Changing last name after marriage (call, divorced, social, people)

[JustJulia]

Originally Posted by 2mares

So basically a marriage certificate does not change ones last name. You must take the marriage certificate to each organization that you have documents with a request a name change.

Correct. You name does not automatically change.

[akorosdc]

Originally Posted by 2mares

So basically a marriage certificate does not change ones last name. You must take the marriage certificate to each organization that you have documents with a request a name change. I did not do this with most of my important documents.

Now when I got divorced, I had to request and have stated in the divorce papers that I wanted my previous name back. I had to show it to change my bank account, they didnt ask for it at the insurance co. Nothing else of importance had been changed when I got married.

This just dosent make sense to me. All I can figure is that I must have been doing something illegal for the last 10 yrs.

I don't know if it's really "illegal", though it could have caused issues further down the line when you had various names for different things.

[imagardener]

Originally Posted by Huckleberry3911948

no desire to change name-- is a strong indicator of where the marriage is going.
separate everything. very weak bonding.
marriage does not just finish badly- its starts badly.
why marry only to divorce.
25% of people are single
respect other peoples rights, live alone & dont marry them.

I did not change my name when I married my current and only husband of 23 years (33 years together). I was 23 at the time.
It was not important to him and I didn't see the need.

I have noticed since then that the typical profile for women who keep their name is: highly educated and/or upper middle to upper social class, certain cultures as mentioned previously, Northeast U.S. coast and California (damn liberals :-).

I have never seen a study that said women who did not change their names were more likely to divorce. Divorce is usually about money not someone's last name, Hucky.

[idesignsi]

Thank YOU for HYPHENS.....it keeps it simple...I use whichever I want to when I want to and the IRS knows the legal way my name is.....HYPHENATION is the easiest way......

[yellowsnow]

I changed my name because I like his name better than mine. I don't think he really cared one way or the other.

If I ever marry again, I may or may not. Not sure.

[msm_teacher]

I changed because his name was way cooler than mine.

It was not discussed because if he had insisted I change my name, I might have made him do all the paper work. I only changed it at the SS office. All our other stuff - bank, insurance, etc. was with the same company who just linked us together. We sent them permission for the other to have access, and that was that.

We did not think about this at the time, but it certainly is simplier to have the same name now we have kids.

[TabulaRasa]

Originally Posted by Tampaite

To all the women in this forum:

After marriage, did you change your last name to that of your husband's last name or husband's first name? and If so, why?

1. Was it your intention to change?

2. Was it expected after marriage?(maybe you had a discussion with your better half earlier during courtship!)

This is just an academic exercise so please don't post questions such as 'why should a woman change her last name..etc..etc..'


.

I don't plan to retain my maiden name. Mainly because I like my SO's surname better, it's "ethnic" and more interesting, whereas my last name is one of the most common in the nation and pretty vanilla. It's just a cooler name and I like how it sounds. If there are kids, I'd rather they grow up with a more unique for our area name, versus being one of a trillion "Smiths" in school, etc.

It's not expected that I take his name, although I do know that he finds hyphenates pretentious. I don't think he'd care if I chose to retain "Smith" over "Genovese," but wouldn't be a big fan of "Smith-Genovese."

I used to work in print journalism, and had an established byline with my maiden name. If I still worked in that field, I would likely continue to write under the name I'd established my career under. Even if I legally changed it to my spouse's last name. Essentailly, my former name would become my pen name, professionally.

[Tampaite]

Originally Posted by 2mares

First, who has ever changed there last name to their husbands first name? I have never heard of this.

I know for a fact that in South India, its traditional for the wife to take on husband's first name as her last name.

[kansas sky]

I will be taking my fiance's last name. We discussed it and he was fine with whatever I wanted to do. I like his last name a lot, but more importantly to me I want to change my name as a sign of my commitment to him and to our marriage. He'd be more than willing to do the same for me if that was the cultural norm...

[Mar1lyn27]

This is probably off topic but I would personally love to meet the man who changed HIS NAME to that of his wife. Can't be more than a miniscule percentage if any at all.

This discussion is all about the woman taking the man's name, which is exactly what I did. I never even thought about it; it was just what we did back then.

Had I had any enlightened thoughts at the tender age of 21 I would have kept mine.
Heck, if I'd had any enlightened thoughts I never would have married that man at all. LOL