Getting married.. name change?

Question

I will be getting married soon. The thing I’ve looked forward to the most about marriage was changing my last name. My father was a deadbeat and I always felt like I should have been given my moms last name. I always said that when I got married I would take my husbands last name. I will be enlisting into the military in the summer and I’m just imagining myself being called by my fiancés last name and it feels extremely weird. For about 17weeks I will be referred too solely by my new last name. Would I even respond to that? I went to basic training before, I’ve seen my last name on my OCP (camo outfit) and I loved it. Because that’s who I am. Regardless of my deadbeat dad, my last name is me. I can’t imagine being called by anything else. My last name is extremely uncommon, which I like, whereas his is very common.
I told my fiancé about it and he said he understood and suggested that I hyphenated my name but that’s too much, I really want just one or the other. My mother is also telling me that I shouldn’t change my name to “secure myself from further name change once divorced”.. thanks mom! 😀 Our children will have his last name and I really want to be known as one unit; “The Smiths”, instead of us having different last names, it’s just scary. 
Did It take some time to adjust to your name change? If so, how long? Do you regret changing your name? Are you happy with the name change? Did you keep your name despite having a worthless parent?

Answer

My dad was an abusive POS. I change my name as soon as I came back from my honeymoon. I was done with that name. It's not losing an identity, you are gaining your new identity as a married woman. People who think I shouldn't change my name in case I get divorced, why get married? 😬 and besides, I'd never want my maiden name ever again, even if my husband and I for some reason didn't work out.

Answer

I changed mine. It didn’t take more than a few months to get used to the change. I don’t have a deadbeat parent. I didn’t want to hyphenate bc I wanted the fam to have the same name.

Answer

I have a fine relationship with my father but I still chose to change it because I also wanted a cohesive family name. It was a big change because my maiden name is Slovakian in origin and my husband's is Spanish! It was definitely weird for the first few months but now Im just used to it. I didnt see it as losing my identity, I saw it as adding to it. But of my female friends I would say it's about 50/50 of those who kept their maiden name post marriage so I dont think it's a weird thing to keep it either.

Answer

Im just here for the comments. As a Muslim this is interesting to read. We don't have to even think about name change. Women do not have a name change after they get married. We have our own identity and lineage. If we really want to we can add our husbands name at the end of ours as an extra but not changing it.

Answer

My father was there with money, but as far as everything else he was a deatbeat. I couldn't WAIT to get away from his last name. It was unique and not many people have the last name, but I couldn't wait to wash myself clean of him. It took a month or 2 to get used to my new last name, but I had so many meetings and appointments I got used to it very quickly.

Answer

I didn’t change my name, mostly because of the hassle. I actually kind of prefer my husband’s last name, but we didn’t get married until our mid-30s and I felt that I was already established professionally with my name. We now have a daughter and she has my husband’s last name. Sometimes people do refer to us as a family by my husband and daughter’s last name, which really doesn’t bother me. I don’t feel the need to correct people if they assume that we all have the same last name.

Answer

I changed mine and changed it back when I got divorced.  Thankfully,  we did not have children and there's no way I would keep the same last name as him or his mother.

Answer

I didn't want to change my name (even though I didn't love my own) and it took me a bit to do it.  I wanted to have the same last name as my son (just like you), so we could all have the same family name.  
Now that I've done it I'm so happy I did.  Yes, it took some time to adjust but overall it was good move and I'm happy we all share the same name.

Answer

I was in the military as well, I got married a few months before I separated, yes it is weird getting used to but when they call by that so often you get used to it pretty quick, I loved hearing them call me by my married last name! A lot of times they still called me by my maiden name because that’s just what they were used to and they forgot sometimes too lol

Answer

I could’ve written this ☹️ I was seriously in the same boat as you. As my wedding date approached I got a bit sad? (not sure if this is the right word) because I had created this identity my entire life that would be wiped out within a matter of minutes with a quick signature on the dotted line but I ultimately decided that it was for the best because our children would have his last name and because of the history my husband and I have. I changed my last name immediately - a week after marriage when I returned from my honeymoon. It’s been almost 6 years and I don’t regret it. I will never change my name back even if we were to divorce. It took a few months to get used to the name change but it wasn’t that big of a deal to me. My first and old last name are super uncommon so it’s nice to have plain last name now lol.

Getting married.. name change?

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