Hyphen or Changing Last Name?

I am changing my name to his. My current last name was my married name from my first marriage but when I divorced, I didn't want to go back to my maiden name because it was my biological fathers name which long story, I wanted no part of. I am ready to get my forever last name.

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This is what I would really like to do, but it's not an option in the state that I live in :/

We are only able to hyphenate, take one or the other's last name, or create a new last name.

I put my maiden name as my new middle name alongside my current middle name so I could keep a little bit of me in it. I felt weird ditching my last name

My fiancé and I will both be hyphenating. I have a short last name with 4 letters and my fiancé’s is 9 letters. My fiancé has a very German last name and it would sound terrible if my fiancé just took mine. On the other hand, I don’t want just my fiancé’s last name either as I’ve grown to love mine. I feel that hyphenating will be the best option for us. Other than that it really is a personal preference.

I was going to hyphenate my name but it would have been 19 letters. I'm changing my last name to his purely for the alliteration because I sound like a superhero. 😂 It's completely up to you. Another thing that could help is think about saying and signing your new or old name. That alone may help to decide to stick with original, have a hyphenated name, or take theirs.

I will be changing mine. When my sister got married she just added his name at the end, now she has four names (which is whole family has two middle names so it fit nicely with their family). You could consider adding his name to the end of yours so you still have your last name but his last name is still your last name!

For me I am changing my last name. I'm wanting to deassociate myself from my father's family because I don't have a relationship with him or any of his family members. I don't have a reason to keep that name and just want to have my FHs last name. But in the end totally up to you and what makes you happy!

I don’t have a middle name so I’m making my maiden name my middle name and taking FH’s. When I was a kid I was all about being progressive and told everyone I was going to make my future spouse take my name but I don’t have a good relationship with my father and his side of my family so I want to take FH’s name because they treat me like their own daughter and I’m proud to become part of their family officially!

I'm changing because I want the same last name as my children but I briefly considered hyphenating to Spitznogle-Dumire. I ultimately decided to just change it because it's not like I'm really well known or anything where I would want/need to keep my "Business name" which is one of the reasons I had considered hyphenating.

I am changing my name because it means a lot to my FH. Even if it's longer name, if you want it hyphened then I say go for it!

I think it is all a personal decision. FH and I talked about it, and he wasn't to keen on hyphening my last name with his. I don't think I was ever going to hyphen it anyway, we are more traditionalists on something's, this was one of those things. I will be taking his last name and I am very excited about it!!

At the end of the day it's a very personal decision. I'm still deciding for sure, but I'm thinking about dropping my middle name and moving my maiden name to my middle name, so I can take FH's last name without a hyphen. You have to check what your state allows but in CA you can do this just as easily as swapping out the last name.

I never really thought about it. I just knew I wanted to change my last name. I never thought about hyphening it. Mt first and last name are frequently misspelled and mispronounced. when I change my last name at least I'll have one name that won't be misspelled or mispronounced. I think it's comes down to what you are more comfortable with.

View Quoted Comment How did that work out for you guys ? I’m running into the same problem. My last name is 7 letters and his is 8. The real struggle is that I want to keep mine and he doesn’t want his. His grandma married and her husband adopted my fiancé’s father, so his theory is it isn’t even really a blood last name. He was thinking about taking his moms but doesn’t want to do that either.

Changing my last name. We have two children together who have his last name. I finally won't be the odd ball out.

I'm changing my last name!

I think it’s totally your decision. I want to hyphenate mine because my last name has a lot of meaning for me. I feel like my last name has so many accomplishments, and I’ve done so much with my name. So I’m hyphenating my name because I don’t want to lose my individuality.

I just added his last name behind my last name so it ended up being first name, maiden last name, new last name. You also don’t have to write your full name unless for legal reasons so when signing your name you can use either last name unless it’s for legal documents.

View Quoted Comment We plan to do this in the future for now I added his last name to the end of my name.

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Hmm I didn't think about just adding his name as a to the end of mine. I will have to see if this is allowed in my state. We are going for our marriage license on Thursday, so I need to make a decision!