Most of the time the last name never comes up. “Hi I’m Jane, this is my husband Tarzan.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Married_and_maiden_names indicates that the tradition of the wife changing surname is nothing close to universal among cultures around the world.
You can tell by a certain look in the husband’s eyes. Seriously, this is not a problem. My wife kept her last name, and it creates no issues.
What are same sex married couples doing about this?
For Hunt, one couple I know, one spouse changed her last name to the other’s last name, and used her “maiden” name as her middle name. Another couple, males, each kept their own name. I imagine it varies just as it does with hetero couples.
I was like others who have posted. The first time around, I was young and not established in any profession, so I changed my name without a thought. The second time around I would have preferred not to change my name, but I had the ex-H’s name.
It will be interesting to see what percentage of same sex couples change their names.
@stugace, my husband and I have no wedding rings, different last name, and we often like to pull jokes on other people, like he hold my hands and said something to the effect that we should enjoy our moment together before going back to our spouses. You bet we got looks from the busy body.
It’s all in the commitment, not all these external stuff. By anyone measure, we have a good marriage, so focus on the things that matter.
I don’t know, I’ve had forms notarized with no issue, as long as I bring older formerly valid ID with me. That’s about as far as it gets. I don’t fly any more because I would flip if anyone started frisking my kids.
My friend’s husband changed his name when she changed hers, they were both “Smythe-Jones” because there were no sons in her family and her father wanted to “carry on the name” (obviously a more unique name than Smythe, but you get the point. They wouldn’t just change to her last name apparently though.
And you can both be wearing wedding rings and say the exact same thing, DrGoogle.
I would not be married except for financial reasons, and eventually we had kids, so changing my name wasn’t something I thought about. I just did it. Also some of us with immigrant roots have had significant spelling changes in our original names, so my “original” name was not our original family name.
What I like is that my name is really common now, and was really uncommon before. With the Internet and all, changing your name to something very common is a good thing; people with unique names are very easy to find on the Internet. Having a common name makes life more difficult for stalkers.
Yes wearing wedding rings is the norm. Not to say that people shoukd not wear wedding rings.
But it’s an American thing because both my MIL and my mom lost their wedding rings way earlier in their marriage. We are aware if this problem so we don’t put too much faith in wedding rings, I’m just adding a different aspect to the matching wedding rings comment.
I have been married going on 34 years and have NEVER felt like a “Mrs” anyway! “Mrs.” is someone’s mom when I was 10 years old! I took my husband’s name and am fine with that but I still always just identify as “me” and not “mrs.” meaning someone’s wife or an elder.
That’s just me.
Having a common name is not always an advantage. Lenders and credit reporting companies may mistake you for someone else.
I did not change my name when I got married for several reasons, but mainly because I always liked my name and wanted to keep it. I go by my middle name, so dropping that was not an option. My maiden name is uncommon and I like it and combined with my middle name, which is also uncommon, makes it almost unique. I’m an artist and will never changed how I autograph my work. I was almost 31 when I got married and it would have been a LOT of things to change by then. I use my married name socially, but all legal documentation has my maiden name.
UCB, there’s no guarantee that that won’t happen even when your name ISN’T common. D has a common last name but a first name that was popular in the late 1800’s. When we took her to set up a bank account for her, it turned out that there was a woman living on the same street as us (we had just moved there), with the exact same name, down to the middle initial. Only their ages and house numbers were different. We had to bring in a birth certificate. It was the oddest coincidence!
We knew somebody who used two different names–that is she used her husband’s last name in some situations, and her “maiden” name in others–but what was unusual was that she used a different first name in those situations as well.
Back to original poster’s advice: Keep it consistent, no matter the choice – if that is possible. I chose to add H name and keep my own (first, middle, maiden, spouse). But it has caused problems. Not all forms give more than 3 separate spaces for names, so I frequently would only include first, middle i. and spouse. With children, I also liked that all our last names were the same, and would simply sign documents with first and last (spouse) name. IRS, however didn’t like that, and wanted to see ALL names in my signature (as it matches my SS card). Drivers License considers married name as my last name, and dropped the maiden. Passport considers maiden name as the start of my last name (as if it were hyphenated, although it is not). Had some issues with airline tickets, and now need to use my passport even when traveling locally. Ticket agents at the airport just laughed and said multiple names are common, but the online assistance was not as forgiving. Haven’t had issues w/ TSA – yet, but have only flown domestic.
I have to remember which name to use, depending on whether I’m booking domestic or international. I booked using my “driver’s license name” one time and the family almost went to Amsterdam without me. I am sometimes fortunate to get “TSA Pre” on my boarding pass. I cannot, however, get the paid version because all of my IDs don’t match.
Re: Issues with TSA at airport.
I believe almost all of DS’s government IDs include his middle name, but if the name of the ticket/boarding pass does not include his middle name (not even middle name initial), will he likely have a problem getting through the security check?
For myself, I think I have had at least 4 variations of my full name – some of them due to a typo (a mistake not done by me but it is next to impossible to have it corrected once a “mistake” is made.) What a mess. Luckily, I rarely travel. I often receive a check with a mis-spelled name (including one from IRS!), but usually I do not have a problem in depositing the check into my account at my bank. I never know when I will have a trouble due to an inconsistency in my name.
“Keep it consistent, no matter the choice – if that is possible.”
And if not, make sure your kids know all of the names.
My mother didn’t normally use her first name because there were too many aunts and cousins with that first name. She went by her middle name. When she married my dad in 1950, like most women in her generation she took on his last name. Most of her documents ended up being in the form of Middle Maiden Married, but certain documents had the birth certificate first name on them for whatever reason (alumni association correspondence from her college was one of them). This meant that there were all kinds of combos possible: First Middle Married, First Maiden Married, FirstInitial Middle MaidenInitial Married, etc. We made sure that the death certificate and all paperwork for the estate had all four names on it so that whoever would be using that paperwork would have a decent chance of finding the right name(s) that they needed to find.
When Happydad naturalized two years ago, his whole foreign birth certificate name ended up on the new US citizenship document. This forced a visit to the local Social Security Office to have a new SS card issued with that full name on it, and has been followed by a whole bunch of name fixing with banks and the like that is still continuing. (Want those frequent flyer miles? Make sure the name on the ticket matches the name on your frequent flyer card.) It hadn’t occurred to either of us that he might have to start using his original four-part Latin American style name after nearly 30 years with an abbreviated-by-the-international-students-office version. If we’d known in advance that this could happen, he might have thought to request the simpler version on his citizenship paperwork. Oh well.
My wife’s last name (before marriage) became her first name and her first name became her middle name. This happened by accident, not by design. Also, she gave herself an unofficial first name (which she usually uses, i.e., she wants to be called) which does not show up in any official document, driver license, credit cards, passport, etc. How can you imagine it would become such a mess.
I think my situation is slightly better, but in the end, I now have accumulated almost half a dozen variations of my name. It would require major efforts to clean this up - If this mess is not “fixed” before I die, I need to decide in what name I will die with.
Oh…even for my child who was born here, he did not know he has a middle name until he was almost graduated from high school. He said he knew we had mentioned a middle name to him before
but he thought it was just an unofficial one (i.e., a nick name only, or even a “joke”.) But it is indeed his official middle name. He rarely used his middle name and I wonder whether I should suggest him to use it consistently to avoid any inconveniences or troubles in the future.
I kept My name, because it was the name given to me when I was born. My H suggested it before I did. But it certainly has not been w/o its problems. Children’s friends and teacher’s did not know what to call me. When traveling, it is not always known we are married or even together. There have been problems with insurance, buying property, etc.
It has also had its advantages. We work for the same employer. People not knowing we are married has been interesting.