Keeping maiden name

You could consider:
-adding his last name to yours as a middle name
-creating your own last name by merging the letters of yours together eg. If your name was smith and his was jones, you could become Mr and Mrs Smones

Apologies in advance because this may seem harsh but your FH could just deal with the fact you don't want his name and you both live happily ever after in the 21st century?


Why should you have to compromise? How does he feel about taking your name instead? Because if he doesn't like it that's basically what he'd be asking you to do.
Also plenty of married women use Ms and their own surnames! Keep your name... it will save you time, money and effort changing it on official documents anyway.

View quoted message I agree. You’ve only really got 2 reasonable options here; either he takes your last name or you both keep own names. Don’t worry about traditions or social pressures, people do whatever they want nowadays so neither would be particularly unusual 😊

I've recently made the decision to be Mrs MyName HisName legally and professionally - to keep my identity and reputation. Socially I'll be Mrs HisName so the double barrell isn't being used all the time and we have that Mr & Mrs so and so which I do think is nicer and less of a mouthful! Thought I'd throw it out there as another option as I hadn't thought of it until I knew someone who did this.

In my circles Ms MyName would signify that you're divorced... obviously, you do you and societal perception might not be an issue for you, but just a heads up that that might be how people that don't know your situation would interpret that name.

That's a point about how some people view Ms, but honestly that is a very outdated viewpoint and what's so wrong with being divorced? Not be a negative person but separations and divorce happen a lot and do you know who has to go through the faff of changing everything back?! Women! I've been married before so I know personally. There are plenty of brides on here who are planning their second or third weddings. If women want to take their husbands surnames then wonderful. But you are under no obligation to follow what society 'expects'.


Whether you choose Ms or Mrs isn't really the issue here, it's about keeping your last name. And I'll say it again, why can't he take your last name or you both double barrel?

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Oh my gosh absolutely no hate on people are divorced!!!! I definitely didn't mean it to come across that way.

It was more that I'm not sure people would necessarily want others to assume they are divorced when they're actually married.

Yeah I use Ms currently as I'm divorced but I wouldn't have used it when I was married, for me Ms = divorced.

I guess everyone is different.

also with regards to not wanting to be Mrs Maidenname as that's your mums name, that's what happens to the majority of people with their mother in laws, I don't see that as a problem.

could you not double barrel it the opposite way?

My name is triple barreled lol. My maiden name is a combination of my mother and fathers and both have significant means to me hence me not wanting to remove them. This is my professional name and for legal documents I've added my husbands name. I kept my maiden name as its part of my identity and I like it, he didn't want to take my name and u wasn't too fussed. Do what makes you happy, its a bit of an archaic tradition and if you don't want a double barrelled name or to take his then he needs to understand why.

Do whatever works for you - if he's so worried about not having the same surname, then he can take yours. Or you can be Mrs Emma Mylastname Hislastname without double-barrelling (or Mrs Emma Hislastname Mylastname) and only use the one name for everyday. Or stay as Miss Currentsurname, or Ms Currentsurname. Or do a mix. One of my cousins married a guy whose name sounds really weird with her firstname, so they are 'Mr & Mrs Hissurname' socially and she stayed as 'Miss Hersurname' for work.

Ms was originally created so that women didn't have to give their marital status away when giving their title. I've never associated it with divorce, although obviously it is in some circles. To be honest, I think that now, it has just become another choice for women, since I know married women who call themselves 'Miss' and unmarried ones who call themselves 'Mrs' (usually those in long-term partnerships) so I don't think anyone can tell anything from a woman's title any more!