To not want the faff of changing my surname if we get married this year...

[SweetMarmalade]

Dp & I have been together for almost 25 years, have a dc.

Possibly going to tie the knot this year, no big event, we’ve decided we really should just go ahead and do it. Won’t change who we are, our relationship but it will make us both feel secure for the future.

My biggest issue is changing my name! I’m late 40’s, at this time in my life the thought of changing my name seems like a big pita! Bank, passport, GP, hospital, driving license etc etc

Dp would like me to change my name, I’d like to keep it! We’ve talked about if I possibly‘double-barrel’ it but it’s still a faff! I love my surname, it means a lot to me and my heritage.

I love him, want to marry him, aibu not wanting to change my name?

Your name, your choice.

I would probably use Ms MaidenName but it’s up to you. I also probably wouldn’t bother getting existing places to change my title specially but would just use ms on new stuff or if I happened to be calling places anyway ask them to update it,

My kids think it's normal for Mums to have different surnames
I live in Italy and you can't change your name so it absolutely is!

YANBU but it really isn't that difficult to change your name.

I didn't change my name and I'm Ms Surname. There's nothing complicated about it.

Don’t change it and then elderly relatives can’t piss you off writing Mrs DP initial Married Surname on mail....

Like mine do...... Ugh.

Dh & I both changed our name when we married. We just picked one we liked. I've been happy with that but I'm told that dh's grandfather is 'spinning in his grave'.

I'd rather be a miss than a mrs. Miss seems independent to me, not a sad spinster.

Funny how your Dp is keen for you both to have the same surname but not keen enough to change his own .

@SweetMarmalade, why are you buying into patriarchal norms that suggest that marriage is the pinnacle of woman’s existence? I was with my DP for more than 20 years, and I can honestly say it never occurred to either of us for a single second that I would do anything as anti feminist and ridiculous as change my name, or that our DS would not have both names as a matter of course. I was Dr Framing Device before we married and Dr Framing Device afterwards.

"Just be aware that Mrs. Is short for mistress!"

How ridiculous to say this and in the Uk there is no full stop after Mrs usually/needed.

FWIW I kept my own name but my children have his name. This was after healthy discussion. What finally swung it for me was several research articles that seemed to suggest that children do slightly better in school if their surname Is closer to the beginning of the alphabet. His surname begins with a letter far closer to A than mine 🙄

I didn't change mine. I haven't ever regretted it.

Have met plenty of women who changed their name reluctantly, some who have regretted changing their name but none who regretted keeping their own name.

My dd has my name.

Ps, I wouldn't have married a man who insisted I change my name.

Do NOT change your name if you don’t want to. I’m a product of a generation who almost all automatically took their husbands surname. It’s been a bone of contention all my married life. This year I set up my own business and discovered if I wanted to use my maiden name for anything I had to change by deed poll. Worst decision was just not thinking about it. You are, and my strong advice is do not give up your own name.

Dh & I both changed our name when we married. We just picked one we liked.
^^

I’d have happily done this.

Which shows my excuses about it being a faff were just that. I didn’t mind rebranding myself, but didn’t want to feel like I was being rebranded as someone’s property.

I got married and didn’t change my surname. DH didn’t want to take mine - despite mine being the better surname (his is rare and sounds rude, mine is common and so easy to spell/pronounce). I asked if he’d take my surname as a middle name, which I acknowledged he’d never use. If he did that I move my surname to my middle name and take his. He said no. So nobody changed. I don’t go by his name socially either - apart from my in-laws (of course ).

I changed my title to Mrs my surname. But things like bank and doctors want my marriage certificate to change the title, which is a faff so I’m just down as Miss still. I kinda like having different titles as I dislike that someone can know my marital status before my first name. Keeps people on their toes. Also as I tend to book most things - he’s often called Mr MySurname, so he gets a taste of what I have to put up with

I was widowed young and have married again.
Didn't occur to me to keep my name first time round
I'm now recently married in middle age and wanted to take my new husband's name
It doesn't make me any less independent and I'm certainly not Offred!

Why would you change it? And why after 25 years together would he care?

I married more than 25 years ago. I was Ms Pallisers before I married and Ms Pallisers after I married.

Yes I use Miss currently

You don't have to, if you find it bothers you. There's no law about this.

I know, part of me wishes Dc had both our names, he does have my father’s first name as a middle name. Our names together don’t flow that well, silly really but that’s probably the only reason. Dp wouldn’t have minded, it was discussed and then it just never happened.

Been happily married since 1997 but really regret changing my name. It was when I realised a few months in that he would never have changed his name to mine that I knew it was a mistake. Have considered changing it back but that seems like a real faff now. He also now says he regrets wanting me to change my name at the time and now realises what a big ask it was.

If I don’t change my name do I become Mrs (maiden name)?.

You can tick Ms or Mrs on any form you have to fill in, regardless of surname.

Or Miss, Mr, Mx or none.

I don’t know why anyone would change their name just because they’ve made their relationship legally binding. It’s a throwback to when people could literally be owned. Hideous.

Been married 25 years and we still get cheques from MIL to Mr DHname and Mrs DHname. Every year DH says to his mum, “Thank you for the cheque. I can’t bank it because we don’t have a bank account with Mrs DHname on because that isn’t Cankles’ name.”

This late 40’s ‘spinster’s’ marital status up there in red lights for all to see!

WTF? Why do you care? There is SO MUCH messed up about this. Have you never heard of Ms?

I never bothered! There was a brief window where I was Ms Myname, then I passed my PhD viva and became Dr Myname. So I never was a Mrs.

My little bastard DC call me Mrs DHname sometimes when they're trying to piss me off. That's not my name, thank you!

I was with my husband for 14 years before we got married. We had already got five children together and they all have my surname. Partly that was because I felt if he wouldn't marry me then why should I give the kids his surname but also the practicality of birth certificates. If we gave them his name and then broke up I couldn't change their names back and get new birth certificates but if they had my surname and then we married we were told that was the only time you could get new birth certificates. You can change their name by deed poll but wouldn't get a birth certificate whereas if the two biological parents get married you can then get a new birth certificate with the fathers surname on.

As it turned out I decided to keep my name even when we did get married as the kids didn't want to change their names and nor did I really so it was easier to keep them as they were and change Miss to Mrs. My husband would have liked me to change our names but not enough to fight me on it so we just stuck how we are - not the end of the world.

Also as I tend to book most things - he’s often called Mr MySurname, so he gets a taste of what I have to put up with

Yep. Did this with our honeymoon. Have never had anything but support for keeping our own names since.