to another unpronounceable German name, so nothing has really changed to that effect - everyone mispronounces my name, basically - it’s just weird to look at my license now and see a whole new name on it.

It really hit tonight when my dad and I were talking about getting business cards together for me, and he said “So you just put Elza Maidenname on the cards…”, and I had to interrupt him and say “That’s not my last name anymore, Dad.”.

This is a really long, pointless post just to say I miss my maiden name now. I didn’t realize I would miss it so much, but I guess when it’s been your name for thirty years, you get attached to it.

E.

2

Clarification, if you don’t mind going into it – I see where he’s coming from about the children’s names [well, not really, but that’s just me], but I’m a little in the dark as to why your name being changed was so important. If the children are going to carry his last name, then his “line” goes forward, regardless of what your last name is.

3

Which is precisely why I didn’t change mine. Fortunately, Mr. S was completely indifferent to the issue; in fact, he was kind of glad I kept my name, so that people would know that I wasn’t the previous Scarlett he had dated, who was a total and utter bitch, apparently.

Hopefully the fact that this was very important to your new hubby will mitigate the sadness, and you’ll get used to it in time. Clearly this was not a decision made lightly.

Scarlett Maidenname, who has run out of adverbs

4

Ditto. :confused:

5

Want some of mine? I, unfortunately, always have extra.

6

Some women I know say that keeping the maiden while giving the children a different name makes it seem like the kids are from a broken home, and they don’t want the school gossiping. Personally, this is what I plan to do if I get married (keep mine, give husband’s to children), but that’s just because my last name is weird.

7

Pffft. Sounds like an opportunity to educate the gossiping dolts. Number one, it’s not any of their business, and two, they need to understand that not every family consists of Mr. and Mrs. Whitebread Cleaver and all the little Cleavers. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve told people that yes, we actually are married, and shown them my wedding ring. IMHO, it helps knock it into their skulls that some of us uppity wimmins keeps our names. :smiley:

8

I guess I should have emphasized that it seemed much more important to him that I do change my name than it was to me that I didn’t change my name. He rarely has strong opinions on things and I was really rather indifferent to either choice. So I did it mainly for him. And I do like the idea of having the same name as him, it’s just weird to give up the name I’ve had for thirty years.

I’m not regretting changing my name - in fact, it’s almost fun to try and torture people with the spelling of the name - it’s just odd not to have my old name.

I did consider hyphenating, or keeping my maiden name as my middle name, and while the two names sound good together, my initials would have been A.S.S. Not exactly what I want on luggage :smiley: .

E.

9

Thanks, Elza. If you’re guilty of not being specific enough, then so I am.

My question was really why it was so important to him that you change your name. You don’t have to go into it if it’s too personal, natch, but I’m just curious. Did he think all of you having the same name would make more of a “family”? Trying to ward off the inevitable questions? Etc?

10

Lord. That sentence up there should have read “…then so am I.” Sheesh. Or Seuss. Whichever.

11

In 2005, that’s just silly.

12

…no. That should have said “…than so am I.”

Oh, I give up. I’m fucking off now.

13

snort - you know, if you didn’t keep fixing your typos, no one would have noticed :smiley: .

Honestly, he couldn’t really give me a solid reason. He’s as much of a feminist as I am (if you can call a man a feminist) and said that if I really didn’t want to change my name, he would be fine with it, but he would really like it if I would. It wasn’t a guilt trip or anything. But it was weird hearing that from him, especially when he’s all for equality.

So I don’t know why he wanted me to change it - I think it did have something to do with the ‘family’ aspect. It might sound silly, but when we first took our cats to the vet after we moved in together, we put it under his name since it was his long-term vet, and he got the goofiest grin on his face when he realized that they were under his name. I think to him, it’s just a way for us to completely be a family - not that we’d be any less with different names, but that’s how it was in his family, and how it’s always been in mine. So maybe it’s more traditional than anything else. But I have to admit, seeing that grin on his face when he saw that the cats’ files were under his last name kind of made my decision for me.

And yeah, his name is dying out, while my maiden day may still be somewhat obscure, but there are still plenty of us out there. So I think he also liked the fact that there would be another one out there, too. And sometime soon, there will be kids.

To him, I think it feels like it’s a more cohesive family unit. And again, it’s really a non-issue to me. I wasn’t going to change my name simply because I just didn’t have an opinion one way or the other. But because he did have an opinion, and he rarely makes requests of me like this, I wanted to give him that.

To his credit, we did discuss taking a new last name altogether and BOTH of us changing our name, or hyphenating for both of us - and unfortunately, his name starts with an A, too, or we’d both be A.S.S.es:D. But to take a new name completely (we were discussing his mother’s maiden name of Miller) would have defeated the purpose of carrying on his name, so we pretty much disregarded that.

E.

14

You can. :wink:

15

Actually you were right the first time. :smack: :smiley:

16

Adolf Stalin? Is that you?

17

Hello! People act like this is something NEW! I kept my maiden name (being uppity and all) and never married my son’s dad, and gave my son both our names. So fucking what if other people don’t get it.

I use my husband’s name when it suits me. Like when a company won’t deal with you unless you’re the wife. Then I say I’m Mrs. Husbandslastname. Otherwise, Fuck’em if they can’t wrap their brains around it.

18

I went through the same thing with my husband. He doesn’t have much family and the majority of mine are on my mother’s side. My father passed away when I was young so I wanted to keep my maiden name. After seeing how it pained my husband, I decided to change it. He’s all for equal rights, he just thinks it makes me MORE his wife with his name. More like we’re a united front or something.

After about 6 months, it felt weird having someone refer to me by my maiden name. I was sad at first, but I got used to it. It must be that independent woman streak in me. You’ll feel better after a while.

19

My parents never married (they’ve been living unhappily in sin for nigh on 30 years), so they have different last names. The only thing that has ever been an issue is what title to use for my mother, as no one’s going to call a woman in her 50’s Miss as it’s just weird, IMHO, while Mrs. doesn’t really fit and no one ever seems to use Ms other than school teachers. I intend to keep my last name when/if I ever marry, at least for professional situation, but the confusion will be taken care of by (God willing) the title being Dr. I’m not sure about other circumstances, but my feeling is, either I don’t know you at all and it will be Dr. Maidenname, or it will simply be Sarah. I don’t like formalities much.

20

Thanks for the explanation, Elza. I’ve got to say, it was really sweet of you to do that for him.

sobs and flees into the night