Marriage survey

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I am particularly interested in women answering these questions. Have you or would you:

1. Change your name after marriage
2. Have a wedding ceremony
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying
4. Have a prenupital agreement (if it's legal in your country)

What would your reasons be? And how would you feel if your partner held the opposite viewpoint, in each case?

I chose to change my name, since my maiden name wasn't "mine" but my father's (also for the practical reason that my husband's last name is easier to spell.) If he had been opposed to me taking his name I would have thought it very odd, like he didn't want me to be associated with him and his family.

I had a wedding ceremony, albeit very low-key. I would have been fine with having a civil ceremony at the court house, if he had preferred.

I was "engaged", in that we agreed we would be married on a certain date several months in the future of our discussion of getting married. I don't know how one can get married without being engaged, truthfully--what are you imagining here? Like you are just casually dating until suddenly one day you get married with no planning? Even if you elope to Vegas, you're still going to be technically engaged from the moment you decide to be wed until Elvis is pronouncing you man and wife...

I wouldn't have a prenuptial agreement because it shows a lack of trust. If my partner didn't trust me, I wouldn't marry him.

I spoke to my mother about being "engaged" one time. I thought it was essentially just the waiting process you had to legally go through before you were married, but according to my mother it's more of a social practice that involves rings and an engagement party.

My personal viewpoint is as follows: ideally I wouldn't feel comfortable with my wife changing her name, I don't want to purchase or exchange rings, I don't want a ceremony and I would favour prenupital arrangements (though they aren't legal in Ireland, so if I were to marry someone here I couldn't have them anyway). But I accept I may have to make compromises on one or all of these stances, and I'm gauging here to see if the overall consensus is against me.

Ah, I was curious as to why you were asking. If you don't want to do any of those things, I am unsure why you would want to be married at all? What you propose doesn't seem much different than living together.

The first (and only) thing that comes to mind is tax benefits.

Ah, they eliminated the tax break for married couples in the US a few years ago. Now singles and couples pay the same.

I don't live in the US, but I'm looking at the rights page here and I still see "income tax deductions, credits rates exemption, and estimates", that might be out of date though. I might be cautious about the idea of marrying at all in the US.

There's more about that here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_penalty
It refers to the fact that some married couples pay MORE taxes than singles, although as of 2001 that changed for people in my tax bracket. As you say, though, you are in Ireland so it doesn't affect you--your own tax laws must vary.

I think you are correct that your list of preferences and caveats would ruin the romantic notion of marriage which many women have, and would make most of them think twice about marrying you. However, people with AS who find a partner to marry often seem to have unconventional relationships, so perhaps there is a woman out there who would have the same opinions concerning marriage as yourself.

I've been married twice, so I'll answer twice.

First time (lasted 7 years):
1. Change your name after marriage
Yes
2. Have a wedding ceremony
Yes, a small backyard one with just a few family and friends.
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying
Yes, for about 2 1/2 years
4. Have a prenupital agreement (if it's legal in your country)
No (it's legal)

Second time (5 1/2 years so far, we're still married):
1. Change your name after marriage
Yes
2. Have a wedding ceremony
No, we just went to the courthouse, invited no one.
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying
Yes, for almost 5 months.
4. Have a prenupital agreement (if it's legal in your country)
No (it's still legal)

Might have been the times, but I would answer exactly the same as arielhawksquill for all the questions! I would have kept my last name, but my husband's was easier to spell/pronounce/remember for others. I had horrible troubles with those issues for mine. We got married in my parent's back yard. We were engaged for 3 months while arranging to get married, but no rings. After 35 years I have no ring (sensory issues). Nobody had heard of pre-nups then, to my knowledge.

1. Change your name after marriage?
I did. Don't really care for myself, but I want to have the same name as my kids.

2. Have a wedding ceremony?
I did. That was a mistake and a huge waste.

3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying?
For about a year. Reservations take that long in some places.
Anyway, it's a good idea not to rush into things.

4. Have a prenupital agreement?
A marriage is already a contract. The state offers a standard contract, based on the wisdom of the ages, such as it is. It does change (very slowly) as society changes. For young people, there's probably no need to do anything different, and you're better off not thinking along those lines. There are a lot of huge, deep questions, it all has to work together, and you haven't had time to figure it all out yet. If you're older and have baggage or kids or whatever, it might be something to think about. It depends.

1. Change name? Yes.
I actually changed my surname when I was 23, so I no longer have my father's surname, but I'd take my husband's (unless it was really bad and he didn't want it either) because of clan obligations. When you take your husband's surname, you become part of his family, and that sort of includes you in their circle of loyalty. It doesn't affect your ability to go home to mother, since your surname usually doesn't affect her (regardless of whether she changed hers or not). So you're hedging your bets, making sure you've got two families to turn to if he dies or runs away leaving you with kids.

2. Wedding ceremony?
No. No one to invite. Otherwise a big party would be a must.

3. Engagement?
Yes. Time to get used to the whole idea. No idea how long.
I once went to an RC engagement ceremony with a priest and everything. No idea who was getting engaged, and it was in French, so I didn't catch much. It was nice, though. (They were neighbours at the cottage and invited whoever was around. I think my mother knew the parents of one of them.)

4. Prenup?
No. As others have said, it's a trust issue. Plus current laws are pretty fair about assets brought into the marriage already.

Hector, you're only 22. Too young to get married, so don't worry about it. You can always change your mind lots of times before you're ready.

1. Change your name after marriage: Yes
2. Have a wedding ceremony: Yes, small one.
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying: Yes.
4. Have a prenupital agreement: Nah, we were both broke anyway.

Funny story... We decided on simple bands. He suggested we should have messages to each other engraved on the inside of them. I said that was a great idea and I already knew the message I wanted engraved in his..."Put it back on!" Rings are a mark. They are important to some girls. You might also find it important when you decide to take the leap.

not a woman (obviously.. but there's nothing wrong with engagements

"marry in haste, repent at lesiure"

I am married, and my answers to your questions are:

1. I did not change my name, in this day and age there isn't much of a reason to, plus I don't see why the women have to make the change but the men get off scott-free. My husband did not want to make any changes such as having adding each other's names to our own. So I said shag it, neither of us will make any changes.

2. We had a civil ceremony.

3. We where engaged for a while before the marriage.

4. We do not have a prenuptial agreement.

I've been married twice as well, so I'll answer twice.


1. Change your name after marriage: No. People, especially at work knew me by my own name, and I reckoned it would just be confusing to change it.
2. Have a wedding ceremony: No. My parents were, rightly as it turned out, not too enamoured of my choice of husband so it was a civil ceremony with only 2 witnesses present, and the wife of one of the witnesses.
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying: No. Had been living together for about 5 years beforehand.
4. Have a prenupital agreement (if it's legal in your country) No.

1. Change your name after marriage: Yes, apart from at work. I was pregnant when we got married and it seemed easier to have the same name as my husband and future child. I'm going to keep the name even though we are now on our way to divorce.
2. Have a wedding ceremony: Yes. My second husband likes to be the centre of attention and the life and soul of the party, so a party there was.
3. Be "engaged" prior to marrying: Yes. We were both waiting for our divorces to come through!
4. Have a prenupital agreeement (if it's legal in your country) No, unfortunately. My husband is claiming he is entitled to money which I inherited from my grandparents, and which was put down as a deposit on our house. Legally, he isn't entitled to it, and it is causing me a lot of anger, and will no doubt make both our lawyers richer as he continues to argue about it.