I don’t want to change my name after marriage, and was wondering how many others out there on VJ kept their name or plan to. (Is it really so rare as I think?).

I'm the USC and will change my name once I get married. It is something that I want to do.
I want the same surname as my (soon to be) husband, as the children we plan on having together, and I have no ties to my current last name. I do not have a relationship with my father and I believe part of my reasoning has to do with that.

But most importantly - I'm marrying the man of my dreams and want his last name

However, I do understand why some women do not want to change theirs. I am an independent woman and a professional with a degree with my (current) last name. Many women keep their last names for these reasons. I do not believe that keeping your last name means you love your husband less. It is a personal choice.

I couldn't wait to change my name .....

Me too!!!! and I'm going to be so proud to have the same name as him!

I am keeping mine

I totally agree with you, Meredith, I also want to change my name after we get married. I can't wait to carry His last name, I want everybody to know we belong together! I'm already training my new signature No ties to my current last name as I also have a very cold relationship with my father...
Also, I'm hoping that a name without the Slavic "-ova" at the end can help me when job hunting. I heard that some companies are sorting out incoming resumes based on the persons names - I don't think it happens a lot, but I want to avoid such discrimination.
I can imagine situations, however, when a woman doesn't want to take her husband's last name. I don't think it matters, the most important thing is that the two people love each other and want to spend the rest of their lives together.

I've already been told that in China, I am Jim Powell and she is Wang Jie. In America, she will be Sarha Wang and I will be Jim Wang. I think she means it...

Jim

i will definitely change my name! i can't wait to change it to something that fits me better. imho:D and be proud to show him how much i truly love him.

I didn't change my name and never will. It seems to be very common for women to change their name here in the US. It's one thing that I am a little surprised about.

Yes, she did.

I was happy to change mine..since it was my ex's

Good point. I was daddy's little girl, he used to say I was his greatest achievement and now he's gone. Probably wanting to keep his name has something to do keeping him with me always. I miss him sooo much...

I never wanted to change my name, if and when I got married, mostly because my mom didn't and it never made sense to me. But another aspect is that changing my name would change my ethnic heritage completely, which would be really weird. Right now my last name is REALLY OBVIOUSLY Jewish, and if I changed it, it would suddenly be really obviously latin (or Portuguese to those who know the difference, which isn't many people). I feel like it would be taking away my own heritage and replacing it with my husbands or something. Dunno.

Hi Everyone,

Good luck on your immigration journeys. What an interesting message thread, indeed. In answer to the message thread, my response is:

As for my own situation, regarding the married last name, I am using that new married last name instead of my old maiden last name. I like my married last name, and I love my husband and feel that this is respectful for him and his family. I overall hated my maiden last name, which I had no connection with my former family (my ex-so-called family that have now pretty much disowned me), and growing up my former maiden last name caused a lot of confusion and I was made fun of quite a bit because of it.

Besides, why get rid of a good tradition of changing women's last names when they get married? It has worked for many years throughout history that women change their last names when they marry, so why shouldn't it work now? After all, by having the same last name, doesn't one feel more connected to their new married family too?

Ant

I hyphenated my name for professional reasons, but I never liked my maiden name (hard to spell—or more precisely, easy to misspell) so I pretty much only go by G's last name. It's pretty common (but not *too* common) and sounds good with my first name (and in combination with my maiden name). But legally, my name is hyphenated.

I'm excited about having a Portuguese last name...

I'll likely hyphenate my name. Besides, in my fiance's culture, women keep the names of their fathers. His mother kept her name and so to him it is normal. I think whatever works for person is best.

My fiance and I talked about it and I'm excited about the fact that she's excited to carry my last name. Of all the 'traditions' that come with getting married (ie., the rings, ceremonies, etc.,) no other one truly shows the singularity of two becoming one as carrying the same name. She is no longer daddys little girl, she is now preparing to make the trasition into being my wonderful wife. She is now the most important person in my life as I am the most important in hers, and carrying the same last name is just another expression of that unity.

Besides, if she chose not to take my last name, I'd tell the kids that she's their step mom... out of spite. (I KID, I KID)

EDIT: Our views and opinions only. Mileage may vary.

Cannot wait to change my name to his. I did the hyphenation thing my first marriage and what a chew that was! Which places filed me under my maiden initial, and which filed me under my married by putting my maiden as my middle name...what an absolute pita that was.

But I did it because I didn't want to blend fully with my ex. I think I always knew that we weren't right for each other, and to me, the name holdout was my last bit of something just mine. For me, it was a defiant act because I didn't want to be fully associated with his circus freak family, lol.

With D, i CANNOT WAIT! I love my maiden name...it's VERY unique and unforgettable. But the thought of me shedding that and accepting his as symbolic of the new family we have created is just too sweet! Cannot wait!

However, with work...I'm unsure as to what I want to do. As I've said...my name is very unique. It is unforgettable. And in a business such as sales, to have a 'gimmick' such as the one I have is almost too good to be true. So David and I will have to discuss that at a later date.



Beautifully said...and your joke was cute

I changed my name to my husband's because 1) I like my husband's name and being connected to him in another way and 2) my prior name was associated with my ex and it was (to me) a constant reminder of the pure hell he put me through.

I changed my name. I think it's fun having a unique Indian last name.

I didn't change my name. I don't understand the tradition at all, or why it is the woman has to be the one to change.

No name change. My mom changed her name because she got married before she started her career. Me & my sisters don't change name after marriage. I don't think it was such a big deal for us about the name change.

changed my name.

Couldn't wait to do so.

My fiancee wants to change her last name when we get married. But if she didn't, I would support that decision.

My fiancee will take my name. I think she should keep her own name, but she has cultural reasons for taking my name. Her surname is the name she is given from her father, and when she gets married she is no longer under her father's protection and care, but under her husband's. It is the husband's responsibility to care for her, so she takes his name. We're trying to respect the culture as much as possible, but it's not always practical to follow all of the customs. I will be paying the brideprice, for example, but my parents aren't going to travel to Kenya to negotiate the price with her Godparents. Their plane tickets alone would cost as much as the brideprice.

I changed my name, I like my new lastname but it is kinda hard to spell (he has a german lastname). And since that is the tradition here that is what i wanted to do!

I do not feel specially attached to my lastname and having two lastnames in Spain was kind of messy here, like when we got my military ID and they put my name, my first lastname as middle name and then his lastname as my lastname

So i would rather have just one

I changed my last name.. because I love my husband (not saying that those of you who don't change their last names don't love their husbands, but for me it was a way to show him I loved him) And also because my maiden name was long, difficult for most people to spell.. and quite frequently mispronounced.. although my married name gets misspelled and mispronounced all the time too.. but at least its shorter! And also, because I've pretty much always expected to change my name when I got married.. My husband did tell me once (before we were married) that he would switch to my last name too.. but we didnt..

I'll definitely be changing my last name, and I can't wait to do it. It's so weird... not THAT long ago, I'd never have been able to imagine myself really really wanting to marry anyone, let alone taking their name. But (for all the reasons LisaD listed above, basically) I now find I can't wait... it's the symbolism of the whole thing - and believe me, that does not in any way make me some kind of chattel, I just... hm, can't explain why I love the idea so much.

... although the fact that nobody has ever, ever, EVER been able to spell my surname right (even when I stand there in front of them spelling it out to them... ffs, there's only five letters in the thing, and when I went to get the long-form copy of my birth certificate that I'll be needing for my interview next week, I found that my surname had even been mis-spelled on the official lists they have in the national records centre... correct on the birth certificate, presumably correct on the 'original' register at the time, and yet copied across wrongly from that to the register they hold there!)....

... so yeah, as you can see from the above tantrum, I won't be too upset at losing the most mis-spelled surname of all time. But that aside, I can't wait to take my new name... oh yeah, and I love the way it sounds with my first name, much better than my own surname ever did!

Hmm, I must just go and practice my soon-to-be new signature, like some kind of besotted schoolgirl... hahaha.

I will hyphenate my name, and hopefully if my fiane will change his mind, we will hyphenate or use my current last name as a second middle name to our children. Hopefully, he will understand the importance to me and agree without bias. If not, I wil more than likely use his surname name for our children. I am aware of his cultural wishes.

But, there is still hope.

When we married i changed my surname to his. No reason to keep my lastname as it was my ex's, and that part of my life is behind me.

ELW,

Had to mark N/A to both questions, because there was no meaningful other choice. Rodjanaa uses my surname in the USA, she uses her maiden name in her native country. So she did both - changed and didn't change.

Yodrak

I kept my last name because my husband said there were too many of his last name and he wasn't interested in creating any more. He thought about taking my last name, but eh.

I kept my maiden name as middle name, and my husband's lastname is my new lastname. So when I have to signed I put my first name, then the initial of my maiden name as middle name and then my husband's last name. In this way at least I have still a part of my family's name, I didn't want to erase it for good. I wanted to keep something from my family and from my country.

I can not wait to carry my man's family name .

Didn't change mine and have no intention of doing so.

Me too!!!! although people here may have a hard time pronouncing it right