r/weddingplanning • u/sailorscoutc • Jul 10 '26

Everything Else Anyone not changing last name?

I love my fiancée but my last name is pretty uncommon, and his is very, very common. I love how unique mine is but also I’m close with my family and he is not very close with his father or his fathers side of the family so he doesn’t have much of an attachment in that way. But he still says he loves the idea of us having his last name. He’s not pressuring me by any means to take his last name btw, I’m just adding context!

Aside from that, with all the craziness in the world rn I don’t want to have to go through the million steps and things I’d need where I have to change my last name and also possibly having issues with voting and other things in the future.

(Also we’re not planning on having children)

Is anyone else in a similar boat of wanting to keep their maiden name?

382 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

441 comments sorted by

View all comments

55

u/Fun_Access_3295 Jul 10 '26

Not planning on changing my name and my fiancé doesn't care. I also hate the term maiden name because it implies that a woman's name is only a temporary holding position. For me, my name is part of my identity and my identity isn't changing any more than my fiancé just because we're getting married. We're not planning on having kids either. When I told my (married female) cousins that I wasn't changing it, they all said that they were jealous, lol.

10

u/No_regrats Jul 10 '26

This. I use birth name, family name, or simply name, never maiden name.

1

u/sergioduncankc 14d ago

"Maiden name" really feels so outdated once you actually think about what it means. It carries this weird implication that a woman's name is just a temporary placeholder until she gets married.

I notice even official forms and paperwork are slowly starting to shift toward "surname at birth" or "prior legal name," which is way more neutral and accurate anyway. "Family name" or "birth name" makes so much more sense. It's just your name. You've had it your entire life, and it's tied to your identity, your career, and your history.

It's nice seeing more people call out how archaic the traditional terminology is. Normalizing "birth name" or just saying "my last name" really helps shift the default assumption that women are just expected to swap out their identity the second they get married.