Letters to the Editor
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The question I had to answer was -- did I want to disappear?
I went to school with a girl whose names was Mary. Mary Elizabeth. But I won't ever be able to find her because I'm sure one day she, like me, married. And changed her name. And vanished.
I didn't change my name because it never occured to me to do so. Why would I want to disappear and reimerge as someone else? I wasn't in hiding. I had done nothing wrong.
I gave my children their father's last name. It made him happy and I had no problem with being known as Thing 1 and Thing 2's mother. I am now married to a different man, with a different last name, still not the same as mine. We have no problem understanding our relationship.
I remain my grandmother's granddaughter, my classmate's classmate, my coworker's coworker. I bring my history and my name with me. Good and bad. There it is. I am not lost.
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If you take his name
he will be left nameless.
Which is kind of how women see men today, anonymous tools.
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Getting Lost
I kept my name which was very common at the time(1980). I felt a strong affinty for my family, my name and and my heritage. But most importantly we(my hubby and I) have lived in several different states and countries and never returned home to live. I wanted my friends to be able to find me wherever I was and keeping my name has made this happen time and again.
The kid issue was a bit of a dilema. We had two boys ,I got to pick the first name, gave them my m last name as a middle and my husband's as a last.Eight years later we decided to have another. s he got the same. Due to my last name being diferent (kids rarely if ever use their middle name) many people assume I am Erinn's stepmother...In fact my son recently home from college discovered that two of his best friends thought for fifteen years that my husband was his stepfather. These are kids we had alnmost living at our house. So its a tossup if I had to do it over again. I have noticed that the two older boys have started using their middle (my last) name now that they are away from home. I do think if your bethrothed insists upon you taking his name and it is as issue for you find another guy. That is a red flag to me re: control issues. Itshouldn't be a make or break deal.
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Just sad...
This is the saddest sentence I have read here in a long time:
Various, mundane circumstances have led us to decide that marriage is the right thing to do now.
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kudos to the men
I haven't read one letter from a guy stating he was going to change his name to his wife's because of an abusive/absent father. They are also apparently really, really attached to their last names as well. Why is it that only women had terrible family lives or hate their names?
I'm all for choice, but isn't it funny that only women are pressured to make this choice? Why is that?
On a more serious note I've seen a couple of letters from women saying they changed their names to "show commitment" or some crap like that. If that's what it takes to be committed, you guys already have problems.
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What???
"The paperwork involved in changing my name was a nightmare and screwed up my credit rating--did you know that your credit history evaporates if you change your name, even if for the "conventional" reason of getting married? The system assumes that women don't have any credit history before they marry and/or apart from their husband."
To me, that's a load of crap. When I look up my credit report, it shows every single line of credit I've opened since I was 18, it even showed accounts I've had closed for years. It shows every single address I've ever lived at, because the credit form asks for all legal names I've ever had. Credit ratings don't disappear just because you changed your name or otherwise people who've filed for bankruptcy would just change their names and start off with brand spanking new credit histories and easily obtain loans, the credit industry has to be a little more savvy than you changed your name so now we don't have any of your history.
As for the paperwork, I'm not sure what these nightmares are. I had to have a certified birth certificate to have a drivers license in the first place. I have a copy of my marriage license because it's a legal document and I have all of my legal documents in a safety deposit box.
I went to the social security office, in 10 minutes they finished my application and I live in a city with the population of almost a million people. After that was done I went to the DMV and had it changed, took just as long as doing anything at the DMV does. Then my credit cards, I had to send them a copy of my marriage license. For work, I went into my work software and told them I got married. At the doctor, I just told them, my name changed, here's my new insurance card, which my work took care of. So all in all, it probably took a grand total of 6 hours to change my name. I didn't have a passport before I was married, so when I got one it wasn't a big deal, it was just the birth certificate and the marriage license. Are you paperwork challenged or just like whining, if it was so much trouble, why do it. If it was going to be hell to do it I wouldn't have.
As for phone bills and the like, what the hell do I care if they come in with my old last name, I still have to pay the damn things. When I move, or change cell companies, I'll have them started under my new name.
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it's true
"The paperwork involved in changing my name was a nightmare and screwed up my credit rating--did you know that your credit history evaporates if you change your name, even if for the "conventional" reason of getting married? The system assumes that women don't have any credit history before they marry and/or apart from their husband."
This happened to my mom as well...it was the late '60s-early '70s, but it was her credit that was screwed when HE filed for bankruptcy.