I took the married name and dropped the “maiden” name entirely because I never liked it. If I’d had a maiden name as cool as my married name I would have kept it, because it was a hassle to change everything over --and I really enjoyed the “feminist” judging. :rolleyes: To me, feminism is about choosing what you want, and having the option to do so; taking a married name is not a betrayal of gender or feminism and didn’t make me a brainwashed little girl.
Huh, who knew that baggage was lurking?
I kept mine, hubby took mine.
After about two years of marriage, my wife just changed her last name to mine this past Friday. My own preference was that she keep both names, but it wasn’t that big a deal to me.
Incidentally, the only reason we even had the option is because she married a gaijin. Japanese law currently requires all couples to have the same last name (about 5% or so choose the wife’s), except in the case of a Japanese citizen marrying a foreigner.
That’s wacky, man. I can’t imagine trying to tell the American people what they would do with their names. You’d start to fear for your life or something if you proposed that in Congress.
Mom took Dad’s name. I have no idea why because her name is much more common and infinitely easier to spell, and she had a professional career under her maiden name. She says it’s because she asked me, “What’s my name,” and my little toddler self answered “Mommy _mcl!”
I’ll probably keep my name. I’ve been mulling the idea of taking Tom’s name, which he is very much against because he hates his name. (Don’t ask me why he chose it as a screen name then 
) I refuse to let him take his because he does not need to be makin’ the same mistake as my mom.
Refuse to let him take mine, that is.
Good baggage. That feminism=choice reasoning is why I decided to stay home to raise my kids (I did work part-time on weekends). However, I really goofed on the name thing. I wanted to keep my name, but my M in L had a snit fit. Desiring peace in my new union, I caved. His name was 5 letters long and so was mine. I figured I could always change it later (never did) or just use my maiden name for creative endeavours.
Now I’m separated with four kids and haven’t yet made a decision as to what to do about my last name. I don’t want his name any more, but then travelling, dealing with school, doctors etc. becomes complicated when a Mom’s name is different than her offspring… I have a pen name, which is my maiden name, just in case my work is ever published… Anyway this will be my choice, what suits me and my kids, not tradition.
You’re telling me. Every couple of years or so the question of allowing it comes up and the usual old farts in Parliament say how letting spouses have separate names will wreck the institution of marriage and do irreparable damage to the fabric of society (hey, where have I been hearing that before?). They futz around until the Diet goes into recess so that they can let the whole thing drop without even taking a vote.
Kept my own name. It wasn’t even a discussion. We’re both artistic types and we were also both in academia at the time so he knew the value of a name professionally (and I had a few teeny minor publications to my name, and he had plenty of performances of his work, and the odd recording kicking around.) It wasn’t really viable or desirable for either of us to change our name.
I’m getting married in August and I’ll be taking his surname. This was my choice… I didn’t want the double barrelled thing because I would have a different name from him and our kids which I didn’t want - also his name would die out if our kids don’t take it and, as I wanted the same name as the rest of our family, I chose to take his name. Also, its a cool name and mine’s bog standard so there was little decision making to be made really. For the record, he would have been happy with any decision I made.
When I was younger, I was fiercely against giving up my name for a time. I was damned proud of being Dutch, (well, a quarter Dutch. But it was the important quarter.) and not willing to give up that name for anybody. Then I got into a relationship with an incredibly hot Canadian whose family had come from the same frikkin’ region of the Netherlands as mine. One of our friends snickers every time she sees our full names written out, because they are so very Dutch.
Should we at some point feel the need to register our love with the appropriate governmental officials, (hi, immigration!) I still wouldn’t take his name, though. It’s not the name, the guy, or the principle of the thing - it’s the fact that the name is his father’s, and neither of us want anything at all to do with that guy. Taking my name would be a bad idea for him, since he’s already well known in some circles by his current name, and a change would mess up contacts that have taken a lot of effort to establish. But different, uncommon names mean that we will have a near-impenetrable telemarketer detector! Anybody who calls asking for Ms. Shooting or Mr. Hoofgsnezzer gets beaten with a wooden shoe.
I was in my thirties when I got married and I wasn’t enthusiastic about changing my name. I asked a whole lot of people for their opinions and I ended up deciding to change my name because it is pretty customary in America, even though I think it’s a bad custom that I wish would go away.
When I was making this decision, it never occurred to me for one moment that our marriage wouldn’t last forever. If that had occurred to me, I wouldn’t have changed my name.
I changed my name, our marriage lasted two years, and now I’m waiting around for the divorce to become final so I can finally get my own name back. There’s nothing wrong with his last name, but it isn’t mine. And he doesn’t deserve the honor of my carrying his damn name around.
I had to change my name in about twenty places, and now I’ll have another half dozen places, more than twenty-five places I need to change my name. It will be a huge hassle. Worst of all, in my opinion, is that I finally got hired where I had been wanting to get hired for years, and now everyone knows me by the wrong name. I have a really great reputation at work, and it’s all with the wrong name. Damnit!
If I should ever get married again, which is unlikely, I will absolutely, positively not change my name. Being called by that name, even when I loved my husband, just really irked me.
I’m still legally “Maiden name”, but I sign everything except visa things and cheques with “Married name”. I’m going to change it legally, but not right now, because it means a largish hassle. First I’m going to get a marriage certificate with my name on it, then work on changing legally.
My marriage certificate says that Mr. Lissar is married to someone who is not me. And it’s signed by the minister and our best friends. :rolleyes: Well, the first name is right, but the last name bears no relation to either of our names.
I wouldn’t hyphenate. Matsui-Busbridge sounds ridiculous.
I"m getting married in May (yay!) and I’m keeping my name. But I’m 51 and set in my ways, and there will be no children involved, so it’s not a big thing.
My mom dropped her middle name and took her maiden name as her middle name back in the 1950’s. So it’s not a new custom. Maybe it’s a regional one, though. (We’re in GA, USA.)
I did have a question, though: where titles are needed, I now sign things “Ms. Archergal.” After I’m married, do I say “Mrs. Archergal” or am I going to be “Mrs. Dear Robert?” (my fiance).
(I know, I can still say “Ms.”)
The problem is when a child with a hyphenated name marries a spouse with a hyphenated name, giving the grandchild a last name that is actually 4 hyphenated last names. This grandchild would certainly not be able to marry someone else who also has 4 hyphenated last names, because no computer name data base can handle 8(hyphenated) last names.
What I dont understand, is why any woman would keep her married name after divorce, if there were no chlidren, and her husband was an *****. I lost count of how many women I know who hate their ex-husbands but yet keep his name.
My first wife kept her last name, which was fine with me.
My current wife gladly took mine. She was not thrilled with her dad’s family at the time anyway. Hyphenating was out of the question: Peters-Payne sounded like something urologists take care of. 
I’d gone by my middle name all my life. My first name was the same as my mother’s, so it’s a bit confusing, and I really don’t care for the sound of it. It was always a tremendous pain trying to get doctors, new teachers, etc. to call me by my middle name instead of my first.
When I got married, I took my husband’s last name and dropped my first name. So now I’m Middle Maiden Married. I love it. It’s like losing a millstone around my neck. It confused the heck out of the lady at the DOT when I went into change my license, though: “You changed your first and your last names? You can’t do that! I can’t authorize that!” Oy vey.
Not married yet (5 1/2 months to go - yay!), but I very briefly considered hyphenating because I like the way our names sound together - we both have fairly difficult German names, but they go together, if that makes sense. And I’m still attached to my name.
However, that was quickly swept to the side when I realized that my new initials would be “A.S.-S.”.
Even I don’t love my old name that much. I’m taking his name and keeping my middle name - dropping my current surname. I’m not thrilled about it, but I also don’t want to be grabbing luggage at the airport that’s labeled “ASS”.
Ava
For my first marriage, we made one up. We thought it was important to have the same last name and his was horrible and he wouldn’t take mine. Well, having the same last name didn’t do much to keep the marriage from imploding.
When we divorced, I kept the made up name for a while - to answer Susanann’s question - because it pissed him off to no end and because I wasn’t quite ready to let it go. Eventually I went back to my maiden.
When I got remarried, I kept my name. I’d already changed it twice, wasn’t interested in a third change. And I’d grown up a little - was known by my new last name in my career.
The kids have my husband’s last name. I’d have thought that it would cause problems, but so far, no issues at all.