Hello everyone!
So I know that questions like this are posted all the time, but I thought my name change dilemma was a little bit unique to others. My fiancé is South American, and in his country, a woman keeps her maiden name and adds her husband’s last name after her maiden name with a ‘de’ in between. My fiancé has actually asked me to change my name in a similar way, as he does not like the US tradition of completely giving up the woman’s maiden name.
My question is this: how do I go about doing this when we get married? For example, if my name were ‘Paige Mary Smith’ unmarried and I want my married name to be ‘Paige Mary Smith de Johnson,’ will I need to involve the courts? ‘Smith de Johnson’ would be a mouthful of a legal last name, so would I make ‘Smith’ a second middle name? How would you all go about this?
I hope the question makes sense to everyone!