Name Change - Who has decided to hyphenate?

I'm not changing my last name at all.

We are both women and are going to hyphenate. I already have two middle names (my mom gave me her maiden name as a middle name), so it’s going to make my name incredibly long, but we thought it was important to do this to designate our new family.

I kept mine. I’ve thought about changing it. We’re both older (he’s retiring soon) and maybe when I retire I’ll finally change it since mine is tied to my professional achievements/publications and I don’t want to while working. We’ll see!

I'm taking his last name, and I'm changing my current middle name into my old last name.

I’m adding his name to my name but I not until COViD is over/controlled and I would be able to go into as office to change it. So it might be a while. I don’t trust mailing in my originals. So two last names, no hyphen. So I will have my first, middle, maiden last name, and his last name.

I hyphenated.

I am hyphenating! I love my family and proud to be apart of it but I also love the man I’m marrying and want to take his last name so hyphenating for me !

I decided not to take his last name partially because I really like my name, for work it’s important that it stays the same, and it just seems like a hassle to change everything. Who wants to go to the DMV and the Social Security office anymore then they absolutely have to. We decide instead that any kids we have will have my last name as their middle name and his last name as their last name.

I'm thinking of taking his name legally but everywhere else I'm going to hyphenate. I don't want to lose the name I've had all my life and IT RHYMES! So how can I give that up😂

I’m not going to hyphenate, but I’m undecided. I’m either going to just keep my last name, or add on my last name as a 2nd middle name. My fiancée is also all about combining both our last names into one ( think something like BlackSmith), which I appreciate so much, too.

Just a heads up about hyphenated names… Throughout life you run into a lot of problems with it. As far as taxes go, your prescription insurance at a pharmacy might reject from it it gives problems a lot. Any sort of records department also has issues sometimes. Any sort of special character or even apostrophes gives people these issues

I have no idea what we are doing. It's definitely a complicated and emotional decision no matter the couple (even people who have a solid tradition to follow).


We want our last names to match so a change will be involved somewhere. I am extremely attached to my last name and it is very unique. My SO already has a hyphenated last name. One option we have talked about is both changing our names, his to the first half of his current last name followed by mine and then I would take the same hyphenated combination.
He has also said that he would be happy to take my name and would drop his entirely since his relationship with his family is rocky and we are very close to all of my family members. To make things worse, he is the only son of a Hispanic mother and he has already told his family he never plans on having kids, so no one to pass any of our names on to.
Best of luck in your own decision! I am sure you will figure out what the right choice is eventually.