Name changing

I don't think you are being stupid. You obviously care about her. You just need to be careful that you are supportive and that you are not following your own agenda re. the name changing, otherwise you may just alienate her when possibly she really needs a good friend.

I guess you have to think whether what you really want is for her to force this issue because that might show up the DP as controlling and she will then have second thoughts about the marriage? My best friend didn't like my DP (at least she didn't like our relationship I think) and it was a part of why our friendship withered a bit. I thought that she was asking lots of really intrusive questions, but I'm sure she felt she was looking out for me. Perhaps she was, but it didn't feel very supportive at the time. If you can have a neutral conversation then no problem at all.

I took dh's name and consider myself to be a feminist. I'm certainly not oppressed, nor would I assume that someone who kept their maiden name was more free than someone who didn't. It sounds like the question you'd really like to ask is not are you keeping your name, but why are you marrying the "meaty man's man" in question, and is he controlling you?

I don't consider myself defined by either my father's name or my husband's. Probably because the names are very similar and I have a very unusual first name. I tend to just use my first name, but in my professional world that's quite acceptable.

I'm from Welsh stock too Sakura, had a long, difficult maiden name I've burdened DS with as a middle name.

One of my Dad's friend's sons has taken a new name, relating to the local river, I think it's a stage name and there's a tradition of taking a 'bardic' name too I think.
People are often known by nicknames there too, Dai Bread etc.

I didn't marry my husband for children ( my post did rather sound like that, didn't it!). I just mean that if I hadn't desired children, I would just had a long monogomous affair with him until it petered out. I wouldn't have got married.

I ended up taking my husband's name.
I found being a daughter more oppressive than being a wife.
I chose to separate myself from the daughterly oppression by symbolically severing and recreating my identity through my name.
You can choose your husband, not your family.
I love my family, but it was something I had to do.
If I hadn't wanted children, I wouldn't have got married to anyone.
My kids' first names were chosen exclusively by me and they have my husband's sir-name, which I'm not that happy with on the whole, but I do feel that because the children came from me and are therefore more part of me, I want my husband to have a fatherly claim on them which I let him do by giving them his name.
Professionally I vary between my maiden name and married name. My passport is in my maiden name. I haven't changed my name with the bank etc. I'm Welsh, and culturally the Welsh are used to varying the way they use their names. Many Welsh people refer to themselves by their middle name, for example. It's not set in stone. I added a middle name onto my daughter's passport when she was one in case she doesn't like her first name when she's older and can use the other one.

She is probably aware that it is perfectly possible to keep her name if she chooses to. Its not unusual of uncommon so its unlikely that she won't have come across the idea before. Her choice to change or not will depend on how much she is bothered by the principle, what her dh feels about it and what his thoughts mean to her, what her relationship with her father and her fathers family is like and which name she likes the sound of, which name will be better profesionally and if she is bothered by the logistics of having a different name to her dh and possibly her dcs. Its not as straightforward as if you are a feminist you must keep your name and if you don't you it must because you a married to a controlling bully. Do you think you are letting your unease about the man she is marrying colour your judgement of her being able to make the choices she wants?

I consider my first name to be my name and my last name to be my family name. I love having the same family name as my dh and dcs as well as my bils and sils and dns. I wouldn't be at all bothered about having the name of my cousins who I've never met. Its a personal choice and not an antifeminist statement.

wrt your friend I think you would be patronising wrong to try and persuade her. If she has to be talked into it I can't see any good coming of it tbh. Asking her if she is changing or not might make her think about it if she hasn't already.

Blimey.

Is there a deed poll form that I can sign saying "I take this name for myself, my husband, and future issue"?

Eh?

mrsrisotto what you're proposing sounds a bit odd TBH. We double barreled to become Mr and Mrs Myname-Hisname. The children are all Myname-Hisname as well.

DH took out a deed poll but I didn't. The deed poll he signed says "I take this name for myself, my wife and future issue". So in point of fact I have never actually changed my name officially.

As to what happens with the next generation, well that is up to them. DD has already said she will probably combine Myname with her DH's name when the time comes, and lose her father's name altogether. One of the DS's plans to just use DH's surname (but presumably that would depend on any future spouse agreeing). I'd like one of them to keep my name but if they don't well that is their choice.

can't force, sorry

I also changed my surname because I don't like my maiden name. I struggled with the spellign and ugly, hard sound for years and it wa s relief to change it to something softer and prettier.

I have kept my maide name as a middle name for professional purposes - so I am First name- Maiden Name- Married Name at work, iyswim.

I don't think you have any place suggesting she keep her name or otherwise - totally her decision. I am a feminist, btw, and generally do agree that the whole 'taking your husband's name just because' thing is outdated patriarchal nonsense. I just don't think you can force these opinions on friends - gets too messy.

I have two friends where the man was going to take the womans name - nicer names and otherwise would be the end of the line for the name.

In the end they never got around to it and now they do the traditional thing -I think a lot of people take the path of least resistance TBH.

Why not suggest that he take her name?

Why would you care what your friend is doing? I'm sure she's made her own decision about what she'll do. I don't mean to be arsey but let her fight it out herself.

It is a bind. I have never been keen on double barrelled names - just a personal thing but I think they're cumbersome. In the event DH already had a double-barreled name so I got that. it's a bloody mouthful! He suggested triple-barrelling when we got engaged but that is clearly ridiculous!

msrisotto - if you double barrell but do it the other way round for you and your OH - then you still have the problem with which version do the kids get? You would also get people who know your DH better referring to you as Mrs his-one, and people who know you better referring to him as mr your-one. I think that would get really irritating quite quickly! You would also get people like eg bank joint account type forms, having a "brain/computer says no" situation all the time.

If I were you I'd just pick one and go with that.

Oh I forgot - of course the other reason that people do what I did ie the traditional method - is that everything is set up for that. The woman just tells the registrar and it's done. Whereas for the man to change, means deed poll. If everyone changes, that's 2 deed polls, and then double of the task of changing the passports, bank accounts, driving licences, everything. Which is bad enougn doing it for one! So I took the 2nd easiest way out - the easiest being keeping your original name and not changing abything. But then you're back to what about the kids? I can't imagine many men would be cheerful about having a different surname to their children.

When your children marry someone with a double barrel surname, the convention is that they combine the wife's mother's family name with the Husband's father's family name, so that they still only have a double barrel name.

I prefer the Icelandic version - my daughter would be Miss Millysdaughter and my son would be Mr Peterson (if my husband was called Peter).

yeah! Headache.....

And then when your children decide to marry someone else with a double-barreled name...

I am pondering this one currently as me and DP recently got engaged. I think he is coming round to both of us double barrelling it. I will remain Ms and he/we do want to recognise our union IYSWIM and the potential children surnames dilemma would be slightly easier.

Still, how would it work? You change to yurname-hisname and he changes to hisname-yourname and post to/reservations etc for the both of you gets addressed to both of those names? It's not perfect.

I don't think of my name as being that central to my self-construct.

I don't believe in the soul or an immutable essential me anyway, so changing parts of what makes up my sense of self isn't that problematic to me.

I wanted us and any future children to have the same name.

And keeping one's father's name doesn't seem that much more radical than just following tradition of taking husband's name.

Although in the past marriage may have been about the handing over of ownership of a woman, I see it as being in the protectorate of husband and his family. Mothers and infants are vulnerable and to me marriage and being Mrs. .... means that society asknowledges that Mr. .... is responsible for his family.

I think it would be better if we could choose our own names, or have an individual name given in the Native American style Sitting Bull.
Make a clean break from the patriarchal naming system.

And then eventually a removal of titles indicating gender altogether, I suppose.

Just ask her if she is going to change her name and take it from there.

If she is going to take his name, and he is someone who would not be at all happy with anything else, then trying to persuade her will either a. not work or b. work and cause a whole load of trouble in her relationship. So I wouldn't push it TBH.

As for whether it's an essential feminist thing - I always felt that I would definitely keep my own name on marriage. But when it actually came to it I thought that for various reasons I would change it. Mainly to do with wanting to have the same surname as any children (and DH would not have been happy having a different surname to his children), and practical reasons to do with official type people getting confused. It just seemed easier.

In the scheme of things I think that how people operate in their day to day relationships has more of an impact than what they call themselves. I think people were surprised that I changed my name but knew it wasn't because I had changed IYSWIM.

Would still like to see miss and mrs scrapped and replaced with ms though. That one really annoys me.

My friends and I have talked a lot about changing our names as each of us has got married. Just a simple, 'what do you think you'll do? have you ever thought about keeping your maiden name' should get the ball rolling.