Real Life Marriage: We Are Family!

I looked at the name scrawled in black sharpie against the cooler sitting in my parents' garage and thought, "Who is that?" And then I realized, "Oh yeah, that's their last name, my OLD last name." Somewhere between getting married and year six or seven, I actually started seeing myself titled by my married name, and somehow, that made my maiden name seem foreign.

I chose to take my husband's last name when we got married. It is not something all women do, and honestly, it was a bit of a pain. My name change required not only a Social Security alteration, but also a change to my professional licensure (which might have been just as much or more of a pain). Changing was name symbolized new life, however, and that is what I saw myself beginning when I got married, so I made the outward change.

It is not that the name change suddenly made me only a part of my husband's families. I think I am still getting to know them and learning my place in them. It is just that somehow, over the course of marriage, my husband has become my family. He is my home. Thought we are very different, we belong together, and I just cannot see it any other way.

Some people see family as a mom, dad, kids, and relatives. For my husband and I, it is just the two of us, but we are family, nonetheless. We are bonded, a unit, and by God's grace, may man not turn it asunder (King James Version 1987, Matthew 19:6).

Reference:

King James Bible. (1987). Bible gateway. https://www.biblegateway.com/versions/King-James-Version-KJV-Bible/