THE WEDDING PLANNER
It's all in a name
Editor's note: It started as a cathartic way to vent, until she mentioned it to her editors. Now Advertiser relationships writer Tanya Bricking is going public with the Wedding Planner, a Web log with new postings Tuesdays and Fridays.
Bricking is marrying a military pilot who has deployment orders for Afghanistan, so she's going through whirlwind planning as she rushes toward a November wedding.
By Tanya Bricking
Advertiser Relationship Writer
Monday, Sept. 8
We were in line at the video store filling out a membership application when this whole I'm-really-getting-married thing hit me again.
My fiancé wrote his name on the form. Then he wrote mine — or at least my first name, along with his last name.
It felt weird. Not in a bad way, just in a bit of a jolting way.
It's strange to accept my changing identity.
I always thought I would be one of those women influenced by the feminist movement of our mothers. I'd keep my name and be my own person.
Then I decided it would be complicated if we had kids and I had one last name and my husband had a different one and our kids didn't have mine. Yes, it's a predictable bride-to-be dilemma: what do you call yourself once you get hitched?
I knew I didn't want a hybrid name, and I hated the idea of hyphenation. It just seems too bulky. Yet I wondered if my husband-to-be would be offended if I didn't take his name.
I got myself all worked up about how to tell him that after nearly 33 years of the same name, I was having trouble letting go of it. (Kind of like getting rid of our duplicate furniture, but to a greater degree.)
So about a month ago at dinner, I told him there was something I wanted to talk about: what my last name would be after we got married. I was expecting this to be a BIG discussion. I told him I was debating a dual identity: my maiden name at work and his last name in social circles.
And I told him I wasn't even sure about that. Maybe I would make my maiden name my middle name, I said. What did he think?
I shouldn't have gotten myself all worked up, because he said he would be happy with whatever I decided. He left it completely up to me. Small discussion.
Maybe he just wanted out of a complicated decision.
To me, it wasn't just about the logistical nightmare of changing my name on my driver's license, bank records and other documents. It wasn't the threat of high divorce rates. It wasn't even that taking someone else's name seemed slightly subservient and house-wifey to me. It was the idea of changing the way people know me that made me uneasy.
I know this is a non-issue for a lot of women, and I don't know if they just grew up with a last name they were dying to get rid of, or if it's some renewed popularity in traditional values. I can't believe how many of my friends have taken their husbands' last names recently with no discussion about it. But that appears to be the trend.
The Lucy Stone League, an organization named after a woman who refused to take her husband's name when they married in 1855, estimates 90 percent of women marrying today will drop their own name to take their husband's.
I thought that seemed like way too many. Then I read the Alternatives to Marriage Project, an online newsletter dedicated to equality for unmarried people, which also says about 90 percent of married women nationwide give up their last name when they marry.
And, as if I needed a bridal magazine to confirm it, Condé Nast Bridal Infobank last year found 83 percent of first-time brides in their 20s planned to take their husband's name, up from 71 percent a decade earlier.
I know this is just part of the process that career women go through when they get married.
No one is making us surrender our identities or give anything up in feminist terms. It's just another thing to let your mind buzz about. I wonder if the buzzing will multiply when I assume more than one identity.
[Posted on July 16, 2004 at 10:33 am HST]
I am a mom, who's son is getting married and plans to take the wife's maiden name as his.
I divorced and remarried when he was 7. He has no contact with his father (he carries his last name). It is hard to pronounce and spell. My husband, his step father, have always had a great relationship. He would have adopted him and changed his name when he was a child but it wasnt possible, legalities and $$. But we always told him that when he turned 18 he could change it for a small fee. He never wanted too then because of school, college records. But now he is planning to get married and wants to take her name. He says it is easier to spell, pronounce than ours and this way only one person will have to change their name. My husband is feeling very hurt and somewhat rejected. Me too. Comments ?
T'Lyn
Florida
[Posted on February 18, 2004 at 10:37 pm HST]
I (by accident) only wrote my maiden name on my marriage certificate and not my husband's last name... My intention was to take his last name from the start. Does anyone know if I will be able to obtain new identification (i.e. license, passport) with my husband's last name appearing on it? I would really like to avoid the headache of appearing in court to legally change it...
sierra
new york city
[Posted on February 16, 2004 at 5:14 am HST]
Well - if you have children they'll have to have a name. By the time they learn their "family" names they will have already have been imprinted with a preference.
The thing is: a child will come to the point where they'll be able to know their last name, but will not have the ability yet to fully understand the "that doesn't mean daddy loves you any less" talk that you'll need to have to explain this.
There will inevitable be a moment where a child will get lost. Some adult will manage to deduce the child's last name. There will only be a one in two chance of it being in the phonebook.
I cant even begin to count the ways that this is anything more than an indulgance. As a man, if I was faced with such an issue I would take her last name just to deal with all the fallout.
Joe
Washington DC
[Posted on February 14, 2004 at 7:12 pm HST]
I was wondering if, in the midst of all or your self-aggrandizement with respect to you individually rejecting your prospective spouse's last name, all of you enlightened women-children also decided to refrain from taking part in that rather quaint & sexist anachronism known as the "diamond engagement ring"? And did your husbands assume all of your respective debts: Student Loans, consumer debt, etc?
I think that today's female is little different than Chaucer's 14th century female archetype: the vapid "Wife of Bath"- all the world would be perfect if women merely had there own way in every aspect of society.
No wonder marriage rates are at a 40 year low point- I pity your husbands.
Demosthenes
Virginia
[Posted on October 14, 2003 at 3:06 pm HST]
responding to Natalie's slightly silly comment below:
It's not just another man's name you have. It's the name with which you were born. At that point, it seems appropriate to claim it as your own, regardless of if it's your dad's name, your mom's name, or one they made up.
pat
honolulu
[Posted on October 6, 2003 at 12:18 pm HST]
If you're unsure, wait. If you're going to change your mind 6 months after the wedding, it will be a lot easier to change your name to your husband's than the other way around.
Also, if you're unsure, why is the default taking his instead of just maintaining the status quo (i.e., leaving your name unchanged)?
Gina
South Bend, IN
[Posted on September 18, 2003 at 8:54 am HST]
I agonized the whole year my husband and I were engaged whether I should change my name. I finally decided to do it one day when a married colleague said: "What's the big deal? You're just going from one man's last name to another."
Natalie Wilson
Portland, OR (formerly of Kauai)
[Posted on September 16, 2003 at 7:15 am HST]
Yes, you read my last name right. It is a whopping 11 letters! My maiden name had 4 letters. Changing my name when I got married (8 months ago) was a big deal. I was giving up a 4 letter name at the beginning of the alphabet for an 11 letter name at the end of the alphabet. Unfortunately for me, the discussion was not as easy for me with my "husband-to-be" a the time. Nevertheless, I gave in and have ended up with a long last name. I am a teacher at a middle school in Kalihi and getting the students to say my new name has not been an easy thing. Therefore, I am Miss Chee (not Mrs. Chee, that's my mom!) at school and to my students, but Diane Wakabayashi to everyone else. Not to mention, fitting my name on those credit card receipts has been a pain! The worse though, was fitting my signature on my new driver's license. After the lady at the DMV told me "Wow, long name, huh?" she had to clear the signature screen 4 times because my signature could not fit in the box. My name is now Diane Hideko Mew-Ling Wakabayashi. Try saying that 5 times fast! =P
Diane Wakabayashi
Pearl City
[Posted on September 12, 2003 at 2:42 pm HST]
So why exactly are you giving up your name?
jill
honolulu
[Posted on September 12, 2003 at 1:55 pm HST]
Tanya,
Don't worry if you really want to keep your last name
tell your fiance if he loves you enough to marry you
he'll understand.
Malia Funk- age 8
California
