Name Change

I am a resident of Arkansas. I changed my surname to my husband's surname. We are planning for a divorce. Can I restore my maiden name after divorce?

My step son wants to change his surname to mine, his father has never supported him and has rarely contacted him, but still refuses to relinquish his rights. I have been there for him for over five years. Can my wife and I change his name to our name?

my birth name is ---------- , and their is a birth certificate . however , my mom remarried and the name ------ was given me and that is the name i have used for 60 year's . how do i go about legalizing -----------?

My son was adopted as a child by my new husband. His adoptive father is out of the picture and he has chosen to use his birth father's name on all of his legal documents (SSN and Drivers) for the past 20 years. Does he need to change his birth certificate? He lives in Indiana and was born in Illinois, where do I file the change papers, if needed?

I have a rather complicated question. I have read most of the postings on your website but no single answer completely speaks to my situation. I recently applied for a Paramedic license in California and was denied because the name on my application and my Birth Certificate did not match. In short, I need to know if it is necessary to file a Petition for Name Change thru the court system or if some other document would suffice as proof. Here's the back-story. I used to be an actor for many years and while my first name has remained the same, the last has changed many times. When I submitted my Paramedic application I also provided copies of each of the Driver's Licenses and Social Security cards that I had used with each successive name change (as proof that I have been using my CURRENT name for MANY years) but that apparently was not acceptable proof. Here's the complicated part of my question. I read on this website that in California it IS possible to acquire a 'legal name' simply by usage. If this is indeed so, is there a document that I can obtain (from the County I reside in perhaps) that could verify my current name? If not, what ARE acceptable forms of proof of name change in California? If I do end up having to file a Petition of Name Change thru the courts (to satisfy the proof requirement), is it possible to list my current last name as well as BOTH of my family last names on the Petition while still using ONLY my current name professionally? In other words, I do not wish to completely lose both of my family names but hope to avoid the confusion that might occur with listing all three last names on professional documents (like licenses). I once had a friend whose last name was so long that it generally wouldn't fit on most applications - as a result he had numerous de facto last names (depending on how many boxes were available on that particular department's application form). If he ran into this problem with one (albeit long) last name, won't I run into the same problem if I'm using THREE last names? Finally (to complicate things still further), all three of our children also share my current last name (the name I have been using for almost 12 years) - if I add three last names to my Name Change Petition, will it be necessary for me to do so for all three children as well? What are the legal ramifications if my children share only one of MY last names?Thank you for taking the time to answer this for me. I know that there is probably no 'simple' answer since I am balancing different/competing requirements but hope to be able to find the most direct solution to my problem.