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How many of you ladies changed/are changing your lastname? I'm not engaged yet, but my SO and I have talked about me changing my last name when the time comes. I am all for it. My Mom were talking about it randomly and she said she feels that when you take your husbands lastname you "lose part of your identity." She seemed to be upset about the fact that I want to change mine. I feel that it is tradition to change it and never thought about keeping mine.
I'm just curious how everyone on the bee feels about it.
I am definitely taking his last name. I am very traditional and I am excited to take his last name.
I think thats alittle extreme to be honest lol. I'm changing mine. My FI hasnt pressured me at all, but he said he would like me too. I told my parents and they said they dont care either way, its my choice. Im still the same person, my last name is just different.
I kept my last name because it was important to ME
That's great if your mom feels that way about her name, just as it's great how you feel about YOUR name--you should do whatever YOU want--not let other people (mom-fiance, etc) browbeat you.
I always thought I would growing up, but as the wedding approached I realized how important it was to me to keep my name.
We're both traditional so I always planned to take his. Even though I kind of hate it. No one can pronounce it from the way it looks (it's french). :-P
I am thinking (not sure yet) that I want to make my maiden name a second middle name. It just sounds weird together.
@MissKatieP: I don't think I will be taking FI's last name. I'm already published under my name, so I'm not opposed to going by his name socially but I want to stick with my name in my career. Haven't 100% decided whether I'll take both names or not, though. When I told my mom this, she freaked out and told me that "a family can't be a family without a family name" (ie- the complete OPPOSITE of your mom's reaction lol). My advice? Go with whatever your gut tells you to do and ignore whatever everyone else has to say about it :-)
I'l be taking his last name for a few reasons. Let's say I'm Ms. A and he's Mr. B. I would never want to be called Mrs. A because that's my mom's name. Growing up, my friends called her Mrs. A. My sister in law, when she married my brother, became Mrs. A.
I'm not hyphenating because my first name is 3 syllables, my middle name is 2 syllables, and each of our current last names are two syllables. 3 2 2-2. It's a mouthful.
My only regret is that my last name is a color (and not a common color name like brown or green) and thus easy to spell, pronounce, explain over a bad phone like, "It's BLANK! Like, the color!" His last name is a bastardized spelling of an archiac French word for lawyer and has all sorts of double letters and a silent letter at the end. I don't look forward to trying to explain how to spell it to people now, "It's BLANK! Like, the... here do you have a pen?"
@MissKatieP: Maiden name is becoming new middle name, and I'm taking his last name.
I will be taking his name... he is very traditional,and he really wants this- hes looking forward to me having his name. and i was married before and HATE HATE my last name now.. i was considering changing my middle name to my maiden name- but decided against it.... the only thing is i will having a mouthful of a name once we are married but i def wont get confused with anyone else
I plan on taking his last name. My last name is longer than his and will look weird hyphenated and it's just more complicated
I will be taking my FI surname, it's tradition after all. In fact if I didn't I would probably get more comments as to why not :)
I'm finishing my PhD and plan to be Dr. MyLastName, but Mrs. HisLastName.
I am planning on keeping my last name. Just because as the wedding approached I felt a huge identity crisis coming on from changing it.
Sometimes last names mean a lot to some people, sometimes it doesn't. I'm always one to question the norm and when I did so the tradition of taking his last name.... was outdated in my opinion. I felt I was losing a part of myself so I did not change it.
To each their own. Know that you're going to get flack for doing anything different than just changing it all the way, even hyphenating it. :/ That's just how most people think.
My advice is just to stay strong and stick to your gut feeling on the matter. There's really no right and wrong answer. As your FI what he thinks about it. Maybe his opinion will help you make up your mind.
Ironically I was fine taking his last name until after the wedding planning and drama insued. Then I was NOT interested in taking it since it reminded me of his mother and the other crazy ladies in his family. Unfortunately we had a huge fight on it so I slunk off to SSO/DMV and just recently changed it.
I changed my last name. Thinking about it definitely felt like I was losing a part of my identity though. As a compromise I kept my maiden name as a second middle name. Even though it makes for a reaaaallly long name, it helped with the transition. Its like adding on the new name to the new me, instead of getting rid of my old identity altogether, if that makes any sense. But to each their own!
@vickyness: I think secretly this is the reason I was so against changing it. Hearing someone call me by my MIL's name is too uncanny. I hate it. Not changing my name reminds me of how I'm different
I will legally be First MyLast HisLast. At work I will stay First MyLast because his last name is so common that it would cause email issues and I've established a name for myself. Socially I will be First HisLast to make sure I have the same last name as future kids.
I am planning on hyphanating.... I wanted to keep my last name. Mostly becasue of the whole identity issues and also the feminist in me takes over and thinks that the whole name changing thing is really silly. I can tell FI wants me to change it though, so I did agree to hyphanate.
I made my maiden name my middle name, and took his last name, so instead of MyFirst MyMiddle MyLast I'm MyFirst MyLast HisLast. I was a little attached to my last name, but it was never a question for me to take his name...it was what felt right, it was what I wanted, and I love his last name.
It's a very personal decision, and you shouldn't let anyone browbeat or shame you into making a particular choice. If you want to take his name, take it. If you want to keep your name, keep it. It should only matter what YOU want.
I don't even think I thought about it--I just assumed I'd take his. It's "just a name" and it makes things a lot easier later when there are children in school, etc.
I'm hyphenating. People at work can call me Ms. MyLast or Mrs. Mine-His if they prefer, and our friends and family won't be corrected if they call me Mrs. His.
I wanted to keep mine for multiple reasons, the main being that everyone knows me in this profession as Ms. Mine. And once I'm out and working, I prefer to have my name not necessarily associated with my children for safety reasons. So Mine-His worked well.
Im adding his name to my name. So I'll probably write my name: FirstName MaidenName LastName. My maiden name will become my middle name (although Im not changing my middle name either...I may do FirstName MiddleInitial MaidenName LastName). I have a really unique last name - there is no one in the United States (and probably Europe as well) that has my last name but is not related to me. So I would never remove it from my name.
I graduated law school 5 years ago and have been working in the field ever since. I am known by my name and it is important to me. Professionally, it makes the most sense to keep it.
Socially, if people call me Mrs. DH, I don't correct them and we didn't make a big deal out of it at the wedding or anything.
I had an inkling of doubt a few weeks ago and then went to book a couple of work trips. I quickly realized what a huge hassel changing would be for me!
I will be taking my husbands name but moving my current last name to my middle name. I like keeping my last name somewhere in the mix, its a sense of family but as I start my own family I definately want us all to have the same last name
My husband and I both legally changed our last names! We decided on something new for our own family (it happened to be a name he had used professionally as an alias, and it has two additional meanings to us, but it is not related to our families' last names).
I wanted us to have the same last name, it is so nice and does make things easier. I would have taken his given last name, but he didn't want me to! He didn't think it was fair for me to take HIS name, and he didn't particularly love his last name so we chose this new one for us both.
I dropped my given last name, he kept his and just added on our new last name. We both LOVE our new name, love being the "Smiths" together and we feel awesome that this was something we both decided together and did equally (kinda funny because I am totally not a feminist).
@Ashley_B: I don't think it's that far off to think of your last name as part of your identity. Most people would not want to change their first name because it's part of your identity, so why change the last? If I wasn't engaged in a professional career (published papers, etc.) and I wasn't going to be the first doctor in my family, I would probably just change my last name to my FH. But my professional name has become part of my identity, and although I would love to add his name to compliment my identity, I don't want to change it all together.
Definitely not taking his name, I like my name as it is and see no reason to change it!
I don't want to completely drop my name so my maiden name will become my middle name and I'll be taking his last name. I understand wanting to keep your indentity but I don't think adding his name will change how you are perceived as an individual.
I'm dropping my middle name and making my last name my middle name and his last name our last name.
@mcklough: i'm doing the same! I love my maiden name and it has so much history. FI's name is hyphenated and sort of made up. His mother was adopted by her aunt who had shortened her maiden name then hyphenated...
@Mrs.Lonestar: I asked SO if he would consider dropping his middle name and taking my last name as his too, but he wasn't too hot about it and ultimately it's not a big deal.
He is the 5th in his family (but they all have different middle names so there are no numbers, thank god!) so the first son will also have his name. I want the second child or first girl to have my last name as her first name. I LOVE my name
I would have been ok with changing it to his, had we met/dated/married earlier in life, but seeing as I am nearly done with a PhD and have a few scientific publications that I want to be easily attribtued to me, I won't be changing my last name. He is supportive of whatever I want to do.
I'm a tad worried about how our (mostly his) extended families will react, or if we'll run into confusion or complications over it. (No matter how much warning we try to give, I am certain we'll get checks made out to a person who doesn't exist, and hopefully the bank will be understanding!) But given my professional situation I think changing it would be unwise. Anyone without my CV in hand would think I have no publications.
I am changing my last name to his. My daughter, my mother, and I all have the same middle names so I didn't want to hyphonate and have 4 names, so I will just change my last name to his. That way I can also keep the middle name my family has made a tradition. Hopefully my daughter will keep it going with her daughter :)
I said 'other' because I technically can't change my last name. If you're a resident of Quebec, whether you marry there or somewhere else like we are, you can't legally change your documents when you get married.But we're marrying in NYC and moving to NC, so once I'm a resident in the US but still a Canadian citizen, I might be able to change my passport, for example.
I probably *would* change my last name if I could because I'm not terribly attached to it and we'll be married before I finish my PhD or have my first publication, but I share a last name with my daughter. We don't really care about the two of us having different last names, but I want all our children to share a last name, so it becomes problematic. His is a hyphenated name (both beginning with C) and my last name also begins with C, so there's zero hyphenation possibility for our kids without dropping one of his and creating a ridiculous half French/half English alliterative hyphenated name... Sigh.
I am taking his last name its easier to pronounce and we have 2 kids together I would like to have the same name as them.
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