Well Zen, I was a fair flaxen haired maiden, once upon a time, in a land far far away!

So when I said "I don't" and signed the paperwork, I took my maiden name back, which for some reason ticked my X off.

But somewhere along the way my stepdad felt slighted. Had a birth name, natural father was killed in the line of duty when I was 3 days old, Mom remarried when I was 2, and I started using his name. Back then it was not common for kids to have different names than their parents. Turned 18 and had to use my "legal" name - Dad never adopted me. Anyway in a 10 year period, I had 3 different last names.

On another note - it is often common among southern ladies to drop their middle name and used their maiden/birth name as their middle name.