Crystal Hefner would like to be known as Crystal Harris now. Several weeks ago, the 39-year-old model revealed that she’s been trying to change her name on Instagram. And according to a recent report, she’s trying to make the change official. On July 17, People reported that Crystal filed to legally change her name back to her maiden name on June 13.
Crystal was married to Hugh Hefner for five years.
After tying the knot at age 26 (when Hugh was 86), she remained married to him until he died in 2017. After his death, Crystal described the marriage as “traumatic” and “restrictive,” per E! News. She told the entertainment outlet that she did love him, but the way he treated her made her doubt how he felt about her. She also described losing sight of who she really was.
“I completely changed everything about myself,” she said. “Beauty is subjective and there’s all types of beauty, but I just stuck to what Hugh Hefner saw as beautiful.”
Through changing her name back, she’s reclaiming her identity.
Crystal recently opened up about her reason for trying to change her Instagram handle. “I’ve been trying for so long to get @instagram to let me change my username back to my real name,” she wrote on Instagram on June 13. “My original name. The name I didn’t feel comfortable with for a long time, because it never felt like mine anymore.”
She explained how she became Crystal Hefner “overnight” because her name “was changed for me.” “Not thoughtfully, not ceremoniously,” she explained. “It was done swiftly, as soon as Hef’s secretary had a marriage certificate in hand. I had no clue how to change a name legally. I just … became someone else, overnight.”
When people told her that the Hefner name made her famous and that she “wasn’t enough without the name,” she started to believe them. “I came from nothing,” she continued. “I had spent a lifetime feeling small. So I clung to the story I was fed. And it worked — for a while.”
Now, though, she’s more sure of who she is, and wants to be known as Crystal Harris. She acknowledged that she was successful when she went by Crystal Hefner. “I did accomplish things with the Hefner name,” she said. “I made eight figures. I launched businesses. I found a version of confidence. But here’s the thing — none of that was ever about the name. It was about me.”
At the same time, she’s not ashamed of her past.
In changing her name, Crystal is not running from her past. At the end of her post, she wrote, “And now, I want my name back. Crystal Margaret Harris. Not because I’m ashamed of who I was — but because I finally know who I am.”
According to People, name changes in California typically require a formal court hearing, and one was not listed in Crystal’s court documents. Per Us Weekly, in the filing she wrote, “I am a widow and reclaiming my maiden name.”
She told the publication why it took her several years to do so. “There’s always been a lot of noise around why I kept the Hefner name,” she told Us Weekly. I had so many people assuming it was for attention or clout.” In reality, the reason was “far more personal and complex,” she said.
“When you go through something as intense and all-consuming as that chapter of my life, you don’t just snap your fingers and reinvent yourself,” she explained. “You have to peel back the layers, face the trauma, and slowly come back to who you really are.” And now, it finally feels like the right time for her.
