Is it better for a woman to change her last name at marriage?

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I don’t think it has to do with socialized medicine since we have that in all the other provinces and they don’t require us to keep our maiden name. Quebec just likes to be different in everything.
Actually, part of the explanation I received was that the divorce rate was so very high in Quebec, it made medical recordkeeping for women very expensive, so they went to birth certficate name only.🤷
 
Honestly, I don’t care. Whether she does or doesn’t isn’t relevant to whether she’s a good wife who lives for God and tries to help her husband get to Heaven.

Actually, a friend of mine has decided that when he marries, he wants to take his mom’s maiden name, because it reflects his culture and heritage much more than his father’s does. That is, if he doesn’t marry a girl from that same culture and take her name. I think it’s cute and judging by what he wants to name his future kids, it makes more sense. He’s also a very devout Catholic.

I don’t know. I’ve got awhile before I marry, that is, if I don’t join the convent. I’ll worry about it when the time comes.
 
I’d like to change my name to my future husband’s name, but I’m not 100% convinced yet. Here are my concerns:

First, my name ends with a vowel and his starts with one. That could sound weird. Also, his is a very ethnic name, which might look strange with my very white skin - although I’m proud to be dating him, so I’d be proud to take his name.

Next, I already have four names - First, Middle, Mother’s Maiden, Father’s name. I’m quite attached to my middle name, so I guess I could lose my mother’s maiden name, and convert my father’s name to a middle name.

My other concern is that I can’t remember if women change their names in my boyfriend’s culture. I asked him once, early in the relationship, but I forgot the answer. Doh!

I can’t bear the idea of a hyphenated name. My name is seven letters, his is also seven, so that would be a really long name. Also, I just don’t like the look of it.

My mom kept her name, and I was constantly explaining that my mom wasn’t Mrs. W, she was Ms T. instead. Even with T as my middle name, it was still confusing. People kept asking if she was my stepmother. I’d rather avoid the confusion if possible.
 
In general (in all but legal matters), tho, I choose to be Mrs. Hisname. I remember in Montreal a child (Miss Fathersname) got seriously injured on the playground. The mother could not be reached by telephone because she was AT THE SCHOOL volunteering in the library. It was over an hour before anyone put two and two together and got Ms. Hername down from the library to accompany the ambulance to the hospital.
Errrm, this is not the mother’s fault, if I had a child at a school with such shoddy record-keeping habits, I’d be making an appointment for a “prayer meeting” with the prinicipal.

Child: Miss Fathersname
Emergency contacts:
Father, Mr Fathersname, day time phone contact xxx xxxx
Mother, Ms Hername, day time phone contact yyy yyyy

Nothing to do with the mother’s name, everything to do with the school’s recording-keeping.

I had an earful from my father about how “illogical” my position was because no one would know that the family unit was the family unit … but as I said in my original post (and as he wilfully “refused” to hear), my children would have had their father’s surname, I have my own name as well as his and he has his own, so there was no reason for confusion - we all would have had a common name. Last time I looked there were many children from broken families or single parent/unmarried parent homes with different surnames from their primary caregiver’s, and schools have to manage that on a daily basis. Schools routinely record mobile numbers for both parents. That particular argument IMO doesn’t wash these days, though I can imagine it having happened in the past.

I hasten to add that if any friend or colleague of mine says she wants to be addressed as Mrs John Doe, then I address her as just that. To me the issue is not so much “should” or “shouldn’t”, but that none of us shoves our own view down the throat of a woman whose view differs and who has a perfect right to decide for herself what she will be called.
 
I think it’s about as morally neutral as cremation.
Really. It is okay for a Catholic to be cremated. AS LONG AS it isn’t done as an act of disbelief in the resurrection of the body.

Since different cultures do different things as far as woman taking the man’s last name, that part of it is morally neutral.

So, AS LONG AS the woman isn’t keeping her own last name in defiance of the Church’s teaching in Ephesians 5, “Wives, submit to your husbands; Husbands LOVE your wives…”
then it could be morally neutral.

I think for purposes of family genealogical research, it would be considerate of future generations to keep the same family pattern going, imho.
And as long as she’s not keeping her name because she sees divorce as an option.
 
And as long as she’s not keeping her name because she sees divorce as an option.
I doubt most women would be thinking along those lines when it’s a simple matter to return to your maiden name even without a divorce – you just start using it again and get your ID, passport etc reissued in your maiden name.
 
I doubt most women would be thinking along those lines when it’s a simple matter to return to your maiden name even without a divorce – you just start using it again and get your ID, passport etc reissued in your maiden name.
Oh. I never realized it was that simple. I know and have met women who are divorced, and I couldn’t figure out why on earth they didn’t go back to their own name, so I guess I just thought it was more involved after divorce.
 
I wouldn’t like to pass any general judgements, in fact, I’d rather generally not pass any judgements at all, but in some situations, this may be related to the fact that people these days often behave as if they were single when they are not.
 
I have taken my husbands last name. It did not even enter my mind to keep my maiden name for it would be my fathers last name I would be taking. So if your last name was good enough for your mother, why is your husbands name not good enough for you?

If it is a big issue to those who chose not to take their husbands last name, then maybe you shouldn’t get married in the first place. It shows no great love or commentment, for does not this bring about doubt, not to mention and insult not good enough for you!

To me they are only letters of no value and if they are more of value to keep your maiden name then say no to the question “will you marry me”! For the two shall become “ONE” Feel sorry for the kids. Getting crazier and crazier.

God Bless
 
I have taken my husbands last name.
Good for you. 👍
If it is a big issue to those who chose not to take their husbands last name, then maybe you shouldn’t get married in the first place. It shows no great love or commentment, for does not this bring about doubt, not to mention and insult not good enough for you!
Oh, hello, I don’t love and am not committed to my husband of 23 years with whom I have attended Mass more than once a week since we met and done countless hours of church work with and for whom I have persisted with jobs that stressed me out solely so that he could do things in life that were important to him, and with whom I have followed church teachings on marriage and sex and NFP and all those things. Glad you’ve straightened that out for me. I better remind him to feel insulted, too, I think he missed that bit, just like I missed all that other stuff. 😉
 
I have taken my husbands last name. It did not even enter my mind to keep my maiden name for it would be my fathers last name I would be taking. So if your last name was good enough for your mother, why is your husbands name not good enough for you?

If it is a big issue to those who chose not to take their husbands last name, then maybe you shouldn’t get married in the first place. It shows no great love or commentment, for does not this bring about doubt, not to mention and insult not good enough for you!

To me they are only letters of no value and if they are more of value to keep your maiden name then say no to the question “will you marry me”! For the two shall become “ONE” Feel sorry for the kids. Getting crazier and crazier.

God Bless
we have been given numerous examples showing that what a woman does concerning her last name is culturally relative. therefore, how can you say she lacks commitment if she doesn’t take her husband’s last name just because that is the tradition of our patriarchal culture?

I don’t understand why patriliny is still such a big deal either. When a woman keeps her last name, why do the children almost always inherently get the father’s last name? I think it makes a lot more sense for someone a woman gives birth to to have the same last name that she does.
 
In the US you have to do this legally too, so I’m not sure what your point is…are you saying that the woman was too lazy to do it legally? :confused:

This makes no sense. They don’t recognize the name you’ve used for 33 years (your DH’s name) because you didn’t change it legally?

I don’t think I’m understanding. :o
This name changing thing is cultural. In many cultures, women always have their own [maiden] names. In Hispanic cultures, the names are used together. (Both men & women carry their mother’s & father’s names).

In the US, you have always automatically become Mrs Hisname legally, when you got married, unless you opted out. (Yes, I know some places are different, but generally, this has always been the case–and the law, until recently).And to opt out was expensive!!

In other countries, for example, the Holland of my mom’s family, women always have their own [maiden] names, regardless of marital status. My great-grandmother, for example, may she rest in peace, was Elizabeth Nevelizier; she was married to Abraham Van Deputte…Whe they came to this country, people called her “Mrs Van Deputte”, and she thought it was just awful!! She said (as:) someone has all ready mentioned), that it sounded like she was married to her:eek: father!!
She married again, after he died, and she was “Elizabeth Nevelizier” to the end. She died thinking that all Americans are :Dcrazy the way we name ourselves.
 
Good for you. 👍

Oh, hello, I don’t love and am not committed to my husband of 23 years with whom I have attended Mass more than once a week since we met and done countless hours of church work with and for whom I have persisted with jobs that stressed me out solely so that he could do things in life that were important to him, and with whom I have followed church teachings on marriage and sex and NFP and all those things. Glad you’ve straightened that out for me. I better remind him to feel insulted, too, I think he missed that bit, just like I missed all that other stuff. 😉
Good for you so quit boasting, boasting. That is what marriage is all about.Remember we are Jesus bride and Jesus has never boasted of himself and what he has done for us!? So by keeping your last name do you think it brought this marriage to be a Blessed one in deciding to keep your maiden name? Or was it your great love and giving of oneself for Love. Yes, maybe not for husband it was not an insult but maybe other men it is. Not to mention a husbands parents would think their last name is not good enough or be insulted?

To me it is just another way the devil works in causing divisions.

God Bless
 
My long post got deleted. Basically, I wanted to comment on previous posts, but I doubt I’d be contributing anything constructive to the discussion, so… 😉

Basically, if you were to ask me, I wouldn’t really mind which name my hypothetical future wife were to take. However, I could very much mind certain reasons for particular decisions.

Strong family identity? Sure. Lack of such custom in her community? Sure. Need to preserve some continuity for professional reasons? Sure. “You are not the head of the household, I am fed up with the male domination and the kids don’t necessarily get your name either!” Errr… Nope? I might one day hear that marriage is an instrument of male domination, that it’s unfair for a man to tie a woman llike that and so on. While I think it’s completely dishonourable to pay a woman less than a man for the same work and that people should get promoted on the basis of personal merit and usefulness, and I’m not big on trying to get things my way, I’m somewhat afraid of feminist agenda entering into my life so closely.

By the way, in my part of the world, it’s becoming more and more common for women to take a hyphenated name. When you hear two surnames from a woman you can be practically sure she’s married. That way she gets to keep her current name and she still takes the husband’s.

Lastly, the maiden name is in most cases the father’s name, which means another man’s name. It would be a bit of a contradiction to ignore this and I’d be worried by such a logical contradiction (it suggests there’s something which influences the person to think outside normal logical patterns, which is potentially dangerous), even if I could perfectly understand a conscious notion of strong family identity. 🙂 Another thing, perhaps in some cases, especially with very young brides, it might mean the lady isn’t really to loosen the ties with the father and move on to married life. In Roman law, there was the sine manu marriage model in which the woman remained in her father’s authority as the family head, instead of entering the husband’s family. Perhaps not a great thing for marriage.

Lastly, well, really lastly (:p), sometimes men have had no qualms taking the wife’s name, as for example when it’s a historical name or a title is attached.
 
Why can’t some of the men change their last name to the woman’s name?

And I know the obvious objections that I’ll probably be getting to this, like the idea that a society where some men change their names in marriage and some women change their names in marriage would create disorder. But I really think this would just be a small problem, and an easy solution could be figured out to eliminate any possible (but unlikely) confusion.
I know two people at work who have taken their wife’s last name, so I wouldn’t say that it does not happen.

Also, (and this is for some other posts) the difficulty of changing your name with the government can very based on who you are dealing with. About three months before me and my wife got married, she had to go for a new driver’s license. So she asked how to do it when we got married. The guy behind the counter said “we can take care of that right now, what last name would you like on your license?”

She came home and said “I’m a Hapka now!” I was quite surprised:) I always thought it was somewhat hard to change your name…

Andy
 
I know two people at work who have taken their wife’s last name, so I wouldn’t say that it does not happen.

Also, (and this is for some other posts) the difficulty of changing your name with the government can very based on who you are dealing with. About three months before me and my wife got married, she had to go for a new driver’s license. So she asked how to do it when we got married. The guy behind the counter said “we can take care of that right now, what last name would you like on your license?”

She came home and said “I’m a Hapka now!” I was quite surprised:) I always thought it was somewhat hard to change your name…

Andy
Assuming your husband’s surname is usually as simple as presenting your marriage license, but I’m surprised the license was issued before your wedding. Somehow I don’t think the license issuer was following accepted practice – I mean anyone could go in and change their name on their driver’s license, effectively assuming a new ID without leaving a paper trail.
 
Assuming your husband’s surname is usually as simple as presenting your marriage license, but I’m surprised the license was issued before your wedding. Somehow I don’t think the license issuer was following accepted practice – I mean anyone could go in and change their name on their driver’s license, effectively assuming a new ID without leaving a paper trail.
Aren’t you supposed to have the marriage license before the wedding and not wait up until the wedding?
 
Good for you so quit boasting, boasting. That is what marriage is all about.Remember we are Jesus bride and Jesus has never boasted of himself and what he has done for us!? So by keeping your last name do you think it brought this marriage to be a Blessed one in deciding to keep your maiden name? Or was it your great love and giving of oneself for Love. Yes, maybe not for husband it was not an insult but maybe other men it is. Not to mention a husbands parents would think their last name is not good enough or be insulted?

To me it is just another way the devil works in causing divisions.

God Bless
Knock off the accusations, please. My post is no more boastful of my position than yours is of your own. My description of my marriage is in response to your apparent statement that a woman who wants to keep her last name is not committed to anyone but herself. In my case, yes, keeping my own name (actually keeping my own and adding his) has been a good thing for the marriage for reasons that would take too many keystrokes to express here.
 
I’m planning on changing my name to my husband’s when I get married. For me it symbolizes joining him in a family and leaving my own. If I had become established professionally under my maiden name, I might keep it – or keep working under my maiden name and change my name legally and socially.
 
Aren’t you supposed to have the marriage license before the wedding and not wait up until the wedding?
Oops, sorry, I meant Marriage certificate, not marriage license. Just because you have a marriage license doesn’t mean the marriage is going to take place.
 
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