Female Professional names

[Poirot]

For various reasons, many women use their maiden names professionally, even though married. In fact even if they are married BEFORE acquiring the professional status (doctor, lawyer, nurse, corporate position, any job) they might still use their maiden name.

I think it great, have no problem with it. (I have family members who have done so, in fact)

So.....if a person is in the very same position, job, calling, etc. is it at all confusing, normal practice to change their professional name upon marrying or divorcing?

And yes, I am thinking about Kayla, who earned her MD with the last name of Johnson out in CA, came to Salem using that name, was named Chief of Staff at Salem Hospital with the name, and even still was using it after the divorce, but now is suddenly using her maiden name.

Do people do this?

 

[oldsoapie]

Well, Poirot, they do in Salem........not sure about other places.

 

[redsquirrel]

They don't here either. They probably do in Salem because the writers probably put the wrong last name in one time. Then decided to cover their butts and keep it.

 

[JasonDíSpeech]

It's not a huge hassle, but it's fairly uncommon for someone as established as Kayla supposedly is to switch names. (And I would feel this way even if I didn't think her divorce were so monumentally stupid.) It would be more common for her to be known professionally as Dr. Johnson, but be known as Kayla Brady about other sectors of Salem. (I've known several divorced/married/remarried women who have done this.)

HOWEVER In this case, it's really just symptomatic of the crappy, lazy writing. Like "Jennifer Horton," "Nathan Horton," "Sami DiMera," "Melanie Jonas," and now "Kayla Brady." Rather than acknowledge her marriage and history, they want to remind us that she's a Brady, that's why she's around town. Cheap. :(

 

[Heather4CU]

They do this with Jennifer all the time too. Some scenes she is Jennifer Deveraux and others she is Jennifer Horton. For crying out loud, she was divorced for many years, including when Jack died. But TIIC seem to have rewritten that now and want us to believe they were married.

I think Marlena is the only character that has consistently used her maiden name professionally and then her married name socially.

Coincidentally, I do this as well. I use my married name legally but professionally and on social media, I use my maiden name.

 

[robinsnest]

I have my birth certificate last name. My children have their father's last name. My sister kept her name too. I have a cousin who hyphenated her last name so she could keep it and not be different from her children. I find it amusing that it "confuses" people, even in this day and age where my sons are grown adults.

But I worked at a school with a woman who every 5 years changed her last name; not that she married and divorced, no she just picked a name she liked and then went through the court process of legally changing her name, then all of her teaching credentials, and the name on her masters degree and so on.

She'd complain about how expensive doing this was, but really there was no need to change her name other than she had tired of being Ms. X and now thought that Ms. O sounded better. She had done well in Salem.

 

[Poirot]

If Kayla had ALWAYS gone by Dr. Brady, that would have been fine. But she was Dr. Johnson for years and years, even when she came to Salem, and then bingo, is Dr. Brady.
And I also have family with hyphenated names, so understand that.

Is Hope now going to be Hope Williams again? Detective Williams?

 

[Heather4CU]

I started following Mary Beth Evans (Kayla) on Instagram a couple nights ago. She posted a photo of herself and Patsy Pease (Kimberly) and used the hashtag #KaylaBradyJohnson. So she herself considers the character to still be Kayla Johnson LOL.