Mrs. You...or Mrs. Me-You???

In keeping with the spirit of this wedding talk we've been having on here let's keep it going with this: the name change.

A co-worker is getting married in a little over a week and when she came by my department today, I asked if she was going to hyphenate her name or just take on her soon-to-be husband's last name. She said she'll be taking his name and after a longer conversation (which isn't at all relevant to this topic but was hilarious nonetheless), went back to her own work - the conversation, however, continued in my office. Here are the responses:

Miss BB: I'm taking my husband's last name. It's not even a discussion for me. But if for some reason I'm super famous and they only know me by [insert gov't name], I'll keep it in the public eye to cut down on confusion.

Fiesty: I don't know about dropping my last name and I don't want to hyphenate it. I really like my name as is and I'd have a problem just changing it. I guess it would become more important after we have kids.

Dubb (she's already married): I hyphenated my name because if I didn't, they couldn't call me [insert various nicknames that include her maiden name]. She may have only been partially joking but it was funny.

KayKay: Eh, I'd probably change my name in but I'd keep my maiden name in my career world.

Call me old-fashioned and perhaps a bit naive, but I really didn't know women discussed the idea of NOT taking their future husband's last name until a couple of years ago when I was reading a message board. Many of the women were adamant about not taking on their husband's name because they wanted to "keep their identity" and not get lost in his name. Miss BB Note: I frequent 2-3 boards and I'm not talking about either of them. The men who responded questioned why the woman who has agreed to marry him will not agree to taking his last name. Some of those men went as far to say it would be a total deal breaker if the woman didn't agree to. at the very least, hyphenating her name. I guess it's THAT'S serious.

The ladies of my department reached out to our former co-worker, Chief, to get his thoughts and his response is: "It depends if she's career minded or tryin to accomplish something where she's recognized by her name; it's cool, I can accept that. However in general I would like for my wife to take my last name, but it's nothing to fight about." I'm surprised Chief would say it's "nothing to fight about" because he's quite traditional and THIS is probably one of the upper echelon traditional things in relationships. When I told Fiesty about the conversation on the msgboard and how some of the men saw it as a deal breaker if the woman wouldn't consider taking his name at all, she said she could understand why.

I believe it's a personal decision (my girl Lucky has had her own reason for wanting to keep her last name) and that whatever makes you both comfortable is what you should rock with. But at the same time, I'm like "Why not take his name?"

What's say you? Let's discuss!