I have a new name?!

Welcome to Thoughts for Thursday! This feature is our outlet to talk with you about whatever we currently have on our minds. It might be bookish, it might not! Now for this week's thought:

I have a new name??

So as some (maybe most... I dunno?) of you know I recently got married :) If you missed the recap of my wedding, check it out here. Along with all of the joys and changes from getting married, came the name change.  And let me tell you, it was a struggle.  I had no idea what I wanted to do at first.  Should I keep my last name? Should I change my middle name to my maiden name?  Should I just drop my last name for his?  Should I hyphenate last names? What about having a double middle name?  All of these questions just kept running through my head.  

Some background on it all: growing up I swore I was never going to change my name because it was part of me.  How could I change it when it was my mom, dad and brother's last name? But over time I started to change my mind.  Before and after the wedding we discussed the name change. My husband was super supportive and said I could do what I wanted and would make me happy.  But after getting married, I knew I wanted to take his last name. I want kids eventually and I want all our of last names to match (of course I think it is fine if they don't!).  But my huge dilemma came with what to do with my maiden name since it has been a part of me and my identity for so long. 

I decided I had three choices: keep my middle name, change my middle name to my maiden name, or have a double middle name. My mom was all for me changing my middle name to my maiden name.  My dad, on the other hand, was like no keep the middle name just drop the maiden name. So really they were no help on that front :) My middle name is my mom's name and my brother's middle name is my dad's name.  My parents started this family trend, so it was hard for me to wrap my head around dropping my middle name.  I researched how complicated it would be to have a double middle name.  It is not terribly hard, but without hyphenating it, I was reading that some people had major issues.  The US systems are not used to handling a double middle name.

So after some more thought, I ended up keeping my middle name (my mom's name) and dropping my maiden name. It was a super tough choice. Even though I was excited to have a new last name to match my husband's, I was kinda sad at the same time.

If you are married, what did you decide to do? Did you struggle with your choice at all? If you are not married, do you plan to change your name when you get married?