Did you change your name when you got married?

[MooncakeandAvocato]

I’m getting married soon. I will not be changing my last name - it’s not a practice that appeals to either of us. Any children will be double barrelled. This is a decision with which we’re both very happy.

This has come up in conversation with our families and friends and the reactions have been interesting. Nothing particularly negative, as we’re very much the demographic for this sort of thing, but a few of my female friends/relatives (none of the male ones) have expressed mild surprise that I ‘don’t want his name’ and ‘he’s okay with it’.

I find this interesting, so I thought I’d bring it to MN. Did you change your last name upon marriage? Why or why not? Do you regret your decision to change/not change it?

To be perfectly clear, I am happy with our decision (not canvassing for opinions on it). I am also entirely supportive of every woman and every couple choosing the naming convention that best works for them, so not judging people for doing things differently to us. Just interested in hearing people‘s experiences.

Double barrel is sometimes fine but what about when those kids have kids, do they double the double barrel and have four?!

Literally no one has ever produced this penetrating 'insight' before.

@toastofthetown

I changed mine - though moved my surname to a middle name spot. I dislike double barrelled names so don't want one for me or my children. I also wanted to share the same surname as my husband and for any children we have to share the same family name too. That left us with three options: my name, his name or a new name and we chose his name. I don't really care what anyone does, as long as they are happy with it. Anecdotally most of the people I know personally and professionally have changed their names, fewer have double barrelled and fewer again retained their maiden name. That actually surprised me, as I expected the number changing their name to be far lower than it actually has been so far. I'm in my twenties, so I wonder as I get older if more friends will retain or double barrel their names.

And to answer your question on age and location. I'm late twenties and live in the midlands, but my friends are scattered around the world. I have't noticed any correlation between location and name change (but that's a small sample size). I think age might be a bigger one. A pp mentioned having half a lifetime of professional development in her name, but that wouldn't be the case for my friends who married in their early twenties.

Changed mine because I was persuaded against my better judgement to change it on my first marriage. I didn't want to go into a second marriage with my ex's name.

Didn't want new husband's name either because that would have meant being called the same as MIL!

So I did a deed poll change back to my birth name.

@JadeTrinket well what’s the answer then

I didn’t change my name.

DS has my family name as a middle name, it’s is actually a boys name as well which was handy. So it’s not double barrelled.

My family name was extremely common which I’ve never liked. I always knew I wanted to change my last name whether I married or not. I really like DH’s last name so changed it to that. I go by Ms though

Double barrel is sometimes fine but what about when those kids have kids, do they double the double barrel and have four?!

I'm actually aiming to raise my children to have sufficient problem solving skills that they can find their own solution to this utterly confounding issue.

I do suspect that they'll drop one or other of their surnames at some point (probably DH's as mine is that incredibly rare thing, a woman's name that's nicer than her DH's) and that's absolutely fine, it's their name. They can change it to something entirely different if they want!

@Bowlofhotslop I think it’s really up to the kids in question to decide what they want to do as and when the time comes, as we’re doing now.

However, in cultures that traditionally double barrelled last names, the custom is for people to keep their birth names upon marriage and give their kids a double barrelled name that comprises one name from each parent. So, for example Maria Sanchez Ortega marries Eduardo Fernández Garrido and all of their kids are XX Ortega Garrido. Historically, the father’s last name came first, but that’s no longer the case, so you can do them in whatever order you like.

Just to add as well I didn't get any assumptions that I would change my name. From all my family and friends it was 'what are you two doing about names?' type questions rather than assuming that I would automatically change it.

Didn’t change mine, DH didn’t change his. Child has both surnames, sometimes people assume otherwise, they’re corrected if it’s important for accuracy.

The paperwork seems laborious, particularly if you split up and have to change it again.

@Hardbackwriter people are so defensive about this! It wasn’t a dig, it was a genuine question. I’d actually find it quite difficult to choose to drop one if I was double barrelled but also would not want to take on another double barrelled name. Perhaps in that case creating a new name altogether would be better as some people do.

Didn’t change mine. My mum hadn’t changed hers so for me it was normal not to and I’d seen first hand that it didn’t cause any issues. No issues for me either.

I have my mum’s surname as a middle name and have passed that name on to my DCs as a middle name (they have DH surname) so it’s clear we are all family.

IME people changing their names does quite often cause (minor) issues at work as you don’t know that the random Liza Jones calling or emailing you is actually Liza Smith who you worked with last month, you can’t find people on LinkedIn, won’t recognise them on a list of attendees, people say “oh speak to Liza Smith” but then you can’t find them as they are now Jones, etc. Connections get lost.

@MooncakeandAvocato thank you that’s very informative.

@Hardbackwriter “I'm actually aiming to raise my children to have sufficient problem solving skills that they can find their own solution to this utterly confounding issue.”

I snorted my tea!

@Bowlofhotslop Excellent. Glad to help!

Creating an entirely new name is always an option, as well. I suspect the actual solution will be something that hasn’t occurred to any of us. I’d be quite interested to see what naming conventions look like in 50 to 100 years - what’s changed and what’s stayed the same.

I was a lefty Londoner when I got married, I live far away now. Most of my friends are quite career-driven, married and had kids late 30s (and we were all Ms before we were teenagers).
My children have both surnames. I don’t really call either my spouse or my offspring by anything other than their first names so I simply couldn’t care less about the idea of a family name.
There was a kid in my year who was in a cult where the women changed their first names rather than surnames so his mum was the equivalent of Brian-Kate Maidenname. Everyone thought it was weird but much later I thought it’s actually exactly the same thing.

No. And I got married 24 years ago when it was usual to change.

I feel quite strongly about it and I like my maiden name.

I'm keeping my name when we marry. Our daughter is double barrelled which FIL has spent the last year making comments about and constantly "forgetting" although he never forgets the part of her name that corresponds to him, just me. So I fully expect him to refer to me as Mrs Hisname until the day he dies

Yes I changed my name from a beautiful double barrelled name to a very common surname. I regret it eveytime I see it written or have to sign something

So many of my friends changed their names, divorced when husbands cheated, and now have to drag around their husbands' names because it is too late to change. ( we are all in our 50s).

@Bowlofhotslop I'm sorry if it was a genuine question but as the other sarky reply you got suggested, people say this all the time and it's not usually a genuine question, they normally think they've smugly and originally caught you out with an impossible question. Which is why I have a sarky set response - that isn't the first, or the tenth, time I've used that answer...

@toastofthetown We mostly didn’t get assumptions, either. The few expressions of (mild) surprise were very much the exception. Which is what made it so interesting, I think.

For the record, I’ve got two postgrad degrees and a decade of professional achievements in my name, but that’s not why I’m not changing it. I’m not changing it because I don’t see any reason why I should. It didn’t even occur to me (or my soon to be DH) that I needed a reason, tbh.

I double-barrelled mine, but now wish I hadn’t. The resulting name sounds good (or at least I thought so at the time) but, in the Internet age, there’s nowhere to hide because it’s so distinctive.

For the record, I’ve got two postgrad degrees and a decade of professional achievements in my name, but that’s not why I’m not changing it. I’m not changing it because I don’t see any reason why I should. It didn’t even occur to me (or my soon to be DH) that I needed a reason, tbh.

Yes, a lot of people assumed I was keeping my name because I was an academic and had a doctorate in that name, but that was actually nothing to do with it. I kept it because it was my name. Men don't have to achieve anything in particular in their name for people to accept that they might be quite attached to it!

@CherryRedDMs Certainly seems like the same thing to me!