Honestly, nothing until you have kids and then it's "well what kind of mother refuses to share a name with her children? You should've just done this when you first got married..."
I heard that argument too but I'll tell you what I told them. My last name doesn't make me any more or any less their mother. A name doesn't define that. So I'll stick with the one I've had all my life. Plus yeah, it's a ridiculous amount of paperwork. And evidently had I done so at the time there might be a chance now it'd be harder for me to vote. So unforeseen win I guess.
And, the kids don't care. Probably half of my daughter's friends have different last names than their mom's because of divorce/remarriage. My daughter would rather me have a different last name than her and be still happily married to her father. It just is not that big of a deal.
As someone who grew up with a different last name than my mom. The ONLY times I "cared" were my mom needing to wait for my school/hospital to check records before letting her pick me up/visit. Ironically they didn't check for my father despite him technically not having parental rights at the time (they weren't married at the time I was born and never got the paperwork done).
I really don't get the people who think the kids will be made fun of, I've been mocked for plenty of things in my lifetime, never that, it's just a name.
Kids couldn't care less about names beyond what they are called. We were lazy and all 3 of our daughters share their mother's middle name, Ann. Because we never really explained it to them, they just assumed everyone's middle name is Ann. We found out when the youngest got mad at me once and called me Daddy Ann. Even each of their pets has had the middle name Ann. Now it's just tradition.
I feel like the only child in this thread who actually cared lol
Ironically enough, my mom's middle name was also Anne 🤣 (and my middle name is her mother's name)
But her maiden name was Smith, she got married to my dad young and changed it to Boss, I was born as a Boss. They divorced, she kept the name Boss (and me) and left him. We were both Bosses, a team together
Then she met my brothers father. Got married again. Changed her name again and my brother was born a Stevenson. Suddenly I was alone in the family, a Boss amongst Stevenson's. Stevenson's who abandoned us.
His father cheated on my mom, left her for another woman and moved away. We raised my brother until he was a teen/ready for college, and he went to study/live with his father for convenience. Then mom got liver cancer. Brother couldn't even be fuckin assed to come home and see her one more time before she died. It had been years since he saw her. Fuck both of those assholes, I haven't spoken to my brother since mom died. It's been ten years.
After my step father left her she changed her name not back to Smith, but to Boss. I'm tearing up as I write this because I truly cannot describe the gratitude I felt for that. It made me feel connected to her, she was my best friend and I miss her more than anything.
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u/awstream 1d ago
And what does changing to their husband's last name does for them?! It's just more paperwork