Change my name, change my name

So today I downloaded the forms necessary to bring with me to court in order to have my name changed, officially, by the state supreme court. Eight years ago when I married my husband, whose last name has 9 letters in it, I hyphenated my own 5-letter last name to his. I didn't want to be so radical as to not take my husband's name at all, but I also didn't want to 'give up' my maiden name--so I compromised and did the hyphen thing. Plus, I was attached to the symmetry of my name--first name has five letters, last name has five letters, both end in 'in'--it was a symmetrical name, and that explains my desire to hold onto it.

Well, it turns out that a 14-character last name (15 with the hyphen) is more of a burden than it's worth. I'm always having to spell it, it doesn't fit on my driver's license, and I can never remember whether I'm listed as the hyphen or just my husband's last name. The driver's license thing really drove the point home--by keeping my maiden name as a hyphen, I lost my entire first name, which is represented on my license by only the first letter. But after 8 years of this kind of torture, it was recent events that moved me to make the change.

People must change their names for all kinds of reasons, but primarily to escape child support, liens, jail time, abusers, and the like. I say this because the program I used asked me if I was changing my name because my life was in danger, if I was responsible for paying child support, and if I had been convicted of a crime. In addition to paying the court $210 to grant my name change, I will have to take out a public announcement in the newspaper announcing my name change to the world.

I've had it with the hyphen, it must go, and go it shall before this baby is born. I don't want to be alphabetized away from my husband and baby--we need to be under the same umbrella, the same name, a family in name as well as in fact. My maiden name will supplant my middle name, which I never cared for anyway, and I can finally start using the 9-letter name that I gladly took from my husband years ago. It's a strong Irish name, and I have absolutely no problem with it.